The student learned several important skills when progressing from their preliminary task to the full product. These include improving cover design aesthetics and detail, learning to use specific tools in Photoshop like scaling, rotating, and image effects to customize their work, and utilizing InDesign's features like the drop cap tool to lay out text professionally in the double page spread. Overall, the tools in Photoshop and InDesign helped the student produce a higher quality final product that better represented their house style.