Ps Weekly

Hello All!

I hope you had a good weekend. Ours was spent getting prepped for wannabe-hurricane, Tropical Storm Fay and getting this BLOG! up and running respectably enough to send to Mom. She prolly won’t read it, but it’s good to keep Mom’s in the loop, right? Speaking of moms, I saw…nah, it’s prolly too early to go there (:

The real story here is that my wife, Jennifer, toiled over the architecture of this BLOG! for almost the entire weekend. Only taking breaks to iron sheets and fold cloths. Man, am I am one lucky guy or what? (:

Okay, so here’s some news to brighten your Happy Hamburger Tuesday:

• Do you constantly hump the refresh button on your favorite news sites to see if anyone has swiped your copyrighted work? Well, hump no longer: A new product from Idee Canada called TinEye. It’s very cool stuff! You just upload your image (like, that one image that you thought TIME magazine stole from you) and TinEye crawls the Web, inspecting images pixel by pixel, checking to see if someone out there has used your image illegally. If it proves to work, this will be some pretty powerful software. Their CEO, Leila Boujnine, told PC Pro that, “TinEye does for images what Google did for text.” That’s an intensely bold statement! Can you imagine the huge lumps of backpay if you had your images registered at the US Copyright Office and TinEye found that someone misappropriated your image?
• We just received our house copies of Photoshop User September 2008! Woohoo! And it looks absolutely beautiful! Man, sometimes it just makes me wanna pound myself in the face! Huh? Oh, never mind lol Just grab a copy, flip through it, and you’ll see what I mean when I harp on and on about “working with the best people in the business” (: Oh, I almost forgot to mention, this is an EXTRA special edition. Our President of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) and Editor-in-Chief of Photoshop User (a.k.a. my Chief; a.k.a. a bunch of other things), Scott Kelby, had a little birthday surprise in mind for me this issue. He’s aware that I’ve been struggling to get up to speed with everything here and that I haven’t really had time to write anything substantial lately. So, to push me into the deep end of the pool and get me swimming, Scott asked me to write the “From the [Managing] Editor” article for this issue! This is a great honor because that page usually comes from the Chief—and only the Chief. It came out great, and thankfully we had a headshot on hand because Scott shot me awhile back while he was working on that “Cool, Gritty Look” everyone’s been after.
• You’ll notice a new “Life” tab at the top of the center window: I have the strangest [poop] happen to me on a daily basis, so we’ve added this as a space for me to vent and describe the full range of craziness—from good to bad. I just need to find a way to keep kids out so I don’t have to worry about my mouth!

Whelp, I guess that’s it for now. I’ll try to get something written up for the Life tab this evening. I’ll probably password protect it or find a way to incorporate an age-verification window…or something. Anyways, if I don’t see you (due to some sort of technical difficulties and/or whatnot) then have a GREAT WEEK!

Chow Mien~

~Issac

Tags: Editor Note, Hurricane Fay, Issac, Issac Stolzenbach, Kelby Media Group, Life Tab, NAPP, National Association of Photoshop Professionals, Photoshop, Photoshop User, Photoshop User magazine, Scott, Scott Kelby, Sept. 2008, TinEye, Tropical Storm Fay

Hello All!

I’m like Garfield when it comes to Mondays, and typically wouldn’t/shouldn’t write a post on Monday, but here’s a couple things I came across today that were just too cool to pass up:

1) Scott’s got a shot of a model that’ll make your freakin’ chest hurt. Seriously. It’s that beautiful: http://www.scottkelby.com/blog/2008/archives/1799

2) My buddy Corey sends me experimental stuff all the time and I plan to share some of it with y’all because there are some things that never make it into the magazine (hey, he can’t write the whole freakin’ thing ya’know?) and other people should have a chance to see his genius too. Believe it or not, this was all done using Photoshop CS3 Extended. Note: All the rights, trademarks , and whatnot are reserved for the owners of the “Saw” line of movies and this is for experimental purposes only (as mentioned): Corey\’s Experimental Ad for \”Saw V\”

3) And for the not-so-cool thing (but it’s really well written and thoroughly researched): My old pub, the Orlando Weekly, recently ran a feature that spotlights a local concern, but blossoms into something downright depressing–if not sinister–on the national scene. Check out “The Incredible Shrinking Newspaper” by Jeff Billman, Billy Manes, Deanna Morey, and, my old editor/mentor, Bob Whitby.

