CD or DVD drive not recognized by Windows after you install an Adobe application

Windows 2000, XP or Vista doesn't recognize your CD or DVD drive after you install one or more of the following Adobe applications: Audition Encore Photoshop Album Photoshop Elements Premiere Elements Premiere Pro Production Premium Production Studio Soundbooth Other CD and DVD burning applications, such as Roxio Easy CD Creator, are installed on the computer. Other CD and DVD bur... Read More

Making a better slideshow in Lightroom, part 2: Timing, music, titles, and transitions

Making a better slideshow in Lightroom, part 2: Timing, music, titles, and transitions
In this second part of a two-part series on making great slideshows, learn some more tricks for taking your slideshows to the next level.

Color management workflow in After Effects

Color management workflow in After Effects
Learn how to manage color in high-definition video, cinema, and web video projects using After Effects CS3 and Photoshop CS3.

Photoshop CS4 Review - Deke McClelland Reviews Adobe Photoshop CS4 On dekePod

For visually creative folks of all stripes, the wait is over! Digital shooters are buzzing with the announcement of Adobe's Creative Suite 4. And day and date with Adobe's news, electronic publishing pioneer Deke McClelland is providing a third-party, impartial, and highly opinionated five-minute review of the new software. His latest dekePod episode, Photoshop CS4: Buy or Die, shows you all facets of the program — complete with commentary — without interrupting your busy day. (posted by Jennifer Apple for www.PhotoshopSupport.com)

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Adjust hue and saturation in Photoshop Lightroom

Adjust hue and saturation in Photoshop Lightroom
This short video tutorial sheds light on a great new feature in Photoshop Lightroom. Learn how you can use the Auto Adjust slider to easily fix the hue and saturation of colors in your images without affecting the colors that don’t need adjustment.

Halo 3 Logo

Halo 3 Logo
Learn how to create the new Halo 3 Logo! 1. Start by opening a 500px by 150px file. 2. Write “HALO 3“(yes, in uppercase) using the Halo Font in any color. 3. Apply these layer styles: - Drop Shadow - Inner Shadow - Inner Glow - Bevel & Emboss - Gradient Overlay 4. You should have something like this: 5. Now, we’re going to create [...]

Learn how to create the new Halo 3 Logo!

1. Start by opening a 500px by 150px file.
2. Write “HALO 3“(yes, in uppercase) using the Halo Font in any color.

3. Apply these layer styles:
- Drop Shadow

- Inner Shadow

- Inner Glow

- Bevel & Emboss

- Gradient Overlay

4. You should have something like this:

5. Now, we’re going to create the rust effect. Create a new layer and paint the top part of your text using the Spatter 59px default brush and #406482 as color

6. Press Ctrl and click over the small halo text layer’s thumb to select it, then go to Select -> Inverse and delete your selection

7. Ctrl+D to deselect and change that layer’s blend mode to Color Burn and opacity to 45%

8. Make again the last 3 steps but brushing the bottom part of the text and keeping Normal as the layer’s blend mode

9. Add your text to an image or a coloured background to make it look better and you’re finished

Photoshop CS3 10.0.1 update printing notes

Photoshop CS3 10.0.1 update printing notes
With Adobe Photoshop CS3, Adobe made a significant effort to improve the printing experience for our users. A number of issues have come to our attention since Photoshop CS3 shipped, and the 10.0.1 update addresses several of those�issues. The attached PDF document�contains information and instructions specific to the printing issues fixed in the 10.0.1 update. The�PDF document�contains installation instructions for...

Free Photoshop Brushes And Textures - Random Roundup

Free Photoshop Brushes And Textures - Random Roundup
I've been finding some very nice free Photoshop brushes lately and wanted to share them with you. First there's some gorgeous high resolution brushes from the always generous BittBox. Secondly, a new offering from Smashing Magazine, and thirdly I found some free textures and brushes from a new site I discovered, Room 122, from design artist Nathan Brown. So here are the summaries and the links: (posted by Jennifer Apple for www.PhotoshopSupport.com)

Export and Automation Tools options are grayed out (Photoshop Elements 4.0-6.0)

... Read More

Clarity and other silders are missing from Camera Raw plug-in

Clarity and other silders are missing from Camera Raw plug-in
Features such as Clarity, and other sliders, are missing from the Camera Raw plug-in....

