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» Adobe releases CS4 trials

Adobe has today released all of the CS4 trial versions and they are all available on the Adobe downloads site. For all of you who have been waiting for this, it’s a finally thing with them here. It’s worth to note that the trials available for download also include localized versions for download so it’s not only the English trials available.

• Download Adobe trials

» It’s Monday “Start of the week” News

 

It’s raining heavily outside, it’s cold and it is dark. I definitely do not want to get up and go outside today but I have to nonetheless. Here are some news for today:

• Photodex, makers of the ProShow Gold slideshow program, has announced a plugin for Lightroom that will let you quickly export photos into ProShow Gold or Producer to make slideshows. With ProShow Gold being a PC only program so is the plugin.
   
• A report from SquareTrade says that it’s two times more common that a Blackberry breaks during the first year than an iPhone. Despite all the reports of unhappy iPhone customers (don’t you always hear the unhappy more?) the iPhone, according to the report, is the smartphone with the lowest malfunction rate.
   
• Terry White has posted the new CS4 wallpaper and screensaver (both Mac and PC available) on his blog. Sadly not as nice as the CS3 ones they still are worth to check out!
   
• Finally, Nick La over at the Web Designer Wall posted today and let us know that he’s beginning a complete wordpress theme guide. He is going to update the post with links to each tutorial as he is publishing them.

Finally, check out my own annual Holiday Gadget Gift guide coming in an hour or two, or click the sidebar banner on the site to download it beforehand!

 

» Export InDesign CS4 documents into Web Flash Books

In this tutorial you lean how to make a cool online presentation of your indesign documents using the new flash export.

 

» Creative Suite 4 Information

As always with a new product shipping, there are a lot of things that are being asked etc. I thought I’d take this moment to post some great learning resources for CS4 as well as some good information and discussion.

Learning Centers

There are some really great learning centers being made as well as online classes. Both free and commercial.

• NAPP CS4 Learning Center (Free, Photoshop Only)
• Layers Magazine CS4 Learning Center (Free)
• Kelby Training Online Classes (Paid)
• Lynda Online Classes (Paid)

Good Information

• On his blog today, John Nack talked about extensibility in Photoshop CS4, mainly the 64-bit support.
• Adobe started shipping CS4 on October 15th. In some parts of the world they be a bit after in sending them already, so just bear with them and it’ll be solved.
• Tutorials on this site will begin once I get CS4 here myself.

If you have any special questions about CS4, post them in the comments and I’ll try to answer to my best, or point you to a place who can give you an answer.

» CS4 is now shipping

Though I should get this out before the regular news post later today. Adobe is now shipping the CS4 versions and they are available for immidiate purchase right from the Adobe store. Pre-orders should begin shipping out today and on. For any specific questions, contact Adobe support.

» Monday “A” News

 

It’s Monday and here are the news, a lot of A-companies today:

• Adobe late last week announced that the official release of Camera Raw 4.6 is here. This is probably also going to be the last update before CS4 — which is due to start shipping on Wednesday 15th. Download Here: Windows | Macintosh
   
• Tomorrow it’s time for Apple’s special event, "The Spotlight turns to Notebook" where they’re bound to release new MacBook and MacBook Pro laptops. Rumors has it today that we also might get to see new versions of iLife and iWork. You’ll be able to follow my metaliveblog from the event, right here on the site, starting 15 minutes before the event tomorrow, at 11a.m Pacific (7p.m CET). The metaliveblog post will be up in the morning!
   
• With the release of CS4, I plan to post the new CS4 features in tutorials and cover them and mix them to get some interesting workflow based improvements and to give some suggestions on how to improve it. If there is anything special you want me to cover in terms of CS4, shoot me a comment or a mail.
   
• More about Apple. In a recent poll. Apple shows off to be the most environmentally-friendly tech company as seen by the general public, which is pretty interesting considering that they’ve gotten a lot of critique about the production process from a few places.
   
• What more can I do but to send you off to my buddy Jason Andersons blog today (being influenced by all the "A"’s used in this post I have to end with one as well), he runs a great blog called Canonblogger and he just announced the continuation of his podcasts from today and on!