Well, I guess that’s it for now. We’re still working on stuff behind the main page here but the end is near! We should be “online” any day now. Thanks!

~Issac

Tags: Bob Whitby, Corey Barker, Corey's Experiments, journalism, Orlando Weekly, Photoshop CS3 Extended, Scott Kelby, Scott's blog

Hello Folks!

I hope all is well. I just wanted to hop on and drop a note thanking my wonderful wife, Jennifer, for spending her day off making this blog a li’l’ less of an embarrassment to our family and country. The thing is really getting there, right? We have some other plans that will put the Phenomenal Photoshop at your fingertips–including a freakin’ killer set of contests and prizes once we “officially” go live.

So what’s up this week? We just sent another fine, fine issue of Photoshop User magazine to the printers; more than 200 cities are logged in for “Scott Kelby’s Worldwide Photo Walk” and TODAY is the last day to register as a Photo Walk leader so visit www.photoshopuser.com/photowalk; I found an awesome (and utterly profane) link from John Nack’s blog (he’s Principle Product Manager for Adobe Photoshop) that speaks to the masses about how, graphically speaking, America is [Effed]; and I’ve got footage of Chris Main, my buddy and Managing Editor of Layers magazine, caught playing tug-o-war with himself (he gets pretty loopy when he’s on deadline).

The next issue of Photoshop User magazine, September ‘08, has several features in it. The main feature is “Freelancing 101: How to Turn Your Passion into Profit,” by Lisa Sage. Lisa was getting approached by several video game, film, and publishing companies, so we asked her to keep track of those “ah-ha” moments that could help her fellow NAPP members get into freelancing. It’s a killer issue all the way around and I’m sure you’ll enjoy it!

Today is the last day to register as a leader in your city of choice for Scott’s Worldwide Photo Walk–I can’t believe how this thing has blown up! Well, yes I can–if anyone could pull off something of this magnitude it would be him–but still…200 cities all over the globe are going to gather, walk, talk, and shoot? That’s intense! You can register now, right here: http://www.photoshopuser.com/photowalk/register.html.

And last, but certainly not least, here’s that shot of Chris as promised.

Y’all have a great weekend! We’ll see ya here next week! All the best~

~Issac

Just doing a test to verify communication between the blog and iPhone 3G. Photo integration and all! (:

Here’s a scene that caught my eye this afternoon.

Hello!

My Chief, Scott Kelby, the Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of Photoshop User magazine, just announced that he’s going global with a very cool event: The Worldwide Photowalk! Check out all the details on Scott’s Blog. There are a TON of prizes from the best and brightest in the biz, including: Adobe Systems, CDW, Epson, Kelby Training, MPIX, Peachpit Press, Photos Walk Pro, Wacom, and more. Lots of participants will get Scott’s latest book, “The Lightroom 2 Book for Digital Photographers“; plus, if you get over there and get signed up fast, you might have the opportunity to be the leader for your city!

As promised, here’s the link to our entry for The 48 Hour Film Project, called “The Rice Inn“: http://photoshopuser.blip.tv/. Check it out and feel free to post your comments on how awful you think it is! Well, the acting is anyways, especially from that dood wearing the black fedora; however, there are a lot of excellent parts! Our Video Team is an exceptional collection of candor, courage, and cougar bait! I’ll post some pictures using Photoshop Express later this week (if you don’t know what that is, go check it out, it’s like Photobucket on steroids).

Well, I think that’s it for today. Look for a redesign to this site soon! Plus, we’ve got a big surprise in the works, so stay tuned for that too! Have a great day!