Photoshop or Photoshop Elements crashes or opens the first file slowly after launch

Photoshop or Photoshop Elements crashes or opens the first file slowly after launch
When you open a file or create a new document after you start Adobe Photoshop or Adobe Photoshop Elements, one of the following occurs: The application crashes with an error message. On Windows, the error may cite prntvpt.dll. The application takes several minutes to open the first file, but it opens subsequent files more quickly. When you create or open a file after you start Photoshop or Photoshop Elements, the...

Troubleshoot installation problems in Adobe Photoshop CS3 on Windows XP

What's covered Beginning troubleshooting Intermediate troubleshooting Advanced troubleshooting This document can help you to resolve system errors that occur while you install Adobe Photoshop CS3 on Windows XP. System errors can manifest in many different ways, including (but not limited to) the following: A blank or flickering di... Read More

Troubleshoot system errors or freezes (Photoshop Album on Windows XP)

What's covered Beginning troubleshooting Intermediate troubleshooting Advanced troubleshooting This document can help you resolve system errors that occur when you use Adobe Photoshop Album in Windows XP. System errors can manifest themselves in many different ways, including (but not limited to) the following: -- A blank or flickering dialog box -- A frozen cursor or screen --... Read More

Nest a Photoshop sequence in your Adobe Premiere Pro project

Discover the time-saving advantages of nesting Photoshop sequences in your video project. Read More

Basics - 15 Web module

Basics - 15 Web module
Learn to use the Web module to publish your photos to a customized web gallery. Matt Kloskowski shows you how publishing to the web is a simple task that doesn't require any coding.

Wacom Pen Input Livens Adobe Creative Suite 4

Wacom today announced support for Adobe Creative Suite 4, officially launched yesterday, providing significant workflow advantages and numerous ways for users working with a Wacom pen tablet or interactive pen display to naturally express their creative ideas and enhance productivity. (posted by Jennifer Apple for www.PhotoshopSupport.com)

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Can't find or start the installer after you download Photoshop Elements 6 or Premiere Elements 4 (Windows Vista)

Can't find or start the installer after you download Photoshop Elements 6 or Premiere Elements 4 (Windows Vista)
After you download Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 or Adobe Premiere Elements 4 on Windows Vista, the installer does not start and you can't find the downloaded file in the folder to which you downloaded it. The Launch button in the Akamai Download Manager window does not do anything. You started the download from Microsoft Internet Explorer 7, and Protected Mode is enabled in the Security settings. You started the download from Microso...

Edit your Encore DVD menus easily by opening them in Photoshop

See how tightly integrated Photoshop and Encore DVD are, and learn how easily you can edit menus in your DVD project by opening them in Photoshop. Read More

Easy Favicons - No Plugins required!

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Letting an image edit itself

Letting an image edit itself
Bruce Fraser and David Blatner share their secrets for simplifying tonal adjustments in Photoshop.

Basics - 04 Filter and find images

Learn how to find your photos quickly using the updated Filter Bar in the Library module in Lightroom 2.0. Discover how to find images based on different criteria, such as Attribute or Metadata. Read More

Free Fonts Of The Month: Myndraine, Museo Sans

Every now and again we take a look around, select “fresh” high-quality free fonts and present them to you in a brief overview. The choice is enormous, so the time you need to find them is usually the time you should be investing in your current projects. We search for them and we find them, so you don’t have to.

This month we are glad to present 5 free high-quality fonts and collections of grunge and handwritten fonts. Please read the license agreements carefully — they can change from time to time.

• Last episode features Fertigo Pro and FF Nuvo,
• You can find over 80 more free fonts in our section Fonts.

Every now and again we take a look around, select “fresh” high-quality free fonts and present them to you in a brief overview. The choice is enormous, so the time you need to find them is usually the time you should be investing in your current projects. We search for them and we find them, so you don’t have to.

