Adobe Flash Workshops and Seminar by Ycademy

A  new important Ycademy development cycle will start next week: Adobe Flash will be the focus for the next 3 weeks and beyond as the case may be.

The Ycademy May Seminar, which will take place on May 29 and 30, 2010 will concentrate on practical flash application and template modification accessible to people who have followed the flash cycle as well as for participants who have no clue about flash coding: we will work along two parallel workflows, one focused on flash editing, the second on xml editing.

Photo Yorgo Nestoridis

Flash Animated Photo Album

Here is our ambitious educational plan:

Week 1: Introduction and Graphics Creation and Animation

Week 2: Action Script 3.0, Flash Audio and Flash Video

Week 3: Interactive Flash, Project Editing and Publishing

The Great Ycademy Flash Seminar

The Program of the Seminar will be released shortly, however we already know that the Seminar will focus on productivity and using Flash to increase our service level for the benefit of our customers. Namely we will develop and implement flash based products and add them to our product range.

Pre-requisites

This cycle is for participants who have Flash CS4 or CS5 installed or who will install it shortly. The Trial Version available at Adobe will do for the time of the cycle. Please contact Bianca for more information and the best way of equipping your computer with the software.

It is recommended to follow all daily calls as from Monday, May 10, 2010 to acquire the basics; the calls will be recorded. Recordings are available for free to Ycademy Pros, and they are included in the Seminar ticket available shortly.

The Ycademy Flash Cycle is accessible to beginners and there is no need to have any special knowledge. Basic Photoshop knowledge is an asset but not necessary.

Note

The Ycademy Flash Cycle is the most Cost and Time effective way to take our online Web Design and Site Development business to the next level. Join Ycademy Pro and take advantage of permanent updates and cutting edge of technology made available to interested ordinary people wanting to do extraordinary things.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Digital Portrait Photography Ycademy

A specialty in Digital Photography is Portrait Photography. After our Digital Photography Seminar in April we will deal this week with Digital Portrait Photography at our daily calls at 8 pm London Time at yorGOtalk.

One of the most interesting subjects in Photography is the human being and thee are basically two approaches of picturing people and they depend on the main question:

What’s the Story behind a Digital Portrait

In other terms: what is the result you want to achieve, the story you want to tell, the moment you want to ban. A good photographer is a great story teller. And here is the point: you can write a comedy or a drama, neutral descriptions or flattering phrases.

216682144_5c8f04511e

Digital Portrait Photography 1

In photography it’s the same as in music: a great theme can be declined as Rap, Hip Hopp, Blues, Rock, R & B and so on.

At our calls, we will look at some options as listed below.

Portrait Photography option 1

You want to capture a face, a story engraved into a face by life. The means: work with sharper contrasts, harder light and so on to enhance the details of the expression, skin, texture. Emphasize nature.

Portrait Photography option 2

You want to provide a favorable look, a flattering picture; your goal is to become the preferred son in law of your mother in law. Work with the powder box, softening, soft light and soft shadows. Strip off a few pounds and make the skin smooth by applying the baby bum filter :-). Wedding photography is using many of the same techniques we use here, just that there you may add  even more glow and glitter.

greekface

Digital Portrait Photography 2

Portrait Photography option 3

You need a formal portrait, for example for a CV or Business related picture. The work starts with dressing up the subject and choosing the right pose. Get the best out of the subject and do only minor retouching, in any case your post editing should not exaggerate the enhancements to the point where even a mother would not recognize her son.

Portrait Photography option 4

Children and Pets. The main problem is that you need to keep them in front of your lens; the best recipe is to keep them busy instead of keeping them still for 10 minutes with a ‘Cheese’ burned into their face and a Colgate smile as if you had glued their mouth angles to their ears. Just keep them busy and … shoot.

Portraiture and Lighting

There are three main technical tools involved in the production of a good portrait.

First, the Light! Even with an average or low-end cam you can shoot for a decent result for as long as your light is right.

Second: a good Photo Editing program for your post editing tasks.

Third, a camera, whereas the two above mentioned tools will compensate for a big deal of your cam’s eventual shortfalls.

