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» Late Thursday News

I’m pretty tired after working a full day in the camera store and I’m going to be early because the day is repeating itself tomorrow. Fun but tiresome. Here are at least a few late Thursday news.

• From screenshots of the new Apple App Store we can see that they are imposing restrictions in both price and application size. The maximum size is 2gb and the prices range between $0.99 to $999, where the latter probably is for more enterprise styled applications.
   
• A new build of the Parallels Desktop shows support for both Linux as well as 3D graphics inside of Windows. To get the free update, just go under the help menu and chose Check for Updates.
   
• One of the site visitors sent me a comment yesterday noting me on a tutorial error which is indeed a realism miss. In the Pixelmator tutorial about Creating a realistic sunlight effect I missed to at the end, flip the copied image vertically so that the small piece of the window comes at the top. So for anyone being affected by this miss in the recording, now you know how to fix it.
   
• Over at his blog, Scott Kelby has posted a review of the Ray Flash. The Ray Flash is essentially a ring flash that attaches to a normal hotshoe flash to make it a ring flash. It sounds like a cool product so go and check that out.

That’s that for the news today, tomorrow I’ll be back with the Friday goodies, so stay tuned. Oh and until then, don’t have too much trouble, it is Friday 13th.

» Wednesday News Stuff

It’s a split day today, school is over for this time for me and a nice summer is awaiting. However because of the grade I’m now graduating from (our school system is different here) I’ll not go with almost anyone from my old class now that we all move up. A little sad to not see half of the people but I’ll all get over it. Onto the news.

• On Monday, Steve Jobs mentioned in the keynote very briefly that Apple is beginning to seed a developer version of the new Snow Leopard that will be replacing Leopard in the next year. It’s going to be much of a performance update with fewer new features. What we have learnt now from seeing the system requirements is that they will be dropping the PowerPC support to go to Intel only now.
   
• Today you’ll definitely want to check out the guest blogger over at Scott Kelby’s blog, Moose Peterson. He’s one of the best wildlife photographers I’ve ever seen and I love his wildlife work. Give his entry a read.
   
• Are you wanting to go the the Photokina in Colonge coming up on September 23rd through 27th? Then you might want to enter the contest from ThinkTankPhoto where you can win a trip complete with hotel stay and $500 in spending money. Just go to the contest site and read through the rules and enter if you are elgible.
   
• If you are interested in all the happenings at the WWDC Keynote you can view it either online or download the podcast.

» .Mac becomes MobileMe

Yesterday at the WWDC08 Keynote, Apple announced its new online service that will replace the outdated .Mac. The new service is called MobileMe and is labled as "Exchange for all of us" and I think it really summarises up what it is. MobileMe features a remake of the old .Mac with a much nicer and cooler interface and with push-features as the main advantage point, perfect if you move a lot between different computers or computer and device. It’ll still cost you the "usual" $99/year but now with an increased value.

You can read more about it over on the Apple website.

» My Favorite Software and Gadgets

Like everyone else I have a lot of software and gadgets that I use daily and really like as well and I get a lot of questions about what I use for different things. Here is a list over my favorite software and gadgets for their specific purposes.

 

Software Graphics: Adobe Creative Suite Design Premium Screen Recording: ScreenFlow Word Processing: Microsoft Word Mail: Apple Mail Music: iTunes Calendar: iCal Project Time Management: Billings Passwords: 1Password Alarm Clock: Awaken Presentations: Apple Keynote FTP: Flow Chatting: MSN & iChat Business Phone: Skype with SkypeIn Web Browser: Safari & Firefox Backup: Time Machine

Gadgets Cellphone: (Soon) iPhone MP3 Player: iPod Video 30gb Gaming Console: X-Box (I’m no gamer) Home Phones: Siemens Gigaset Excerise: Nike + Webcam: iSight (built-in) Presentation Remote: Apple Remote   Services Podcast: Libsyn Web Hosting: XLD Studios Music Download: iTunes VoIP: Skype Stock: iStockPhoto