Tags: 48 Hour Film Project, Lightroom 2, Photoshop User, Photowalk, Scott Kelby

Wow! It’s amazing what can happen in 48 hours. We (Kelby Cross High A/V Club) had a helluva good time over the weekend putting a film together for the 48 Hour Film contest that made its way to the Tampa/St. Pete area this past weekend. We hung out together at the office last Friday night while trying to squeeze together the contest’s essential elements (Genre: Thriller, Character: Bob Percival, Prop: a hairdryer, and line of dialog: “How could you do this to me?” Friday night (July 18, 2008), I had the opportunity to work with some of our most-elite troops at Kelby Media Group. While Corey Barker (my best bud, Photoshop User columnist, and Education and Curriculum developer at Kelby Media Group) and Jason “Scriv” Scrivner (the Brains operating behind the award-winning podcast PhotoshopUserTV, Co-Director of our project, and I believe our first video dude…back when we were KW Media Group) were in the air flying back from a couple days of training in San Jose, CA. Meanwhile, a bunch of use were kickin’ around ideas in the conference room at our main building up until around 2 am Saturday morning–the fellas would finally land safely in Tampa and return to us safely come Saturday morning; however, Scriv’s iPod touch and noise-canceling headphones would not (sorry for your loss man). In the conference room was Adam “Head Queso” Rohrmann, Stephen “Cougar Bait” Bell, Bill “The Newbie” Duffin, Erik “The Big Kahuna” Kuna, Juan “The Magic” Alfonso, and Paul “The I.T. Guy” Wilder.

Man, you wanna talk about the most creative, fun, insightful, patient, brilliant, and wild bunch in town? It was a total blast getting in writing-room-lock-down mode with them. After the creative juices got flowing–around 1 am, four hours after getting the details of the short movie–we had Paul Wilder in position to be the mysteriously creepy Hannibil Lecter-like character who had a taste for livers (he wrote his grotesque recipes for cooking human parts in a Moleskine notebook with lemon juice and sent them overseas, where his international freak-friend would use a hairdryer to decode them). It seemed we were going in circles for the most part and I pushed for a break so we could sleep on it and consider the development of the characters.

The next morning, I had an Bob’s whole background in mind (or so I thought lol)–he’s a haunted veteran and we’ll push the audience into thinking he’s developed a taste for killing ’cause that’s clique and what one might expect, but actually he’s simply developed a taste for Arabic foods. Jennifer (wifey) and I arrived a tad late and by the time we got there, the script changed completely. After some sleep, the directors figured it wouldn’t be the best idea to have this crazed-and-somewhat-leaky-trousered-perverted character running around with our company name stamped on it…it’s just not who we are (well, it’s not who MOST of us are lol). All of us agreed that we should keep it under control.

Scriv explained the new plan, which in essence, is the one that’s sitting on the DVD in the judge’s office. I guess I could sit here writing all night about this adventure, but we’ve got to save most of it so there’s something to see this Wednesday, July 23 at Channelside in Tampa (: I saw the completed project today and it’s a freakin’ riot! Everyone contributed at least a sentence to the main script. Plus, we have some great shots we need to get off the D3 and post a slide show or something.

Oh, and I wanted to give a shout out to Erik B. for leaving me some comments. Thanks for checking back here and giving me a push to start posting here again, man! He was going to design this ’site for me, but I figured it would be great for my wife and I to try and learn how to do it.

Tags: 48 Hour Film Project, 48 hour project, Behind the Scene at Kelby Media, Behind the Scenes at Kelby Media Group, Kelby Media Group, Life at Kelby Media Group, Photoshop Guys, Photoshop User, PhotoshopUser TV

Good Morning All!

(And by “all” I mean my wife because I do get at least one page view when I do these things.)