Mephisto

Digital Portrait Photography 3

The most important Elements

The most important elements are: your Subject and YOU or rather: You and your Subject and the way you perceive it, and the way you translate your perception into a portrait. A portrait is successful when people who know the subject say: this is exactly the way he or she is. Or, under option 2 if your mother in law thinks you are a great photographer or when your just married couple and their families go WOW on your shots.

In other words: you must read the subject and you must be aware of the goal you want to achieve. Based on your reading and goal you plan your Portrait and you start imagining the lighting, the angle, the pose, the camera settings and so on. It’s a mental process which leads to the actual shooting.

More at tonight’s call.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

5 Tips to take Pictures of Cars

When you take shots of a car it’s like taking pictures of anything: if you like cars, you will probably do better. A car lover will see these details and lines, a simple photo technician will just not get a grip on. It’s a bit like focusing on Cindy Crawford’s eyes and neglecting all the other eye-tearing shapes. Which brings us right to the subject of tonight’s Ycademy call.

Look at the subject from different angles

Maserati 8CTF Indianapolis 1939

Maserati 1939 Indianapolis

Search for the design elements which make the car unique. In a time when all cars tend to look the same and where the best picture of a new Chevy looks as annoying as a Tata, we need to search for the highlights in the design. The mass produced Japanese, European and American cars are frankly no fun and there is not much to take pictures of that will knock you off the driver’s seat. The best you can do with them is to use them for further treatment and as a base for interesting trash graphics.

I have never understood why the masses have to drive such ugly cars and why the car companies reserve good design to the high end production, if at all.

So, sneak around your car, bend and stretch and find the best angles to shoot some flattering shots, sensual shots, aggressive shots, shots with a soul and a body: don’t forget, the car has also a rear, which may be as so often, the better part of the model.

Look for interesting Details

The excitement is where there is beauty, great design, interesting shapes and details. Sports Cars are still a great playground, at least on the higher end, and then of course classic cars. But on most any car you will find some detail of interest and be it just the most ugly heck spoiler on a Japanese Ferrari imitation from the 80s (remember that Honda, huh?).

Indi Maserati 1939

Create Focus with your Camera Settings

I like to shoot with priority on Aperture to work with depth of field in order to create focus; you can try as well to use macro settings for small details, namely on a small model car as featured here. It’s a matter of taking several shots and then selecting the best result. But in general, you should do better getting off the A and P modes on your Digital Camera.

The first picture above was zoomed, the two underneath work with depth of field.

Create Focus by Post-Editing

The result is better but not satisfactory: more focus can be added, first by taking better shots (you have to become a better photographer …) or by creating focus when post-editing. There is nothing wrong with post-editing, in fact, it enables you to make up for the lack of your camera’s quality (the best excuse) or for your lack of photographic knowledge (much less flattering for you and therefore not recommended …).

Now that we have established that the Nikons,Canons, Sonys and Leicas out there are not as brilliant products as marketing lead us to believe when the sales rep pulled us over the table, we breathe better and can now look for Companies which make money out of the technical failures of the Camera Manufacturers: Adobe has set industry standards in this field and their survival depends largely on the lousy camera quality (as I said, it’s the best excuse!).

The problem with Adobe, and Photoshop in particular is it’s low tech interface which requires a compass and a world map to find your way through the forest of settings nobody can learn in one lifetime (… Hinduism is a viable option). So finally here are your choices: become a Hindu Guru or learn how to take better pictures.

We cannot take better pictures, since the camera manufacturers do a lousy job. Hinduism is a difficult option for a Steak Tartar freak.

What else is there?

Luckily there are many more photography aficionados in the same case as you (and I) and they were there before us. These smart spirits have overcome the problem by creating things called Photoshop Actions and Plug-ins, Filters and Presets for Lightroom.

These guys of whom nobody knows the names, deserve highest respect and esteem, if not a legacy like the unknown soldier. These are the heroes who make our lives easier and due to whom our religious integrity is no longer threatened by Adobe and indirectly by the negligent Camera Manufacturers.

Let’s add some Creative Blur, Zoom or Pane effects to our masterpiece. A difficult job with a low end digital camera but a piece of cake for a good PS Action!

