Layers Magazine 2009-07-08

Create Hollywood-style type effects

DISPLAY UNTIL SEPTEMBER 15, 2009

TWEET THINKING FONT MONSTER Build brand recognition in a social media world

FLASH FIND

What is it, how do you create Add Google Maps to your one, and where do you use it? Flash applications

www.storemags.com & www.fantamag.com


[CONTENTS]

] J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 0 9 ] VOL. 5, NO. 4 ] WWW.LAYERSMAGAZINE.COM

[ T U T O R I A L S ] 44 ] Digital Photography: There and Back Again: A Photograph’s Tale —Seán Duggan

50 ] Adobe Photoshop CS4 : A Picture’s Worth a Thousand Words —Dave Cross

59 ] Adobe Illustrator CS4: Create a Vector Font Monster—Jacob Cass

66 ] Adobe InDesign CS4: Improved Format—Terry White

72 ] Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro: The Proof Is in the Pages—Taz Tally

76 ] Adobe Dreamweaver CS4: Add Style to Your Lists—Janine Warner

82 ] Adobe Flash CS4 Professional: Mapping in Flash—Lee Brimelow

86 ] Adobe After Effects CS4: The Power of Words—Steve Holmes

CHRISTY WINTER

32 [ C O V E R

S T O R Y ]

www.layersmagazine.com

32 ] Silver Screen Styles

Hollywood can be a great source of inspiration to the graphic designer and illustrator. It’s everywhere you look: on the big screen, in movie posters, on official movie websites, and the list goes on and on. All you have to do is keep your eyes open and then have lots of fun playing around in Photoshop trying to re-create some of your favorite effects—and before you know it, you’ll have a plethora of new techniques in your design arsenal.—Corey Barker

[ F E A T U R E ] 38 ] To Tweet or Not to Tweet

If you’re a professional designer or photographer and you’ve refused to jump into the social media scene, it’s time to reconsider. Twitter can be a great tool for growing your business, and we’ll not only show you how to get started but we’ll also show you how to build and maintain a professional, follow-worthy network.—Nancy Massé

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Page 38

05 L AY E R S M A G A Z I N E ] [ j u ly / a u g u s t 2 0 0 9

[ D E P A RT M E N T S ] 8 ] Letter from the Editor 12 ] Layers News 16 ] Designer Spotlight 26 ] Instant Inspiration 30 ] The Digital Canvas 98 ] Tips & Tricks 100 ] Creative Suite Q&A 118 ] Design Contest

Page 30

[ C O L U M N S ] 18 ]

[ O N

Design Makeover: Play It Again—Jake Widman

22 ]

Artistic Expressions: Creating a 3D Coin—Bert Monroy

64 ]

The Art of Type: Off the Beaten Path—James Felici

T H E

C O V E R ] Shortly after Jonas Bergsrtand graduated from Forsberg’s School of Design, he was picked up by CIA (Central Illustration Agency) in London. Since then he has worked for well-known clients such as Chrysler, Hasbro, and MTV. Look for Jonas’s incredible illustrations throughout this issue of Layers. [Jonas Bergstrand]

[ R E V I E W S ] 90 ] CINEMA 4D R11 Studio Bundle—Jason Scrivner 91 ] Epson Discproducer PP-100—Rod Harlan 91 ] ProScale ID—Jay Nelson 92 ] Episode Pro—Erik Kuna 92 ] Eos Wireless iPod Speakers—Chris Main 93 ] GroBoto 2.1.8—Bruce Bicknell 94 ] Toon Boom Animate—Marcus Geduld 96 ] NIKKOR AF-S DX 18–105mm f/3.5–5.6G ED VR—Laurie Excell 96 ] Digital Juice Fonts—Rod Harlan 97 ] Toast 10 Titanium Pro—Daniel M. East 97 ] Portraiture 2—Daniel M. East Whenever you see this symbol at the end of an article, it means there’s either additional material or a download for that story at www.layersmagazine.com. So be sure to visit the website and check it out.


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[ON THE WEB]

] J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 0 9 ] VOL. 5, NO. 4 ] WWW.LAYERSMAGAZINE.COM

[TUTORIALS] We’re always adding new tutorials to the Layers website, so be sure to visit often. And don’t forget to sign up for our graphics tip of the day and to read RC’s daily blog, Living in Layers. Here’s a small sampling of some of the tutorials that you can find at the site now:

[PHOTOSHOP] www.layersmagazine.com/category/photoshop Masking Liquids in Photoshop (Video): If you’re intimidated by the task of masking or selecting liquids in Photoshop, then this tutorial is for you.—Corey Barker

[ILLUSTRATOR] www.layersmagazine.com/category/illustrator Smart Objects from Illustrator to Photoshop to Dreamweaver (Video): This tutorial will show you how to take your smart objects from Illustrator to Photoshop, then from Photoshop to Dreamweaver. But you probably guessed that from the title, didn’t you?—Geoff Blake

[INDESIGN] www.layersmagazine.com/category/indesign Custom Underlines in InDesign (Video): Learn how to create and edit custom text options to take your underlined and highlighted text to new heights.—Jeff Witchel

JONAS BERGSTRAND

[FLASH]

16


[ LAY E RS

TV]

Hosted by Corey Barker and Rafael “RC” Concepcion www.layersmagazine.com/tv Be sure and join Corey and RC in their weekly video podcast. From killer tips and tricks to full-blown tutorials, Corey and RC cover all of your favorite print, Web, and video apps.

[ N E W S L E T T E R ] www.layersmagazine.com Want to keep up to date on the latest tutorials on the Layers website, find out what’s coming up in the next issue of Layers magazine, and learn about hot new products and industry events? Visit the Layers website now and sign up for our monthly e-newsletter and the tip of the day.

www.layersmagazine.com/category/flash 3D Rotation in Flash CS4 (Video): Flash CS4 includes 3D tools that allow you to rotate perspective around a movie clip. We’ll show you how to take charge of those controls. —Tom Green

[DREAMWEAVER] www.layersmagazine.com/category/dreamweaver Using Dynamic Web Templates in Dreamweaver, Parts 1 & 2 (Video): Learn how to set up a quick-editing environment for your websites using global templates.—Janine Warner

[AFTER EFFECTS] www.layersmagazine.com/category/aftereffects Metallic Text with After Effects (Video): Did you know that you can create chrome or metal-looking text directly in After Effects? Well you can, and J. Schuh will show you how.—J. Schuh

[PREMIERE PRO] www.layersmagazine.com/category/premiere-pro Text Rolls and Crawls (Video): This tutorial shows you how to get your text moving in Premiere Pro.—Franklin McMahon

06



[

FROM THE MANAGING EDITOR] C H R I S

{

}

M A I N

type tricks

SOMETIMES IT’S NOT HOW YOU SAY IT, BUT HOW YOU DESIGN IT Have you ever looked at a movie poster and said to yourself, “Wow, I wish I could do that,” and then just walked away without giving it a second thought? Well, what are you doing? You just found a great source of inspiration and you walked away. You should immediately go home, fire up Photoshop, and try to re-create that effect. At least that’s what one of our resident Photoshop gurus, Corey Barker, believes. In this issue’s cover story, “Silver Screen Styles” starting on page 32, Corey not only talks about how to find inspiration at the movies, but also how to turn that inspiration into fantastic techniques that you can add to your design arsenal. He walks you through the entire process by re-creating type that’s similar to the logo used for DreamWorks Animation’s hit movie Monsters vs. Aliens. In keeping with our type theme, we know how important both type and images are to great design. Sometimes designers use type to communicate a message and sometimes designers (such as our featured artist Jonas Bergstrand on page 16) use pictures or illustrations to tell a story. In some cases, they morph the two together. To see what I mean, check out the Photoshop and Illustrator tutorials in this issue. Dave Cross shows how to convert an image into text in Photoshop; Jacob Cass shows how to convert text into an image in Illustrator. Pretty cool, eh? You’ll find the Photoshop story starting

[You should immediately go home, fire up

on page 50 and the Illustrator story on page 59. Oh yeah, we also carried the type theme to the Layers Back Page Design contest. Flip to page 118 to check it out. I’ll wait. So what do you think? Could you use a whole bunch of really cool fonts from Digital Juice? Then get those designs turned in. We love seeing what our readers can do. So how many of you out there have heard of Twitter? (You can stop laughing now because I know it

Photoshop, and try to

was a silly question. If you’re a designer or photographer, you own a computer, and in recent studies,

re-create that effect.]

study done, you’d see that I was right].) And how many of you have sworn never to use Twitter? (Come

100% of all computer owners have heard of Twitter [yeah, I made that last bit up, but if there were a on, you can fess up—we hear it from people all the time.) Well, we’re here to change your mind. Twitter really is a great tool for creating a network and growing your design or photography business, and we

think that once you read Nancy Massé’s feature on page 38, you’ll be tweeting within a matter of minutes and taking command of the social media phenomenon. If you flipped through this issue of Layers before reading this, you may have noticed that some columns have disappeared—in particular, “The Digital Camera,” “Photoshop Lightroom Tutorial,” and “Photoshop for Photographers.” All of these topics are so closely tied together, it just made sense to combine them all into one über digital photography tutorial, so we added a new column called, strangely enough, “Digital Photography Tutorial.” This step-by-step article is geared toward the digital photography workflow. It will cover everything from taking the shot, to managing and editing images in both Lightroom and Photoshop, to output. In some issues, you’ll see more Photoshop than shooting; in others, you’ll see more shooting than Photoshop. I think you get the idea. Speaking of ideas, if there are any particular topics you’d like to see covered in this tutorial—or any of our other tutorials—drop us a line at [email protected]. We’re always happy to hear from you.

www.l ayer smagazine.com

That’s it for now. Hope you have as much fun reading this issue as we had putting it together. After all, we do all of this just for you. All my best,

Chris Main Managing Editor

08



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CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

Corey Barker • Peter Bauer • Bruce Bicknell • Lee Brimelow • Cyndy Cashman • Jacob Cass • Rafael “RC” Concepcion • David Creamer • Dave Cross • Seán Duggan • Daniel East Laurie Excell • James Felici • Marcus Geduld • Steve Holmes • Nancy Massé Bert Monroy • Jay Nelson • Jason Scrivner • Taz Tally • Janine Warner Terry White • Jake Widman

CREATIVE DIRECTOR PRODUCTION MANAGER ASSOCIATE DESIGNER ASSOCIATE DESIGNER PRODUCTION DESIGNER

Felix Nelson Dave Damstra Taffy Orlowski Christy Winter Dave Korman

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Ronni O’Neil

PUBLISHER EXECUTIVE PUBLISHER BUSINESS MANAGER CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER

Scott Kelby David Moser Jean Kendra Paul Parry

DIRECTOR OF WEB DEVELOPMENT AND PROGRAMMING WEB PRODUCER WEB TEAM

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5100 Newport Dr. Suite #6 Rolling Meadows, IL 60008

Tommy Maloney Annie Cushing Justin Finley • Karey Johnson Andrew Kurz • Fred Maya Aaron Westgate Kelby Media Group 333 Douglas Road East Oldsmar, FL 34677-2922 Phone: 813-433-5010 www.kelbymediagroup.com [email protected]

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COVER DESIGN

Cover image courtesy of Jonas Bergstrand

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Produced using Adobe InDesign CS4, Adobe Photoshop CS4, and Adobe Illustrator CS4. Body copy is set in Avenir. Headlines are set in Solex. Come and listen to a story about a dude named Fred. Poor designer, barely kept his family fed. Then one day he was layin’ out a page, and from down the hall came the art director’s rage. Fury that is, bad leading, ugly text breaks. Well the next thing you know ol’ Fred’s a flippin’ fries... Okay, you can pretty much stop reading this. It ain’t a gonna git any better.

All contents © COPYRIGHT 2009 Kelby Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved. Any use of the contents of this publication without the express written permission of the publisher is strictly prohibited. Layers magazine is an independent journal not affiliated with Adobe Systems, Inc. Adobe, the Adobe logo, Acrobat, Adobe Premiere, After Effects, Dreamweaver, Flash, Illustrator, InDesign, Lightroom, and Photoshop are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Adobe Systems Incorporated in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Some of the views expressed by contributors may not be the representative views of the Publisher. ISSN 1554-415X



[layers news] graphics design news • new products • digital video news • other stuff

More content, more places

Is it possible to have access to too much video? Of course not. That’s why Adobe, building on the vision of the Open Screen Project (www.openscreenproject.org), recently announced at the 2009 NAB Show that they’re extending the Adobe Flash Platform to the digital home. Sometime in the second half of 2009, we should start seeing televisions, set-top boxes, Blu-ray players, and other devices that have the ability to connect to the Internet and play back high-definition (HD) video and rich applications via the implementation of optimized Flash technology. You can probably guess why companies such as Disney, Intel, and Netflix are so excited about the Adobe Flash Platform for the Digital Home; they’ll be able to deliver high-quality content to a wider audience right were we live— in front of the TV.

Help your clients help themselves

Are you a Web designer with tons of clients? And do these clients constantly call you for minor changes that they need on their sites right away, making you drop everything just to keep one client happy? Well, Adobe has come to the rescue with a fully hosted online service called Adobe InContext Editing 1.5. Now your clients can perform their own simple website updates without waking you up in the middle of the night, and more importantly, without damaging the integrity of your great design and hard work. Simply assign editable regions in either Dreamweaver CS4 or in a Web browser. (If you use Dreamweaver CS4, you can also specify editing options or define CSS styles to be made available to your clients editing the site.) The client can then access the Adobe InContext Editing service via a Web browser, type in his username and password, click the Edit button, and then go to town—allowing you to sleep in just a little bit longer. He doesn’t even have to install any software or learn HTML. For more information, visit www.adobe.com/products/incontextediting.

Save time www.LAYERSMAGAZINE.COM

with Strobe

Adobe recently announced a new open framework for building custom media players, codenamed Strobe. The concept is to offer production-ready components to content publishers so they don’t have to waste time creating playback technologies from scratch. Now developers can use Strobe software components to add rich functionality such as advertising, user measurement tracking, and social network integration without having to code the functionality directly into the media player. Developers can use only the parts of the framework that they need and assemble plug-and-play software components from Adobe and third-party providers. Strobe includes media features found in Adobe Flash Media Server 3.5, such as Dynamic Streaming. You’ll also be able to pause and seek within live video via DVR functionality. According to Adobe, since Strobe was announced, more than 20 companies already plan to support the Strobe framework. Strobe is expected to be available in Q3 of 2009 at no charge. For more info, visit www.adobe.com/go/strobe.

12


Universal Type Server, take 2

Every designer uses type. In fact, just take a quick glance through this issue of Layers and you’ll see quite a few tutorials on the creative uses of type. We even have a feature on creating type Hollywood style. So if type is so important to the designer, then type management must be just as important. Extensis steps up to the plate with Universal Type Server 2 Professional and Lite. Universal Type Server stores all fonts and font metadata—including classifications, keywords, and regrouped families—in a central location for easy access to all users. From one central easy-to-use interface, an organization can manage users and fonts while maintaining compliance and consistency for both Mac and Windows users. One of the coolest new features on the client side is the ability to tear off a font preview and float it over any open document—a great tool for finding just the right font for any document. Users also have access to a Glyph View dialog where they can preview all the glyphs for a font and even compare multiple font versions of a single glyph. According to Extensis, the new release also provides faster font auto-activation for Adobe Illustrator and InDesign CS2 through CS4, and QuarkXPress 7 and 8. Administrators can also quickly tell if all their fonts are compliant with licenses, and Universal Type Server can prevent users from installing unlicensed or unapproved fonts directly into the system font folders of the OS, thereby circumventing the font management system. The Professional version is the only server-based font management that offers an optional Directory Integration Module for both Microsoft’s Active Directory and Apple’s Open Directory for a secure way for customers to simplify and automate user management. Universal Type Server should be available by the time you read this. The Lite version, which includes the server and 10 clients, will retail for $1,395 (upgrade: $697.50). The Professional version will retail for $1,808.95 (upgrade: $1,061.45) and each Client will start at $163.35 (the more clients you buy, the lower the price). For more information, visit www.extensis.com.

Web Watch

[more cool sites for creatives]

http://tutorialblog.org

Photoshop tutorials, graphic design articles, freelancing tips, and much more

http://delicious.com

A social bookmarking service that many designers use to save their bookmarks online and share them with other designers

https://sucasa.webassist.com

A place for Web designers to share, sell, or buy Web templates, layouts, menus, and more

Easily manage uploads and downloads on your websites

WebAssist—a company that offers software, solutions, and training for building better websites—has released Digital File Pro 2 for Dreamweaver. Using the Wizard, it’s easy to enable your website visitors to upload files to any directory on your server that you choose. Uploaded images can be automatically reformatted, resized, renamed, and output in multiple versions. Digital File Pro includes a number of professionally designed progress bars that can be used to indicate that an upload is still in progress. The Extension also integrates seamlessly with online stores so you can offer digital downloads to your customers, all without using any PHP code. Digital File Pro 2 retails for $99.99. For more information, visit www.webassist.com.



And don’t forget about Layers magazine online, where you’ll find even more tutorials on all of your favorite Adobe apps, plus more reviews, and RC’s daily blog

Control your Canon

Upcoming Events

PHOTOSHOP CS4 DOWN & DIRTY TRICKS TOUR Toronto, ON (June 26, 2009) Calgary, AB (June 29, 2009) www.kelbytraininglive.com

Fotolia

HOW DESIGN CONFERENCE June 24–27, 2009 Austin Convention Center Austin, TX www.howconference.com

brings economic relief

July 17, 2009 Los Angeles Convention Center Los Angeles, CA www.kelbytraininglive.com

PHOTOSHOP LIGHTROOM 2 LIVE TOUR

SIGGRAPH 2009 August 3–7, 2009 Ernest N. Morial Convention Center New Orleans, LA www.siggraph.org/s2009

PHOTOSHOP WORLD CONFERENCE & EXPO October 1–3, 2009 Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino Las Vegas, NV www.photoshopworld.com

Fotolia, a major player in the microstock photography industry, recently announced the availability of its microstock video collection to supplement their more than five million images and illustrations that are currently available at www.fotolia.com. The library of more than 10,000 videos ranges in various sizes and lengths and includes HD clips. Prices for videos start as low as $10. But that’s not the surprising news. Less than a month later, Fotolia announced the availability of free, premierquality, royalty-free images. That’s right—free. You can find this collection of nearly 350,000 images at http://photoxpress.com. Members can license up to three images per day, free of cost (this number increases to ten after you complete your profile). According to Fotolia, the images were sourced through numerous partnerships around the world. Best of all, all images have accompanying model releases and may be used for any personal, commercial, or professional use (just make sure you include the proper photo credit as explained on their FAQ page). How’s that for an economic stimulus plan? ©PHOTOEXPRESS.COM

INDESIGN CS4 PRODUCTIVITY TOUR

July 31, 2009 South San Francisco Conference Center South San Francisco, CA www.kelbytraininglive.com

]

Recently, onOne Software jumped into the iPhone app frenzy. It’s not often that we cover an iPhone app, but this was just too cool to pass up. The new application is called DSLR Remote, and here’s how it works: simply install the free companion DSLR Remote Server software on your laptop or desktop computer, connect your Canon EOS digital SLR to the computer via a USB cable, and then use a Wi-Fi connection to communicate with the software using your iPhone or iPod touch. You can control the camera’s shutter speed, aperture, and white balance, as well as trigger the shutter. If your Canon supports Live View, you can also get a live stream of your camera’s viewfinder. You can then view your shots with a flick of your finger, rotate the iPhone for a larger preview, and zoom in to check focus. The app will retail at the iTunes App Store for $19.99. For $1.99, you can get a Lite version that will only fire the shutter. Hopefully, Nikon, Olympus, Sony, etc. versions aren’t far behind.

June 22, 2009 Nashville Convention Center Nashville, TN www.kelbytraininglive.com

LOCATION LIGHTING TECHNIQUES

n e ws

with your iPhone

MAXIMUM PHOTOSHOP CS4 TOUR

Chicago, IL (July 20, 2009) New York, NY (July 22, 2009) www.kelbytraininglive.com

[

Manipulate flat objects in

3D space directly in After Effects

Digieffects has released a new plug-in for After Effects that can warp any flat object into almost any shape using a mesh in 3D space. FreeForm AE makes it easy to create 3D effects, which previously required a dedicated 3D program or high-end workstation, without ever having to leave After Effects. According to Digieffects, the new plug-in is powered by a proprietary, full 3D rendering engine that quickly provides beautiful, high-quality renders. FreeForm AE retails for $299 and works with After Effects CS3 and CS4, and runs on both Mac and Windows. For more information, visit www.digieffects.com.



[j o n a s

[

b e r g s t r and ]

DESIGNER SPOTLIGHT]

Layers: On a student blog in the U.K., you mentioned that illustration is just another form of communication. What did you mean by that? Bergstrand: I think illustration is much more than just decoration. A good illustration/illustrator provides illumination. And this doesn’t happen by chance—it’s not a byproduct to style. Illustration may not be a science but it certainly communicates in a precise way.

www.LAYERSMAGAZINE.com

Jonas Bergstrand was born in Stockholm, Sweden, where he still resides today. Jonas knew early on that he wanted a career where he could draw all day long but had no idea at the time what an illustrator or graphic designer was. After graduating from Forsberg’s School of Design in 1997, Jonas got his start by assisting a former teacher. Three years later, he was picked up by CIA (Central Illustration Agency), a critically respected agency in the U.K. According to Jonas, “Illustration may not be rocket science but to me it’s a blast.” His long list of clients includes Chrysler, Hasbro, MTV, The New Yorker, Priceline, T-Mobile, and Yahoo!

