The cost is $50 per workshop.
November 90-Minute Mini-Workshops.
Classic Halloween Vinyl Records on MP3s.
The entire MP3 collection is available for free — just in time for Halloween parties. Download your favorites to your iPod, or burn CD’s right from your computer.
Jason at the Scar Stuff blog provides the MP3s in zipped files for each album. For immediate gratification, scroll down this post where you can play tracks from a few of our favorite albums.
Enjoy! And Happy Halloween from Creativetechs in Seattle!
Apple iWork ’08 opens Microsoft Office 2007 files.
Build a PowerBook and MacBook repair toolkit.
Over the last week we’ve had a lot of Apple laptops in our office for various repairs and upgrades — including one of our own MacBook Pros that was upgraded with a larger internal hard drive.
It is a good reminder that however skilled you are at hardware repair, you won’t be able to open a MacBook Pro case without the right set of screwdrivers. We’ve asked Creativetechs’ hardware guru, Jasson Lewellen, to compile a list of tools and training materials for people who are interested in doing basic Apple laptop repair.
So whether you run an IT team headed towards self-service, or you are an intrepid DIY home-user willing to void a warranty, here are a collection of links for you to start building your own laptop repair toolkit.
Use Safe Boot to Clear Font Caches.
If you suspect that fonts are causing problems in your applications, an easy troubleshooting step is deleting your Mac’s font caches.
We’ve covered font cache problems before in our Garbled Fonts Troubleshooting Guide — which delves into font problems more deeply. However we did overlook a quick and easy method to delete font cache files.
Photoshop CS3’s clone tool adds “Ignore Adjustment Layers”.
Photoshop guru Jason Hoppe teaches non-destructive retouching techniques in Photoshop. In classes at Creativetechs he shows many ways to improve your images without overwriting the original image data. Done properly, image quality doesn’t degrade as you make edits, and you retain flexibility when clients come back with later change requests.
Here’s a classic example of those non-destructive techniques in action: We’ve added a separate cloning layer instead of cloning directly onto our image. And we’ve used a color adjustment layer to correct our subject’s skin tone without directly changing our photo’s original colors.
However, you must be aware of a subtle-but-important detail when using a cloning layer on images that have been color corrected with adjustment layers. In this week’s creative tip we’ll discuss that issue, and we’ll show why retouchers know to always turn off their adjustment layers before cloning on an image.
Plus we’ll show Photoshop CS3’s new Ignore Adjustment Layers button that makes life better for Photoshop retouch artists.
1-800-GOOG-411
How to smooth skin in Photoshop.
October 90-Minute Mini-Workshops.
The cost is $50 per workshop.
Thanks to everyone who helped make last month such a success. We continue to get rave reviews of our new 90-minute morning workshops. It seems the short format is really working for people. Here is the new lineup for October and November.
Firefox Can’t Reach Internet?
With great standards-compliance and cross-platform support, Firefox is becoming the browser of choice not just for end-users but for many web developers as well. Once it’s deployed inside some corporate networks, the Macintosh edition can’t see past the firewall.
Firefox may be an excellent internet citizen, but it doesn’t follow Macintosh standards too closely. Among the conventions it ignores are the Proxy settings in the Network pane of System Preferences. Instead, Firefox keeps it’s own proxy settings hidden, three levels down in its own preferences. This is the most common reason Firefox can’t seem to load web sites when Safari can.
To solve the problem, go to the Firefox menu and select “Preferences…”, choosing the “Advanced” button at the top of the resulting window. Then from the row of tabs, select “Network” and click “Settings…” to bring up the proxy configuration panel. From there it’s easy to fill in your proxy addresses, and your Firefox users will be back online.