Maserati Detail

Your imagination is the limit and you will have to decide how far you want to push the tweaking; however, you should know that in fashion photography the most outrageous morphing is stretching Cindy’s legs and worse on better parts. So, don’t be ashamed to express your dream world as do the pros (the dream being most of the time the cash in the kitty called the fruit of empathy, huh.).

Indi 1939 Marerati

By the way… instead of blurring the car you could use spinning blur on the wheels while keeping the car in focus – the feel of motion.

Narrow Framing

Namely for details, frame as close as you can to obtain the highest amount of data possible; it will make your post-editing easier. If you take a pic of a car in its natural environment, make sure that the viewer’s eye is not sidetracked by the background or other distracting or dominant items:

Maserati BW

Maserati bb

I hope these 5 tips will help to get better results. I will share with those present my PS Blur Action at tonight’s Ycademy Workshop at 8 pm London Time.

Looking forward to seeing you there.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Watermark and Copyright with Photoshop CS4

A small but important task for all creative minds: protect your work! Even considering that in certain countries, such as the USA, your images are automatically copyright protected when you publish them, you may want to make it “crystal” clear to everyone that you claim your rights on your work.

In Photoshop CS 4 it is easy to create a simple Action for the purpose of watermarking and to add a copyright notice to your picture. The watermark is the visible sign, while the copyright notice is attached to the file.

Transparent Watermark 1

Transparent Watermark 2

At tonight’s call we will create an Action in CS4 allowing you to add quickly your watermark and copyright notice to your images.

Join the workshop at 8 pm London time at yorGOtalk.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Let your Zoom tell the Story

Today a simple exercise with your Zoom. The recommendation is to use only optical zoom as the digital zoom chips away loads of data and because the cropping tools in Photoshop return better results.

At tonight’s workshop we will comment the pictures below and work on our Zoom.

600shell4

Zoom 2

600shell5

Zoom 3

How about some more Lightroom Presets?

[download_box]Download some Lightroom Presets[/download_box]

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

More Lightroom Presets: The 70s

Back in fashion, the 70s have also their photographic face. If you are of my generation or older, you remember the 70s quite well. Point and Shoot photography with simple 35 mm cams became popular. Plastic lenses and cheap lens’s distortions, zoom available to anyone … photography gained a wider popularity. While film development cost was still high, the Point and Shoot cameras of the seventies guaranteed at least a clear picture.

Stabilizers were not yet available but the shutter speed was set to 1/100 or 1/125 so that most pictures came back shake-free and fairly sharp with wide depth of field.

700y

Seventies

Why use 70s Filters?

In fact, why filtering at all? At a time when most anyone can shoot a sharp picture and where Digital Cameras do “it” all, the trend to filters is increasing; maybe because most images are taken using automatic camera settings, which give to all those pictures the “same look”. That “same look” often is flat and lacking depth, soul and emotion.

Seeking the imperfection of the popular cams of the 70s can help to distinguish your pic from the industrial mass output.

[download_box]Download some 70s Presets for Lightroom[/download_box]

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Portrait Editing

May be the most popular subject of photos are people, friends, family, kids. Taking pictures of people is somewhat delicate since nobody likes lousy pictures of his face. In fact, few people like pictures which look exactly what they see when looking into the mirror.

We are no professionals with all the lightning equipments and professional cameras, but like anyone, we like to take pictures of friends and family. The least we can do is to try to take the shot from the most advantageous angle. Our photo must make people look great. We also can position the subject in an advantageous light and may be in front of an attractive background. For the rest, we will need some software to post-edit the portraits in-order to produce a flattering result.

Portrait Enhancement

Tonight at the Ycademy Workshop I would like to share with you the hallucinating experience of portrait editing using an intelligent piece of software. Yes, for once it’s not Photoshop or Lightroom.

The workshop is a Bonus Session for Seminar Participants.

portrait

Portrait as shot

portrait1

Portrait enhanced

For Seminar Participants

[toggle title="Hidden Bonus :-)"][download_box]Download and Install[/download_box][/toggle]

PS: This bonus is only available today.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Portrait Shooting

Based on Digital Photography Ycademy 9 we are able to plan our pictures depth of field. The only remaining problem is: you may have a camera which does not allow for A settings (manual Aperture priority settings).