Layers: A lot of your images use solid colors or various shades of the same color in the background, which really helps to focus the viewer’s attention on the subject. Does this occur more in your commercial work, or is this a personal preference? Bergstrand: It’s a personal preference that luckily works pretty well as a way to direct focus to what’s important. I can’t pinpoint exactly when and where I picked up on this way of treating colors. A conceptual color treatment is something you’ll find throughout the history of illustration, I guess. Many of my personal favorites like Paul Rand, Abram Games, and Saul Bass used limited palettes. Layers: Many of the characters in your illustrations are very two-dimensional—some even have the appearance of jointed cardboard cutouts. How did this style evolve and how do you feel it impacts the viewer? Bergstrand: When I started out, I was very exited about the precision that computer-generated images offered. I was heavily into flat areas of color and perfect shapes without jagged edges. I still like the control that Illustrator provides when I lay out my images, but over time I’ve

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17 l AY E R S M A G A Z I N E ] [ j u ly / a u g u s t 2 0 0 9

backtracked slightly and I enjoy the presence of the hand more and more. I think my current style is something of a hybrid where I try to pick the best out of two worlds. Control and chance brought together is what I’m hoping for. Layers: What applications do you work with regularly? Do you have a favorite? Bergstrand: I use Illustrator and Photoshop for all my images. I produce the basic drawing in Illustrator and then apply “makeup” in Photoshop. Layers: You have a lot of photographic elements in your images that create a collage effect. How do you decide what should be illustrated and what should be a photograph? How does the mixture of photographic elements and illustrations help to convey the message you’re trying to get across? Bergstrand: When I plan an image, I have something like a wish list of what photo material I’d like to feature. Many times though I have to reconsider because I can’t find what I’m looking for. Sometimes the clash between photo and drawing helps underline the message but I also grant myself the luxury to use the effect just for the fun of it. Layers: What artists have most inspired you? How has that inspiration carried over into your own work? Bergstrand: Paul Rand is the undisputed king if you ask me. I don’t want to use “was” because his work is still so fresh. (What was UPS thinking of when they destroyed their classic logo?) His work proves that there’s no boundary between illustration and graphic design. In all things important they’re the same. This is a fundamental and very inspiring truth—many times sadly forgotten, though. Why are design schools so keen on separating the two? I don’t see the gain in that, only loss.

[CONTACT] Jonas Bergstrand www.jonasbergstrand.com


ALL IMAGES BY JONAS BERGSTRAND

[

DESIGN MAKEOVER] J A K E

{

}

W I D M A N

client: Terry Shaw] [www.musicpotential.com play it again ©2008 DAVE KENNEDY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. WWW.DAVEKENNEDYPHOTOGRAPHY.COM

before

…he’d like to project (the image) of a virtuoso player who can play multiple instruments.


M

usician and music teacher Terry Shaw has an independent streak. “I like to do things myself if I think I can do them better,” he says. “I’d rather play solo than with lesser musicians.” That’s why he plays all the instruments on his latest CD, Instrument of Choice. On his website, he describes the CD like this: “It’s plastic, round, 4¾" in diameter, silver on one side with pictures of me on the other.” Obviously, Shaw has a sense of humor; however, he also describes the songs this way: “They’re original compositions covering many styles—bluegrass, swing, waltz, gypsy jazz, Celtic, Latin, contra, and jazz. And if that isn’t enough, I even include my cat singing on his own track.” “I don’t have ADD, but I like all types of music,” he says, “Irish to Balkan to swing. But it still sounds similar because I wrote it.”

Shaw’s musical career started with playing the trumpet in his school band. He took up stringed instruments when a friend in the fifth grade introduced him to the guitar; he has since expanded his repertoire to include the mandolin, banjo, dobro, and fiddle, all of which appear on Instrument of Choice. Shaw sells the CD through his website (www.musicpotential.com) and directly at the venues where he performs. When we approached him about a redesign, he said he likes the current cover, though he’s not fond of the lettering. “It’s too common,” he says. “I’d like a font that’s a little less pedestrian—maybe even one that looks like hand lettering.” He also says he’d like to project the same kind of image as Mark O’Connor: that of a virtuoso player who can play multiple instruments. But he doesn’t want to lose the personality and warmth that the current cover captures.

[

Jake Widman is a writer and editor who lives in San Francisco. He’s been covering the intersection of computers and graphic design for about 20 years now—since back when it was all called “desktop publishing.”

makeover submissions We’re looking for product packaging or labels, print advertisements, and magazine covers that are currently in the marketplace for future “Design Makeovers.” So if you or someone you know has a design that you’d like us to consider making over, or if you’re a designer and you’d like to be considered for a future “Design Makeover,” drop us a line at [email protected].

18


]

19

DESIGNER: Stephen Woltz (designer), Ben Capozzi (teacher)] [ www.svhed.org

The final design is homemade without being homespun...

E

mploying images ranging from mandolins set aflame as a nod to Jimi Hendrix to collaged bluegrass fantasies, 19 Halifax County High School students in the graphic arts class at the Southern Virginia Higher Education Center tackled the CD makeover with relish. We bought and listened to the CD, did a heckuva lot of individual and group ideation, and looked at Mark O’Connor’s branded material before beginning our designs. Unfortunately, the photographer’s request that we use the photo in its entirety removed from contention those designs that relied on isolating Shaw from the background (and frustrated those who had looked at Shaw’s website and seen his penchant for inventively placing his photo into improbable settings). Finally, just three choices remained. Two were by outstanding sophomores, but senior Stephen Woltz’s design is our final answer. Noting that Shaw says his background is primarily in rock, Woltz wanted a “grunge” feel for his design, and to give it some personal-

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ity without pretension. To achieve that look in Photoshop, Woltz built up layers of marbled paper as a background in warm earthtones and added coffee stains. An unrehearsed placement of instruments against the background gives the cover a handmade feel while suggesting Shaw’s virtuosic range and affinity for craft. The design walks that fine line between country and cornpone and still manages to capture the jazzy feel of Shaw’s music. Woltz chose an edgy but strong font, Cracked from www.dafont .com, for the CD title. He picked another font from dafont, Joe Hand 2 for the signature and the song titles, and tweaked the paths to refine the handwritten feel. Woltz simplified the weak layout of the original back cover and focused it on a boldly cropped close-up of a banjo. The final design is homemade without being homespun, a theme that seems to run throughout Shaw’s work and comments.

D E S I G N E R ]

Stephen Woltz] [Southern Virginia Higher Education Center Stephen Woltz and his classmates are students in dual-enrollment courses at the Southern Virginia Higher Education Center’s Business of Art & Design program, an innovative curriculum for Danville Community College students and Halifax County high schoolers. In addition to developing his design talents, Woltz writes and directs his own films, competes for top honors in his graduating class, flings himself at opponents in the Allied Independent Wrestling Federation, and volunteers with the Ruritan Club. Digital Art & Design curriculum coordinator Ben Capozzi has a degree in Studio Art from Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia, and worked in the school’s InnovationSpace multimedia center. He’s now pursuing an M.A. in Education & Instructional Technology and works with Woltz and other students five days a week to develop Virginia’s creative professionals of tomorrow in a sweet lab outfitted with Adobe CS4 and Mac Pro towers. His job, like each of his students, rocks.

APPLICATIONs USED: Adobe Illustrator CS4 and Adobe Photoshop CS4


l AY E R S M A G A Z I N E ] [ j u ly / a u g u s t 2 0 0 9

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after DESIGNER: Davin Sanchez][ www.behance.net/DavinSanchez

I…focused on a more reflective and intriguing image that matches the breadth and depth of the music.

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hen I saw the original CD cover, my first thought was, “Whoa!” It feels like a rush project, and the generic font doesn’t live harmoniously with the overall imagery presented on the cover. Certain aspects of the cover are fun—the cat thinking of the song titles—but the execution makes the overall effect seem silly and hokey, miles away from the fun and intriguing nature of the music. But I knew that with a little TLC, Instrument of Choice could be a true eye-grabber. I didn’t want to use the existing cover image because it tells the viewer nothing about Shaw’s music. I wanted to convey the feeling, emotion, mystery, and storytelling that is Terry Shaw. When I listened to his music, read his blogs, and checked out his website in an effort to familiarize myself with the artist, I realized

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that this music was far more complex than the cover led his listeners to believe. I removed Shaw from the cover and focused on a more reflective and intriguing image that matches the breadth and depth of his music. I chose the image of the woods because this image, much like the music, wasn’t easily defined—you could get lost in it, and yet it could be your own backyard. In an effort to convey Shaw’s lighthearted nature, I chose to preserve the image of the cat and the curiosity that cats so readily symbolize. The cover also needed some organic, hand-wrought imagery to reflect the individuality of this artist and his music. I handwrote the text and drew some illustrations. I thought they would complement the sincerity and uniqueness of Shaw, and I thought they would be fun.

D E S I G N E R ]


Davin Sanchez ][ www.behance.net/DavinSanchez Davin has lived from coast to coast but now lays his head primarily in the City of Angels. He started designing in high school in Florida, laying out fl yers for local bands, silk-screening T-shirts, and painting and drawing. Davin took his first major corporate job at a well-established company doing identity branding and Web and print design, as well as working on the side with local bands. The corporate print world became uninspiring after a few years, and he needed to move on. Davin then came into contact with an Interactive Agency in L.A. He packed his life in his car and left for the Wild West a week later. Davin quickly became an Art Director, creating work for Scion, Budweiser, Bud Light, Pepsi, and Sony Pictures. Davin has moved on and now does contract work in the Los Angeles area. His most recent work has been (on the Web) for Ford Models, Battle for Terra, and Bank of America; identity work for SanSu Solutions; and clothing for Maroon 5 and Sara Bareilles.

APPLICATIONS USED: Adobe Photoshop CS4, Adobe Illustrator CS4, and Adobe Photoshop Lightroom

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DESIGNER: Laurie Davidsohn-Bienstock ][ www.davidsohngraphics.com

…the lines of the music staff also represent the strings of Shaw’s repertoire of instruments.

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erry Shaw is a multitalented instrumentalist and composer with a wide array of music styles. Shaw clearly has a sense of humor, which adds to his personality and spills over to his music. My vision for the redesign of Shaw’s cover was to create something upbeat, magical, fun, fluid, and full of high energy, with a hint of whimsy, all while maintaining a serious side. Wow, that’s not a lot to ask for, is it? I started with classic music symbols: the treble clef and musical staff. The treble clef serves as an anchor for the cover, and the lines of the music staff also represent the strings of Shaw’s repertoire of instruments. I built upon these elements with fun, colorful, and random string instruments. I created multiple layers in Photoshop with various textures and silhouettes of more instruments and generously included swirls and wavy composition lines for fluidity.

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Since Shaw lets his cat “sing” on one of the cuts and has a picture of him on the original cover, I thought it was something personally important to him. I wanted to keep it in my redesign, so I added the singing black cat among the instruments. For Shaw’s name, I chose Adobe’s Voluta Script, and I used Sam Wang’s free Harrington font for the CD title. Since Shaw’s music style ranges from bluegrass to Celtic to jazz and then some, it seemed fitting that the fonts would be so different from each other but somehow still work well together. I toned things down a bit for the back cover. While I do like the photo of Shaw with all of his instruments on the original cover, it seems to lack a bit of style. I cropped the photo and gave it a sepia tone to blend in with the overall design. Finally, I added an excerpt from a favorable review on a popular industry website.

D E S I G N E R ]

Laurie Davidsohn-Bienstock ][ Davidsohn Graphics Laurie Davidsohn-Bienstock continued her education in graphic design after receiving a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism in 1985. Over the following decade, Laurie refi ned her talents and professional qualities while working for some of the most prestigious design firms and advertising agencies on the West Coast. In 1998, Laurie launched her design firm, Davidsohn Graphics, and in March 2007, along with her husband Cion, purchased Town and Country Printing in Agoura Hills, California. Sometimes Laurie feels like a kid in a candy store, only she’s a graphic designer in a print and copy shop. Laurie has an intense passion for graphic design, and since the purchase of the print shop, a love for different and unique paper and card stock. While she typically uses all three of the main programs in Adobe Creative Suite, her favorite is Photoshop, where she enjoys creating textures using multiple layers, filters, and masks. Laurie and Cion live in Granada Hills with their two daughters. Laurie also has five indoor cats and several outdoor strays.

APPLICATIONs USED: Adobe Photoshop and Adobe InDesign www.storemags.com & www.fantamag.com


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ARTISTIC EXPRESSIONS] B E R T

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creating a 3D coin The new enhanced 3D capabilities built into Photoshop CS4, coupled with the animation function, bring new features for you to explore that you might not have considered before. In the past, creating a simple animation of a twirling coin required the use of multiple applications to achieve the effect. One of those applications was a 3D program that was usually costly and required a long learning curve to master. Now it can all be done within that program we all know and love—Photoshop.

Don’t fear change I M A G E S : © I STO C K P H OTO I L LU ST R AT I O N : TA F F Y O R LO W S K I

Perhaps I was a little off in saying all you need is Photoshop. There’s one other thing you need to create this animation and that’s an image with some coins.

STEP ONE: Start by finding or creating an image that shows both sides of a coin. Using the Elliptical Marquee tool, select one side of the coin (press-and-hold the Shift key to get a perfect circle; press-and-hold the Spacebar to reposition the selection as you drag). Once you’ve made your selection, press Command-C (PC: Ctrl-C) to copy the selection, choose New from the File menu, and click OK. This will create a document that matches the size of the copied selection. Press Command-V (PC: Ctrl-V) to paste the data into your new file. Once pasted in, drag the Background layer to the Trash icon at the bottom of the Layers panel to delete it. This will leave the coin with transparency around its edges. Repeat for the other side of the coin then save the two files with the appropriate names for the front and back.

[ The new enhanced 3D capabilities built into Photoshop CS4…bring new www.LAYERSMAGAZINE.com

features for you to explore that you might not have considered before. ]

STEP TWO: Go to File>New and create a new 8x4" file at the same resolution as your coin files. Click on the Create a New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers panel. Press Shift-Delete (PC: Shift-Backspace) to open the Fill dialog, choose 50% Gray from the Use drop-down menu, and click OK. This layer will be our 3D coin. Under the 3D menu, choose New Shape from Layer>Cylinder. The flat, gray layer will turn into a gray cylinder.

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STEP FIVE: Now let’s turn

STEP THREE: The 3D widget that appears when you’re working with your 3D tools allows you to control many of the object’s attributes. This is that little object with the three colored arrows you see located at the upper left of our cylinder. If yours isn’t showing up, select one of the 3D tools from the Toolbox by pressing N or K (if you still don’t see it, make sure that the Enable OpenGL Drawing option is turned on in the Performance Preferences). Each color represents a different plane of the object’s axis: red contains the controls for the x-axis, green controls attributes for the y-axis, and blue denotes the z-axis. Passing your cursor over the various symbols on the 3D widget, and clicking-and-dragging once the point you’re hovering over turns yellow, will activate its specific control. The small box where the three axes converge will control the size of the overall object. Traveling up one of the tiny poles, you’ll come across three symbols. The arrow at the top controls the placement of the object within the file window on its plane; the arc rotates the object; and the little box below the arc controls the size of the object in the direction of the arrow’s plane. Clicking on the little box on the blue pole will allow you to shrink the height of the cylinder to resemble an actual coin, as you see here.

this thin cylinder into a coin! Make sure your 3D layer is selected. Call up the 3D panel from the Window menu. Click the Filter By: Materials icon to access the Materials section of the 3D panel. There you’ll find the three sides of the coin. I know you always hear “there are always two sides to every coin” but in this case we’re also dealing with the edge.

STEP SIX: Click on Top_Material to bring you to the section that contains the attributes for that side of the coin. Click the Edit the Diffuse Texture icon (to the right of the color swatch next to the word “Diffuse”) and choose Load Texture from the dropdown menu.


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that it’s facing the same direction as the image of the original coin. Select the Move tool (V) and drag-and-drop one of the saved coin images into the 3D coin file. Select the 3D Scale tool (nested under the 3D Rotate tool in the Toolbox, or go up to the Options Bar and click on the Scale the 3D Object icon) and resize the 3D coin so that it matches the size of the saved coin image. When finished, drag the saved coin image layer to the Trash icon at the bottom of the Layers panel.

l AY E R S M A G A Z I N E ] [ j u ly / a u g u s t

STEP FOUR: Using the 3D Rotate tool (K), orient the 3D coin so

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Navigate to the file that contains the face of the coin and click Open. The cylinder will now have the face of the coin appear on the top. For the bottom part of the coin, choose Bottom_Material and apply the file with the back of the coin to it the same way you applied the top part of the coin.

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to open the Pattern Picker. Click the vertical rib pattern that you saved and then click OK. Save the file with the pattern of the ribbing with the other faces of your coin.

STEP EIGHT: Back in the file with the 3D coin, choose Cylinder_ Material in the 3D panel. This time we’ll load the texture in the Bump Strength section: click the Edit the Bump Texture icon to the right of the Bump Strength value and choose Load Texture from the drop-down menu. Find your file with the ribbing pattern and click Open. You can push the Bump Strength number up to about 10 or whatever value looks best for your coin. Here we’ve added a spotlight to accent the edge where you can see the ribbing.

STEP SEVEN: The edge of our coin requires a little more work. A


real quarter has ribbing along its edge. You must create a bump map that will simulate that ribbing. In a new layer, create a very narrow, vertical selection with the Rectangular Marquee tool (M). It should be about the thickness of a single rib on the coin. If you keep the 3D layer visible and turn the coin to its edge, you’ll be able to approximate a thickness by comparing the selection to the 3D coin. Fill the selection with a 50% gray. Don’t deselect the rectangle yet. Click the Add Layer Style (ƒx) icon and apply a Bevel and Emboss. You’ll have to adjust the Size of the bevel so that you get an even amount of light and dark along the edge. The default setting might be too much to actually see a bevel and emboss within the rectangle. Using the Rectangle Marquee tool with the Option (PC: Alt) key pressed, drag around the top and then the bottom of the rectangular selection to deselect those areas. This will leave you with a selection that has even tones for the vertical rib (as shown). Choose Define Pattern from the Edit menu, name your pattern, and click OK. You can now drag this layer to the Trash icon and deselect.

Create a new file of any size you want, making sure it has the same resolution as your 3D coin file. Open the Fill dialog again, but instead of using 50% gray, choose Pattern from the Use drop-down menu. Then, click the preview thumbnail next to Custom Pattern

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Put your money in motion Now that our coin is complete, it’s an actual 3D object that can be moved around in three-dimensional space with any of the 3D object and 3D camera tools. It can also be animated, so let’s open the Animation panel from the Window menu. The Animation panel will display the various layers that your file contains. Choosing the layer that contains the 3D coin and clicking on the small arrow to the left of the layer name will drop down the parameters for the layer’s movement. Click on the Time-Vary Stopwatch next to the 3D Object Position property. This will place a diamond-shaped indicator in the Timeline—this is called a keyframe. Move the Current Time Indicator (CTI; the small, blue arrow at the top of our Timeline) over to the position in time where you want the movement to end. Using the adjustment tools for the 3D object, move it, rotate it, or whatever else you want to do to it. Once you’re done, a second keyframe will automatically appear at the new place in the Timeline. Photoshop will now interpolate between the two keyframes, thus generating the movement. This is a whole new capability available to the Photoshop user. It’s powerful and far easier than many of the previous ways of achieving these effects. One small caveat is that to properly view the 3D functions requires a video card with enough power to display it. The world of 3D opens new doors for you to explore and enjoy. Have fun!

]

Bert Monroy is considered one of the pioneers of digital art. His work has been seen in many magazines and scores of books. He has served on the faculty of many well-known institutions, written many books, and appeared on hundreds of TV shows around the world.

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[ i n s p i r a t ion ]

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INStANt INSpIRAtIoN] L u c {

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You don’t get what you deserve; you get what you negotiate.” Instant Inspiration is where we showcase an established commercial designer and pick their brain in an effort to gain insights on the creative process and inspiration in general.

Luc Latulippe

What’s the “method to your madness?”

My process is pretty simple: sketch something out on paper (usually on scrap paper with a ballpoint pen), scan it into Photoshop, import into Illustrator, and use the Pen tool to “trace” things out on a very old (eight years?) Wacom tablet. The finished file is then flattened and saved as a TIFF in Photoshop, and emailed off to the client. I’m still using CS2 and have no plans on upgrading anytime soon either.

What inspires you?

I’m not much of a traditional artist-type. I don’t carry around a sketchbook or take photos for inspiration. I do carry a notebook, but literally to take notes in. As with most people, the fun stuff of my childhood—comics, robots, monsters, science fiction—always gives me warm feelings, so I suppose you could say those things inspire me, but I’m always inspired by seeing the work of other illustrators and designers. I’m also a contributor to the Drawn! blog (www.drawn.ca), which is just one fabulous place to see what others are up to.


What are you working on now?

I can’t usually answer this with anything more than “Oh, some magazine illustration,” but last week was really interesting for me. I got to draw Jane Austen getting attacked by zombies for a piece in The Hartford Courant about that new Pride and Prejudice and Zombies adaptation of [Jane Austen’s] book. The only downside was that I only had a couple days to make this rather big illustration and I’d have loved an extra eight or nine hours to really finish it they way I had wanted to. I mean, it’s Pride and Prejudice… and Zombies.

[Owner] Freelance Web design and illustration [About] Luc began his career in animation working on Saturday morning cartoon shows before moving more towards illustration. Since 1998, he has produced nearly 1400 illustrations for hundreds of clients around the globe. [Website] http://www.luclatulippe.com

What has been your crowning achievement so far? I don’t know that I’d call anything of mine a “crowning achievement,” but one project does stand out, and you’re going to squirm and grimace when I tell you about it. It was a set of illustrated instructions for cancer research at a men’s clinic on how to self-collect a rectal swab sample…told you so. The goal was to produce a set of instructions, which helped patients feel less uncomfortable about the whole procedure. The reason I’m so proud of this particular project is that— besides being a fun challenge—it turned out to be an incredible success for this clinic’s research. Thanks to my illustrations, their success rate jumped something like 1200% in less than a year. This means my drawings are actually helping people, helping science, and benefiting public health. That’s pretty awesome!

