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If today's graphic looks like last week's, it because today builds on last week's theme. But the topic is fresh. Today, I show you how to construct rays of soft, blurry, and entirely fabricated light using none other than vector-based shape layers. In Photoshop. With the help of the Polygon tool and the Masks panel. And the Linear Dodge blend mode.

So much sweetness, so little time. Here's the official description from lynda.com: Read more » 

This week marks my favorite Deke's Techniques so far, in which I show you how to create an ambigram, which is a word that reads the same whether the page is right-side up or upside-down. Here's what we're about to make:

Don't you just love animated GIFs that play forever and ever? Me neither, but I figured it was important to employ one in this case. Because the first time you see it, it's like what? The second time, it makes sense. And then after that, it gets very annoying. Consider it a test of your ability to concentrate. From now on, IGNORE THE SPINNING THING!

Meanwhile, a word of warning: Even at nearly 12 minutes long, this video goes by fast. If I had it to do over again, I would have slowed a few steps. But that's the nature of blog videos. Once they're out there, they're out there. Still, it's cool. And you can always pause, back up, and replay.

(Ye gads, my favorite Deke's Techniques so far requires a lot of apologies. I'm so sorry. Ope, there I go again!)

Here's the official description from my video publisher lynda.com, which comes to you entirely without my (come to think of it) idiotic qualifiers: Read more » 

Although Photoshop 3 is fondly remembered as the version that introduced us to layers, we sometimes forget that it was not the first image editor to do so. In my capacity as a contributing editor to Macworld magazine at the time, I reviewed at least two layer-empowered programs that beat Photoshop 3 to market, Painter X2 and Live Picture. Read more » 

If you're anything like me, you sometimes make mistakes. For example, a few weeks ago, before recording the Photoshop 20th anniversary Martini Hour, I broke my foot falling down a short flight of stairs. Which was fun, because years ago, I had broken the other foot falling down a long flight of stairs. Not to mention the time I busted my teeth on a the bar of a trampoline. Or accidentally yanked a speaker down onto my head and bled so badly I had to replace the couch.

Then there was that time I cautioned a woman not to help a group of us lift a heavy object (it was a car) because she was pregnant (she wasn't). Or the time I called that other woman "Sir." Or when my buddy and I were trash-talking this guy for half an hour---I mean, really laying into what an absolute jerk he was---and then strolled out of my dorm room and found him sitting in a near fetal position by my door. Read more »