Don’t worry, there is a way to at least partially compensate for this shortfall.

The below gallery can best be viewed HERE (opens new window).

Depth of Field in Portraiting with a low end Camera or Mobile Phone

Remember, we said that the depth of field is function of aperture and distance. Hence, we can use the distance trick which works with most any digital camera or mobile phone.

First we try to compose our picture in a way that the person is not glued to a background, such as leaning on a wall. Position the person at least 2 meters off the next background. Then frame clsosely from maximum 1.5 meters (without zooming). The result may be better if the background is even further away to fall out of the metered focal range (corresponding to infinity settings) which is at about 10-12 meters.

Now shoot your portrait: the autofocus will grab the face and apply the distance, which in it’s turn will trigger the aperture and shutter speed in function of that distance and light. By setting your camera presets on Portrait, the camera does this as well, whereas a narroc depth of field is forced.

In any case, you will end up with a sharp portrait and a more or less blurred background.

Portrait Post Editing

If you have taken your picture according to the above, then your post editing is a sunday walk. Just apply some of the great lightroom presets or photoshop actions. Some of these professional tools will lift the quality of your mediocre picture dramatically and clearly digg a huge canion between you and the competitors in your camera’s class.

Here an example: the below picture has been taken with my 4 years old $50 supermarket camera according to the above rule. Then I just pulled it through some professional filters such as stuff from from Kubota, Davis and onOne. This is a matter of just seconds :-).

Join tonight’s YcademyWorkshop for more tips and tricks.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

As today the Moon is at it’s closest to the earth for this year, I did a test run last night and brought back the following shot:

This is about as good as it could get

The above was shot with the following

F-stop:                   f/6.3

Exposure time:    1/250

ISO-speed             ISO-400

Focal-length:        49 mm

35-mm focal length:  389

Exposure Program: Aperture Priority

The idea was to figure out different settings to catch at least some of the texture of the surface of the moon.

Tonight I found a nice spot, just above Vouliagmeni’s Limanaki to catch the moon rising above the Varkiza Bay.

Click to view the bigger version for more detail.

This time I went for Shutter Priority and ISO 200 which resulted in an Exposure Time of 0,77 sec. Also I used an Exposure Bias of +0.7 step.

Of course this is not the kind of quality you could expect from a professional picture, but it shows what you can do with most any point and shoot.

The temptation to pull such pictures through Photoshop is evident and I have not resisted just for the fun.

And a cooler version, filtering out some red which we usually see when the moon rises at the sea:

Related posts: Shooting at the Moon HD Video with your Digital Photo Camera iPhone 4 Photo Camera Review 1 Vouliagmeni Kavouri Beach Flowers from Vouliagmeni Beach

The Magic of Depth of Field

At the beginning, many photographers struggle with the concept of aperture and depth of field. I remember back in the 60ies when my dad ciselled the principles into my brain. He was shooting with a good old Leica I loved for all the buttons and little wheels it featured for tons of settings.

I could not imagine what they were good for: but they looked god for sure and that was a good enough reason to fetch my interest.

By the way, have you ever noticed how “look-focused” photographers are? And the look of their camera? It’s part of the over all estethics photographers are in search of and  attached to, I guess.

Of course it is sexier to have your portrait taken in an Indiana Jones Look (or the Marlboro Man minus the smell of the sweating horse and the cow dung…) holding a big cam with a mega lens in front, than Indiana with an iPhone, huh.

Back to the depth of field. I was exercising on flowers in the garden 50 years ago and the game went as follows.

marienkaefer

Marienkaefer

Exercise 1

1. Move as close as you can (don’t use Macro to start with)  to the object you want to take a picture of and set your lens to the widest aperture (that’s the smallers f/number!). In my case it was f/2.8 at that time). If you do this with your digital camera, the cam will automatically select the appropriate shutter speed.

2. Repeat the exercise with f/5.6, f/8, f/11 and f/22.

3. You have now 5 pictures of the same flower with a background (and maybe foreground) of the surrounding flowers. However your pictures are different from each other and the difference is in the depth of field.

