If you don't already know, photoshop is a huge part of digital photography. I think it's part of why a lot of film photographers held out for so long and didn't (or still won't) switch to digital. If you master photoshop then you can take good photos and make them amazing. Sometimes you can even take bad photos and make them good.
I'm sorry to say that most of my photos don't come out of the camera looking like the ones on my site. It just isn't possible. Of course you need to start with a good photo to end up with something amazing. The tricky, time-consuming part is going from good to amazing with a little photoshop magic.
Of course it makes us regular folks feel better to find out that celebrities aren't really as beautiful as we're led to believe so check out the
iwanex site. Click on the portfolio link at the top for some cool, mouse-over examples of photoshop magic applied to celebrity photos. Of course these people had already been worked over by hair and makeup professionals and photographed by some of the highest paid pro photographers. It just shows that everyone (I admit that Halle Berry is just about perfect even without photoshop) can benefit from a little photoshop help. I'm not quite as heavy-handed with it, but I apply the same sorts of touch-ups to my portraits.