Got a personal quote or any advice?

What jumps to mind is: “You don’t get what you deserve; you get what you negotiate.” It sounds cold and harsh, but it’s the truth. More illustrators need to develop their business and negotiating skills better. We tend to be taken advantage of a lot in our field, and as such our business suffers.

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A spread for BC Business magazine about stores that promote sales by holding cocktail parties.

Barber Lounge

A promotional card for a business in San Francisco. I also designed their logo, branding, and other print collateral.

1000 Journals

This was one of a hundred covers for a project called the 1000 Journals Project. I chose to show my dog, Totoro, in Stanley Park, Vancouver.

All art depicted © Luc Latulippe 2009.



Shopping Party

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Coffee Couple on The Beach

A cover for Granville magazine in Vancouver. The beach depicted is Kitsilano Beach, and the shore visible across from that is the Westend and Downtown.

Sex Talk


For Philly magazine, about the inappropriateness of certain topics during a meal. As you can see, I sketched the illustration out using traditional means—pen, pencils, paper. The sketch was scanned into Photoshop and imported into Illustrator where I "traced" it with the Pen tool. At the color stage, I can refine things and change my mind about small layout decisions. In this case, very little changed other than making the shot a bit wider and moving the blonde (bottom right) a bit higher.

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showcasing the design work of our readers

www.l ayer smagazine.com

Design: Fairy Tales ] [ Client: Personal Work ] [ Designer: Bethany Spencer ] [ Software: Adobe Photoshop CS3 ] [ http://vacuumslayer.deviantart.com

Ad Design: Surfer magazine ] [ Client: Lassen Hawaii Clothing ] [ Designer: Tom Smith ] [ Software: Adobe Photoshop ] [ Gallery at www.graphics.com

Design: Resplandor ] [ Client: Personal Work ] [ Designer: Eduardo de la Cruz ] [ Software: Adobe Illustrator CS2 and Adobe Photoshop CS2 ] [ www.artcreativeimagesgallery.com

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gallery]

31 l AYERS MAGA ZINE ][ july / august 2009

Design: Boxing Hall of Fame 2008 ] [ Client: World Boxing Hall of Fame ] [ Designer: Eduardo de la Cruz ] [ Software: Adobe Illustrator CS2 and Adobe Photoshop CS2 ] [ www.artcreativeimagesgallery.com

Design: Z06 Orange Vette ] [ Client: Personal Work ] [ Designer: Edward Eksi ] [ Software: Adobe Illustrator ] [ www.edwardeksi.com

The staff at Layers magazine appreciates the time and effort involved in the creative process, no matter how large or small the project. With this in mind, we offer you the opportunity to display your work on The Digital Canvas. Please submit your print, Web, or packaging design (jpeg or eps format) to: [email protected]. Please include name of piece, client name (if applicable), applications used, and any website where our readers can view more of your work.


CHRISTY WINTER


By Corey Barker When I was first approached about this article on Hollywood type effects, my eyes lit up—as did my imagination. Being one of the biggest movie fans in the office, it made sense. I’m the one who is always going to midnight shows and still showing up for work the next day. It’s a passion that has played a major role in my creative process. I get so much more than two hours of entertainment; I also get a treasure trove of creative ideas.

Much of the peripheral visual media for a movie is also rich with inspiration. Has your attention ever been captured by a really well-designed movie poster, even if you weren’t interested in the movie? Before you know it you’re examining the logo, the overall image, the colors—and you suddenly find yourself a little inspired. This happens to me all the time and it motivates me to try and re-create the effect.

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TRAJAN

FOR FUTURE REFERENCE So with the ubiquity of so many examples on television, on the Web, and of course, in movie theaters, we seem to have an infinite database of images from which to gather ideas. If I see a logo or title that has a cool effect or captures my imagination in some way, I have to try and re-create it. When you’re studying an effect, look at the whole thing but also break it down and look at the parts. You might just see a part of the effect you like. When you do, then it’s time to reverse-engineer it—not to figure out how the original designer did it, but rather how you might do it and incorporate these techniques into your own work. While it’s obvious that most of us aren’t creating type treatments for major feature films, by engaging our imagination we can use existing examples to help us explore how we might create a certain effect and perhaps come up with a new technique altogether. It’s been proven that you tend to be more creative when faced with a challenge, so start with something you’ve seen. No, don’t steal, but rather use it as a springboard from which to sort out your own technique and style.

L AY E R S M A G A Z I N E ] [ j u ly / a u g u s t 2 0 0 9

ne of the most visually stunning aspects of these posters is the overwhelmingly creative use of type. For some movies, the logo becomes one of the stars of the movie, and it gets its own star treatment in a way. For instance, let’s consider Steven Spielberg’s film, Jurassic Park (www.jurassicpark.com). (I assume we’ve all seen it.) The posters for this movie were nothing more than the actual Jurassic Park logo on a black background. The logo had a certain theme park feel to it and that was all that was needed. It became an easily recognizable icon. Hence the name became one of the stars. You often see this with big-budget epic films—because these movies are promoted so heavily, they need eye-catching imagery. Another Spielberg classic that has a recognizable typeface is Raiders of the Lost Ark (www.indianajones.com). This type style has been typecast (pardon the pun) as a standard look for conveying action and adventure, and it’s been mimicked many times. Then there are those films’ titles that are a bit understated, but the appearance of the text still plays a critical role. Take The Matrix (http://whatisthematrix.warnerbros.com), for example. The text treatment on this film used a standard typeface that was broken up and slightly offset in various places for a sort of convoluted effect. The result is a very simple graphic look, yet powerful enough to carry the theme of the movie. Other movies use simple customized fonts with mild type adjustments for a subtle effect. One example would be Spider-Man (http://spiderman.sonypictures .com). This text effect is a line of text in a specially designed typeface with some careful character spacing, which is very effective. The font that’s chosen has a critical role, as it needs to invoke a feeling associated with the film. A common font used in movie titles is Trajan Pro. In fact, this font has been used so much that it has become sort of an inside joke with working professionals (check out http://typographica.org/001120.php). Why is it so popular? I’m sure different designers have different reasons, but I think it’s because it’s a classy looking and easily readable font. Still, it seems that it’s been overused. My point is this: It’s important that the typeface works with the title it’s portraying. You can see how certain types of movies, especially in specific genres, all have common type effects among them. Big effects movies tend to have really elaborate logos; sci-fi movies tend to have more angular, modern-looking text; while dramas will have more basic and straightforward text with subtle colors. Comedies and animated films tend to be colorful with bolder text, and often have some element of 3D.

Even though the names have been changed, you can probably guess which movies inspired the artwork above.

CREATE YOUR OWN TITLE Let’s put this into practice. Just recently, DreamWorks Animation released their newest feature Monsters vs. Aliens (www.monstersvsaliens.com). The type treatment for this movie was designed to carry the theme of the movie, which portrayed the word “Monsters” with a more organic look and the word “Aliens” with a more angular, hi-tech look. Now, one thing was obvious when I first saw this: It was no doubt done in a 3D application. Does that mean we need a 3D app to create this look? Not necessarily. After a little experimenting, I discovered a way to get a similar result, all in Photoshop, with no 3D application at all. We’re going to create our own movie title in order to explore the technique, which would be the case anyway, because you want to use the technique on your own text.

STEP ONE: Start by creating a new file in Photoshop (the one shown here is 12x7" at 150 ppi) and set your text. We’re going make a logo for a made-up movie called Human vs. Machine. Of course, the name isn’t super-important here; it’s the technique we’re playing with. We set the word “HUMAN” in Gill Sans Ultra Bold and “MACHINE” is conveniently set in a font called BN Machine (available from www .dafont.com). How nice! Adjust the tracking so the two words are the same width as shown here. (Note: To adjust tracking, double-click the type thumbnail in the Layers panel to both select the type and switch to the Type tool, hold the Option key [PC: Alt key], and use the Left and Right Arrow keys on your keyboard.)


STEP TWO: Control-click (PC: Right-click) on the HUMAN text layer in the Layers panel and select Create Work Path from the menu. This will create a vector path for the text. In the Paths panel, double-click on the Work Path, change its name to “Human” in the Save Path dialog, and click OK. Repeat this step for the MACHINE text layer. You should have two path layers in the Paths panel. Select the Human path layer in the Paths panel, grab the Path Selection tool (A), and select all the paths that create the letters on the canvas. Click the Eye icon next to the HUMAN and MACHINE layers in the Layers panel to hide the original text.

STEP THREE: Go under the Edit menu to Transform Path and choose Warp. In the Options Bar, choose Bulge from the Warp drop-down menu. Set the Bend to –15 and the Vertical Distortion setting to 10% (you may have to experiment with these settings depending on the size of your text and resolution of your document). Then press Enter twice to commit the transformation. Repeat this step for the other word in the title. You may need to do some additional scaling of the text after you apply the warp to both paths (just select the letters with the Path Selection tool and press Command-T [PC: Ctrl-T]).


STEP FOUR: In the Layers panel, click the Create a New Layer icon, and then Command-click (PC: Ctrl-click) on the Human path layer in the Paths panel to create a selection. Click the Foreground color swatch at the bottom of the Toolbox, pick a dark gray color in the Color Picker, and click OK. Then, press Option-Delete (PC: AltBackspace) to fill your selection with the Foreground color. Press Command-D (PC: Ctrl-D) to deselect. Repeat this step for the Machine path and press Command-D (PC: Ctrl-D) to deselect. When done, you should have a result similar to what you see here with each word on its own layer. (Use the Move tool [V] to reposition the layers if needed.)

STEP FIVE: Double-click directly on the name of the first layer that you just created in Step Four (Layer 1) and rename it “Human 1.” Similarly, rename Layer 2 “Machine 1.” Now drag these two layers to the Create a New Layer icon to duplicate them. Click the Eye icon for these new layers to hide them for now. We’ll come back to them later. Activate the Rulers by pressing Command-R (PC: Ctrl-R), click the Human 1 layer in the Layers panel to make it the active layer, then drag a couple of vertical guides from the ruler and place them at each side of the text. They should snap right to the edge.

STEP SIX: With the Human 1 layer still active, click the Add a Layer Style icon (ƒx) at the bottom of the Layers panel and choose Stroke. Set the Size to 3 and the Position to Inside. Down in the Fill Type area, choose Gradient from the drop-down menu. Click on the gradient preview, choose the Copper preset gradient in the Gradient Editor dialog, and click OK. Back in the Layer Style dialog, set the angle to 140˚. Click OK. This gradient will play an important role when we make this look 3D.

STEP SEVEN: We need to rasterize this effect by merging it with an empty layer, so create a new layer and drag it under the Human 1 layer. Reselect the Human 1 layer and press Command-E (PC: Ctrl-E) to merge it down into the empty layer. This will render the layer style to the text (you’ll need to rename the merged layers to “Human 1” again). Then go under the Image menu to Adjustments and select Desaturate.

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STEP ELEVEN: Okay, now that the 3D part is done, let’s finish the face of the text. Remember those duplicate layers we created? Go ahead and activate the Human 1 copy layer and make it visible. Command-click (PC: Ctrl-click) the layer thumbnail to select that layer. Set the Foreground color to R:238, G:137, B:5; click OK; and set the Background color to white. Using the Gradient tool (G), select the Foreground to Background gradient in the Gradient Picker in the Options Bar, and then Shift-click-and-drag from the bottom of the word to the top, giving it a gradient of orange to white. Press Command-D (PC: Ctrl-D) to deselect. Click on the Human 1 layer in the Layers panel to make it active and select Hue/Saturation in the Adjustments panel. Click on the Colorize checkbox and set the Hue to 220 and the Saturation to 50. This will apply a blue tint to the 3D layer.

STEP NINE: Now load this layer as a selection by holding down the Command key (PC: Ctrl key) and clicking on the layer preview thumbnail for Human 1 in the Layers panel. Press Option-Command-T (PC: Alt-Ctrl-T) to start a step-and-repeat move (keeping it selected will ensure the repeated items stay on one layer). Drag the center target point to the bottom of the canvas again, just like before. Go into the Options Bar and again click on the chain icon to lock the proportions, and set the Width to 100.4%; the Height will set automatically. (Yes, this is a small amount but it’s important for getting the 3D look in the next step.) Press Enter twice to commit the transformation.

STEP TEN: Press Shift-Option-Command-T (PC: Shift-Alt-Ctrl-T) over and over until the edge of the graphic once again touches the guides. What you’ll get is a cool 3D effect that’s enhanced with the addition of the gradient stroke we applied in Step Six. Pretty cool, huh? Press Command-D (PC: Ctrl-D) to deselect and then repeat Steps Six through Ten for the Machine 1 layer (you may need to reposition the guides to the left and right edge of the word first). Make sure to create a duplicate layer of any other layer to which you want to apply this effect.

STEP TWELVE: Click back on the Human 1 copy layer to make it active, then double-click on the layer to open the Layer Style dialog and choose Bevel and Emboss. Feel free to experiment with these settings to see how they look but the settings shown here work pretty well for what we’re after. (Note: The Gloss Contour has been changed to the Half Round preset and Use Global Light was turned off. Plus, the Highlight Mode color has been changed to yellow and set to Linear Burn and the Shadow Mode color has been changed to orange.) Don’t click OK yet.

STEP THIRTEEN: Activate Pattern Overlay in the list of Styles on the left. Click the Pattern thumbnail preview to open the Pattern Picker and choose the Clouds pattern. (Note: If you don’t see the Clouds pattern, click the flyout menu in the Pattern Picker, choose Texture Fill at the very bottom of the menu, and click Append in the resulting dialog.) Then change the Blend Mode to Color Burn. Don’t click OK yet.



STEP EIGHT: Now press Command-T (PC: Ctrl-T) to invoke Free Transform. Grab the center target point, hold down the Shift key, and drag it straight down to the bottom of the canvas. This will be the vanishing point for the 3D effect. Go into the Options Bar and click the chain icon to lock the proportions, then enter 90% for the Width; the Height should change accordingly. The graphic will scale down toward the center target. Press Enter twice to commit the transformation.

STEP FOURTEEN: Now activate Satin in the list of Styles on the left. Change the Blend Mode to Normal and the color from black to white. Set the Opacity to 100%, the Angle to 53˚, the Distance to 14 px, and the Size to 10 px. Change the Contour to Ring and uncheck the Invert box. The last Layer Style you’ll turn on is Stroke. Set the Size to 5 and the Position to Inside. Change the Blend Mode to Overlay and the Opacity to 75%. Click OK.

STEP FIFTEEN: Select the Machine 1 copy layer and make it visible. Command-click (PC: Ctrl-click) the layer thumbnail to select that layer. Set the Foreground color to green (R:57, G:181, B:74), click OK, press Option-Delete (PC: Alt-Backspace) to fill the layer with that color, and deselect. Now drag the Hue/Saturation layer that you created in Step Eleven to the Create a New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers panel to duplicate it. Drag this duplicate adjustment layer above the Machine 1 layer. Hold the Option key (PC: Alt key) and click between the two layers to clip the Hue/Saturation layer to the Machine 1 layer. This will add the blue shade to the 3D edge of the MACHINE text.

STEP SEVENTEEN: Double-click on the Machine 1 copy layer to open the Layer Style dialog and choose Bevel and Emboss. Again, feel free to experiment with these settings or use the settings shown here. (Note: Use Global Light was turned off.) Don’t click OK yet.

Activate the Texture option just under Bevel and Emboss in the list of Styles on the left. Click on the Pattern preview to open the Pattern Picker, locate the pattern you just defined (it should be the last one in the list), and set the Depth to about 25%. You can also reposition the pattern by moving the style window to the side and clicking inside the image and dragging; this allows you to move it around to where you like. The final layer style to activate is Satin. Set the Blend Mode to Darken, the Opacity to 51%, the Angle to 23˚, the Distance to 15 px, and the Size to 13 px. Change the Contour to Linear and uncheck the Invert box. When done, click OK.


STEP SIXTEEN: Now we need to create a pattern to use for the

36

MACHINE text. Press D to set your Foreground/Background colors to their default black/white. Then create a new layer, fill it with white, and drag it to the top of the layer stack in the Layers panel. Using a small, hard-edged brush (B), click a point on the canvas and then Shift-click a second point to draw a straight brush line. Brush up and down, left to right, and at various angles all over the canvas. Also change the brush size periodically to vary the width of the strokes. Once done, go under the Edit menu and choose Define Pattern. Name your pattern and click OK. You can either hide the pattern layer or throw it away.

[

As you can see, we’ve achieved something very close to the original, using some relatively simple techniques right here in Photoshop. The most exciting part is that I learned some really cool things that I might not have ever discovered if I hadn’t challenged myself to recreate an existing logo. What I’ve gained are some new techniques that I can use for whatever projects may come up in the future. So remember, when you’re at the movies, or just about anywhere, pay close attention to the world of ideas that surround you. They’re out there; you just have to pay attention.

Corey Barker is an Education and Curriculum Developer for the National Association of Photoshop Professionals. His expertise in Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator has earned him numerous awards in illustration, graphic design, and photography.


]


BY NANCY MASSÉ

Are you a Tweep? Do you belong to the Diggnation or do you prefer to reside in Plurkistan? Do you know the difference between a Poke and a SuperPoke? Furthermore, do you care whether or not you are linked to a LION? If any of the above statements make sense to you, congratulations, you’re already at least somewhat familiar with the world of social media (SocMed), an approach to Web-based communication that has seeped into just about every facet of the Internet. These days, you pretty much can’t go online without being presented with the opportunity to connect, comment, friend, link, or share the coolest, most awesome bits of yourself to the world in a manner that goes way


beyond a standard Web forum or BBS.

Images: iStockphoto.com Layout Design: Taffy Orlowski

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Along with the popularity of SocMed comes a wave of “social media experts.” Everywhere you look, there’s a social media expert dying to share his or her “secrets” to growing a network on Twitter, making money off Facebook, or getting a job through LinkedIn—of course, you usually need to buy their ebook, DVD, or register for an e-seminar in order to “unlock” their secrets, but I’m here to tell you that there really is no mystery behind social media. For the record, I am not a social media expert, nor would I ever claim to be. I’m just a person who latched onto the concept early. (Confession: It started with MySpace back in ’04 and grew from there.) I became fascinated with end-user, content-driven sites and how people were sharing the latest information. Suddenly, you didn’t need to work at the world’s top PR firm to disseminate information; you just needed to know where to find the cool stuff that no one else in your corner of the “webbyverse” could find, and then spread it out to an ever-growing network of people in an almost Ponzi-like fashion. I joined LinkedIn and then Twitter roughly a year after each one launched. By being immersed in it at relatively early stages, my understanding of the concepts of social networking and communicating via these new channels grew as the sites grew. Today, I probably have an account on just about every major social network there is under various pseudonyms—all just part of my personal fascination with SocMed as a tool for communication. Heck, I even have my own social network about social networks. It wasn’t until I joined Kelby Media Group in July of 2008 that I got the chance to put my own ideas into action on how to harness SocMed for marketing, brand-building, and customer service, and so far, I’d have to say that the results have been pretty successful.

So what’s the purpose of this article? Originally, I wanted to give an overview of, and insight into, some of the more popular SocNets out there but as time went on, I decided to focus my efforts on Twitter. The goal is to give you my perception on what has worked and what hasn’t in the past to help you become “experts” in your own right and save you the trouble of making the mistakes that I and millions of others have already made.

First thing’s first: If you’re considering using Twitter as a way to promote your skill sets or your business, before you even start, you need to ask yourself, “What are my objectives?” Start at the very beginning with your UserName. This is how people will come to know you from here on out. Are you going to use your real name or your business name? Maybe a pop culture reference or something that defines you? No matter your choice, give it some thought first. (Hindsight: “NAPP” [the National Association of Photoshop Professionals] was taken when I started the “NAPP_News” Twitter account. If I could go back, I’d scrap the underscore. It caused a little confusion at the beginning.) Now, this is going to be old news for some of you but if you really want to tell the world more than what you ate for lunch, you need to make yourself “follow-worthy” before you try to engage in building your network. I get quite a few follow requests and I actually go through every single one and click on the requester’s Twitter page. I try to follow back every active and interested designer, photographer, or Photoshop user who follows me on Twitter to keep the communication channels wide open (only mutual follows can DM each other). (See “Twictionary” on page 41 for a definition of DM or any other Twitter term that you find unfamiliar in this article.) So how can you tell if a new follower is active and interested (i.e., follow-worthy)? I can’t, but there are many clues to look for. If you want to make a good Twitter impression, here are some tips that I’ve gleaned from observations made over the last year from thousands of follow requests that I’ve received. 1. Put your house in order first—Just like networking in real life, you get only one chance to make a first impression. Furthermore, when it comes to social networking, the amount of time you have to make that first impression lasts about two to five seconds. Make sure the following points are done well before you start trying to expand your network. • Create an avatar. Leaving the default Twitter avatar up tells the world that you either have no idea what you’re doing or you’re spam. While the former is definitely forgivable, the latter will hurt you. Note: British blogger, Malcom Coles, wrote an excellent post in April about things to consider when creating a Twitter avatar. Find it on www.malcolmcoles.co.uk. • Create a background or at least change the default background. What goes for the avatar goes double for the background. Twitter



ut the advent of the SocMed movement has also given rise to a new age of social networking (SocNet) in which transparency is the norm. This new drive for “realism” online has also opened the doors for individuals to market themselves like never before. Thanks to blogs and the explosion in popularity of sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, just about anyone can make a name for themselves, including the creative set. The question is, “Is SocMed right for you?” And if so, how does one go about harnessing the power and influence that it can bring without falling into the nonproductive pit of “time suck”? How indeed? I have to admit, when I was first approached to write this article, I thought it would be a piece of cake, but social media changes at the speed of now. Everything I’d planned to write about is now old news and the thought of giving a “Social Media 101” lesson left me curled up in the corner in a fetal position because social media, in all its forms, is probably the hottest topic on the Web these days. There are thousands, if not millions of blog posts and articles on that subject, each with its own merits and pitfalls, which brings me to my next hurdle…

backgrounds have become more popular lately, especially since the social media crowd realized that they were a great way to tell people even more about you. As a designer or a photographer, you know how important that is. Think of your Twitter background as your own personal billboard and wow your potential network with your skill sets! • Fill in the About Me section and add a Web link. The more people know about you, the better. • Upload your email address book. Start building your network by using the one you already have. Don’t forget to repeat this process every few months, as more people are discovering Twitter every day. • Say something. Even if you have no followers, an empty timeline means you have nothing to say, and who wants to follow someone with nothing to say? This is a great time to get used to updating to Twitter and figuring out if this is something you’ll want to do on a regular basis. Plus, you can get all the “Trying Twitter out for the first time—not sure if I like it yet” tweets out of the way. • Fill up your timeline. Take a few days to tweet some interesting posts, links, and observations that span over time. Don’t just fill it all up at once (the time stamp will give you away). Plus, you can bury those, “Trying Twitter out for the first time…” tweets. They’re like lunch tweets. Who cares? 2. Make your profile public—I like the fact that Twitter allows people to keep their profiles private; however, it’s a very rare occasion that I’ll send a follow request to someone with a private profile. This is simply because I figure that the person has made their profile private for a reason. If you intend to use Twitter as something other than keeping in touch with friends and family (or if you cater to a special niche market), I strongly suggest that you make your profile public. And, if you do choose to keep it private, there will be no “Twhining” over the fact that you have no followers!