Photography Gear Cameras Nikon D50 Olympus C-5060 Nikon Coolpix 4600 Lenses Sigma 10-20mm ƒ/4-5.6 DC HSM Nikkor 18-55mm ƒ/3,5-5,6G ED Sigma 70-300mm ƒ/4-5,6 APO DG Flash Nikon Speedlight SB-600 Filters Cokin P121 GND Cokin P154 ND8 Hoya Polarizer Hoya UV’s Bags Lowepro MiniTrekker II AW Lowepro Slingshot 200 AW Lowepro Nova 1 AW Tripod Manfrotto 055XPROB Tripod Manfrotto 486RC2 Ballhead Accessories Omnibounce Cokin P Holder Cokin 52mm Adapter Ring Cokin 77mm Adapter Ring

Hardware Computer: MacBook 2Ghz, 2gb RAM, 250gb HDD External Screen: Eizo FlexScan S2201W & Samsung SyncMaster 913N Printer: HP Laserjet 1320 & Epson Stylus Photo R265 Headset: Plantronics .Audio 400 DSP Tablet: Wacom Bamboo Mouse: Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer for Bluetooth Keyboard: Apple Keyboard (old version) Scanner: Epson Perfection 1670 External Hardrives: 250gb External LaCie Porsche HDD USB 2.0 & 80gb External USB (from old internal)

 

» I’m a ScreenFlow convert!

I got turned on to this new screen recording software called ScreenFlow a week ago or so by Terry White and I must really say I already love it! At first glimpse it sounded like a little more than what I wanted but it’s really cut the production work in half. Sure what I too loved with iShowU was that I didn’t need to export the recordings and that they were created on the fly, but I still always exported them for either my podcast or for the web so it didn’t really make a difference. What’s more, every time I needed to record a podcast, I would record it, import the media files into iMovie and then export it all. That takes some time and that itself is worth the money that ScreenFlow costs.

The cool effects like the ability to add callouts, video actions and more to the video as well as record yourself through a webcam, while you are recording is very sleek and I just love those features. The main interface is pretty easy to use and it takes much less time now to produce my podcast episodes, time I can spend on other things.

^{(Click to Enlarge)}

As seen above, the ScreenFlow interface also features multiple tracks and effects so you can create pretty elaborate videos, without really knowing a lot about video editing. At the end it is just to export it which doesn’t take all too long, and then just post it up on the web!

You can probably already tell that I like ScreenFlow and think it is a wonderful application and I’m typing up a review of it to go online today in the reviews section, which will be a little more in-depth than this post here is.

Before I leave you to have a nice Sunday, I really do recommend this application if you are doing any screen recording that needs you to either export or do a little editing or both in the same time. I have a little wishlist for the app, mainly for the audio effects (things like an EQ and other audio editing controls would be nice) but I’ll take that in the review!

• ScreenFlow Website

 

» Thursday Quick-News

• Over at Photoshop Insider, Scott Kelby posted a very good post with what he wants to see in the next version(s) of Photoshop and Lightroom. It’s some really good ideas that I really like and agree on.
   
• If you are a keen photographer you should have checked out JPG Magazine and if not, then you should go ahead and do that right now. It’s a really cool photography magazine with contests and featured amazing photography.
   
• The Mac program Delicious Library has been updated to its second version featuring a lot of new updates and cool things. It’s only available for Mac OS X 10.5 and if you are interested in it and you are not using Leopard, you can still purchase the older version for use with Panther and Tiger. You can purchase a brand new copy for $40 and an upgrade from the old runs for $20.

 

» Three CS4 beta products available in Adobe Labs!

Adobe has released the beta versions of three CS4 applications in the Adobe Labs today! It’s Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Soundbooth that we get to take a look at right now and like usual, you need to get a beta serial for any of the applications if you want to use it longer than the two day grace period. The beta serial is easily obtained if you have either a product serial or a suite package serial where the product is included! The new products features a little interface change to now suit the Adobe way of things that was in most of the CS3 applications except the newly purchased Macromedia ones.

» It is Tuesday-day!

Well today is indeed Tuesday and adding some corny titles to it, we end up with Tuesday-day, the day which really is Tuesday. Just arrived home after being at the doctors taking a blood test to find out if I’m allergic or not, unfortunately I bleed easily so the nurse had to try twice, once in each arm because the first vain broke. Anyway I’m all good and now I just need to wait for the results and just take the pills when I get symptoms. Anyway, that’s enough about me and onto the news!