Conclusion: The narrower the aperture, the wider the depth of field! This is the real issue here, meaning, the smaller the opening of the lens’s diaphragm (high f/number), the longer the cam will expose the sensor(film) to the light inflow and the sharper your picture gets along the depth (z-) axes.

The wider the aperture (small f/number) the narrower the depth of field (and the faster the shutter speed) and you end up with these beautifully blurred back and or foregrounds. Your digital camera’s auto-focus, focused on the flower you want to feature, will automatically make sure that your depth of field is optimized for the flower.

flower

Flower

Exercise 2

Do the same exercise again by zooming out or moving away from the object you are taking the picture of. Shoot from a distance of about 1 meter to 1.5 meters (4-5 feet). Again you will end up with a series of pictures.

You will find: the further you move away from the flower, the wider the depth of field will get! This is the second important rule.

Put simply: if you want a sharp picture throughout the whole depth, increase the distance and use higher f/numbers. If on the other hand you wish a picture where the focused object is sharp and the background and or the foreground are blurred, then move closer and decrease the f/number (wider aperture or diaphragm of the lens is wider open, which triggers a faster shutter speed).

Conclusion 1

This exercise should help you to improve on your Macro shots and Portraits. The effect is function of depth of field: to limit the depth of field use a wider aperture (smaller f/number) and move closer; the background will be less in focus and you get the desired blur-effect.

Conclusion 2

This is probably the most important single concept which will bring you ahead of the masses. I guess 99% or more of all camera users are not aware of this concept and will continue to shoot happily their flat shots.

Conclusion 3

The best way to achieve the effect is by using your camera’s manual settings (priority on Aperture A-mode). If your cam does not allow for Aperture priority, then you still have the option to pull your picture through Lightroom of Photoshop and to manipulate the background out of focus … but why going that route if your cam can deliver a better quality original?

It’s obvious that skilled Photoshop users are absolutely capable to fake the blur effect, but believe me: if you want it well done, it takes time, loads of it and you have the bitter taste in your mouth of someone who just became aware that he re-invented the wheel. Imagine: the cam does in a fraction of a second (literally) what may cost you hours in Photoshop.

The Camera and Photoshop or Lightroom

No, I am not against Photo Editing Programs at all. Photoshop is a great tool and can do things the camera cannot do; on the other hand the camera is a great tool as well and it can do certain things better than Photoshop. So, let’s use each tool for what it is made and you cumulate the quality of the cam’s work with the quality of PS.

The best results in Photoshop are achieved with a great picture at the base: the more time you spend to make your picture great, the less time you will spend in Photoshop and the better your image data.

Try this over the week-end and come back with some nice, more or less blurred pictures! Stuff them into a new Gallery on Your Semiomantics Evolution site to share your results. I am looking forward to it.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Photo Editing vs. Graphic Design

Sometimes it is difficult to draw a clear line between photo editing and graphic design or editing. The present Ycademy Sessions deal with Photo Editing and the primary goal is to improve our photographic skills.

Whether we use Lightroom or Photoshop, we can push our editing away from photography into the fields of graphic creativity, which is not the purpose of what we are doing at this stage.

Don’t just take pictures – Tell a Story

The beautifu world of Photography starts with your shot and leads to the story your picture will tell after editing. Make sure it is still a photograph for the purpose of the April Ycademy!

vouliagmeni1

Vouliagmeni

Sure we can use most any pictures to tell a story by using the graphic design editors from Photoshop. But it’s a lot more difficult to come back with an optimized photograph, where subtle editing will not destroy the photo caracter of the image and yet allow us to tell a story.

You may argue, that you don’t need an optimized Photo to tell a story. True. Your output however is no longer a photography but a graphich illustration as the case may be. Whether at the base you have been using a photo or a hand designed image is not really relevant. What is relevant, is to know, which language we use to communicate and to express ourselves and how the viewer will percieve our image.

I like to clearly distinguish between photographic work and digital graphic work.

Using Filters and Presets in Lightroom

Tonight’s workshop will deal more in depth with Presets and Filters in Lightroom. Different snapshots taken during the editing proces will help to select the final version of the picture.