3. As you go, create balance—If you can, try to create a balanced-looking timeline. When I say “balanced,” I’m referring to your content. Look at your timeline objectively. Is it filled with nothing but TwitPic links with no captions, RTs, or “@” replies? If that’s the case, you may want to rethink your approach. A well-rounded, savvy Tweep has a balance of links, personal observations (if you’re representing yourself and not a group or business), “@” replies, original content, and RTs. You want new potential followers to be able to take a quick glance at your timeline and get a sense of who you are, what interests you, and how you use Twitter. The savvier you are about using the tool, the better impression you’ll make.

One of the biggest mistakes you can make when building your network is to follow hundreds or thousands of people at once. It makes you look like a spammer when the ratio of people you’re following is much higher than the people who are following you, and you may even get flagged as a potential spammer. It screams, “I don’t know what I’m doing,” which destroys your credibility as someone follow-worthy. Here are some tips that I used to grow my network: • Try to keep your following-to-follower ratio close to 2:1 when you start. • Search for peers or folks with like-minded interests using sites such as www.Twellow.com or http://WeFollow.com. • Follow only 10–20 people at a time. • Give people time to follow you back. People have lives just like you. Don’t take the lack of an instant response as a slight.

• Don’t feel as if you have to follow everyone back either. I use the criteria I listed under “Put your house in order first” on page 39 to decide whether or not to follow people back. You may have your own. • Don’t be afraid to “@” reply. Set up a search (if you use TweetDeck [www.tweetdeck.com], a browser for organizing tweets) for keywords that interest you. If someone asks a question or tweets something that interests you, answer them. Chances are, they’ll follow you because you actually took the time to get involved. • Use Web tools such as Less Friends (http://lessfriends.com) to even up your following-to-follower ratio. Follow notices come via email. They can get lost. It’s good to check periodically to see if there are people you want to follow back, or to cut some of the people you follow loosely. • Add your profile to sites such as Twellow and WeFollow. • If you have the means, and a following of 400–500 people, hold a contest or giveaway. It’s a great way to boost your following, but it’s still up to you to keep them. • Be patient. Building and sustaining a solid network takes time—unless you’re like Drobo. By giving away a DroboPro, they gained more than 4,000 interested followers in one day. Yup. They did in one day what took me 10 months to do. • Make your Twitter presence known. Add a link to your Twitter page or a Twidget to your blog, website, email signature, other social sites such as Facebook, and yes, your business card. • Don’t obsess. It really doesn’t matter if you have 10 or 10,000 followers. What matters is that you add value to whatever field you’re in. Believe me, if people like what you’re putting out there, they’ll find you.

There’s no easy way to say this but if you get involved in SocMed, you’ll face falling into the dreaded time-suck trap. Building a network takes time and you’ll learn rather quickly whether or not it’s something that you want to do. Twitter is just like licorice: you either really, really like it or you don’t. That’s all there is to it. Building a SocMed presence is essentially free but time is money, and the time you spend building your network does eat into time that could be spent doing your work. Want to avoid the time suck? Here are a couple of suggestions: • Once you’ve decided if SocMed is right for you, visit www.TweetStats .com and enter your UserName. TweetStats will search through your tweets and graph them for you so you know what time of the day and what days of the week you tweet the most. Use this to plan your “Twitter Breaks.” • If you freelance or work from home, get an egg timer—seriously! Take ten-minute breaks in your day to check your SocMed sites, answer “@” replies, update your Facebook, etc. When that bell rings, get back to work. • Use sites such as http://Ping.FM, www.FriendFeed.com, or www.HootSuite.com, to send your updates if you use more than one SocMed site. • TweetDeck, TweetDeck, TweetDeck. I don’t know how I ever tweeted without it!

Want to get more insights on using Twitter? Visit www.layersmagazine.com/social-media-twitter.html for a roundtable discussion between NAPP_News and a few of her fellow Tweeps. We’ve also included a list of helpful links to some of the best TwitterTools on the Web, plus a list of common TwitterTypes.

40


What follows are a few definitions for some common terms used in the Twitterverse. “@” reply: Placing the “@” symbol in front of any Twitter UserName puts it in the user’s “reply” column and makes it easy for them to find it. (Note: Twitter recently changed the name of the Reply tab to @[your UserName], so now it shows all tweets where your UserName appears. It no longer has to be at the beginning of a tweet for it to work.) DM: Direct Message. Anyone you follow can DM you without you following him or her back; however, you can’t DM someone who isn’t following you— get it? FailWhale: A term for when Twitter goes down due to a high volume of traffic. Coined for the picture of a cartoon whale that appears when this happens. #FollowFriday: A TweetMeme that happens every Friday. Users tweet the names of other users they think everyone should follow too. Works great when they actually tell you why they think you should follow them. FTW: For the win! Hashtag: A keyword with an # in front of it (e.g., #PSW = Photoshop World). Hashtags add context to tweets and make entire conversations searchable.

OH: Overheard RT: Stands for ReTweet—a method of spreading someone else’s tweets and citing the source. Note: Some people like to use “(via @UserName)” instead of RT. I like RT because it uses fewer characters. SocMed: Social media SocNet: Social networks THX: Thanks Timeline: The window in which all the tweets from the people in your network appear. Your personal timeline can be viewed by clicking on your profile page. TW+ just about anything: An action taking place within the Twitterverse. (e.g., Twhining = whining on Twitter). Tweeps: Twitter users (a.k.a. Tweeple). See definition for “TW+ just about anything.”

IMHO: In my humble opinion

TweetMeme: Any viral social action that happens on Twitter (e.g., #FollowFriday).

IRL: In real life

TweetUp: A meet-up organized via Twitter

JK: Just kidding

Twitterverse: Everything that has to do with Twitter

Lunch: Something you should never ever tweet about unless you’re having it with someone famous—like Ghandi.

Twoosh: A tweet that’s exactly 140 characters long. Made popular in the earlier days of Twitter by @Tweet140.

NSFW: Not safe for work

YW: You’re welcome


One of the things I love (and sometimes loathe) about Twitter is how it’s changing the way we communicate. On the plus side, it’s turning thousands of people into savvy communicators. My motto: If it can’t be said in 140 characters, it can’t be said. Furthermore, I can’t tell you how many news stories I heard on Twitter first before they ever made their way near traditional media outlets. On the down side, it can look to a newcomer

as if a bunch of people are talking but nobody is listening. It can feel like that sometimes, too. But the bottom line is this: Twitter is just a tool for communicating. It’s only what you make of it, and the opportunity does exist for you to make something of it. My best advice is to just jump in and swim. Twitter offers an excellent opportunity to create one-to-one connections if you’re willing to make the commitment. And only you will be able to determine if the effort is worth your time.

In March, Ashton Kutcher challenged CNN to see who could reach a million followers first. Apparently, Ashton won. WTH? Anyone feel like starting an #UNfollowFriday? JK

Want to read more about anything and everything Social Media? Go to www.Mashable.com.

• You put an “@” symbol in front of everyone’s name in everything from blog comments to emails. • You haven’t updated your blog in ages. • You have updated your blog—with posts about Twitter. • You quell the urge to panic when you see the FailWhale. • You can’t say it in 140 characters, so it ain’t worth saying! • Every event that takes place in your life is quickly followed by the thought, “Was that Tweetworthy?” • Nonsensical word MashUps with capitalizations, but no spaces, makes perfect sense to you. • U cnstntly try 2 make sentnces shrtr & shrtr so u can say mor w/less rm. • You absentmindedly add #Hashtags to any given sentence to help give it #context. • Think AutoDMs are the devil.

Twitter has become a media darling, thanks in part to our President and his brilliant leveraging of Twitter during his campaign, and it’s now becoming an integrated arm of our standard media outlets. Don’t believe me? Turn on CNN—or better yet, just follow @CNNbrk.


Launched in 2006, Twitter got a nice boost in 2007 thanks to Leo Laporte and the interactive portion of the South by Southwest festival (anyone remember “SarahGate”?). Events such as the 2008 Macworld keynote have actually been blamed for causing the site to go down due to the volume of traffic. By the end of 2008, Twitter had between four and five million users and that number is still growing. February ’09 heralded a 1,382% yearover-year growth, and in March 2009 alone, Twitter grew its user base by 78%. [Sources: HubSpot and Nielsen Online]

Nancy Massé is the marketing copywriter and “social media ninja” for Kelby Media Group. She’s all over the SocMed universe under various noms de plume but prefers tweeting as @NAPP_News. To see her very first published piece, Google “MyFirstEpicNovel.” Nancy promises to never, ever tweet about what she had for lunch.

42



JONAS BERGSTRAND

[DIGITAL

PHOTOGRAPHY TUTORIAL]

S E Á N

{

}

D U G G A N

there and back again: a photograph’s tale I recently returned from a trip to Hawaii with lots of new photos. In this article, I’ll cover how to integrate the images and Lightroom catalog information from a trip or a location shoot into your main Lightroom catalog back home. We’ll also take a look at synchronizing Develop settings, launching a panorama merge from Lightroom, and essential “round-tripping” techniques for moving files between Lightroom and Photoshop.

Primary Lightroom catalog

[CATALOG TRAVEL STRATEGIES, METHOD 1]


ry storage driv ma e Pri

s

Location back-up drives

Location back-up drives

s

ry storage driv ma e Pri

Location Lightroom catalog

Primary Lightroom catalog

[CATALOG TRAVEL STRATEGIES, METHOD 2]

There are two ways to work with your images while you’re traveling

If your laptop is used only for travel and isn’t your primary imaging

and I’ll cover both in this article. First, if your laptop is your main

computer, then an easy way to keep track of your images while

computer, you can add any new images you take on your trip to

you’re traveling (or on a location shoot) is to create a new cata-

your main Lightroom catalog. Then once you return home, all you

log just for that trip (File>New Catalog). Once you return home,

need to do is transfer the image files to the primary hard drive where

this separate catalog can be integrated into your main Lightroom

your image archive is stored (more on that below). To ensure that

catalog, and in addition to your images, any work you’ve done in

your files are protected when you’re on the road, you should have

Lightroom, such as virtual copies, collections, ratings, keywords,

at least two copies on separate hard drives.

Develop module settings, etc., will be preserved.

[If you’d like to download the images used in this tutorial to practice these techniques, visit www.layersmagazine.com and navigate to the Magazine section. All files are for personal use only.]

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[MOVE FOLDERS USING THE LIBRARY MODULE]

[UPDATE FOLDER LOCATIONS]

If you’ve used Method 1 as described above, once you return home

If you choose to move the image folders outside Lightroom, or have

you need to move the images from the external hard drive to the

inadvertently done so, then you’ll see a question mark next to those

primary drive where your image archive is stored. The easiest way to

folders, as well as on the thumbnails of the images in that folder.

do this so that Lightroom sees the move and keeps track of where

This means that Lightroom can’t locate the folder. Control-click

your images are is to move them within the Library module. To do

(PC: Right-click) on the folder icon and choose Find Missing Folder

this, open the Folders section in the left Panels area of the Library

to reestablish the link between the catalog and the folder. In the

module and drag the folders to the correct location on the primary

subsequent dialog, navigate to the actual location for the folder,

storage drive. You can only move one folder at a time.

highlight it, and click Choose.

[IMPORT NEW CATALOG INTO MAIN CATALOG]

[CHOOSE LOCATION FOR CATALOG IMPORT]

If you’ve used Method 2 as described above, and have created a

In the File Handling section of the Import from Catalog dialog,

separate catalog for all of the photos you created while on your

choose Add New Photos to Catalog without Moving if you’ve

trip, then you can import this catalog into your main catalog. From

already moved the image folders from the travel hard drive to

the File menu, choose Import from Catalog. Navigate to the loca-

the primary storage drive (as described in Step 3). If you want

tion of your Lightroom catalogs, select the one from your trip or

Lightroom to move the images for you, choose Copy New Photos

location shoot, and click Choose.

to a New Location and Import. Click Choose to specify the folder where you want the photos copied (in this example, this is my 2009 folder). Click Import and Lightroom will create a copy of the folder that the images are currently in.


[MAKE TIME ZONE ADJUSTMENT]

[ROUND-TRIPPING WITH PHOTOSHOP]

I rarely remember to change the date in my camera to the local

Although you can use Lightroom to apply a lot of adjustments

time zone when I’m traveling, and if I do, then I usually forget to

to your images, for some tasks you still have to use Photoshop.

change it back to my home time zone when I return. Fortunately,

To make this transition easier, Lightroom provides several menu

Lightroom has a fix for this. In the Library module, open a folder of

commands that lead to specific Photoshop features. In the rest of

images that need a time zone adjustment. Choose Edit>Select All,

this tutorial, I’ll cover a scenario for using Lightroom to launch a

and then Metadata>Edit Capture Time. Select the Shift By a Set

panorama process and “round-tripping” the files from Lightroom

Number of Hours (Time Zone Adjust) option, and in the New Time

to Photoshop and back again.

drop-down menu, select the correct time difference adjustment.

Before sync

After sync


[PANORAMA PREFLIGHT: GLOBAL ADJUSTMENTS]

[PANORAMA PREFLIGHT: SYNC SETTINGS]

Several of the images from my Hawaii trip were photographed specifi-

Once the adjustments have been applied to one of the panorama

cally to make panoramas. Before the panorama is assembled, how-

source images, they can be applied to others in the series if the

ever, global (overall) adjustments are needed. For this image of the

exposure of the different shots is similar, as was the case for the

view taken from Makapu’u Point looking up Oahu’s windward coast,

two files in this Hawaii panorama. With the corrected image

the file was brightened with the Exposure slider, Clarity and Vibrance

thumbnail selected in the Develop module, Command-click (PC:

were increased, contrast was boosted with a Tone Curve, and changes

Ctrl-click) on the second image of the panorama series to add it

were made to the Luminance section of the HSL controls to brighten

to the selection, then click the Sync button on the lower right. In

the foliage colors and darken the blues. (Note: You can download the

the Synchronize Settings dialog, check all the settings that apply

DNGs from www.layersmagazine.com to follow along. Only one of the

(Local Adjustments settings such as the Brush should probably be

images has been adjusted as described above.)

unchecked), and click Synchronize.

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47

Before

After

[LIGHTROOM TO PHOTOSHOP: MERGE TO PANO]

[STRAIGHTEN HORIZON WITH RULER TOOL]

With the source thumbnails for the panorama selected, choose Photo>

Once Photomerge has created the panorama, you can decide if

Edit In>Merge to Panorama in Photoshop. When the Photomerge

you want to keep it or return to Lightroom for further fine-tuning of

dialog appears you can choose the type of layout for the merge. If

the RAW files. In this image, the horizon isn’t straight. To fix it, use

you’re unsure, leave it set to Auto. For scenes with obvious near-to-far

the Ruler tool in Photoshop (grouped with the Eyedropper) and

relationships, Perspective works best, and for landscape panoramas

draw a line along the tilted horizon. Then choose Image>Image

such as this example, I usually choose Cylindrical. Make sure that

Rotation>Arbitrary. The angle measured by the Ruler tool is already

Blend Images Together is selected. Click OK to create the panorama.

entered in the Rotate Canvas dialog, along with the correct direction

(Note: Panoramas can also be launched from Bridge by selecting the

needed to create a level horizon. Click OK to apply the correction.

thumbnails and choosing Tools>Photoshop>Photomerge.)

Layer mask

Before

[APPLY NONDESTRUCTIVE CROPPING]

After

[APPLY ADJUSTMENT LAYERS]

If you want the image shape to be more of a standard rectangle, the

Overall, I was pleased with the way the image looked, but it still

next step is to crop the panorama. Use the Crop tool (C) to define a

needs some tonal fine-tuning in Photoshop. Select Curves in the

rectangular crop box around the image, then click the Cropped Area:

Adjustments panel and set the layer blend mode in the Layers

Hide radio button in the Options Bar, and press Return (PC: Enter).

panel to Screen without making any changes to the curve. In the

This will allow you to undo the crop at a later time if you decide to

Masks panel, click the Invert button to change the Curves layer

go with the original “organic” Photomerge edges. (This only works

mask from white to black. Then use the Brush tool (B) and paint

if your image has layers with no Background and isn’t resized.) To

with white at 30% Opacity over the lighter areas of the mountain.

restore the hidden cropped areas, choose Image>Reveal All.

At this point, Save and Close the file and return to Lightroom.



Drag with Ruler tool along tilted horizon.

[ADD PANORAMA KEYWORDS]

[BRING THE PSD FILE BACK TO PHOTOSHOP]

Since this image and the two original files that created it are either

The layered PSD file is now a part of your Lightroom catalog. At

a panorama or panorama components, let’s add the keyword “pan-

this point you can apply further edits in Lightroom, or reopen the

orama” to these files, as well as any other files in this folder that

current file into Photoshop and work on it there. To do this, select

qualify as pano source images. This makes it much easier to find

the thumbnail of the PSD file and choose Photo>Edit In>Edit in

potential panorama images in your catalog in the future. To do this,

Photoshop CS4 (you can also get this option by Control-clicking

find the Keywording panel in the right Panels area of the Library

[PC: Right-clicking] on the image or thumbnail). A dialog will appear

module and enter the keyword “panorama.”

giving you three options of what data will be brought into Photoshop. Let’s take a closer look at these choices.

Double-click Smart Object thumbnail to edit RAW settings in Camera Raw.


[EDIT IN PHOTOSHOP OPTIONS]

48

[EDIT AS SMART OBJECT]

Edit a Copy with Lightroom Adjustments: Lightroom edits you have

A fourth option appears in the Photo>Edit In menu: Open as Smart

made to the PSD file will be applied to a flattened copy (i.e., no

Object in Photoshop. This works well for RAW files where you want

Photoshop layers) and opened into Photoshop. Edit a Copy: Does

to embed the original RAW file within a layered PSD file. Once the

what it promises—opens a copy of the file into Photoshop with all

file is open in Photoshop, you can double-click on the Smart Object

layers preserved (but no Lightroom adjustments are visible). This is

layer thumbnail to open the Camera Raw dialog. But for a file that

useful if you want to take the file in a different direction than the origi-

already has layers, it doesn’t open an embedded file with all of the

nal PSD file. Edit Original: Preserves all the layers but no Lightroom

layers preserved, which is how this would function if you made a group

adjustments are visible. This last option is what I use most of the time.

of layers into a smart object in Photoshop.

[

Seán Duggan is co-author of The Creative Digital Darkroom and Photoshop Artistry. He teaches regular workshops on Photoshop and Lightroom for photographers. Sign up for his free digital darkroom newsletter at his website, www.seanduggan.com. ALL IMAGES BY SEÁN DUGGAN UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED


]


JONAS BERGSTRAND

[PHOTOSHOP D A V E

{

TUTORIAL] }

C R O S S

a picture’s worth a thousand words

©ISTOCKPHOTO/JOAN VINCENT

I love Photoshop techniques that offer all kinds of possibilities for experimentation—and the following tutorial is a perfect example of one of those techniques. In this issue, we’re going to take a portrait and replace the person’s image with text (think 2009 Grammy posters).


[CHOOSE YOUR PHOTO]

[CREATE VARIOUS TEXT BRUSHES]

Pick a portrait that offers good contrast—a photo that’s very dra-

Create a new document (File>New) in a size that’s smaller than

matic and dark probably won’t work as well. I’ve had the best suc-

your photo: the specifics don’t really matter. Press D to set the

cess with straight-on head and shoulder shots, but again, feel free

Foreground color to black. Use the Type tool (T) to type several

to experiment with all types of photos. For the best results, choose

different words in various fonts and sizes (in this case we used

a photo that has a light background (or select the background

a person’s name). One at a time, draw a selection around each

around the person and make it lighter).

word with the Rectangular Marquee tool (M), and from the Edit menu, choose Define Brush Preset. Name each brush in the Brush Name dialog and click OK.

50



[SELECT THE SHADOWS AND MAKE A LAYER]

[SELECT THE MIDTONES AND MAKE A LAYER]

Switch back to the photograph. From the Select menu, choose Color

Go back to the Select menu and choose Color Range again.

Range. From the Select drop-down menu in the Color Range dialog,

From the Select drop-down menu in the Color Range dialog,

choose Shadows and click OK. (In our example, nothing in the back-

choose Midtones and click OK. If (as in this example) some

ground was selected. If parts of the background are selected in your

of the background is selected, use the Lasso tool (L) with the

photo, see the next step for removing those selected areas.)