This month we are glad to present 5 free high-quality fonts and collections of grunge and handwritten fonts. Please read the license agreements carefully — they can change from time to time.

• Last episode features Fertigo Pro and FF Nuvo,
• You can find over 80 more free fonts in our section Fonts.

Free Fonts Of The Month

Myndraine
An unfinished, yet very impressive sans serif font, designed by Christopher Miller. The font includes 182 characters. [via]

Museo Sans
Jos Buivenga released Museo Sans, a sans-version of his previously released freefont Museo. Museo Sans is a sturdy, low contrast, geometric, highly legible sans serif typeface very well suited for any display and text use. The OpenType font family offers supports CE languages and even esperanto. Besides ligatures, fractions and proportional/tabular lining and oldstyle figures MUSEO also has a ‘case’ feature for case-sensitive forms.

Museo Sans font family comes in 10 fonts: 5 weights (100 300 500 700 900) with each an italic. 2 fonts are absolutely free (500/500 italic). A registration is required to download the files.

30 Free Grunge Fonts
An impressive collection of grungy fonts, published by Danny Outlaw. Among listed fonts are Grunge Serifa and BB Petie Boy presented below. More grunge free fonts.

10 Handwritten Fonts You Can’t Miss
A collection of free handwritten fonts, published by Antonio Lupetti. More handwritten free fonts.

The Fell Types
A set of free modern revival fonts, with ligatures, swash characters, and ornaments, digitalized by Igino Marini. “The Fell Types took their name from John Fell, a Bishop of Oxford in the seventeenth-century. Not only he created an unique collection of printing types but he started one of the most important adventures in the history of typography.

You will find here a non-exhaustive history and a modern digitalization of some of them. If you want to use it in publications on any kind of media you have to put in the following quote as a note: «The Fell Types are digitally reproduced by Igino Marini. www.iginomarini.com» and let the designer know where you used it. [via]

Folks
A TrueType-font, designed by Manfred Klein and available in 4 weights - light, regular, bold and heavy. [via]

Image: DerSven.de

Mailart graphics
This picture font is made up of symbols, images and stamps from the mailart network and Keith Bates’s scrapbook. This font is free for personal use; commercial copyright is retained by artists named in the ReadMe documentation. PC Truetype, Mac TT+PS.

Reminder

FF Nuvo OT Medium
This font is still available for free download. Designed by Siegfried Rückel, it’s a contemporary type design with vertical contrast, and especially the characters a, g and y show the calligraphic touch. Suitable for magazine design from headlines to longer texts as well as for advertising, packaging and corporate design. A free download for a limited time. OpenType.

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Basics - 11 Working with Photoshop

Matt Kloskowski shows you how to move from your images from Lightroom to Photoshop for fine-tuning. You'll also learn how to set preferences for editing in Photoshop. Read More

Glossy web 2.0 button

Glossy web 2.0 button
Learn how to make a nice Web 2.0 style Glossy Button using Layer Styles, also how to make a rollover.

Learn how to make a nice Web 2.0 style Glossy Button using Layer Styles, also how to make a rollover.

(more…)

CD or DVD drive not recognized by Windows after you install an Adobe application

Windows 2000, XP or Vista doesn't recognize your CD or DVD drive after you install one or more of the following Adobe applications: Audition Encore Photoshop Album Photoshop Elements Premiere Elements Premiere Pro Production Premium Production Studio Soundbooth Other CD and DVD burning applications, such as Roxio Easy CD Creator, are installed on the computer. Other CD and DVD bur... Read More

Remove Photoshop CS3 public beta

If you participated in the Adobe Photoshop CS3 public beta program, you must clean your system before installing the final shipping version of Adobe Creative Suite 3 applications.After removing the Photoshop CS3 public beta, you can install the shipping version of Creative Suite 3 applicat... Read More

Error "Licensing for this product has stopped working" when you start any Adobe Creative Suite 3 application

When you start any Adobe Creative Suite 3 application, you see the error message, "Licensing for this product has stopped working. You cannot use this product at this time. You must repair the problem by uninstallin... Read More

7 Open Source Version Control Systems Reviewed

7 Open Source Version Control Systems Reviewed

If you’ve ever collaborated with other people on a project, you know the frustration of constantly swapping files. Some do it by email, some through file upload services and some by other methods. It’s a pain in the neck, and every designer and developer knows it. Revision control is an excellent way to combat the problem of sharing files between workers.