In order to study Lightroom in depth, you may want to grab a great piece of literature from here below.

vouliagmeni4

Vouliagmeni 2

[download_box]Download eBook 20 MB[/download_box]

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Working with Lightroom Presets

Presets are of great help to adjust images in Lightroom. For easy editing it is necessary to get familiar with terminology and some technical features. Most Lightroom presets find their equivalent in Photoshop.

Tonight at the Workshop we will play with some Lightroom Presets and Photoshop actions.

praz-sur-arly

Praz-sur-Arly

Get your materials from here-below:

[download_box]Presets and Actions Download[/download_box]

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Adobe CS5 Pricing in Europe

Why the heck is software more expensive in Europe than in the USA? SOFTware we are talking about. Software you can download or buy on a CD. The cost of copying a CD or software is worldwide the same, i.e. next to nothing. The problem is then either the distribution or unethical pricing by the company in function of target markets … comparable to the pharmaceutic industry. Why should Greeks, earning a fraction of what an average American earns, pay about double the price for CS5?

And what makes Adobe believe that the Greek is stupid enough to actually pay the rip-off price tag? What do we get the Americans don’t have for that additional money?

Microsoft is a similar case with their Windows 7 release which is nothing else that a finally working Vista we had paid good money for a few years ago. Upgrades in the US were 50% cheaper than over here.

In as much as Windows is concerned, I just went for the American versions since 2001. The market is global and so should be prices.

Go Buy where it’s cheaper

There is no point paying for greedy distributors, intermediaries and other “I would like to make money without adding value”-worms. So forget about intermediaries, Adobe should pay them if they need them; I don’t need them nor do the other 6.5 billion people of this globe. There is a thing out there called the Internet which allows for direct delivery online at no cost … worldwide.

There is even a globally accessible thing out there called the Adobe website which provides tutorials, download links, tips and tricks second to none, and definitely better than anything an intermediary would offer.

youtube

Yorgo Nestoridis Editing and Publishing on YouTube

So, remains the Rip off. Unfortunately I could not find any argument against this one.

Or as someone posted on Twitter: “It’s cheaper to fly to the US to buy Adobe CS5 for $2,599 than buy it in the UK”. The price gap is about 1500 Pounds!

Let’s have a look at one of the CS5 packs:

US: CS5 Design Standard $ 1299,-
Germany: CS5 Design Standard € 1699,-

The 1699 Euros correspond to about 2300 Dollars, almost double!

Oh, by the way: by buying product packages, you save up to 60% Adobe dixit on it’s site, which still boils down to the above.

Back in 2007, when adobe launched CS3, the European prices where at about 190% of the US prices; some people made a petition for the attention of the European Commission. Today, may be such a petition may have more impact. For sure, consumer protection organizations should look into the matter and use their influence to tell European people what Adobe calls them: stupids, for the least I can find in my rich 4-and-more-letter word vocabulary.

The Markets make the Price

I hate to be taken for a ride. And I am in a global market. There is Amazon and there is eBay and there are many global market places which define their prices in a global way. So, let’s look at other market places and forget about Adobe’s local rip-off outlets. We are the customers, that is, we are the market or at least the demand side of it. We say what we are ready to pay and our consumer behavior will ultimately have it’s impact on Adobe as it starts having on pharmaceuticals.

Thanks Adobe for a great product; if you would add a pitch of ethics to your pricing policy before being forced to do so, you will see many more smiling faces out there.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

New Adobe CS5 Master Collection

It’s smashing, exciting and a milestone, the new Adobe CS5 release! no reason to try to describe all the new goodies wrapped up in the new pack, just go and have a look at the launch presentation at Adobe. Product delivery to the public is expected to start in May.

The single most important reason to buy CS5

If you watch through the various presentation clips, you fill see that for every product being part of the CS5 Master Collection Adobe presents 5 main characteristics. I was wondering, what would be my synthesized single best reason to switch from CS4 to CS5.

With CS5, Adobe introduces eye-bleeding cool features, and loads of them. However one main argument is that the somewhat oldish programs like Photoshop, Flash and After Effects become much more productivity oriented and user-friendly.

