Another image font, this time a collection of bird feathers from Manuel Persa. This collection is stunning in detail. You can download the layered PSD file here.
Each letter of the feather type alphabet is on its own layer, and at 30 x 40 inches at 300 dpi overall, the artwork is perfectly usable for commercial printing
Many times you are asked to find the CMYK equivalent of a particular Pantone color. If you don’t have a ridiculously overpriced Pantone to Process conversion guide available, you can use Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator.
There are a lot of theories out there as to how you can get the most accurate CMYK values (some area quite complex, such as first converting to LAB color before converting to process colors, etc.). But if you’re a pro you already realize that no Pantone color is going to match 100% in process printing anyway and the Pantone Color Bridge guide is the best and most accurate conversion method.
The Pantone Color Bridge Guide is expensive, so these are the fastest ways that I’ve come across that give the best results. (more…)
Alien Skin Software announced the immediate availability of an update to its Eye Candy 7 graphic design effects plug-in. The update adds the capability to store presets in a cloud storage folder so that they can be synchronized between multiple computers.
Cloud preset sharing is available to all users of Eye Candy 7, not just users of Photoshop CC. It works with multiple cloud storage services, including Dropbox.
I’ve done a visual review of Eye Candy 7 in the recent past, and I love the plugin!
The update also adds compatibility with the new Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud.
There are two ways to apply strokes to shape layers in Photoshop CS6 — via layer styles, which have been around since version 6 (that’s the ancient version 6.0, not CS6), or via the all-new vector shape options. They may appear similar at first glance, but there’s some significant differences.
Bjango has put together an excellent post on getting higher quality strokes in Photoshop CS6 that’s definitely worth a quick read!
Photoshop Etiquette is a site dedicated to offering some best practices for web designers using Adobe Photoshop. Of course, many of the tips are applicable for print designers as well.
Naming layers and using folders to group appropriate layers is a pet peeve of mine. There’s nothing worse than opening a PSD file with 75 layers all named “Layer Copy 1 Copy” and set in no particular order.
Got any tips not listed that makes life easier when using Photoshop? Share in the comments below.
You’ve probably heard, Adobe announced yesterday that the company will focus all of its creative software development efforts on its Adobe Creative Cloud (CC) offering moving forward, thus killing off the boxed tools previously known as Creative Suite. It’s a move everyone saw coming, though I had guessed it wouldn’t happen until after CS 7.
12 awesome high-res dry brush stroke Photoshop brushes, from Spoon Graphics.
I get a lot of emails about Adobe Creative Cloud and whether it’s right for people. A lot of the questions have been answered by Adobe, but they’re hard to find.
I came across The 10 Most Common Myths About Creative Cloud at ProDesignTools that answers many of the most common questions. By far, the most asked concern seems to be about having a constant Internet connection in order to use the Creative Suite applications. This simply isn’t true. In fact, you only have to be connected once per month for the software to ping the Adobe license server in order to verify your subscription.
[zilla_alert style=”yellow”]Other than the way you pay for the Creative Suite Master Collection, there is no difference between Creative Cloud and the standard perpetual license versions we’ve been buying for decades. Well, other than Adobe will send black helicopters to your office to remove the software from your computer if you stop paying for it.[/zilla_alert]
Disclaimer: I don’t know if Adobe owns any black helicopters, but I’m pretty sure I made that part up about coming to your office.
Another question I get is why Adobe has chosen to offer freebies to Creative Cloud subscribers that aren’t available to standard license users. The answer isn’t as simple as you might think. Of course it’s a great way to entice users to subscribe to the Creative Cloud, but the reality is that the accounting methods used by software companies to claim income don’t allow Adobe to “add value features” to standard license users. You can read more about the situation here.
As for my take on Adobe Creative Cloud; I think it’s the future. Adobe wasn’t the first company to offer software on a subscription basis, but it was probably the first (and certainly the largest) in the design industry to do so. Microsoft has since announced Office 365, a subscription-based Office Suite. It won’t be long before all major software is offered as subscription only.
Got an opinion about Creative Cloud? Share it in the comments below.