April 28, 2006

Photoshop podcasts

from John Nack's Adobe Blog:
  • The NAPP's Matt Kloskowski has introduced Photoshop Killer Tips (Web/iTunes), described by its creator as "short and sweet--just a quick 60-90 second video tip each day (Monday through Friday)." It's been running ('casting?) for three weeks, so the site already features a number of tips.
  • InDesign Secrets (Web/iTunes) is a new resource from authors David Blatner and Anne-Marie ConcepciĆ³n, covering all aspects of page layout and production in Adobe InDesign.
These new programs join the growing ranks of design-oriented podcasts, alongside The Russell Brown Show (Web/iTunes), and Photoshop TV (Web/iTunes)."
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April 27, 2006

about:mozilla

In the Netscape days I typed just "about:" accidently and was treated to a message from The Book of Mozilla, including the threat "Their tags shall blink until the end of days."

Now in Firefox if you type about:mozilla in the URL location, there's a different message from The Book of Mozilla.

Wikipedia has the rundown, of course.
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Nucleo Pro

Mentioned by Chris Meyer on the AE list as his favorite software at NAB...

Nucleo Pro is a background render queue for AE, for release in July 2006:

"It's simple - add something to your After Effects render queue, and then tell Nucleo Pro to render it in the background. Not only will your CPU's power be maximized, but you'll also notice absolutely no impact on your computer's performance when working in other applications."
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April 24, 2006

AE->Flash Part II: Audio Amplitude

John Nack, Senior Product Manager for Photoshop, notes that Dr. Woohoo is back leveraging AE for Flash users:

"introducing After Effects 2 Flash: Audio Amplitude. This new ExtendScript exports the audio analysis data from AE 7.0 as an XML file and uses a component to map it to the Rotation and Scale Matrix transformations in Flash 8. 'In other words,' he writes, 'it makes objects in Flash dance to the music.' "
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April 23, 2006

Free AE palette for moving CTI

Jeff Almasol, of redefinery.com and sometime AE team member, posted a free palette for moving the CTI a customizable number of frames.

"rd: Movement" is a script that "displays a palette with controls for jumping to different times in the composition. There are buttons for jumping a specific number of frames forward or back from the current time, as well as 7 favorite buttons for capturing different times (set from the current time) and jumping to them easily."

Be sure to check other recent scripts posted, as well the handy links to other AE scripting resources.

April 20, 2006

GIMPShop -- GIMP Photoshopped

For those who don’t already know, GIMP is a powerful, open source image editing application. GIMPshop is essentially the same program with some cosmetic changes to make it look like Photoshop. And it's free!

After Effects 2 Flash keyframe converter

via Steve Kilisky's After Effects Blog and John Nack on Adobe

Drew Trujillo (dr. woohoo) has an After Effects 2 Flash transform keyframe converter he developed:

"The solution exists in two parts: 1) an After Effects script used to export the Transform Property keyframe data; and 2) After Effects 2 Flash-Transform Properties, which is a Flash Extension that allows you to easily import/parse/map keyframe data from the After Effects Transform Properties (Anchor Point, Position, Scale, Rotation and Opacity) to the properties of a MovieClip(s). You can download the After Effects script for free here, however, I strongly recommend purchasing After Effects 2 Flash-Transform Properties, here, strictly based on the amount of time, energy and money it would take you to create it on your own."

I'm the 'decider'...

April 17, 2006

New AE filters

ObviousFX released the Mac version of "Copy Image," a free filter that copies the comp window render to your clipboard.

RE:Vision Effects released "RE:Map" a set that provides professional quality mapping and distortion tools.