dekeBlog

This week, I bring you one of the best things on earth: free samples. And I don't mean samples of some disgustingly healthy, fat-free, high-fiber cardboard-esque reconstituted potato-chip substitute; no, today, I've got full-flavor, indulgently informative free videos to whet your appetite for Deke's new course at lynda.com---Illustrator CS6 One-on-One: Mastery. Both good for you and truly delicious. And calorie-free, if it comes to that.

Mastery is the fourth level in Master Deke's One-on-One series, so this course covers some powerful vector-wrangling features. But don't be daunted, these helpful features are explained with Deke's usual care and clarity. Don't just take my word for it, savor the delicacies I've spread before you here. The folks at lynda.com always make a percentage of each course free for the sampling, and I've included many of those treats here. (And if you'd like the full meal deal and you're not a member of lynda.com, you can get a free week's subscription by going to lynda.com/deke.) Here's what you can expect:

Chapter 33: Using Smart Guides
You probably sense that Smart Guides are convenient for aligning aspects of your work on the fly, but in this chapter, Deke reveals some of the hidden ways you can exploit Smart Guides to create finely crafted artwork. For your consideration, check out this movie that not only helps you draw custom letters, but also is part of a heart-warming story of a man trying to create a logo for his son: 

Free Sample: Hand-drawing letters as stroked paths

Read more » 

The key topic of discussion at tonight's LA Web Professionals Group meeting, where Deke was presenting some live Deke's Techniques, was Adobe's announcement about the Creative Cloud. The upshot: Rather than release Creative Suite 7, all updates to Photoshop and its creative cousins will now come via a Creative Cloud subscription. In other words, if you want the new features in the latest version of Photoshop, you're going to get them delivered via the cloud. 

This is necessarily causing some confusion and questions for Creative Suite users. I've got two useful sources for information on "Photoshop CC." If your questions are primarily about obtaining, installing, and using Creative Cloud, check out this FAQ from Photoshop's Chief Customer Advocate (and friend of dekeOnline) Jeff Tranberry. If you want to know why you might care to obtain, install, and use Photoshop CC, then check out Deke's new Preview of Photoshop Creative Cloud's new features at lynda.com. If you're not a member of lynda.com, you can get a free week's trial to check it out at lynda.com/deke.  Read more » 

And while you're at it, get your InDesign know-how by lifting it from Anne-Marie Concepcion and David Blatner.

As I've probably mentioned ten thousand times already, I have a project I'm working on that requires InDesign, and I'm heading to PEPCON (the Print and eProduction Conference) this weekend and don't want to seem dull-minded as I mix with the InDesignerati. (In my experience, the crowd, speakers, and attendees alike, are wicked sharp at PEPCON.)

So, one of the ways I'm feeding my craving for more InDesign know-how is to watch a lot of David and Anne-Marie's lynda.com course, InDesign Secrets. In fact, that's where I stole this movie on how to get gradient swatches out of Illustrator and into InDesign.

If you're an InDesign user with a design-centric version of the Creative Suite or a subscription to the Creative Cloud, then you already have access to Illustrator, so go grab those swatches. They're already yours. I'm just using the thievery motif for dramatic effect. Much like one might use these gradients:

Like Deke's Techniques, the InDesign Secrets collection at lynda.com is a continually updated series of short episodes. And if this level of InDesignery is over your head, there's an Up & Running with InDesign course taught by some guy named Deke there, too. And if you're not a member, you can get a free week's trial at lynda.com/deke.  

For those of you who like to read, here are my insightful observations on Anne-Marie's trick:   Read more » 

As I mentioned in my last post, I've been working more with InDesign lately and thinking about how learning InDesign's layout capabilities might be of interest to more people as the Creative Cloud model makes it more readily available (i.e. it's free as part of your subscription, so you might as well give it a test drive). Or maybe, like me, it's been a while since you've needed to use ID, and you're looking to renew your acquaintance. 

Given that dekeOpolitans are generally graphically oriented creatures, I've made a list of five things about using graphics (photos, line art, logos) in InDesign documents. These observations may come in handy should you wish to create garage sale flyer, an invitation to an intergalactic cocktail party, or anything else that might combine your carefully crafted graphics with pithily presented text in InDesign. 

So here's my list of five things about working with graphics in InDesign.  Read more » 

In honor of the upcoming (perennially awesome) PEPCON (Print and eProduction Conference) in Austin at the end of the month, I've decided to remember how to use InDesign. I've also been thinking about how lovers of great Photoshop and Illustrator techniques (often synonymous with "fans of Deke") may be interested in showing off their images with InDesign's layout features, especially as a subscription to the Creative Cloud now makes access to ID essentially free. 

But to ease into the layout program after a diet of mostly graphics and photos, I thought I'd start with this tutorial, extracted from Deke's Up & Running with InDesign course at lynda.com, on how to make a quick and easy logo. Deke uses some familiar tools, like the Rectangle shape tool and Pathfinder, that will help PS and AI users aclimate to the InDesign environment. 

In the mood to read rather than watch? Don't have access to the lynda.com sample files? Here's an illustrated step-by-step recounting of how I adapted this tutorial to create my own personal logo from scratch inside InDesign:  Read more »