Option key (PC: Alt key) held down to circle the areas you don’t

Press Command-J (PC: Ctrl-J) to copy the selected pixels onto a new layer. Click back on the Background layer in the Layers panel.

[FILL THE LAYERS WITH BLACK AND GRAY]

want selected. Then, press Command-J (PC: Ctrl-J) to copy the selected pixels onto a new layer.

[FINE-TUNE THE RESULTS AND MERGE DOWN]

Click the Eye icon next to the Background layer in the Layers panel

If necessary, show the original Background (click where the Eye

to hide that layer from view. Click on the midtones layer and from

icon used to be) and use the Brush tool (B) to paint with black on

the Edit menu choose Fill. Use 50% Gray, check the Preserve Trans-

the shadow layer, gray on the midtones layer, or use the Eraser

parency box, and click OK. Then, activate the shadow layer and use

tool (E) to completely remove areas. (Note: For gray, click on the

the Fill command again, except this time use Black with Preserve

Foreground color swatch, enter R:128, G:128, and B:128 in the

Transparency checked. You should have a very basic portrait made

Color Picker, and click OK.) In this example, we added a little more

from black and 50% gray.

definition to the ears by painting with gray on the midtones layer. Once you’re satisfied, click on the top layer (the shadow layer) and press Command-E (PC: Ctrl-E) to merge it with the midtones layer.


[ADJUST BRUSH SETTINGS AND PAINT TEXT]

[COPY THE PORTRAIT]

Click the Create a New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers panel.

Create a new layer and drag it above the black-and-gray portrait

Press D to set your default colors. Choose one of your custom brushes

layer. Press Command-Delete (PC: Ctrl-Backspace) to fill it with

from the Brush Picker in the Options Bar, and in the Brushes panel

white. This will provide a white background behind our image. Hide

(Window>Brushes), click on the words “Brush Tip Shape.” Adjust the

all the layers except the black-and-gray portrait layer, and then click

Spacing so there’s space between each word. Under Shape Dynamics,

on that layer to make it active. Press Command-A (PC: Ctrl-A) to

vary the size and rotation of the brush. As you paint on the new layer,

Select All and then Command-C (PC: Ctrl-C) to Copy.

experiment with the Shape Dynamics. Repeat with your other custom brushes. For now, just get some “text paint” on the layer—we’ll continue painting in a moment.


[PASTE INTO A LAYER MASK]

[CONTINUE PAINTING, VARYING BRUSHES]

Show all layers and activate the layer with the painted words.

Activate the painted text layer (not the mask) by clicking on the layer

Click on the Add Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers

thumbnail, and continue painting using the different custom brushes

panel to add a layer mask. Hold down Option (PC: Alt) and click

you created. You can also continue to experiment with the brush

on the layer mask thumbnail (this will hide the painted text and

settings for Size, Spacing, and Shape Dynamics. (Although you don’t

show just the mask). Press Command-V (PC: Ctrl-V) to paste the

need a pressure-sensitive pen for this technique, it sure helps!)

copied pixels onto the mask. Press Command-D (PC: Ctrl-D) to Deselect. Press Command-I (PC: Ctrl-I) to Invert the mask (your mask should look like a negative of the black-and-gray pixel image that you pasted). continued on p. 54

52



[ADD A LAYER WITH RANDOM TEXT] The painted text will only appear inside the white and gray areas

If there are areas where you’d like text to appear in the portrait—or

of the mask. To add a bit more randomness to the portrait, add

there’s text showing where you don’t want it to show—click on the

a new layer above the painted text layer. Then use the same text

layer mask and paint with a round, soft-edged brush: use black to

brushes to add a few words here and there outside the boundar-

hide the text, white to show the text, and shades of gray to make

ies of the mask.

the text somewhat visible.


[VARIATION: ADD A GRAIDENT OVERLAY]

54

[PAINT ON THE MASK IF NECESSARY]

[VARIATION: USE TEXT BLOCKS WITH THE MASK]

Here’s a simple variation: Add a Gradient Overlay layer style to the

Use the Type tool to click-and-drag a text box around the entire

painted words layer. Just click on the Add a Layer Style icon (ƒx) at

image. Get a large amount of random text (we used www.blindtext-

the bottom of the Layers panel and select Gradient Overlay. In this

generator.com) and paste the text into the text block. Hold down

case, we clicked on the Gradient thumbnail, and selected the Blue,

Option (PC: Alt) and drag the layer mask from the painted text layer

Red, Yellow gradient in the Gradient Editor. Click OK to close the

onto this new type layer to copy the mask. Then, either hide the

Gradient Editor, then select Screen for the Blend Mode and click

painted text layer, or use both the painted layer and the new type

OK. Hold down Option (PC: Alt) and drag the word “Effects” in the

layer—the possibilities are endless!

Layers panel on top of the “extra words” layer to copy the same layer style to that layer.

[

Dave Cross is Senior Developer, Education and Curriculum, for the National Association of Photoshop Professionals. He is the author of Photoshop Finishing Touches and The Photoshop CS2 Help Desk Book, and is featured on a series of Photoshop training DVDs.


]





59

JONAS BERGSTRAND


[I

LLUSTRATOR TUTORIAL] J A C O B

{

}

C A S S

create a vector font monster Need a monster to gain world domination? In this tutorial, we’ll teach you how to create a font monster entirely out of a single typeface. What you do with it after that is entirely up to you! You’ll learn how to use the Glyphs panel and how to outline, resize, and rotate fonts. And if you’re adventurous, you can try out the Pathfinder panel, as well. Also, be sure to check out Jonathan Yules’ original Helbotica font monster (www.invdr.com), which inspired this tutorial.

[SET UP YOUR DOCUMENT & SETTINGS]

[TYPE THE ALPHABET]

Choose File>New to create a new A4-sized document. For maximum

Select the Type tool (T) and choose a typeface in the Control

efficiency when designing our font monster, you’ll want the Pathfinder

panel that your font monster will be based on. In this tuto-

panel (Window>Pathfinder), Swatches panel (Window>Swatches), and

rial, we’re using the notorious Comic Sans (Bold) just for fun!

Glyphs panel (Window>Type>Glyphs) open and within easy reach.

Drag out a big box to the right of your artboard, and type the

Click-and-drag each panel to the left of the artboard and arrange them

alphabet in both lowercase and uppercase. Also type all of the

into a single toolbar. (Note: To dock panels together, drag the panel

numbers and special characters. Don’t click anywhere just yet.

that you want to appear on the bottom near the base of any panel, and when you see a blue line appear, release the mouse button.)


[MAKE USE OF THE GLYPHS PANEL]

[CONVERT TEXT TO OUTLINES]

Look in the Glyphs panel and you’ll notice a lot of unfamiliar char-

Now you need to create outlines of the characters so that you

acters, but you’ll want to use these characters in your design, so

can use them as objects rather than as a typeface. Choose the

go ahead and double-click on any characters that you find useful. If

Direct Selection tool (A), click once on the type, then Control-click

you’ve clicked outside of the text box, simply use the Type tool and

(PC: Right-click) and choose Create Outlines from the list. You’ll

click back in the box, then double-click on the glyph characters.

notice that all the objects are in one group. We need to separate each character, so Control-click (PC: Right-click) again and choose Ungroup. Each character can now be selected on its own.


[CREATE A BACKGROUND]

[LOCK THE BACKGROUND LAYER]

Click the Create New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers

With the background created, you’ll want to leave this layer on

panel to create a new layer. Choose the Rectangle tool (M) and

its own so you can create a more complex background at a later

drag out a large rectangle over the whole artboard. This will be

time, if you choose to do so. This is just good practice. Click-and-

the background and mood of your piece, so if you’re creating a

drag the background layer to the bottom of the layers stack in the

happy monster, go for a happy color; if you’re doing an angry or

Layers panel. It’s also a good idea to rename the layers. Do this

sad monster, try red or blue. The choice is yours. You can change

by double-clicking on them and naming them in the dialog that

this color later; it’s only here to set the mood of the piece. To

appears. Now click once in the empty square to the right of the

change the color of the rectangle, select it, click on the Fill icon

Eye icon to lock the background layer.

in the Toolbox, then choose a color from the Swatches panel.

60


61

©ISTOCKPHOTO/JOE PERAGINO


[GET INSPIRED]

[DRAG CHARACTERS ONTO ARTBOARD]

When designing, gathering inspiration from a number of sources

With the artboard set up, now comes the fun part—designing

can be beneficial because it helps guide you in the right direction

the font monster! Drag some letters onto the artboard to start

and gives you a base for your designs. Go forth and get inspired

creating your character. To do this, use the Selection tool (V), hold

by whatever you have nearby. You can even draw your own robot

down the Option (PC: Alt) key, and drag a letter from the right side

at this stage; it’s up to you. In this tutorial, we’re continuing with

of the artboard. Holding down Option (PC: Alt) as you drag copies

the comic theme (hence Comic Sans), so for inspiration we’re

the character, which means you’ll be able to use the character more

using a jester illustration from iStockphoto. For easy reference, put

than once. Copy the characters that you think will work to the ap-

the image on your Illustrator artboard. This is also a good time to

propriate positions (i.e., match shapes to the body parts).

save your document.

[RESIZE & REPOSITION YOUR CHARACTERS]

[ROTATE YOUR CHARACTERS]

In the previous step, we positioned the characters in what we

With some of the characters in place, we have a general idea of

thought could work in relation to our font monster. Now let’s resize

what position they need to be in, so we can begin to rotate them.

each of the characters to the right proportions. Click once on a

Click once on a character with the Selection tool and then press

character, press-and-hold the Option-Shift (PC: Alt-Shift) keys, and

the R key to select the Rotate tool. Click-and-drag to rotate the

drag the corner of the character to resize it proportionally from its

selected character in a position you think will work. When finished

center outward. To reposition a character, simply click-and-drag

with that character, press V to choose the Selection tool, click off

it to the new position. Repeat this for the rest of the characters in

the artboard, and click on the next character you’d like to rotate.

sizes you think will work best. Remember to save your document.

You may also want to resize the characters while rotating; just follow the directions in Step 9.


[REFLECT YOUR CHARACTERS]

[ADD TO YOUR MONSTER]

Another thing that comes in handy when creating illustrations

Repeat Steps 8 through 11 and let your creativity run wild to

is the reflection command. Notice that we’ve used two Ls for

create your own font monster. For the advanced users, you

the legs; however, the foot on the left is facing the wrong way.

may be interested in using the Pathfinder panel. Try selecting

We can reflect this L shape and make it face the other direction.

a combination of letters and experimenting with the Pathfinder

With the Selection tool, click on the character, then Control-click

commands. If you need more help with the Pathfinder panel, click

(PC: Right-click) and choose Transform>Reflect. Enter the ap-

Help>Illustrator Help and type in “pathfinder.” Keep experiment-

propriate settings and voilà, your shape will be flipped! You can

ing and repeating these steps and you’ll have a font monster in

also use the other commands under the Transform function to

no time.


manipulate and, strangely enough, transform your shapes.

62

With Adobe Illustrator and a few interesting characters, you too can have your own robot army.

[

Jacob Cass is a 21-year-old designer from Sydney, Australia, who freelances under his business Just Creative Design, which also doubles as a popular design blog. Jacob’s talent has brought him numerous awards and his work has been published in books worldwide. To learn more about Jacob, visit http://justcreativedesign.com. ALL IMAGES BY JACOB CASS UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED


]


[ t y p o g r a phy ]

[

THE ART OF TYPE] J A M E S

{

}

F E L I C I

off the beaten path

I M A G E S : © I STO C K P H OTO I L LU ST R AT I O N : C H R I ST Y W I N T E R

Setting text on curving baselines gets you well beyond how type was designed to be set. You don’t often get to use the word “unnatural” when you’re talking about type, but when it comes to type set on baselines that aren’t straight (so-called type on a path), the word is apt. From the days of the first incised cuneiform tablets, text has been written—then printed—in straight lines. Our whole system of page layout, of text composition, of the shapes of the alphabet’s characters themselves, assumes a straight, horizontal baseline. Computers may have liberated us from the tyranny of the straight line, but they haven’t freed us from the laws of legibility and readability. Getting loopy type to look good isn’t automatic. The most obvious problem when type goes nonhorizontal—even on a straight baseline—is that you have to turn your head to read it. This turns out to have cultural dimensions, as European readers—who are accustomed to reading the spine type on books in a library from bottom to top—are more comfortable reading type going “uphill” than Americans, whose habit of reading spine type from top to bottom makes them more comfortable reading type going “downhill.”

The greatest challenge

[ Getting loopy

But that’s really a design issue. From a typographical point of view, curving baselines mount the greatest challenge, because in addition to head-craning readability issues, curving baselines wreak havoc on the spacing between characters. In the InDesign Type>Type on a Path>Options dialog, you can control how a line of type cleaves to a path. Here you can do a lot of clever and mostly useless things— tricks you may use once but that generally don’t bear repeating. These include all of the choices in the Effect pop-up menu, except for Rainbow, which is the one we’ll talk about here. When using Rainbow, the effect is like bowing a normal baseline, with the stems of the characters rising from it at right angles.


type to look good isn’t automatic. ] For decent character spacing, stick to Align Center. The most important choices in the Type on a Path Options dialog are in the Align and To Path drop-down menus. In Align, you can opt to have your type stand up on the path (the Baseline option), hang

64


65

the path pass right through the centerlines of the characters (Center). Characters standing on the path have normal spacing where they meet the baseline, but their tops get bunched up on concave baselines and spread too far apart on convex baselines. When you choose to have the ascenders align with the path, spacing at the baseline of the characters closes up on convex baselines and spreads apart on concave baselines. The results in all of these cases are bad. You’ll get the most natural character spacing if you select Center from the Align menu and, if necessary, Center from the To Path menu. Here, the top sample shows type that’s set base-aligned to an elliptical path. In the sharpest parts of the curve, character spacing is badly distorted. The middle sample is set top-aligned with the curve, which badly pinches the bottoms of the characters in the tight convex curves. At the bottom is the happy medium: vertically centering the type on the curved path. Using baseline shift to raise the text a couple of points relative to the path improves spacing even more.

of points above where the Center command places it can provide substantially more natural spacing, even in tight corners. It’s inevitable that in tight bends, your type will get looser or tighter, depending on whether the bend is concave or convex. In these places, use your tracking controls to tighten or loosen the overall spacing of words or phrases to establish an even spacing feel throughout the whole text passage. Even after adjusting tracking, some hand kerning will likely be needed.

Choosing the typeface Lastly, the typeface you choose for arcing type makes a big difference in its final look. In general, sans-serif faces fare better than serif faces; all caps text (because the letters have a consistently blockier profile) fare better than caps and lowercase; and condensed or compressed faces tend to look better than those with a wide-set width. Script faces may work on gradual curves, but those with interconnecting letters can either become disconnected or have their connection points overlap—not a pretty thing. Brush faces fare best because their characters are generally not designed to connect, and their calligraphic style gives you more flexibility with their spacing—every little kern isn’t as crucial.

Align: Baseline

Align: Ascender

Align: Center

Note: The To Path menu only comes into play when the path your ©ISTOCKPHOTO/KAWISIGN

type is following has been stroked, that is, given width and color; otherwise, it has no top, center, or bottom to align to.

Better overall spacing Even if you use Align: Center, you’ll still have to do some hand kerning—and possibly some tracking adjustments—where the curves of the path are the sharpest. But there will be far less mopping up to do than with any other alignment option. Another trick to assure better overall spacing is using the Baseline Shift control in the Control panel to make micro adjustments to the type’s alignment relative to the path. Just make sure you have all of

Brush faces and nonconnecting scripts work particularly well on curved baselines, as shown here. Their irregular geometry hides some spacing flaws, and this sample needed only light kerning. Serif faces in particular need more kerning to get character spacing to look something like normal.

the text selected before adjusting this value. Raising the type a couple

[

James Felici is the author of The Complete Manual of Typography (Adobe Press), former managing editor of Publish magazine, and contributor to The Seybold Report, Macworld magazine, PDFZone.com, and Publish.com.


]


down below the path (Ascender) or above the path (Descender), or have

JONAS BERGSTRAND

[

INDESIGN TUTORIAL T E R R Y

{

}

]

W H I T E

improved format The most frequently asked questions I get from people who are new to InDesign revolve around Text Wrap; however, there are also questions about text formatting that don’t get asked. But I know they exist because when I’m presenting in front of an audience and I start formatting text, I can see the look of amazement on some folks’ faces as if they’re thinking, “Hey, I didn’t know you could do that!”


[LET’S START WITH A BLANK PAGE]

[CREATE A TEXT FRAME WITH THE TYPE TOOL]

In this tutorial, we’re going to create a flier for a nail salon. So that

Select the Type tool (T) from the Toolbox and use it to drag out a new

we’re all on the same page, literally, create a new blank 8.5x11" page

text frame on the page. Make it as close to 5x7" as you can when

in InDesign by choosing New>Document from the File menu or by

you’re dragging it out. Of course it’s difficult to be precise when you’re

pressing Command-N (PC: Ctrl-N) on the keyboard. Uncheck Facing

dragging, so switch to the Selection tool, which should automatically

Pages and make your margins .5" all the way around. Click OK.

select your frame as an object, and then key in the exact 5x7" measurements in the Width and Height fields in the Control panel.

66



[ADJUST THE INSET; KEY IN YOUR HEADLINE]

[CENTER HEADLINE; BRING UP THE TABS RULER]

We’re going to add a border to our frame a little later and we don’t

When you keyed in your headline in Step 3, chances are it was left

want that border to actually touch the text in our frame, so before

aligned. So before we go any further, go ahead and insert a couple

we get started putting text in the frame, let’s set an inset.

of new paragraphs (press the Return [PC: Enter] key twice) after the

Choose Text Frame Options from the Object menu. Set the Top,

headline. Now select the headline and click the Align Center icon in

Bottom, Left, and Right Inset Spacing to .25". If the little chain icon

the Paragraph Formatting controls in the Control panel. Once your

is enabled, setting one measurement makes all measurements the

headline is centered, adjust the font and size aspects to your taste.

same. Click OK. Now that you’re back to your text frame, double-

Now put your cursor on the last new blank paragraph that you created

click on it with the Selection tool to switch to the Type tool and key

after your headline and bring up the Tabs ruler from the Type menu.

in your headline.

[SET A RIGHT TAB WITH LEADER DOTS]

[TEST IT BY KEYING IN A SAMPLE LIST]

We’re going to create a list with leader dots. When most people do

Now you can key in your sample list. On the left side, which is where

this, they usually go about it the hard way. But here’s the easy way:

your cursor should be, key in the item name, then press the Tab key

Click the Right-Justified Tab (third one from the left) and then click on

on your keyboard, and your cursor should jump over to the right tab

the ruler near the right indent to add a tab stop. While the tab stop

that we set. Now when you key in your price, it will be right justified

is still selected, go ahead and key in a period in the Leader field.

at the tab stop and there will be leader dots from the item name to the item description that you just keyed in. Just press Return (PC: Enter) to create the next paragraph and your tab stop will be carried down automatically.


[KEY IN PARAGRAPH TEXT]

[ADJUST THE INDENTS ON THE CONTROL PANEL]

Now that you’ve created your list, it’s time to create some paragraph

For the second paragraph of text, let’s indent it on both sides using

text below the list. First, let’s create a standard paragraph of text and

the Indent controls (circled) in the Paragraph Formatting section of

then we’ll add a second paragraph that we’re going to indent in the

the Control panel. Set both the Left Indent and Right Indent to 0.25".

©ISTOCKPHOTO/BVDC

next step. You can close the Tabs ruler at this point.


[ADJUST THE FIRST LINE INDENT]

[USE “PROPORTIONAL PLACE”]

Many times when I receive Word documents that I need to place

Now it’s time to place an image to dress things up a bit. In InDesign

into InDesign, the sender has taken the time to tab in the first line

CS4, there’s a wonderful new feature I call “Proportional Place.” This

of each paragraph. If you use Indents especially in your Paragraph

means you can use the File>Place command, choose your image,

Styles, this becomes a very unnecessary step. Instead of tabbing

and click-and-drag the image onto the page in the exact size you

in the first line of each paragraph, just set a First Line Left Indent

want. InDesign will constrain the proportions of the frame to the

in the Control panel. Here, the first line of the first paragraph has been set to 0.25".

image you’re placing. Using this method, place an image over the right side of the first paragraph of body text.

continued on p. 70

68



©ISTOCKPHOTO/SPIDERBOX PHOTOGRAPHY INC.

[WRAP YOUR TEXT]

[PLACE AN IRREGULARLY SHAPED GRAPHIC]

Of course, the image is now covering part of your text and this is

Wrapping text around a square or rectangle is easy; however,

where Text Wrap comes in (Window>Text Wrap). With the image

wrapping text around an irregularly shaped object requires a few

still selected, click the second icon, Wrap around Bounding Box,

more steps. An irregular object can be a vector graphic such as an

and your text should automatically wrap around your photo. Now

Illustrator or EPS logo or a Photoshop file where you’ve removed

you can adjust how close the text will appear around the sides of

the background. In this example, we’re using a photograph where

your image by adjusting the Offset measurements (as shown). If you

we removed the background and saved it as a layered PSD file. We

like, you can use negative measurements to bring the text closer.

also added a third paragraph to the document.

[WRAP TEXT AROUND IRREGULAR SHAPE] Now go back to the Text Wrap panel and choose the third option, which wraps around an object shape. But you’ll see that it still looks


like all it did was wrap around the bounding box. This is where you have to choose the correct Contour Options: For a transparent PSD file, use the Alpha Channel option; and for an Illustrator or EPS file, choose the Detect Edges option. You can adjust how close the text will appear around the sides of your image by adjusting the Offset measurements (as shown).