» Thursday Morning News

It’s a semi-early Thursday morning here and I’m yawning my way through work before it’s time to get up. Here are the news:

• A couple of days ago a very cool application called Fring was released in the App Store for the iPhone/iPod Touch. What makes it remarkable is that it’s the first one to allow Skype calls (while on WiFi). It doesn’t only work as a normal skype ID client, but it works with skype out and skype in numbers alike! Get it in the App Store, for free!
   
• Microsoft has decided to extend its support for Windows XP through July 31, 2009 which is a full six months more than they originally planned! Good news for all still on XP who don’t want to move over to Vista.
   
• If you’re looking for a good provider of online training classes (and I mean 1+ hour ones) then go and check out the Kelby Training website where they offer some really great classes for only 19.95 a month. Also if you like seminars then go over to the Adobe seminar page where you can sign up for city tour events but more interestingly for eSeminars. If you don’t have the time to be available for an eSeminar, take a look at their long list of OnDemand Seminars that you can just load up and watch!
   
• CS4 is coming closer to being released by every day. Just a reminder, if you recently purchased a version of any of their programs that will update in CS4, contact them and check your eligibility for a post-announce upgrade (free upgrade) to CS4!

» It’s Friday — here’re the news!

It’s a brilliant Friday again! Why? It’s the end of the week, I’m loosing my cold and it’s soon weekend which for me means studio shooting! Now let’s get right on to the news!

• Backup is a very important thing for everyone to do. There are many different solutions available, one that might just suit you right. The Drobo solution is getting praise by many people and they recently released a Firewire 800 compatible unit. The gang over at Macworld has a full review of the system, which may help you if you’re looking for a good backup solution.
   
• Parallels – the virtulasation software makers for mac – have made up an application bundle, called the "Green Application Bundle". It’s got nine apps in it for the great price of $49.95, with perhaps the most interesting thing being Parallels Desktop itself in the bundle, which you’ll get in the budle or $49 instead of $79.
   
• With the CS4 announcement, a lot of plugin developers like OnOne Software for Photoshop and WoodWing for InDesign, has announced that their plugins for respective programs, will be fully compatible with CS4 once it ships! Some great news if you have plugins for the suite apps. Also, if you are pondering if you should upgrade to CS4, Dave Cross has a good blog post where he talks about that.
   
• Last but not least, in the shade of the CS4 announcement, Adobe has released a new version of Adobe TV where you can get a whole lot of different video content. Improved things include improved loading time and an improved navigation structure.

» Wednesday Newsflash Goodies

Here’s some goodies for today, Wednesday.

• As y’all know, the big photo convention Photokina is going on in Cologne (Köln), Germany. WIth my hectic schedule right now, I can’t possibly follow up on all (I will on some stuff) new releases from home here so I’m going to link you to a sum-up of the news so far, from 1001 Noisy Cameras.
   
• It can be really hard to find good quality free fonts sometimes especially as the font databases like DaFont is getting so large. Thus, I really like the releases Smashing Magazine are doing a little now and then. They’ve gone ahead and posted some free fonts of the month over at their site. They’re really good and really useful. I’ve played around with some and I do find them super.
   
• I’ve been digging the LumniQuest Softbox III for a while on and off and been pondering if I should get one. I was really happy to see a review of it by David Hobby at the Strobist. David really knows what he is talking about so it’s really good to be able to hear what he thinks!
   
• Finally, with the CS4 announcement yesterday there were a bunch of learning centers published (I wish I would have the software to be able to create one myself, but I’m just not an adobe partnert there). If you wish to learn the new Photoshop CS4, there is no better place than from the Photoshop Guys over at NAPP, at their learning center. If you wish to learn about all the new suite, Layers Magazine has put together a great learning center online as well. Both are free!

» CS4 is unveiled by Adobe!

The time has come. Later today starts the webcasts and dropping in through the day should be the different learning centers from all training providers blessed with a prerelease copy of the CS4 apps. Just now however, Adobe has updated their site with the new features of the apps and the suite packages. You can also find out the pricing scheme (which to my eyes looks untouched from CS3) in all commercial and education stores. What we can’t find out is when they plan to ship these new products, hopefully we’ll get a mention of that later today.

I’m going to be updating more later today with links to various places where you can read and look at the new features, again from those lucky enough to have a prerelease version in their hands.

• Adobe.com
• Press Release
• Creative Suite Page