• Firstly, I’m taking a minute to wish one of my best friends a very happy birthday!! You know who you are and have the best birthday possible!
   
• Yesterday I released a brand new starting episode of the Creative Suite Tips and Tricks Podcast. It’s great to be back and you can view the InDesign tutorial on the podcast site. Also released are two new tutorials here on the site, Create HDR Photos Part 1 & Part 2.
   
• If you are a user of iWorks and specifically Pages you probably want to check out the list of templates for Pages from Jumsoft. They are available from there for only $29 and are of great quality. They also have other templates for other applications.
   
• Trying to get a job? Just got a job and want to make sure you handle it? Over at A List Apart today they’ve posted an article today called Why Did you Hire me?. It gives you some tips on what you do when you just get a job with negotiations etc. Give it a read!

» New Kelby Training classes this week

 

Kelby Training has this week not just released one, but an amazing number of three new online classes this week! And just because I like Kelby Traning and the guys (and gals) over there are amazing and doing an incredible job (and they are good people as well), there’ll always, every Friday, be this Kelby Training column (if more than one class is added, if there one new added, it’ll be in the news post, unless it is seriously cool)!

Layers styles in Photoshop by Corey Barker

The first class this week to go online is a really good class about Layer Styles done by Corey Barker (the Photoshop Laddie!). It is covering the basics on what you need to know in regards to layer styles and how to work with them as well as what the options are. Swing by the class details today!

From Photo to Graphic Art by Lesa Snider King

I’m a big fan of Lesa’s training but it is hard to get to and find, therefore I’m pretty thrilled to see a class form her up at Kelby Training. It’s called From Photo to Graphic Art and will teach you a number of different techniques to do normal effects to your photos and make them look a little bit different as well as use them in new creations.

InDesign CS3 for Printing by Taz Tally

If you are an InDesign user or rather a new InDesign user and want to be able to learn how to prepare your documents and set them up for printing! Taz is doing a great job with this class and I’d suggest you should go and watch it today, InDesign CS3 for Printing is the name, online now at Kelby Training.

 

» Tuesday News World Update

It’s Tuesday today and I was writing this post at 7a.m this morning, before school, but apparently I was way to tired to hit the publish or save button so I quite lost all post content therefore I need to repost it now. I had my concert yesterday and thanks to my family and my best friends for being there and for being the best support. It was really awesome and went really well.

Olympus Releases E-520

Olympus is today announcing its new camera body, the Olympus E-520. It has got improved AF in LiveView, 10 megapixels, a 2.7" Screen, wireless flash control, 3.5 fps shooting and a built in image stabiliser. It is available in four kit versions, body only (£479.99), with 14-42 kit lens (£529.99), with double kit 14-42 & 40-250 (£529.99) as well as with second double kit 14-42 and 70-300 (£759.99).

Cool website - CSS-Tricks

I found out about this cool website through another blog I am subscribed to. It’s called CSS-Tricks and deals with, well, obviously cool CSS tricks etc. but also points to some good thoughts about image protection and other web related things that you really need to know and be in the loop with. A really good site I must say so keep it fresh in memory.

NAPP & Stuff clarification

If you’ve been reading my blog for a while you will know that I like to mention NAPP (National Association of Photoshop Professionals) and the gang over there quite often. Now I want to note that I don’t get any kickbacks or anything (apart from the fun of doing it ) when I mention them and I do it only because I’m a member myself and I really like the work they do and their style (plus they are all a really amazing and friendly crowd)! There you have it, the "amazing story behind".

ScreenFlow - Recording Application

I read this on Terry White’s techblog yesterday and it got me a little bit excited. He got turned on to (and in a chain reaction got me turned on to) a screen recording application called ScreenFlow. It’s another screen recording application for the Mac that lets you edit the recorded material right after you’ve recorded it (sadly though you need to export it out after, one of the things I love about iShowU is that you don’t need to do that there) and add callouts and even record from your webcam while you’re recording your screen. Here’s a link to Terry’s review. (If you are a PC user reading this post and hoping for a program recommendation, my recommendation is Camtasia Studio.)