[ADD A FRAME BORDER] Now to put the finishing touches on this design, we’ll add a nice border to our frame. Select the Frame with the Selection tool and then choose the weight and style of border that you want from the Control panel (we chose 4 pt, and Thick – Thin). We also changed the headline color to purple and added a subtle green background to bring the desin to life.

[

In his current role as Director for North America Creative Pro Core Business for Adobe Systems, Inc., Terry White leads a team of creative professional product specialists. He’s also the author of Secrets of Adobe Bridge and co-author of InDesign CS/CS2 Killer Tips and The iPhone Book 2nd Edition.

70


]


JONAS BERGSTRAND

[

ACROBAT TUTORIAL T A Z

{

}

]

T A L L Y

the proof is in the pages In addition to using PDFs for final print and Web output, PDF and Acrobat are excellent proofing tools, as well. PDF documents can be used for composite content proofs, color-separated proofs, color-managed soft proofs, and for printing color-simulation proofs. This issue we cover composite and color-separated proofs.

[composite content proofs]


[EXPORT PAGE LAYOUT TO PDF]

[CHOOSE GENERAL OPTIONS]

Composite content proofs are designed to primarily show the content

In the General section of the Export Adobe PDF dialog, choose Small-

of a document—the layout of text and graphics. Composite proofs

est File Size as a starting point from the Adobe PDF Preset drop-down

are usually viewed at 100% of the final output dimension, but usu-

menu. Select Acrobat 5 (PDF 1.4) for Compatibility to provide wide

ally use low-resolution images (for small file size to facilitate rapid

compatibility of your PDF proof. For Pages choose All. In the Options

distribution) and may or may not show accurate color. You’ll typically

area, check both Optimize for Fast Web View (this provides page-by-

create a content proof from within your page-layout application, such

page delivery of a multipage PDF displayed over the Internet) and

as InDesign. To begin, open your page layout in InDesign, choose

View PDF after Exporting (to automatically view your PDF in Acrobat).

File>Export, and select Adobe PDF from the Format drop-down

Note the designation “(modified)” will be added to the name “Small-

menu in the Export dialog.

est File Size” in the Adobe PDF Preset drop-down menu.

72


73 L AY E R S M A G A Z I N E ] [ J u ly / a u g u s t 2 0 0 9

[CHOOSE COMPRESSION SETTINGS]

[CHOOSE MARKS AND BLEEDS OPTIONS]

In the Compression section, set Bicubic Downsampling to 100 Pixels

In the Marks and Bleeds section, check Use Document Bleed

Per Inch for both Color Images and Grayscale Images (this will signifi-

Settings (this will ensure that any bleed elements you’ve created

cantly reduce the file size of your PDF by lowering the resolution of

in your page layout will display properly at the edge of your

your images). Set the Compression to Automatic (JPEG) for “smart”

document in your PDF). You can also check Include Slug Area

JPEG compression. Set the Image Quality to Medium. The default

if you’ve added any text to the slug area at the bottom of your

Image Quality for the Smallest File Size preset is Low—experiment

document that you want included in your proof. Note: To create

with Low to evaluate image quality. Use the default settings for Mono-

a slug area at the bottom of your InDesign document, choose

chrome Images, and then check on Compress Text and Line Art, and

File>Document Setup, click on the More Options button in the

Crop Image Data to Frames (both of these will reduce the file size of

Document Setup dialog, and enter dimensions in the Slug fields.

your PDF without affecting viewing quality).

[CHOOSE OUTPUT OPTIONS]

[SAVE AS PRESET; EXPORT PDF]

In the Output section, set Color Conversion to Convert to Destina-

Before you click the Export button to create your PDF, press

tion. Set the Destination to Adobe RGB (1998) (the default sRGB

the Save Preset button located in the lower left-hand corner of

is okay for Web output proofs; however, many print-oriented users

the Export Adobe PDF dialog. Name your new preset “Comp

have Adobe RGB assigned to their monitors). Make sure the Profile

Proof,” and click OK. Your Comp Proof preset will now appear

Inclusion Policy drop-down menu is set to Include Destination

as a choice in your Adobe PDF Preset drop-down menu located

Profile (including the profile will help provide more accurate viewing

at the top of the Export Adobe PDF dialog. You can now use

on the receiving monitor). If your images are already in an RGB

this as a one-step method for creating composition proofs.

color space you may not see much reduction in file size, but CMYK

Now click the Export button to create your content-accurate

images will be reduced by a minimum of 25%, along with file size

proof of your document that’s small enough to quickly email or

reductions from Step 3.

post on the Internet.


[color-separated proofs]

[USE PRINT DIALOG INSTEAD OF EXPORT]

[CHOOSE ADOBE PDF 9.0 FOR PRINTER DRIVER]

Creating color-separated PDFs is a quick-and-easy way to make

Print dialogs vary depending upon application version and operating

sure you’ve assigned your print colors properly. High-quality PDFs

system. Here you see InDesign CS4 with Mac OS 10.5. In your print

can be created either directly from InDesign or through Distiller,

dialog, choose Adobe PDF 9.0 as your printer driver (in this example,

a standalone application used specifically for creating PDFs from

we selected the driver from the Printer drop-down menu). Note: If

PostScript. If you’re creating multiple PDFs from large documents,

you decide to use Distiller, you’d typically choose a PostScript printer

Distiller is a better option than working through InDesign. Here

driver rather than a PDF printer driver.

we’re going to use InDesign to create a color-separated PDF. Instead of using the Export function as we did for the composite proof, let’s go to the Print dialog (File>Print), which provides ready access to controlling separations.


[SELECT PAPER SIZE]

[MARKS AND BLEEDS OPTIONS]

In the General section, choose All to view color separations for all

In the Marks and Bleeds section, check on the settings based on

document pages. In the Setup section, designate the Paper Size

whether or not you want to include marks and bleeds. Remem-

for your PDF. Your choice here depends upon whether or not you

ber, if you choose to add marks and bleeds, you need to make

include marks and bleeds. If you don’t include marks and bleeds,

sure you’ve chosen Custom for the Paper Size in the Setup

your PDF will have the same dimensions as your page layout docu-

section; the paper dimensions will automatically increase to

ment (here 8.5x11"). If you do include marks and bleeds, choose

accommodate your marks and bleeds. And just as we did in the

Custom from the Paper Size drop-down menu. When you select to

comp proof above, you can choose to include the slug area if

include marks and bleeds (see next step), InDesign will automati-

you included one in your document with messages or notes.

cally enter the proper dimensions to accommodate the additional space required.

74


75 L AY E R S M A G A Z I N E ] [ J u ly / a u g u s t 2 0 0 9

[CHOOSE SEPARATIONS FROM COLOR MENU]

[CHOOSE PDF PRESET]

The Output section is where you designate whether your output will

Click the Printer button located near the lower-left corner of

be composite or separations. Click on the Color drop-down menu

the Print dialog. This will activate a second Print dialog in which

and choose Separations. Notice you have a variety of composite

you can choose the PDF Preset you’d like to use. Choose PDF

outputs, as well as an In-RIP Separations choice. Choose Separations

Options from the unnamed drop-down menu located near the

because you want the colors to separate in the PDF prior to the doc-

middle of the dialog. From the Adobe PDF Settings drop-down

ument information going to the RIP. Also note under the Inks section

menu, choose the PDF preset you want to use (here High Qual-

there’s a list of all the assigned colors in this document. This example

ity Print), and the application you’d like to use to view the PDF

shows four process and one spot color available for separation.

after creation (here Adobe Acrobat Pro). Click the Print button to activate a Save dialog, name your PDF, and select a location

[VIEW COLOR SEPARATIONS IN ACROBAT]

KP ©ISTOC

HOTO/L

OW EEZSN

JULIEN PHOTO/S ©ISTOCK

PHOTO

to save it.

After clicking the Save button, you’ll be returned to the original Print dialog. Click the Print button to initiate the creation of your PDF. If you monitor your print queue you’ll notice that Distiller is automatically launched to create the PDF. A color-separated version of the PDF will appear in Acrobat. Navigate through the PDF file to view each color-separated page (here the cyan and spot color pages are shown). Note your specific dialogs may vary somewhat from those shown throughout this tutorial, but the basic steps are the same. The most important setting is to locate the Composite and Separations choices.

[

Taz Tally is the author of Acrobat and PDF Solutions from Wiley Press, as well as numerous other digital imaging books on Photoshop, scanning, digital photography, and prepress. Visit Taz’s websites www.taztallyphotography.com and www.tazseminars.com. ALL IMAGES BY TAZ TALLY UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED


]

JONAS BERGSTRAND

[

DREAMWEAVER TUTORIAL J A N I N E

{

}

]

W A R N E R

add style to your lists There are many good reasons to format text with the unordered list tag, but that doesn’t mean you have to settle for the vanilla bulleted-list style you get from plain old HTML. Add a little CSS to your lists and you can create accessible, versatile designs that fit the look and feel of any website—and follow Web standards. Here are a few CSS tricks for formatting lists. (This tutorial works for both Adobe Dreamweaver CS3 and CS4.)

[START WITH A SIMPLE BULLETED LIST] Enter the text you want to use in your list and make sure to separate each item with a paragraph
tag, not a break

tag. The Unordered List feature (Format>List>Unordered List) in Dreamweaver only works properly if it’s applied to elements separated by paragraph tags. If you try to format text with the unordered list and the bullets don’t appear before every item, it’s probably because they weren’t separated by paragraph tags. To fix the list, just delete any space between list items and press the Return or Enter key before each item in the list. Next, convert your list items to links (Modify>Make Link).

76



[CREATE NEW STYLE FOR LIST ITEMS]

[CHANGE THE BULLET STYLE]

To create a new style that will alter the look of each list item,

In the CSS Rule Definition dialog, choose the List Category on the

you’ll want to create a style for the
tag. Choose Format>CSS

left. Here you can change the style of the bullet by selecting any of

Styles>New to create a new CSS rule. Under Selector Type, choose

the options in the List-Style-Type drop-down menu. If you prefer, you

Tag and then select li from the drop-down list to the right of the

can replace the bullet with your own image by clicking on the Browse

Selector Name field (or type li into the field). Click OK to continue to

button next to the List-Style-Image field and selecting the image you

the CSS Rule Definition dialog.

want to use in place of the bullets. You can also remove the bullet completely by choosing None (as we did in this example). Click OK.

[STYLE LINKS IN AN UNORDERED LIST]

[ADD SPACE BETWEEN BULLETED ITEMS]

You can alter the way links display in an unordered list in much the

The default HTML style for unordered lists places list items too close

same way you’d alter any other links on the page, and you can use

together for most designers, but it’s easy to add a little breathing

compound styles (by choosing Compound for the Selector Type

room. Just create a new style for the li tag (as you did in Step 2), or

in the New CSS Rule dialog) to create link styles that only affect

edit your existing li style by double-clicking on the style name in the

links within an unordered list. For instance, you can create a style

CSS Styles panel. In the CSS Rule Definition dialog, choose the Box

named ul a, which will only affect the link tag when it appears

Category and use the Margin and Padding settings to increase the

within the unordered list tag. So you could remove the underline

space around the list items. In our example, we added 10 pixels of

from all links that appear within unordered lists by choosing the

space to the Bottom of each list item.

Type category in the CSS Rule Definition dialog, and under TextDecoration, click on the None checkbox.


[USE COLOR AND PADDING FOR BUTTONS]

[DEFINE DIFFERENT LINK STYLES]

You can create colored boxes around your links by defining a CSS

A great way to create a rollover effect is to create a second link

rule for the active link, or a:link tag, that combines a Background-

style for the hover link state, a:hover. And here’s another trick:

Color (such as the light blue shown here) with a Width (ours is set to

Duplicate the a:link style you created in Step 6 by Control-clicking

100 px) and Padding (5 pixels Top and Bottom and 10 pixels on the

(PC: Right-clicking) on the style name, then choose Duplicate,

Left) in the Box Category. And here’s the trick that makes it work: In

and name the new style ul a:hover. You want all of the elements

the Block Category, you need to set the Display option to Block. In

of the style to be the same (same Padding, Width, etc.) except, in

this case, we used a compound style ul a:link so that links will only

this case, for the background color (see next step). Starting with

display this way if they’re contained within an unordered list.

a copy of the a:link style means all you need to change are the formatting options you want for the hover style.


[DEFINE THE A:HOVER STYLE]

[PREVIEW TO TEST ROLLOVER EFFECTS]

This time, we changed the Background-Color in the a:hover

In order to test any styles you create that are triggered by a rollover,

style to yellow so that when visitors to the site roll their

you’ll need to preview the page in a Web browser (File>Preview

cursor over a link, the only effect will be that the background

in Browser). As you can see here, when a cursor rolls over the light

color changes from light blue to yellow. For more complex

blue links, they turn yellow, because that’s the background color we

rollover effects, use different background images in the Active

defined in the a:hover style.

link and Hover link styles. You can also change the font color, font face, and other formatting options to alter the text style.

continued on p. 80

78



[REMOVE INDENTING BY STYLING UL TAG]

[USE BORDERS TO CREATE DIVIDING LINES]

You can increase, decrease, or remove the amount of indenting

To add a line between each list item, define or edit the li

by defining a style rule for the ul tag. Remember, the HTML for

tag and set only the Bottom options in the Border Category.

an unordered list includes the
and close
tag, which

Similarly, you can use borders only on the Left, Right, or Top

surrounds the entire list, and the
tag, which sets off each list

to create dividing lines. Make sure that Margins and Padding

item. Thus, if you define a style for the ul tag (just as you did for

in the Box Category are set to 0 to remove any space between

the li tag in Step 2), you can use the Box category to set the Pad-

the list items, and set the Width to 110 px (as shown here).

ding to 0 and the default indenting will be removed. Similarly, you can add indenting by adding Padding to the Left.


[TURN LIST HORIZONTAL]

[USE COMPOUND STYLES]

The trick to making an unordered list display horizontally across

If you want to use different formatting options for lists of links on

a page is to create or edit a style for the list item
tag and

the same page, consider surrounding each list with a div tag that

in the Block Category of the CSS Rule Definition, set Display to

includes an ID style, and then use that ID style as part of the com-

Inline. Note: If you’ve set Display to Block in the style for the link

pound list. For example, you could use a div with ID style #navbar

tag, you’ll need to remove the block setting (i.e., the Display field

around your main navigation links and then a div with an ID style

should be empty) for the links to appear horizontally. You can alter

#sidebar around another list you want formatted differently on the

the space between links, background, etc. by changing the Pad-

page. In this case, you’d create compound styles, such as #navbar

ding and color settings.

ul and #sidebar ul, respectively.

[

Janine Warner has authored more than a dozen books about the Internet, including Dreamweaver CS4 for Dummies. She’s also the host of more than 50 hours of Web design video training for Total Training. A popular speaker, she has been working online since 1995. To learn more, visit www.JCWarner.com.

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]


JONAS BERGSTRAND

[F

LASH PROFESSIONAL TUTORIAL] L E E

{

}

B R I M E L O W

mapping in Flash One of the most important skills for Flash developers to learn is how to utilize the vast collections of Web APIs that are available for services such as Flickr, Twitter, Facebook, and mapping using either Google or Yahoo! In this tutorial you’ll learn how to integrate Google Maps into your Flash application using just a few lines of code. The Google API is incredibly easy to use and it’s extremely powerful.


[DOWNLOAD THE GOOGLE MAPS API]

82

[INSTALLING THE API]

The first step in adding Google Maps to your Flash application is to

In the sdk/lib folder of the SDK you’ll find a file named “map_1_9.swc.”

first download the necessary files. Go to http://code.google.com/

Copy (Command-C [PC: Ctrl-C]) this file to the clipboard. If you’re

apis/maps/documentation/flash in your browser. This site is where

on a Mac navigate to [user folder]/Library/Application Support/

you can find all of the information on using Google Maps inside

Adobe/Flash CS4/language/Configuration/Components (create a

of Flash, so be sure to bookmark it. Find the section on the right

new folder named “Components” if you don’t already have one). If

called “How do I start?” and download the Software Development

you’re on a PC navigate to [user folder]\Local Settings\Application

Kit (SDK) using the link posted in the second item in the list. Unzip

Data\Adobe\Flash CS4\language\Configuration\Components (create

the downloaded file to your desktop.

a new folder named “Components” if you don’t already have one). Create a new folder named “Google” and paste (Command-V [PC: Ctrl-V]) the SWC file into this new directory. If you had Flash open you’ll need to restart it before trying to work with the API.

[If you’d like to download the file used in this tutorial to practice these techniques, visit www.layersmagazine.com and navigate to the Magazine section. All files are for personal use only.]



[OPEN THE FLA FILE]

[ADD THE GOOGLE MAPS COMPONENT]

Download the tutorial files for this article at www.layersmagazine

Before you can start using Google Maps you first need to add the

.com. Open the map.fla file in Flash CS4. In the Library there’s a

component to your application. Open the Components panel by

movie clip of the Adobe logo that you’ll be placing on the map

selecting it from the Window menu. You should see the Google

at the Adobe offices in San Francisco. There’s a single layer in

folder that you created earlier. Twirl down the folder and you

the Timeline named “actions.” The actions layer is where you’ll

should see the GoogleMapsLibrary component. Drag the compo-

be placing all the ActionScript code for this project. This project

nent into the Library to add it to your project. You’ll now be able

will be built entirely using ActionScript and you won’t be adding

to access all of the Google Maps APIs.

anything to the Stage.

[CREATE A BASIC MAP]

[GET AN API KEY]

Select the first keyframe of the actions layer and open the Actions

One of the things that you have to do when using Google Maps

panel (Window>Actions). Enter in the code shown in the image

is to get an API key. Even though it works without one, you need

above. The first three lines import the Google Maps libraries.

to get one to prevent breaking the license agreement. Go back

Line 5 creates a new instance of the Map class, which is the main

to the API website and click on the link in the first item in the list.

object that creates the map. Line 6 is where you’ll need to add

Agree to the terms and then enter in the website that you’ll be

your API key, which we’ll get to in the next step. Line 7 sets the

using the map on. If you don’t know, just enter http://localhost.

size of the map to the same size as the Flash stage. Finally, line 8

Click the Generate API Key button and then copy the resulting

adds the map to the display list so we can see it.

key to the clipboard (it will ask you to sign into your Google Account if you’re not already signed in). Now replace MY_API_KEY in the code with your key.


[TESTING THE MAP]

[ADD SOME CONTROLS]

Go ahead and test your application (Control>Test Movie) to make

Now you’re ready to begin adding some controls to the map

sure that you’re seeing the basic map. You should see a zoomed

so users can manipulate it. Add the highlighted code into the

out map of the world but without any of the controls, such as a

Actions panel as shown above. The first line of code adds a

zoom slider or map type selector, that you’re used to seeing on

new ZoomControl to the map. This adds a slider that the user

Internet maps. These will be added in the next step. You must

can use to zoom in and out on the map. The second line adds

wait until the map ready event fires before adding any controls

a MapTypeControl that allows users to select between the

to the map. Enter in the highlighted code shown above into the

different map types available such as satellite or hybrid. Press

Actions panel. The onMapReady function is where you’ll begin

Command-Return (PC: Ctrl-Enter) to test the movie and try out

manipulating the map.

the map controls.


[CENTER THE MAP]

[HOW TO FIND LATITUDE AND LONGITUDE]

At this point the map is centered on the world map and is zoomed

You may be wondering how I found the coordinates for the Adobe

all the way out. Now you’ll reposition the map so that it’s centered

office. There are numerous ways to get this information. The easiest

at the Adobe offices in San Francisco. Enter in the above highlighted

is to first search for an address on the Google Maps site (http://

code into the Actions panel. To the setCenter method we send in

maps.google.com). Once the map is centered on the address,

three items: the latitude and longitude of the Adobe office, the

simply type javascript:void(prompt(‘’,gApplication

desired zoom level, and the type of map. The user can, of course,

.getMap().getCenter())); in your browser’s address bar and

change these things, but this is how we want the map to show at

hit Return (PC: Enter). You’ll see a pop-up with the coordinates that

the start. Test your application to see the new center.

you can paste into Flash. The Google Maps API has the ability to do this directly from Flash, but that’s out of the scope of this tutorial.

84



[CUSTOMIZE THE MARKER]

[ADD A MARKER] Enter the above highlighted code into the Actions panel. The first

In the Library panel you’ll see a movie clip named “marker.” Dou-

line creates a new Marker object at the Adobe offices. There are

ble-click on it to enter edit mode. You’ll see an image of the Adobe

many different options available for how the marker will look and

logo surrounded by a custom marker graphic. It’s important that

behave. For now we’ll just keep everything at their default values.

the point of the marker is on the crosshairs of the registration point.

The second line of code adds the new marker to the map. Test the

This movie clip has been set up with a class name of “marker” so

application to see the default marker. Now wherever you move

we can attach it at runtime. Click on Scene 1 at the top left of the

the map, the marker will always be visible at the Adobe office. In the

Stage to exit edit mode. Add the highlighted code to the Marker

next step we’ll customize this marker with the Adobe logo.

object to tell it to use the custom marker (note the changes made at the end of line 16). Test your application.

[OTHER MARKER OPTIONS]

[WHERE TO GO FROM HERE]

In the last step you customized the look of the marker but there’s

In this tutorial you’ve created a very simple mapping application

much more that you can do. Since the marker is just a regular movie

in Flash but have only scratched the surface of what’s possible

clip, it can contain animation, video, or any other type of interactive

with the Google API. There’s a full geocoding API that allows

content that’s supported in Flash. Markers are not the only types of

you to get latitude and longitude coordinates for points on the

overlays either. You can draw lines and shapes and add them to the

map or from addresses. You can also get directions between two

map to create rich, interactive mapping applications.

points or addresses on the map. You can find the full API reference by clicking on the link in item 4 on the API website that you downloaded the SDK from.

