A Useful Clarification of the Term “Image Resolution” in Digital Images

In so many of my classes, particularly Photoshop, Digital Photography and the Video applications, we discuss image resolution – or DPI – dots per inch (or PPI – pixels per inch). For the most part, my students seem to grasp the concepts from when I teach in (as I describe it) “Stephanese“. But here’s another discussion on the subject – this time in “CreativeBloqese“.

Check out this article from CreativeBloq.com for further clarification on the subject of pixel resolution (height/width/depth) of an image for print and for screen viewing:
http://www.creativebloq.com/graphic-design/what-is-dpi-image-resolution-71515673/2

On1 Sweepstakes is Starting!

Click the banner 300x250gif and enter each week to win:
On1 Photo RAW and a Wacom Cintiq 13HD Interactive Pen and Touch
12.9 inch Silver 128 GB Apple iPad Pro
$1000 B&H Photo Gift Card
Sony Alpha a6300 Mirrorless Digital Camera with a 16-50mm lens
$1000 Amazon Gift Card
DJO PHantom 4 Qudacopter with 4K/12MP Camera

And, in the meantime, click ON1 Effects 10 FREE to download a free version of the On1 set of Photoshop plugins

A Great Photoshop Plugin has a Great Sweepstakes Coming

As an avid Photoshop user, as well as teacher, I’ve become enamored of a few of the best plugins available for various purposes. One of my main Go-To plugin suites is the On1 set. I’m planning on doing quite a few tutorials on this set, and will be speaking a lot about it in the coming months.

They’re about to release a brilliant new RAW processing app, which will complement their suite. It can be used as a replacement or adjunct to your normal Photoshop or Lightroom workflow, and it promises to be terrific.

To encourage people to check out their software, On1 is going to be launching a new SWEEPSTAKES this Sunday, September 18th. They’ll be giving away all sorts of things – iPads, cameras, drones, software… and I encourage you to enter the sweepstakes! To do so, please click the banner on this post.

In the meantime, I also suggest checking out their ON1 Effects 10 FREE plugin for Photoshop

You know how I like FREE!!!

Click this banner to enter the On1 Sweepstakes this Sunday!
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For the love of Typography

As most of my design and graphics students know, I’m a bit of a type geek. In almost every class, even if it’s not in our regular syllabus, I try to include at least a brief introduction to Type as Design – or, Typography. 

And, you probably also know how I stress the idea of kerning – the way individual letterforms fit together, as a method of refining your work, adding a cohesive look and confirming that you’ve taken some time and put in some effort at making your type look good, as well as read well.

Today, I found an excellent infographic at Digital Synopsis.com, that may help you to make better decisions about how to improve your Headers, your Titles, and all display type. Take a look!

Really Interesting and Informative Typography Article

As almost all of my students know, I’m a bit of a type geek. So, imagine how fulfilled my inner geek feels, when I find blog post about Typefaces, Type Structure, Type families, Type anatomy, and Type Classification, the use of Type in Paragraphs, Typographic Terms like kerning and spacing, Page Layout and Type, and so much more!

Although this article is written with a focus on software development, the article is about DESIGN. Knowing what you’re using, and why. As I always say “in design, you can always break the rules, but first you have to know what the rules are!”

I seriously recommend this article to all my design students, my motion graphics students, my still image students, and anyone else who feels that Type is more than just a way to make a word show up.

http://www.imaginarycloud.com/blog/a-typography-workshop/?ref=webdesignernews.com

Adobe is discontinuing it’s Edge Tools

According to an Adobe Blog, Adobe is about to cease support and updates for it’s Edge tools, including Edge Reflow, Edge Inspect, and Edge Animate. Some of their functionality will be implemented within Adobe Dreamweaver and Adobe Muse – and will also be covered in Adobe’s upcoming Flash Pro replacement, Adobe Animate – which is due out in January.

Creative Cloud members cans till download and use the Edge products, , and security updates will still be implemented

Please see their original blog post at: http://blogs.adobe.com/creativecloud/update-about-edge-tools-and-services/

Adobe is Severely Limiting it’s Font Installations

In a recent article on InDesign Secrets, I can finally find the reason why so many of my InDesign classes have been having font errors when using files from the Adobe courseware. It seems that InDesign – and all of the Adobe programs, for that matter, are no longer installing the fonts that used to come with the programs! I’ve been using Adobe programs for too many  years than I want to count, so of course, I have the fonts installed, but so many of my students are downloading demo software for their classes, and work in an environment with security limitations, so they can’t easily access Adobe’s Typekit (part of the Creative Cloud suite).

In my opinion, this is a terrible move on Adobe’s part, and I can’t quite figure out why they’re choosing to do it. Over the years, I’ve seen Adobe seemingly losing touch with their users in quite a few ways, but in software that’s ABOUT design, I can’t imagine what they’re thinking.

To view the post on InDesignSecrets.com, please visit http://indesignsecrets.com/adobe-drops-fonts-leaves-users-stranded.php

There’s an earlier article about the issue here: http://indesignsecrets.com/happened-fonts-indesign.php   (which includes a work-around)

And, for a list of the fonts originally installed, and mostly still necessary, please see Adobe’s article here: http://www.adobe.com/products/type/creative-suite-6-installed-fonts.html

As for me, I’ve backed up ALL of my installed fonts into a directory I use for my font management program. I suggest you do the same. If you’d like instructions for doing so, please comment on this post.

 

MANY new Adobe Updates coming SOON!

Up until today, I was under NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement) to not reveal what’s coming up to MANY of my student’s favorite Adobe Apps – but today, with the announcement at NAB, all may be revealed. In fact, Adobe themselves revealed what’s to come to Adobe Premiere Pro (oh, my goodness, what they’re doing!), After Effects, InDesign, Illustrator, Flash, Muse, Dreamweaver, Photoshop, and Audition!

You can check out the upcoming changes to the Video Editing apps here:
http://blogs.adobe.com/creativecloud/coming-next-to-adobe-pro-video-tools/

I’m sure there’re going to be many more blog posts at Adobe, to tell us the rest…

Adobe Extends Discount Offers

Here’s an email I received from Adobe tonight:

We are excited to let you know about the following offers — some of the best deals around!

PS-SPECIAL-EXTENDDeadline Extended to Dec. 8 to get Photoshop + Lightroom for $9.99/mo

Due to the fantastic response, the offer for the the Photoshop Photography Program , available to anyone for $9.99/month, has been extended until December 8th. This is available worldwide, wherever the bundle is available on Adobe.com.

The offer includes access to Photoshop CC and Lightroom 5, 20GB of cloud storage and a Behance ProSite.

CC-SPECIAL-EXTENDExtended Upgrade Plan to Creative Cloud for $29.99/mo Until May

We are also extending our Creative Cloud membership $29.99 promotion into 2014. With this extension, anyone owning CS3+ who has not yet made the move to Creative Cloud, will continue to be able to join Creative Cloud at the rate of $29.99/month for their first year of membership.

Here’s the link to all their current Creative Cloud Discounts:
http://www.adobe.com/products/discount-software-coupons.html?promoid=KHQFR