We like to take a break from our technical focus during long 3-day weekends. This Monday take a break from your computer. Download a free PDF template from Corbis, and build a working 35mm pinhole camera. Perfect for sunny spring days.
The 10 Most Popular Creative Tips So Far.
Today marks our 200th straight Monday publishing this weekly tips email newsletter. Whew! It’s been a lot of work, and a lot of fun. We’d like to send a big thank you to all our readers who have helped make this publication a huge success. Check out some of the most visited tips over the […]
The 10 Most Popular Tech Tips So Far.
Each week we bring you a pair of creative and tech tips drawn directly from our real-world experience supporting hundreds of Mac-based creative teams across the greater Seattle area. Take a moment to peruse the most visited tech tips over the last year.
Tech #1: Change Microsoft Office’s serial number, Easy!
Tech #2: Avoid serial number headaches with CS3!
Tech #3: Set default applications in Mac OS X.
Tech #4: My Mac Won’t Start! A Tiny Guide.
Tech #5: Six free Internet speed test sites.
Tech #6: Mac OS X Shortcuts! A Tiny Guide.
Tech #7: What is a good microphone for podcasting?
Tech #8: Garbled Fonts Troubleshooting Guide.
Marketing with Email Newsletters. A Seattle Workshop.
Interested in learning more about using email newsletters as a marketing tool for your clients, or your own studio? We are offering a special Seattle workshop on May 28th: Marketing with HTML Email Newsletters. There are only a few slots left, so if you are interested in attending, sign up today. REGISTER
Build an Acrobat PDF Slideshow.
Say you must produce a looping slideshow of images for a client’s tradeshow booth — but you don’t have many technical details. You know the images will be displayed on a HDTV connected to a Windows laptop. You don’t know what software will be installed, or what image formats that laptop might support. Luckily, you […]
Should You Host Your Own Email Server?
Ten years ago, we were installing a lot of mail servers for design firms and advertising agencies across the greater Seattle area. Today, however, we rarely recommend our clients host their own mail servers.
Why the change? Email has become the key tool for conducting business. Creative teams are accessing email away from the office with laptops, webmail, and (increasingly) iPhones. And most significantly, fighting spam has become a full-time job.
In short, if you own an independent creative studio, there is one good reason to have your email handled by a dedicated hosting company: They’ll probably do a better job than you.
Leopard vs. InDesign: Crashes on Open, Import, Export, Save and Print.
One of the more frustrating Leopard-vs-InDesign issues we’re seeing at clients is a bug that causes frequent crashing when using InDesign CS3’s Open, Place, Import, Export, or Save dialog boxes. Designers may also experience these particular symptoms while re-linking graphics as well as printing files. Until Adobe or Apple fixes this issue, we have an […]
Leopard vs. InDesign: Can’t Hide InDesign.
A common Leopard-vs-InDesign complaint we hear from designers is not being able to hide InDesign, either from the InDesign menu or by pressing Command-H. And worse, if you can get InDesign to hide, you can’t get it back. Happily this problem can usually be fixed by deleting the InDesign preference file.
Proof your email designs in different email clients.
Seasoned graphic designers wouldn’t dream of sending a print project to press without first approving an accurate proof. Your client’s email marketing campaign should be no different. You need to be sure you know what your design looks like on the different email clients your readers might be using. Unless you have a studio filled […]
Save Word 2008 files as DOC instead of DOCX.
If you’ve updated to the new Mac version of Microsoft Office 2008, you may have noticed Word now saves files in Microsoft’s new DOCX format. The problem is, just as Windows users found, not everyone can open this new file format yet. The easy way to prevent compatibility problems with colleagues and co-workers is to […]