[

Lee Brimelow is a Platform Evangelist with Adobe and an award-winning interactive designer. Lee runs the free tutorial site at www.gotoandlearn.com and a Flash-related blog at www.theflashblog.com. He is also the author of several titles for Lynda.com dealing with Flash and After Effects.

]

ALL IMAGES BY LEE BRIMELOW UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED


JONAS BERGSTRAND

[

AFTER EFFECTS TUTORIAL] S T E V E

{

}

H O L M E S

the power of words

©ISTOCKPHOTO/YHLOON

Typography is one of the qualities upon which we base most of our design work, and the type animation engine in After Effects offers a gamut of ways to express typographic flair. One of my favorites is the ability to control the 3D motion and position of text characters. When combined with simple camera moves, depth of field, and some realworld studio tricks we use every day, the results can be—literally—powerful. Let’s get started.


[CREATE PROJECT; ADD BACKGROUND, TYPE]

86

[ADD AND EDIT 3D CAMERA]

Create a New Composition, named “Power of Words,” at HDTV

Now, go to Layer>New>Camera, choose 15mm from the Preset

1280x720 resolution with a 6-second duration, and then double-

drop-down menu in the dialog, and click OK (if you get a 2D warn-

click the Project panel to import an image to use as a background.

ing dialog, just ignore it for now). Press P on your keyboard to reveal

For this example, I purchased a vector illustration of blurry lights

the camera’s Position properties, and adjust the Z position value to

(#4292586 from www.istockphoto.com). Drag the image into the

–600 for the time being. Now go to Layer>Transform>Auto-Orient,

Timeline at 0 seconds and use any effects to adjust color or con-

choose Off, and click OK.

trast, as well as an Effect>Blur & Sharpen>Fast Blur to soften focus. Go to Layer>New>Text, and enter the main text. We’ve styled ours using Helvetica Neue (85 Heavy and 35 Thin), 30-px size, Optical kerning, Tracking 10, black, and centered. [If you’d like to download a finished movie for this tutorial, visit www.layersmagazine.com and navigate to the Magazine section. All files are for personal use only.]



[ADJUST 3D POSITIONS]

[DUPLICATE AND ADJUST TEXT]

Click the 3D Layer switch next to both the text and background

Twirl up the background image layer’s properties, select the

image layers in the Timeline, then select the background image

text layer, and press Command-D (PC: Ctrl-D) to duplicate it.

layer, hit P, and set the Z position to 3000 in the far distance. Now,

Click the Solo box on the left of the Timeline for that layer and

press Shift-S to show the Scale property also, and scale the back-

in the Character panel, change its color to white. (Note: Go to

ground image until it touches the edges of the full composition.

Composition>Background Color and change the color to black so you can see your white text.) Now, change the Font family to be the same throughout—in this case Helvetica Neue 45 Light, the Size to 24 px, and the Tracking to 100.

[EDIT TEXT; RENAME LAYER]

[ADD FIRST TEXT ANIMATOR]

Now, double-click the T icon next to the layer’s name, then type

Now for the animators! Twirl down the Long line of type layer, twirl

in a series of words or sentences of your choice. The longer the

down Text, then click the arrow to the right of the word “Animate”

line, the better the finished 3D strings of text will be, so feel free to

and choose Anchor Point to add your first Animator. Click on the

type and copy-and-paste to extend the lines. You’ll notice that the

name of the Animator, press Return (PC: Enter), and rename it “Ani-

layer’s name becomes rather awkward to work with, so when finished,

mator 1 – Anchor Point” for easy recognition. Go back to Animate

click on the name of the layer, press Return (PC: Enter), and rename

and choose Enable Per-Character 3D from the menu, then adjust

it to “Long line of type” or something short to that effect.

the Anchor Point Animator’s Y value to sit in the vertical middle of the type—in our example, around –9. This enables rotators we add later to spin from the center of the letters, not their baseline.


[ADD SECOND TEXT ANIMATOR]

[ADJUST POSITION AND WIGGLE VALUES]

Twirl up and deselect Animator 1, then go back to the Animate

In the Position value within the animator, adjust the XYZ values to 400,

menu and choose Position, which adds a second animator. Rename

600, 400, respectively. As you can see, this blows the characters

it “Animator 2 – Position Wiggle,” then next to the new name, click

far apart easily. And if you scrub the Timeline, it looks crazy too—

Add and choose Selector>Wiggly. This is where the fun and creativ-

but this is easy to control. Twirl down Wiggly Selector 1, set the

ity really begin!

Wiggles/Second to 0.05 (it will show 0.1 when you press Return [PC: Enter]), and most importantly, set the Correlation to 96%. This causes the letters to remain more in line with each other, forming a gently rippling line of type.


[ADD THIRD TEXT ANIMATOR]

[ADD FINAL ANIMATOR]

Deselect all, go back to the Animate menu, select Rotation, and

Deselect all, go back to the Animate menu, choose Character Offset,

next to the new animator, click Add and choose Selector>Wiggly.

and then add a Wiggly Selector into that new animator. Rename

Rename this animator “Animator 3 – Rotation Wiggle,” then adjust

this animator “Animator 4 – Character Offset,” then go to the newly

the X, Y, and Z Rotation selectors to 1x, 2x, 1x, respectively. Now

added Character Offset value and set it to 10, and the Character

twirl down Wiggly Selector 1 and adjust the Wiggles/Second to 0.35

Alignment to Center. Now adjust its Wiggles/Second to 2 and its

and the Correlation to 0%, and scrub the Timeline. This correlation

Correlation to 0%, then view the results. Looking pretty cool!

value allows the random rotation to apply to the characters individually, which looks very cool.

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[ADD RANDOM LAYER ORIENTATION]

[DUPLICATE, DUPLICATE, DUPLICATE]

Now to adjust the entire layer’s rotation in anticipation of the next

Everything we’ve created so far is referencing Wiggle values, which

step, twirl up the entire text layer, then hit R to reveal its Rotation

are created randomly in After Effects on a layer-by-layer basis, so if

property. Hold down Option (PC: Alt), click on the Stopwatch for

we duplicate this layer, we’ll get wildly different results. Twirl up the

X Rotation to add an expression field, and type in wiggle(0,180),

text layer, select it, then press Command-D (PC: Ctrl-D) to duplicate

then hit Enter to confirm. This will randomly rotate the layer up to

it. Not only do you see a new spread of text characters in completely

180° on the x-axis, but with no motion. Now repeat this process to

different positions, but the layer name has added “2” to the end,

add expressions to both the y- and z-axes, using wiggle(0,360) and

which is why we renamed it. Now, duplicate as many times as you

wiggle(0,180), respectively.

like to suit your design.

[ADJUST AND ANIMATE CAMERA]

[ADD DEPTH OF FIELD; MOTION BLUR]

Turn off the Solo icon for all of the type layers, then select the

Finally, press AA to reveal the Camera Options, then turn Depth

Camera 1 layer and change its Z Position value to –900. At 00:00

of Field to On. Change the Focus Distance to 300 and the Aper-

seconds, click the Position Stopwatch to add a keyframe, then

ture to 80 pixels—this gives us perfect focus on the final wording

scrub to 04:00 seconds and change the Z position value to –300.

line at 04:00. Feel free to turn on the Motion Blur switch for all of

Select that second keyframe and go to Animation>Keyframe

the text layers, then render your final movie.

Assistant>Easy Ease In (PC: Shift-F9), or adjust the velocity to suit your own design.

A really powerful, and even slightly disturbing, motion piece created easily and quickly thanks to some careful planning, animators, wigglers, and expressions, and of course some good “Energi.” Enjoy!

[

Steve Holmes is the creative director at Energi Design in Sausalito, California, the award-winning motion graphics and Web design house. He also speaks at various design conferences on the subjects of After Effects, motion graphics, and typography. Steve races as a professional cyclist in the U.S. and Europe, and can be reached at [email protected]. ALL IMAGES BY STEVE HOLMES UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED


]

[layers reviews] the straight scoop on all the latest graphics gear

CINEMA 4D R11 Studio Bundle


3D ANIMATION STUDIO TAKES GIANT LEAP

MAXON Computer recently released the newest version of their 3D animation toolbox, CINEMA 4D R11 Studio Bundle. The Studio Bundle includes the following modules: Advanced Render, MOCCA, MoGraph, Thinking Particles, HAIR, Dynamics, Sketch and Toon, and NET Render. A few years ago, I jumped from R9 to R10 and thought it was a pretty significant update. Well that jump was pretty minuscule compared to the changes and additions in R11. Expanded integration brings new workflow tools and boosts performance for both Mac and PC users. If you’re running Mac OS X Leopard, the Cocoa-based application takes advantage of the 64-bit processing, but what does that mean? Well, if you’re running the latest and greatest in Apple’s collection of workstations, then you can work with up to 32 GB of RAM! This is all due to the fact that CINEMA 4D R11 is now completely Cocoa-native. In short, rendering large, complex scenes can easily be done in a single pass more quickly and with hardly any hiccups. The newly revised Advanced Render 3 module takes rendering to the next level. Of course, the standard renderer is much faster but the Advanced Render brings great improvements to Global Illumination and Caustics, which make renderings much more realistic. Global Illumination was rewritten to bring faster speeds and reduce artifacting. On the animation side, there are many new features for true nonlinear editing. Motion Clips allows you to create multiple object animations— sort of presets, if you will—that can be inserted and moved around without breaking the overall animation. Essentially, you can record a title flying in while the letters rotate separately from left to right. If you needed to reverse the rotation, however, you can set up the rotation as a Motion Clip and manipulate it how you’d like without affecting the fly-in. CINEMA 4D R11, and the now-included BodyPaint 3D, brings tight integration with Adobe Photoshop. This means a much simpler workflow for editing digital mattes and full 3D environments. Wacom support is now available, and Photoshop ABR brushes can now be imported. Integration doesn’t stop with Photoshop. I like the fact that I can transfer cameras, lights, and null objects (with coordinates for syncing) that have been animated in CINEMA 4D into After Effects. This way I can do the bulk of the 3D elements in CINEMA 4D and carry the project over to After Effects for finishing.

Some other new features worth mentioning are the Doodle tool for in-frame note-taking, CineMan for compliance with Pixar’s RenderMan, and the COLLADA plug-in for interchangeable file formats. CINEMA 4D R11 is definitely a significant release and seems to be more solid than ever. It brings great features and yet still keeps the learning curve to a minimum for ease of use. Even though it’s really geared toward TV and film, it comes with a hefty price tag, especially after adding the extra modules. But that doesn’t mean it’s not worth the extra cost. The bottom line is if you’re heavily into motion graphics with After Effects and Photoshop and want to transition into 3D animation, CINEMA 4D R11 Studio Bundle is definitely the way to go.—Jason Scrivner

Company: MAXON Computer

Price: $3,695

Web: www.maxon.net

Rating: ● ● ● ●

Hot: Faster rendering; 64-bit processing; Adobe integration Not: Cost; minimal online training compared to other software

90



Before

Epson Discproducer PP-100 CD AND DVD DUPLICATOR AND PRINTER

I’ve used a number of disc publishers (machines that integrate disc duplication with disc printing) throughout the years. While not perfect, the Epson Discproducer PP-100 is the best disc publisher I’ve used to date. Discproducer is a PC-only product that runs fine under Apple’s Boot Camp. It’s made up of two Pioneer burners that are capable of write speeds of 40x for CDs, 12x for DVD±R, and 8x for DVD±R DL (dual-layer). The unit connects to your PC using a single USB 2.0 cable (included). While not the speediest of burners in this class, they do burn simultaneously which can speed up the overall workflow. Underneath the two burners, Epson added the technology that makes this unit stand out: a six-color, single-disc inkjet printer capable of printing up to 1440x1440 dpi on regular-sized discs only. The six cartridges (cyan, light cyan, magenta, light magenta, yellow, and black) have an astonishingly long life and can be replaced individually, unlike the integrated cartridges used by all other systems. The unit can duplicate and print up to 100 discs unattended. It does this by using a series of stacker trays and an automated robotic arm that grabs a disc, inserts it into one of the burners, then moves it to the printer, and finally to an output tray. The whole system is managed by the Epson Total Disc Maker software that has three main sections: Disc, Label, and Publish. All the specs in the world don’t mean much if the final product isn’t up to par, so here’s the bottom line: Every disc printed and copied without any errors. Discproducer is a capable disc duplicator with impressive print quality on both watershield and glossy media. As a complete package, it’s the unit to beat in its price range for ease of use and print quality.—Rod Harlan

After

ProScale ID

INDUSTRIAL-STRENGTH SCALING PLUG-IN FOR INDESIGN

The Scale tool in InDesign is fine for resizing selected objects on a page. But when you need to resize an entire document, especially one with multiple pages or to a vastly different shape, you need an industrialstrength tool—one that has some intelligence built in. That’s the purpose of ProScale ID, a plug-in for InDesign CS–CS4 that lets you resize a multipage document with control over what gets scaled, and how. ProScale ID allows you to nonproportionally scale all the pages of a document, including the text, while maintaining line and stroke widths. In many cases, you can use it to resize an ad to a new shape, and the result is 90% done. I used it to resize a multipage book chapter to a new page size with a different aspect ratio than the original. The result required some resizing of the text, but all the frames were in perfect position. There’s a useful Fit To menu for common sizes such as A4, A5, business card, CD cover, banner ad, 1/3 page, ½ page, letter size, tabloid size, etc. It’s great for converting letter-size to A4, and its Bleed preset is useful when you suddenly need to include the bleed area inside the document page. If you often resize documents to the same dimensions, you can save your settings as a preset. Now for the problems: ProScale adds a tool to the Toolbox that I couldn’t make work, but it duplicates the InDesign Scale tool, so you can ignore it. Also, saving a preset can be a challenge because the Save button is grayed out until you temporarily click the Default button. If you need to resize a book, ProScale will pay for itself in the first use. If you often resize ads and other collateral material, it will save you lots of time and energy.—Jay Nelson

Company: GLUON, Inc.

Price: $149

Web: www.gluon.com


Hot: Saves time when resizing complex or multipage documents Company: Epson America, Inc.

Price: $2,695

Web: http://discproducer.epson.com


Not: Toolbox tool is useless; saving presets has interface glitch

Hot: 6-color ink printer; excellent print quality Not: Disc burners could be faster; Windows only


Episode Pro

ALL-IN-ONE CROSS-PLATFORM MEDIA ENCODER


I was apprehensive about adding Episode Pro to my growing list of compression applications; however, I’m glad I did. It’s truly an all-inone solution for encoding on the Mac and PC. The first thing that stands out about Episode Pro is the depth of the software. You can encode in literally every format and, even if you’re not an expert with compression, it includes numerous presets for different workflows and formats. If you have a deeper understanding of compression, you can customize virtually every setting possible in a compression job, which comes in handy when you need to finetune compression to create the desired results. Episode Pro allows you to set up watched folders that it will monitor, and when you drop a finished project into the designated folder, it automatically starts encoding with your desired settings. In addition, Episode Pro has intelligent monitoring that allows you to monitor subfolders, specify the file types you want to encode or ignore, and filter files to encode automatically. Plus, the software allows you to specify delivery destinations to automatically deliver files after encoding. One of the best features is a plug-in for Apple’s Compressor that allows you to encode in all formats available in Episode Pro from one convenient and familiar interface inside Compressor. Episode Pro is a sequential encoder, meaning it will encode files in order and needs to finish each file before moving on to the next. Also, it doesn’t allow for distributed rendering between multiple machines on a network, even when using the Apple Compressor plug-in. If these features are important to your workflow, Telestream offers a product that does both called Episode Engine; however, it’s four times the cost of Episode Pro.—Erik Kuna

Company: Telestream, Inc.

Price: $995

Web: www.telestream.net


Eos Wireless

IPOD SPEAKERS THAT PACK A LOT OF PUNCH The Eos Wireless core system (available in black or white) ships with a base station transmitter and one satellite speaker. The base station has two built-in tweeters and a ported down-firing subwoofer for 2.1 stereo surround sound, and can support up to four satellite speakers. The unit is very simple to use. Just plug in the unit, dock your iPod (or use the auxiliary audio input for other devices), press play, and pump up the volume. With the help of SRS WOW! sound-enhancement technology, the base unit delivers nice, clean, much-better-than-average sound and bass than you’d expect from an iPod system. The best part of the system is the satellite speakers. The compact speakers have their own built-in power supply and can be plugged directly into any outlet to hang solidly from the wall. The plug can also be disconnected from the back of the speaker for shelf or countertop placement. The base station automatically locates the speaker almost instantly. Each satellite speaker is also a self-contained 2.1 stereo system (two tweeters and a ported back-firing subwoofer). The speakers deliver even better sound and bass than the base station. Each speaker has its own independent volume control and delivers plenty of volume before distortion kicks in. We set up four speakers in four different rooms, plus the base station in a fifth room, and it filled the entire house with music. The only problem we encountered was with the speaker in the kitchen; anytime the microwave was in use, the signal to the speaker was completely lost. Overall, the system is impressive. Keep in mind, however, that depending on the number of speakers you need, it can become quite expensive. A core system with three additional speakers will run you almost $640.—Chris Main

Company: IntelliTouch

Price: Core system: $249.99; Additional speaker: $129.99

Web: www.eoswireless.com


Hot: Automation; customization; ease of use; Compressor plug-in Not: No distributed rendering; sequential encoding

Hot: Better-than-average sound and bass Not: Price for speakers adds up quickly

92



GroBoto 2.1.8 3D MODELING APP THAT YOU CAN’T PUT DOWN

Now this is a program that will get your creativity flowing and get you out of any modeling rut that you may be in. GroBoto 2.1.8 is like a breath of fresh air as it’s unlike the majority of 3D programs out there that are complicated and expensive. This program is fun, easy to use, and best of all it’s very inexpensive! That’s almost unheard of these days because most users suffer before they can actually enjoy the 3D programs. Why is GroBoto so cool? Well, GroBoto is designed to give the user organic 3D shapes quickly with very few modeling hassles. As a matter of fact, some of the standard 3D tools that you’re used to seeing aren’t even present. What you get here is something called a Bot, which is a preset 3D object in GroBoto derived from a collection of 3D primitives. Once you place a Bot into your scene, you use an abundant set of tools and options to customize the shape and textures that your Bot is made up of. While the ability to import your own 3D models isn’t available, there are more than 110 Bot types to inspire your creativity, and you can create some very cool stills and movies much quicker than you could in some of the other 3D programs. GroBoto has to be one of the most enjoyable, visually stimulating software programs that I’ve reviewed. Although it isn’t a full-featured 3D program, it is a creative outlet to get the juices flowing again. I’ll definitely keep this one on my desktop! GroBoto is a great product to expand your creativity without spending a fortune.—Bruce Bicknell

Company: Braid Art Labs LLP

Price: $79

Web: www.groboto.com


Hot: Unlimited creativity; 3D creation tools; render time; fun Not: Can’t import 3D models


[

reviews]

Toon Boom Animate


POWERFUL VECTOR-BASED ANIMATION SOFTWARE Ask Web animators what application they use, and the majority will tell you it’s Adobe Flash. That’s too bad. Although Flash CS4 has made great strides by adding 3D and inverse kinematics (bones) to its toolset, it’s a limited animation program when compared to Toon Boom Animate. Toon Boom Animate includes the following features that Flash lacks: lip-syncing, 3D multiplane cameras, cell swapping, multiple brush tools, and motion blur. Like Flash, Animate includes onion skinning, animateable effects, path editing, gradients, inverse kinematics, masks, reusable symbols, sound support, layers, vector shape tools, and multiple color palettes. Animate’s palette support is much more complex and fully featured than that in Flash. For instance, each drawing tool in Animate can have its own color. In Flash, if you chose stroke and fill colors, all drawing tools will use those colors. Morphing in Animate is also much more feature-rich than it is in Flash (where it’s called Shape Tweening). Animate contains a suite of tools and controls to allow you to get exactly the morph you want, and it can import most standard formats, including MOV, SWF, PSD, AI, and PDF. It can export QuickTime movies, FLV, and SWF (Flash) files. As a long-time Flash animator, I most enjoyed using Animate’s lipsynching tools, as this task has always been arduous in Flash. Animate lets you draw mouth shapes for each common sound. It then analyzes the audio and automatically maps mouth shapes to the soundtrack. You can override its analysis if necessary, manually choosing which mouth shape to use at a specific time. Traditional animators will love the fact that Animate includes Xsheets (exposure sheets), which are spreadsheet-like charts used to plot out animations in a standard film and video workflow. Animate’s Xsheets are more than just charts; you can plot keyframes on them instead of on the Timeline if you prefer that workflow. I find it best to use both the Timeline and the Xsheet. The Xsheet gives you many more details about what’s going on in each frame; the Timeline gives you a quicker, more-compact overview. A strong point for Flash is also one of its weak points: its small number of tools. The smaller the tool set, the easier the application is to learn. New users can be up and running with Flash within a few hours. On the other hand, Animate’s complexity means a steeper learning curve without the plethora of books, courses, and online training videos you can find for Flash. To help new users, Toon Boom has loaded their website with training videos and “getting started” documents. Another strong point in Flash is ActionScript. Flash isn’t just an animation tool, it’s also a computer-programming platform. Toon Boom has wisely chosen to focus only on animation, so you can’t use Animate

to code interactive movies or games, but Animate does include a scripting language that allows you to automate repetitive tasks in the application itself. One thing missing from Animate is a Type tool. If I had to choose between animating text in Animate or Flash, I would choose Flash. Although Flash has a Type tool, its text-animation features are sorely lacking. I usually animate text in After Effects, which includes the most advanced text-animation tool I’ve found. Available for both Mac and PC, Animate retails for $999.99 Compare that with Flash, which is few hundred dollars cheaper, retailing at $699. Those prices seem about right, given the animation features of the two applications.—Marcus Geduld

Company: Toon Boom Animation Inc.