Another Fun’tastic issue of Photoshop User magazine, the flagship pub of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP), went to press last Friday! This issue was a little less painful than the last issue (which was a whoppin’ 156 pages). The Production department, under the astute leadership of our Creative Director, Felix “FlippyHand” Nelson, pushed out another issue with another redesign. We tried a few new things here and there, but in the end we’re all happy with what we sent last Friday. In case I hadn’t mentioned it before, I do the managing editor stuff for PSU…yes, I am a lucky SOB…I mean uhh: blessed now that you mention it (:

THANK YOU LESA

There’s something that contributors do that drive me (and the other editors) insane. Some debate what it’s called, but whatever you want to call it, it makes images look like [poop]. When our writers take screen captures to accompany their tutorials, if they don’t have Font Smoothing set to “Best for CRT” in the Appearance section of System Preferences, the letters have colorized halos around the edges. We can’t print those because they’ll come out squishy/smudgy looking. Nine times out of 10, we’ll just re-create the conditions in Photoshop and retake the screen capture. This is time consuming and sometimes impossible. Here’s where Lesa Snider-King, Photoshop World instructor and iStockphoto evangelist, comes to the rescue. On Lesa’s blog the other day, she showed us an example of color-aliasing/artifacting in a photo she took, and how to fix it! It takes a little tweaking of her technique to work on screen captures, but here goes:

Step 1: Open the troubled image and press Command-J (PC: Ctrl-J).

Step 2: Go under the Filter menu and choose Blur>Gaussian Blur. The radius of pixels will vary depending on the resolution of your image but so far it seems that 1.5 to 2.0 with a 72 ppi resolution image will do the trick.

Step 3: Right after clicking OK to close the Gaussian Blur filter dialog, go under the Edit menu, and pick Fade. Or use the keyboard shortcut, Shift-Command-F (PC: Shift-Ctrl-F). Lower the Opacity to about 90% (pretty much anywhere between 80% and 95% seems to work), choose Color from the Blend Mode menu, and click OK to close the dialog.

Step 4: Click on the Layers panel flyout menu icon and pick Flatten Image from the list (or select Flatten Image from the Layer menu).

Step 5: Enjoy!

I’m dealing with some of the same hurdles that kept me from blogging in the past—technology. In the sea of webpages I swim through in a day, I see lots of things that I’d like to incorporate here, but I guess I’ve gotta walk before I run…and keep posting!

In the news:

Scott Kelby’s back here at the shop from Dubai and he gives us some serious training by experience on his blog. Word to the wise: think about what that camera bag is going to feel like after a humping it across the desert for awhile (or anywhere for that matter).

The killer Web Team here at Kelby Media gave our flagship website, www.photoshopuser.com, a serious tuneup, which launched yesterday. It looks fan-freakin’-tastic too! Much easier to find everything and it’s incredibly seamless compared to the old design. Now maybe I can talk them into making this blog look a little less atrocious…if only something could be done about the writing (:

The folks over at Revsion3—who host one of our legendary contributor’s shows, Bert Monroy’s “Pixel Perfect,” and digg.com, and diggnation, and…—have too much time on their hands (and apparently just enough booze). They did an insane lip sync to an old INXS tune! You’ll be digging around for old tapes in no time…or hitting up iTunes for the right “INXS Greatest Hits” release (have fun trying to decide!)

Well, I think that’s an ample smattering of weirdness for today. See you soon (:

Tomorrow is the first day that I’m (supposed) to report on the bits/technutz from all-things-Photoshop that have happened this week, but I’ve yet to get the Blogroll squared-away. The good news is, I’ve finally navigated (circumvented) the technology that’s been standing between me and posting on the blog, so we’re not far away. A NAPP member from Sweden(!), Erik B., has volunteered to help me get the blog functioning and looking the way I want it (like posting Photoshop World Orlando pics and so on). So NEXT Friday is a bit more reasonable…see you then (:

Hello, and welcome to the PsWeekly blog! I guess this is where I’m supposed to give my mission statement and all that, right? Well, I figured the best way to learn about using Photoshop for Web stuff was to get out there and do it. This site should be considered "Under Construction" for now.

Thanks for stopping by! I’ll get some images and other cool stuff up here soon.