Most web-developers have probably worked with some sort of revision control system, but designers may find it a foreign concept. The most obvious benefit of using revision control is the ability to have an unlimited number of people working on the same code base, without having to constantly send files back and forth.

But designers and developers can both benefit from using revision control systems to keep copies of their files and designs. You can instantly browse previous “commits” to your repository and revert to earlier versions if something happens.

This article reviews some of the top open-source version control systems and tools that setting up a version control system easy.

If you’ve ever collaborated with other people on a project, you know the frustration of constantly swapping files. Some do it by email, some through file upload services and some by other methods. It’s a pain in the neck, and every designer and developer knows it. Revision control is an excellent way to combat the problem of sharing files between workers.

Most web-developers have probably worked with some sort of revision control system, but designers may find it a foreign concept. The most obvious benefit of using revision control is the ability to have an unlimited number of people working on the same code base, without having to constantly send files back and forth.

But designers and developers can both benefit from using revision control systems to keep copies of their files and designs. You can instantly browse previous “commits” to your repository and revert to earlier versions if something happens.

This article reviews some of the top open-source version control systems and tools that make setting up a version control system easy.

CVS

CVS is the grandfather of revision control systems. It was first released in 1986, and Google Code still hosts the original Usenet post announcing CVS. CVS is the de facto standard and is installed virtually everywhere. However, the code base isn’t as fully featured as SVN or other solutions.

The learning curve isn’t too steep for CVS, and it’s a very simple system for making sure files and revisions are kept up to date. While CVS may be an older technology, it’s still quite useful for any designer or developer for backing up and sharing files.

Tortoise CVS is a great client for CVS on Windows, and there are many different IDEs, such as Xcode (Mac), Eclipse, NetBeans and Emacs, that use CVS.

CVS Resources

• Introduction to CVS
• CVS Best Practices
• SVN and CVS Quick Comparison
• Version Control with CVS on Mac OS X

SVN

Subversion is probably the version control system with the widest adoption. Most open-source projects use Subversion as a repository because other larger projects, such as SourceForge, Apache, Python, Ruby and many others, use it as well. Google Code uses Subversion exclusively to distribute code.

Because of Subversion’s popularity, many different Subversion clients are available. If you’re a Windows user, Tortoise SVN is a great file browser for viewing, editing and modifying your Subversion code base. If you’re on a Mac, Versions is an elegant client that provides a “pleasant way to work with Subversion.” Xcode is Apple’s developer environment and Subversion client that ships with Leopard on a Mac.

SVN Resources

• Subversion home page
• Getting Started with Subversion - Mac
• Getting Started with Subversion - Windows
• Subversion for Designers
• Beanstalk - A hosted Subversion system
• Comparison of Subversion Clients
• Subversion for Java

Git

Git is the new fast-rising star of version control systems. Initially developed by Linux kernel creator Linus Torvalds, Git has recently taken the Web development community by storm. Git offers a much different type of version control in that it’s a distributed version control system. With a distributed version control system, there isn’t one centralized code base to pull the code from. Different branches hold different parts of the code. Other version control systems, such as SVN and CVS, use centralized version control, meaning that only one master copy of the software is used.

Git prides itself on being a fast and efficient system, and many major open-source projects use Git to power their repositories; projects like:

• Linux Kernel,
• WINE,
• Fedora,
• and many others.

GitHub has recently helped establish Git as a great version control system, providing a beautiful front end for many large projects, such as Rails and Prototype. However, Git isn’t as easy to pick up as CVS or SVN, so it’s much harder to use for a beginner.

Git Resources

• Git on Wikipedia
• Git SVN Comparison
• git-gui - a multi-platform user interface for Git

Mercurial

Mercurial is another open-source distributed version control system, like Git. Mercurial was designed for larger projects, most likely outside the scope of designers and independent Web developers. That doesn’t mean that small development teams can’t or shouldn’t use it. Mercurial is extremely fast, and the creators built the software with performance as the most important feature. The name “mercurial” is an adjective that means “Relating to or having characteristics (eloquence, swiftness, cleverness) attributed to the god Mercury.”