Price: $999.99

Web: www.toonboom.com


Hot: Full-featured; powerful tool for professional animators Not: Pricey compared to Flash; no Type tool

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NIKKOR AF-S DX 18– 105mm f/3.5–5.6G ED VR COMPACT, VERSATILE ZOOM LENS


Nikon has crammed a lot of features and zoom range into a compact, lightweight, and inexpensive little powerhouse, the AF-S 18–105mm f/3.5–5.6G ED VR lens. This dynamo packs a 5.8x zoom in a body that weighs less than a pound and is a mere 3.5" long. As if size and weight aren’t enough, the lens includes an alphabet of Nikon features that’s longer than the lens itself. Incorporating Vibration Reduction (VR) technology, I found Nikon’s claim of being able to handhold the lens at shutter speeds up to three stops slower than normal to be right on, if not a bit modest. The lightgathering ability (maximum aperture) is about what you’d expect from a compact, lightweight lens at f/3.5–5.6, but the VR technology helps to make up for the lack of aperture speed in low-light situations. Not only does the lens have an ED (extra-low dispersion) element, there’s an aspherical element as well—which is optimized for digital SLRs— rendering a tack-sharp image. Exclusively designed for digital SLR cameras with a DX sensor, the zoom range of 18–105mm (27–157.5mm equivalent) is great for photographing subjects from landscapes to portraits. And with a minimum focus distance of 1.5', it works reasonably well as a close-up lens, offering up a 1:5 reproduction ratio. In actual use, the AF-S Silent Wave Motor was very quick and accurate to acquire and lock focus. The nonrotating front element makes it a breeze to use a polarizing filter without having to fine-tune it once it’s adjusted. Who is this lens for? Anyone who wants a small, lightweight, affordable lens that covers a wide range. I consider this the “everyday” lens for owners of DX-format digital SLR bodies.—Laurie Excell

Company: Nikon USA

Price: $399.95

Web: www.nikonusa.com

Rating: ● ● ● ● ●

Digital Juice Fonts

A COLLECTION OF VERSATILE, GREAT-LOOKING FONTS

Digital Juice Fonts is a new multivolume collection of layered graphic fonts that can be endlessly customized and used in all of your print, video, and Web projects. Currently, there are three collections containing more than 4,000 individual graphic presets and community fonts (see below): Collection 1 contains 35 font families (2,500+ fonts), Collection 2 has 10 font families (1,000+ fonts), and Collection 3 has 12 font families (850+ fonts). An illustrator has drawn each graphic font, and the results for some are absolutely gorgeous. And each font is separated into 5 to 12 layers so you can easily turn on and off layers, as well as add effects to each layer, using the included Juicer software. My favorite part of the whole collection is that Digital Juice has built a community aspect into the product that allows users to design and share their own presets. This means you can collect even more graphic fonts for absolutely free. What’s more, many of the community fonts are so good they’re actually worth paying for! The Digital Juice website has also added a number of muchneeded training videos that extends the life of the product. Training includes using Juicer, as well as using DJ Fonts in Adobe Premiere, After Effects, and Photoshop; Apple Motion and Final Cut Pro; and Sony Vegas. With output options from Juicer that includes PNG, JPEG, Targa, TIFF, BMP, and PSD, you’re pretty much guaranteed compatibility with most video, animation, Web, or print applications. Both Mac and Windows OS are fully supported. All in all, this is a terrific collection for anyone who’s tired of the same old Photoshop layer styles and wants to put a little “art” back into their typography.—Rod Harlan

Hot: High-resolution, compact lens with Vibration Reduction Not:

Company: Digital Juice, Inc.

Price: $149.95–499.95

Web: www.digitaljuice.com


Hot: Quality selection of graphic fonts Not: Additional activation

96



Toast 10 Titanium Pro CD/DVD MEDIA AND AUTHORING STUDIO FOR MAC Burning CDs and DVDs is built into most operating systems, so it amazes me that the value for this product remains. But with the tenth version of Toast sporting tremendous updates, improvements, and revisions, Roxio continues to provide more than just a better burning option. Having reviewed every version over the years, I’m still impressed because with each version Roxio bundles even more tools for a very well-rounded suite for burning and archiving your media. Roxio is moving forward and responding to the new formats, technologies, and the demands of their customers. According to Vito Salvaggio, Sonic Solutions V.P. of Consumer Products, “We want to make sure that, as consumer usage patterns change and evolve, our product evolves with [them].” It was an expected pleasure to find support for the newer AVCHD video archive type (used by newer models of HD camcorders) and that things such as Disc Cover and CD Spin Doctor are still there, too. The Toast 10 Titanium Pro package includes versions of SoundSoap (noise-reduction audio software); FotoMagico (HD image presentations); LightZone (image editing); Streamer (content streaming to iPods, iPhones, and other mobile devices); and Sonicfire Pro (soundtrack editing for video), plus support for Blu-ray and high-definition authoring. Salvaggio continues, “We asked ourselves, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we could move the entire contents of the camcorder to a pristine archive?’ so you can archive and back up your [video] in its original high-def quality.” The answer is, indeed, yes. Is Toast a necessity? If you find yourself doing a lot of archiving, video, and duplication of media (including iPods, iPhones, and external drives), then the answer is, again, yes. Toast 10 will save you a lot of steps and expenses with great results.—Daniel M. East

Company: Roxio

Price: $149.99

Web: www.roxio.com

Rating: ● ● ● ● ●

Hot: Full-featured; easy to use; superior to OS disc burning Not:

Portraiture 2 MUCH-IMPROVED SKIN RETOUCHING PHOTOSHOP PLUG-IN There are quite a few plug-ins, tricks, and techniques for creating smoother skin in portrait images, but finding that “just-right” method for your most-frequent corrections can become a time-consuming and costly endeavor if it’s all trial and error. With Imagenomic Portraiture 2, there’s a balance of smoothness and color to the output. While it can do more than just correct images, it can be overkill if not used judiciously. There’s a lot of improvement in the new version that jumps right out at you, starting with a vastly improved user interface. The performance was also appreciably improved over version 1, and the addition of unlimited user presets saves a lot of time in the fine-tuning. The factory presets, however, should really be a jumping off point—particularly when used with smaller and lower-resolution images—and seem to have a cooler colorcast. Another wonderful, yet simple improvement is that Portraiture 2 now generates a new layer in Photoshop, saving steps. Clearly, Imagenomic has taken note of what their end users are asking for and made some major enhancements to an already fine product. As always, the results tell the story, but Portraiture 2 is now more intuitive, easier to navigate, and better performing than ever.—Daniel M. East

Company: Imagenomic, LLC

Price: $199.95

Web: www.imagenomic.com


Hot: Great results; big improvements; performance Not: Presets can be harsh for certain image sizes


JONAS BERGSTR AND

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TIPS & TRICKS]

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FAUX SHORTCUTS Strange but true: You can’t assign custom keyboard shortcuts to the commands in the Character panel flyout menu or the faux styles at the bottom of the panel. No shortcut for Faux Bold; no shortcut for Faux Italics; no shortcut for Small Caps. But rather than having to open the Character panel to access these features, make them available as tool presets in the Options Bar. Just click the tool preset thumbnail at the far left of the Options Bar to open the Tool Preset Picker, select New Tool Preset from the flyout menu, name your new preset, and then click OK. When you’re ready to use your preset, select it from the Tool Preset Picker, then set the font and font size in the Options Bar—all without having to clutter the screen with the Character panel.

www.LAYERSMAGAZINE.COM

ALPHA SELECTIONS A great way to make a complex selection is to fi nd the color channel that has the best contrast between the edges of the subject and the background, and use that channel as the basis for an alpha channel. Did you know that you have ten color channels from which to choose? Use the Image>Duplicate command then, depending on the current color mode of your image, use the Image>Mode menu to convert to RGB, CMYK, or Lab mode. Look for the channel that contains the greatest contrast, and use that

channel to make your selection. After your selection is complete, go to Selection>Save Selection, name your new alpha channel, and click OK. Once you’ve completed your alpha channel, you can return to the original image and use Select>Load Selection to load an alpha channel from any open document of exactly the same pixel dimensions.

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UPDATE YOUR APPEARANCE One of my favorite Illustrator CS4 features is the updated Appearance panel. Not only can you turn effects on and off by clicking the visibility Eye icon, but you can also change the Fill color, alter the Stroke color and weight, and add effects directly from the panel by clicking on the Add New Effect icon (ƒx) at the bottom—no more visiting three or four other panels or menus to make changes.

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VALIDATE YOUR CODE BEFORE YOU PUBLISH

If you ever want to use a style but don’t actually want to stay connected to the style (removing the option of future updates), you can use the Break Link to Style option found in the flyout menu of the Paragraph Styles panel (Window>Type & Tables>Paragraph Styles). In fact, all the style panels—Paragraph Styles, Character Styles, Table Styles, Cell Styles, and Object Styles—have a break link option. Personally, I usually prefer to make a new style, but it can be useful for a one-time-only format.

Code that’s not validated runs a greater chance of having problems in different browsers. You can eliminate this problem by validating the code inside of Dreamweaver. Click on the Validate Markup icon at the top of your document and select Validate Current Document from the drop-down menu to check your code against a variety of formats. (Note: If you don’t see a series of icons just below the title bar at the very top of your document window, click the little button at the far right of the title bar to toggle those icons on.) If you select the Settings option from the drop-down menu, you’ll be taken to the Dreamweaver Preferences dialog, where you can change what languages and technologies you want to validate against.

If you like to use the Control panel (or the Character and Paragraph panels) to apply formatting directly to text—or if you receive a file with format overrides on every style—the Redefine Style option in the Paragraph Styles flyout menu is for you. It updates the style definition to match whatever the selected text is set to—removing the format override warning (the little plus sign next to the style name). To make sure you don’t select multiple, nonmatching formats, it’s often better to simply place your cursor in the text rather than make an actual selection.

USE YOUR FAVORITES The Insert panel in Dreamweaver has a ton of different things you can use—but how can you keep track of the ones you use most frequently? Go to the Favorites panel (select Favorites from the drop-down menu at the top of the Insert panel) and Control-click (PC: Right-click) anywhere in the panel. A pop-up window will appear allowing you to add your favorite components from each section, creating a panel with all of the stuff you need and none of the stuff you don’t. (Note: If you’re using the Classic workspace and you have the Insert Bar at the top of your screen, click the Favorites tab above the Insert Bar.)

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CUT THE CROP If you crop your document with the Crop tool (Tools> Advanced Editing>Crop Tool), you can use the Document> Examine Document menu command to remove data that was outside the crop box. Just click the Remove button at the bottom of the Examine Document Navigation Panel. However, if an object, including invisible compound boxes, overlaps inside and outside the crop box, the object isn’t deleted.

RESIZING A DOCUMENT Speaking of cropping, everyone knows you can use the Crop tool to make a document page smaller (in appearance, anyway). But did you know you can use the Crop tool or the Document>Crop Pages menu command to enlarge a document’s size? For example, you can change a smaller document to a letter-size page. Just select one of the options from the Page Sizes drop-down menu in the Change Page Size section of the Crop Pages dialog. This doesn’t scale the content, it just changes the page size, also known as the media box. Also, you can’t make a page size truly smaller than it was originally created. To do these last two items, you would need a third-party plug-in, such as Enfocus PitStop Professional (www.enfocus.com) or Callas pdfToolbox (www.callassoftware.com).

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COMMENTS IN TIME You can easily add comments to your Timelines in your Flash documents. Select a layer’s keyframe, type a comment in the Property Inspector’s Label name field, and then choose Comment from the Type drop-down menu.

CLEAN UP YOUR DOCUMENT’S LIBRARY Choose Select Unused Items from the Library panel’s flyout menu to highlight symbols not used in your movie. Then, click the Trash icon at the bottom of the Library panel to delete all the unused symbols at once.

TRANSFORM UNDO You can use the Transform panel (Window>Transform) to quickly remove all of the transformation values from an object. Select the object and click the Remove Transform icon at the bottom right of the panel.



[Adobe InDesign CS4]

JONAS BERGSTR AND

[CREATIVE SUITE Q & A]

sweet answers for suite questions [Adobe Photoshop CS4]

[Adobe Illustrator CS4]

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How can I lock some guides and not others?

PC: www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=4048

Create a new layer group by clicking the fifth icon from the left at the bottom of the Layers panel. Drag those layers on which you want to show the effects of the adjustment layer into the group. At the top of the Layers panel, change the group’s blend mode from Pass Through to Normal (this is the key to restricting the adjustment layer). You can now add the adjustment layer in the group, and it will only apply to those layers that are both within the group and below the adjustment layer.

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Can I create a multicolumn text box like I can in InDesign?

Extract is now an optional install for Photoshop CS4, along with several other plug-ins, including Picture Package, Web Photo Gallery, and Pattern Maker. You can download the optional features from the following links:

I know how to restrict an adjustment layer to one layer (Option-click [PC: Alt-click] on the line between the adjustment layer and the layer immediately below it in the Layers panel), but how do I apply an adjustment layer to some but not all layers?

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Yes. First, you need to create a text block by clickingand-dragging with the Type tool (T). Another option is to create a shape and click on it with the Area Type tool. (The interesting thing about the latter option is that any shape can be used, not just a rectangular shape.) With the text block selected, use the Type>Area Type Options menu command and choose the number of Columns and the column Gutter space. As you’ll notice, you can also divide the shape into rows—and with the Text Flow Options you can auto-flow text going left-to-right/top-to-bottom or top-to-bottom/left-to-right. I suggest turning on the Preview to make sure you’re getting the columns and or rows just the way you want.

You can select individual guides and use the Object> Lock>Selection menu command, but I prefer to use a master layer for my guides, with the guides themselves on sublayers. Guides are created on the active layer (but can be moved between layers like any other object), so with some attention to detail up front, the guide sublayers can be locked or hidden as needed.

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What is InCopy? Someone suggested I look into it for our editing process? InCopy is like an editing-only version of InDesign with a few Microsoft Word features added in. Basically, the InDesign user exports the stories as assignments to different editors. Using InCopy, the editors can edit the stories (and possibly photos) while the InDesign user is working on the layout (generally not the same layout that the editor is editing, but it could happen). Everyone has to check the assigned stories out and back in, preventing two people from editing the same story at the same time. InCopy costs about a third of the retail price of InDesign, but isn’t available in any of the Creative Suite packages. If your current workflow requires that edits be done by the designer (creating a bottleneck in the workflow) or the budget is being blown purchasing InDesign for all the editors, InCopy is definitely worth checking out.

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Yes. Those items are considered visual aids, which can be turned on and off. At the top of the page, you should see a series of icons. (Note: If you don’t see a series of icons just below the title bar at the very top of your document window, click the little button at the far right of the title bar to toggle them on.) One of these icons allows you to toggle your visual aids on and off on a page. You can toggle widths and borders, CSS layout elements, and editable regions, among other things. This is a great feature if you want to see your page as it will be rendered.

[Q]

In the Box Category in the CSS Rule Definition dialog, there are settings for both Padding and Margin. Aren’t these essentially the same things? Though Padding and Margin both provide distance, they’re not necessarily the same thing. Usually used when creating div tag elements for a page, the Padding refers to the space on the top, left, right, and bottom from within the container. The Margin refers to the top, left, right, and bottom on the outside of the container, pushing other elements around in a layout. Keep in mind, however, that both Padding and Margin both affect the overall size of a container. If you need a div container that’s 800 pixels wide with a Left and Right Margin of 10, and a Left and Right Padding of 10, then you would set the overall width of the container to 760 pixels

There’s nothing built into InDesign for doing this with the possible exception of writing a custom script. Assuming you’re asking because you’re not familiar with writing scripts, there’s another possibility: Woodwing Smart Image. It can take the caption and credit, entered in XMP or IPTC metadata, and place it on the page when the photo is placed. Text and object styles can be applied to the caption during placement. More info and a 30-day trial can be obtained at www.woodwing.com.

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I get a periodic warning that certain actions can’t be undone when working in Acrobat. I end up making a copy of the file just in case I mess up. Is there a better way to keep from having all these dupe files?

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My form won’t work on a Mac system—it works great on Windows. What’s the problem? Most likely, the Mac user is using Preview—the default program for viewing many files including PDFs. Have the Mac user change the default to open PDFs in Adobe Reader or Acrobat (whichever they have). To change the default, they just need to click on a PDF, press Command-I for Get Info, choose either Adobe Acrobat Pro or Adobe Reader from the Open With drop-down menu, and then click the Change All button. Alternatively, if it’s just a one-time thing, simply drag the PDF on top of the Adobe Reader icon on the Dock.

Can I use Flash video on my website even though I don’t have a streaming server? Yes, you can; however, the video will be progressively downloaded from the server rather than streamed. Video that’s progressively downloaded begins playing as soon as part of the video has been downloaded. If the video file is large or the connection is slow, the video will stop playing until more is downloaded. To add progressively downloaded video to your Flash document, open the Import Video dialog (File>Import>Import Video). After selecting the video you want to import, click the radio button next to Load External Video with Playback Component, then click the Continue button.

Yes. If you really don’t need to keep the file, but are just experimenting with the tools or just want to print the resultant document, simply don’t save the file. I run into this all the time and after I get the warning, I use the File>Revert menu to go back to my last saved version.

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If I’m designing something in a table, I don’t like the fact that the outlines of the table and the dimensions of the table are visible. Can I block that from appearing?

Is there any way to have InDesign automatically add captions from separate text files when photos are placed?

[Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro]

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After completing a tween, my object disappears on the Stage. How do I keep it visible after the tween has finished? Use this shortcut to extend the time an object remains on the Stage after it has completed a tween: Press the Shift key and click-and-drag the last frame of the tween to the right in the Timeline. Release the mouse button on the last frame you want the object to appear on the Stage.


L AYERS MAGA ZINE ][ july / august 2009

[Adobe InDesign CS4]


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4 Over, Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104–105 www.4over.com

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GridIron Software, Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37 www.gridironsoftware.com

Peachpit Publishing Group . . . . . . . . . . . . .71 www.peachpit.com

Adorama Camera, Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .113 www.adorama.com AMC Colorgrafix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .106 www.amc-color.com Artistic Photo Canvas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25 www.artisticphotocanvas.com

[I] iStockphoto.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . IFC–3 www.istockphoto.com I.T. Supplies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10 www.itsupplies.com

Photoshop CS4 Down & Dirty Tricks. . . . . 102 www.kelbytraining.com Photoshop World Conference & Expo. . . 55–58 www.photoshopworld.com Print Factory, Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .112 www.GoPrintFactory.com

Axiotron . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .63 www.axiotron.com

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PrintRunner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .114 www.printrunner.com

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Kelby Training . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95, 108 www.kelbytraining.com

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B&H Photo. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .117 www.bhphotovideo.com

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BlackRapid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .93 www.blackrapid.com

Layers Magazine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .116 www.layersmagazine.com

Boss Logo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .109 www.bosslogo.com

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Really Right Stuff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .49 www.reallyrightstuff.com

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Shutterstock. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .IBC www.shutterstock.com

MacMall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BC www.macmall.com

Smith Micro Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .43 www.mysmithmicro.com Softpress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .79 www.softpress.com

CDW. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9 www.cdw.com

Markzware Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .69 www.markzware.com

Copy Craft Printers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .107 www.copycraft.com

Media Graphix. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .115 www.mediagraphix.com

Corel. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11 www.corel.com

Media Lab, Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .81 www.medialab.com

cPanel. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .116 www.cpanel.com

Mpix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15 www.mpix.com

Wacom. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7 www.wacom.com/americas

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Fotolia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29 www.fotolia.com

onOne Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .53 www.ononesoftware.com

Zoo Printing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .116 www.zooprinting.com

[U] UPrinting.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110–111 www.uprinting.com

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Every attempt has been made to make this listing as complete as possible. However, its accuracy cannot be guaranteed.



For advertising information, please contact Kevin Agren, VP, Sales at 813-433-2370 Fax: 813-433-5013 Email: [email protected]















[DESIGN CONTEST]

] LAY E R S B A C K P A G E ] WIN ALL THREE COLLECTIONS OF DIGITAL JUICE FONTS

HERE’S YOUR CHANCE TO WIN COLLECTION ONE, TWO, AND THREE OF DIGITAL JUICE FONTS! The Mission ] In this issue of Layers magazine, Jacob Cass teaches us how to make a font monster in Illustrator (p. 59) and Dave Cross shows us how to replace an image with words in Photoshop (p. 50). Your mission is to use these techniques to create your very own font creations. And since our cover story is “Silver Screen Styles,” you must incorporate your font creations into a fictitious movie poster of your own design.

The Judging ] The judges will be looking at the creative use of fonts and the quality of the overall design of the movie poster. Keep in mind that we have to be able to clearly tell what object the fonts represent (whether it’s your very own font monster, a car, a tree, etc.) and that you don’t want to use any copyrighted material from actual movies. (Note: Please proofread your designs, or have someone proofread them for you. Typos have a negative impact on the judging.)

The Prize ] The grand prize winner will receive Collection One, Two, and Three of Digital Juice Fonts. That’s a retail value of nearly $500! The three collections offer 57 font families with access to more than 4,350 stunning fonts created by the artists at Digital Juice. These fonts contain lots of layers and effects that make it easy to create new fonts; are compatible with video, animation, Web, and print; and come in super-high resolution. Think of the font monsters you can create with that! (Check out page 96 for a review of Digital Juice Fonts.)

The Deadline ] September 14, 2009. The winner will be announced in the November/December 2009 issue of Layers magazine.

FOR COMPLETE DETAILS, VISIT WWW.LAYERSMAGAZINE.COM/ DESIGNCONTEST.HTML.

“FOURTH ANNUAL LAYERS 100 WICKED TIPS” MUSIC CD DESIGN WINNER (Layers March/April 2009)


Title ] The Drip Drop Caps Prize ] SiteGrinder 2 Pro and a two-year Designer ] Angela Lawrence subscription to Kelby Training Online

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Layers Magazine 2009-07-08

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