Illustrator

Your push back is duly acknowledged. My video series Illustrator CS4 One-on-One: Fundamentals is done, and it features the Queen of Murder rendered as both a skateboard and a surfboard. For the extreme sportz setz, don't you know?

And now for the full story . . . Read more » 

A few weeks ago, when I was up to my ears in a certain Photoshop CS4 Channels and Masks One-on-One book (that will otherwise remain nameless), I was thinking, "Gosh, I wonder what kind of documentation Adobe provides these days?" I happened to have a copy of the Design Premium SKU of Creative Suite 4 sitting on my comically cluttered desk, so I opened the box and poured through its contents. There was very little there. The DVD box and some legal stuff. But nothing resembling a manual. In fact, the only thing that passed for printed documentation was a trifold that read "Learn CS4." So I opened it up and saw this:

A bare-bones sketch of how you can search Adobe's online resources for assistance. But then I looked closer, and right there -- smack dab in the center, on one of the folds -- I noticed this:

I mention this not to draw attention to myself . . . oh, to hell with that. Yes, I'm psyched that the one guy, out of about 50+ presenters who got a picture in the one-and-only, passes-for-printed-documentation trifold is me. I am and will forevermore remain flabbergasted.

But my larger point is that there's a world of altogether-free, check-it-out-today, online video training that I'm guessing most of you don't know about. And because it's the holiday season, when traditional people traditionally exchange gifts, I thought I'd traditionally do just that. Read more » 

My goodness. CS4 appears to have shipped. Here in the dekeCave--where we keep the dekeCopter and the darkly tinted dekeMobile--we have long heard rumblings that October 15 would be the day. But we also heard that October 23 might be the day. And possibly a push-back to November. With a launch event on the fiery noxious planet Venus.

(Don't you think, if CS4 ever recorded an album, this should be the art?)

Thankfully, Adobe has chosen to scale back its extraterrestrial ambitions and launch CS4 here on Earth. And as usual, I have your back. And when I say, "as usual," I mean, for the first time ever. Of course, I always have your back. But this is the first time I have so much of your back from day one.

(Yes, that explains why you've been reduced to just your front. B/c I have your back. It says "hi," by the way.)

Colleen's post tells you what's up with the new books, all three of them, including the revamped and expanded Adobe Photoshop CS4 One-on-One. Read more » 

Color me not psychic, or even on the right press release list. Just this evening I was ignorantly predicting to Deke that Adobe would announce CS4 was shipping next week during PhotoPlus Expo in New York. Then I arrive home to see this on the Adobe site. In truth, I got the heads up from a tweet by my colleague, Derrick Story (who I just saw a few hours ago at O'Reilly, so the news must be very fresh). Derrick is apparently on the right press release list (or possibly not not-psychic), as are our friends over at Photoshop News who have posted said missive here.

If software is anything like books, it will be a day or so before Amazon has "in stock" status. And speaking of books, Deke's Adobe Photoshop CS4 One-on-One book is at the printer as we speak, due in stock shortly, followed very soon after by Adobe Design One-on-One and (if the planets align) Photoshop CS4 Channels & Masks One-on-One. Yes, Deke and his elves have been working very hard. It's why we all look so sleepy and vitamin deficient, as if we've been living off caffiene and giant gift tins of popcorn. But of course, we're armed with Photoshop CS4 skills to fix that in post. Read more » 

I'm am slowly in pursuit of aggregating what videos I can from the various online sources, all in the name of getting you educated.

The players in this video: Me, of course. That voice, right at the beginning of the move, that's Melanie. The guy soon after is Garrick. He and his buddy Larry (of The Jellybricks) did the music to "101 Tips."

I've spent a lot of time with these two. So has the fourth voice you'll hear, Mordy Golding, a frequent contributor to this site.

En masse, the Fantastic 4 of us show you the best features in Photoshop and Illustrator. (Well, two -- content-aware scaling and multiple artboards -- but still, absolutely best features.) Enjoy! Read more »