Aside from being very fast and scalable, Mercurial is a much simpler system than Git, which is why it appeals to some developers. There aren’t as many functions to learn, and the functions are similar to those in other CVS systems. It also comes equipped with a stand-alone Web interface and extensive documentation on understanding Mercurial if you have been using another system.

Resources for Mercurial

• Mercurial tutorial - An in-depth tutorial on installing and working with Mercurial.
• List of GUI tools for Mercurial - Tools to use with any platform for working with Mercurial.
• Understanding Mercurial - A nice document explaining what Mercurial does and doesn’t do.
• Use Mercurial, you Git!- A pro-Mercurial article highlighting reasons why Mercurial is better than Git.

Bazaar

Bazaar is yet another distributed version control system, like Mercurial and Git, that offers a very friendly user experience. It calls itself “Version control for human beings.” It supports many different types of workflows, from solo to centralized to decentralized, with many variations in between.

One of the main features of Bazaar is the fine-grained control you’ll have over the setup. As shown with the workflows, you can use it to fit almost any scenario of users and setups. This is a great revision control system for nearly any project because it’s so easy to modify. It’s also embeddable, so you can add it to existing projects.

Bazaar also has a strong community that maintains things like plug-ins and lots of third-party tools, such as GUI software to add a graphical interface to the system.

Bazaar resources:

• Bazaar documentation - Tons of resources for learning everything about Bazaar.
• Bazaar in 5 minutes - How to set up Bazaar quickly.
• Bazaar migration guides - Guides on migrating to Bazaar from CVS, Subversion, Darcs, Mercurial and other systems.
• Bazaar vs. Git - Showcases the differences between the two decentralized systems.

LibreSource

LibreSource is a Web portal used to manage collaborative projects. It’s based on Java/J2EE and is more a set of visual collaborative tools to help facilitate projects and teams. While the other systems discussed so far have been designed more on a “command line” level, LibreSource is centered more on tools that don’t have a big learning curve.

It has built-in features such as Wiki pages, forums, trackers, Synchronizers, Subversion repositories, files, download areas, drop boxes, forms, instant messaging and more. Think of LibreSource as a collaboration hub for project development.

LibreSource is perfect for the developer or designer who doesn’t want to learn lots of technical jargon and wants to focus more on communication with the project’s members. Just install the package and start collaborating, without facing much of a learning curve.

Resources for LibreSource

• LibreSource Documentation - Tons of articles and tutorials for getting familiar with LibreSource.
• LibreSource vs. Subversion - A table showing the differences between LibreSource and Subversion.

Monotone

Monotone is the baby of the distributed revision control bunch. While many of Monotone’s peers focus on performance, Monotone places higher value on integrity than performance. In fact, it can take quite a bit of time for a new user of Monotone to simply download the initial repository due to the extensive validation and authentication required.

Monotone is fairly easy to learn if you’re familiar with CVS systems, and it can import previous CVS projects. However, it’s not quite as popular as other version control systems.

Monotone Resources

• Monotone Wiki - Monotone has extensive documentation.
• Monotone front ends and Tools - Lengthy list of front ends for working with Monotone, as well as other development tools.

Version Control Tools

• QCT GUI commit tool
  A version control commit tool that supports Mercurial, Bazaar, Cogito (Git), Subversion, Monotone, and CVS.
• Meld is a merge and diff tool that allows you to compare two or three files and edit them in place, while updating automatically. It works with CVS, Subversion, Bazaar and Mercurial.
• Push Me Pull You is another GUI for distributed version control systems. It works with Mercurial, Git, Bazaar and Darcs.

Version Control Resources

• Distributed Revision Control Systems: Git vs. Mercurial vs. SVN
  A quick look at the major differences between the three types of revision control systems.
• Revision Control Systems
  The Wikipedia article on revision control.
• Choosing a Distributed Version Control System
  Article showing the pros and cons of each version control system. (al)