Adobe CS5 will definitely make professional tools available to a wider audience and grant a smoother and much more effective workflow. This is where individuals, Home Business Builders, free lancers, designers and developers will find a true possibility to run a media design, development and publishing business as a one-man show. Or, there will be less need for outsourcing, coding, sharing to get a better result faster.

yn

Yorgo Nestoridis Media Publishing

Adobe CS5 from the point of view of Ycademy

Ycademy, our online Educational Arm has been organizing trainings, workshops and seminars focusing amongst others on Web design and Web site development with Photoshop for some time and we are aware of the difficulties Photoshop represents for the average part-timer or newbie. However with some smart add-on actions, filters and plugins, Photoshop became accessible to average computer users. The new CS5 however makes things much easier in as much as complex manipulations can be executed in just seconds, such as moving, replacing or deleting objects from a photo for example whereas as the case may be, Photoshop will automatically replace the object with the appropriate hypothetical background. Smashing!

Whether you use Lightroom or not, the new Photoshop CS5 is a highly efficient image editing tool, not just for graphic designers, but also for Photographers. The interaction of the various tools provided in the CS5 Master Collection or in any CS5 Pack for that matter, provides a fantastic training environment where I am sure we will have new opportunities to help many people to become familiar with professional tools, cutting edge technology and the joy of exceptional results.

CS5 is in the trend: visual expression has become part of our day-to-day language due to the proliferation of mobile devices and social networks. Amongst all the internet users there will always be a good number who  are reaching out for quality, style and the best possible image or branding. Adobe CS5 is a bundle of tools allowing anyone using it to communicate better and in more creative ways. I am looking forward to explore CS5 with our first training group in June.

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Web Design and Web Site Development

Adobe CS5 from the point of view of Semiomantics

It has never been and it still is not Adobe’s cup of tea: semantics! The proliferation of more visual communication provides increasing challenges for Semiomantics and in fact our way to optimize editing and publishing of visual content and media (images, movies, sound) has still a long way to go and a brilliant future ahead. In short: the more visual content customers publish, the more they will have the need to use Semiomantics tuned scripts to reach Google Top 10or to show up on Bing’s top end. More important even: Semiomantics Approach to Facebook with the new Semiomantics Flash module, which will be released in May, will open completely new perspectives for agents and customers.

Adobe CS5 from the point of view of YORGOO

YORGOO, focusing on free traffic and free leads will wake up soon, simply because we come close to the end of a long development of new content for YORGOO, focusing namely on social networks and Search Engines in the broadest way. YORGOO will remain a starting point for online Marketing efforts and help people to connect quickly with environments where the people are, where the target customers are looking for products and where people interact. The YORGOO approach will remain a no-profit no-ads program and oriented towards all those who want to start an commercial online activity with limited means and high perspectives.

More soon.

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Media Design

Adobe CS5 from the point of view of ChiHosters and Hosting South Africa

More media and more sophisticated media, more creativity and more creation, faster internet lines and computers entail larger file sized and more media oriented hosting needs. At ChiHosters and Hosting South Africa we have planned ahead; entrusting large freely accessible networks with your copyrighted media is not the safest way to protect your interest. Hosting your originals on your own server or host in a reliable way is a necessity for professionals as well as for many security conscious individuals. We are providing the most cost effective solutions in the industry, namely for small enterprises and individuals. Expanding the activity to high end hosting services are under discussion.

Adobe CS5 from the point of view of YORGOO Media

A year ago we have stalled the YORGOO Media development for different reasons, namely because we were not satisfied with the WordPress MU development as well as with the hosting capabilities we had. With the release of WordPress 3 and the possibility to provide advanced media streaming, YORGOO Media is high on our list of priorities since it will provide highly efficient Semiomantics signed publishing solutions to the over 70 000 YORGOO subscribers.

More shortly.

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Yorgo Nestoridis Publishing and Editing

Adobe CS5 Ripoff Pricing Policy

As other companies, such as Microsoft, Adobe has a discriminatory pricing policy, privileging the American Markets. Why the heck should Adobe Products cost more in Australia and Europe than in the USA? Funny, that such a high tech company, with a global approach has such a narrow, short sighted pricing policy. It’s comparable to the pharmaceutic industry and there we know what the natural reaction of the markets are. If anyone from Adobe reads this: tell your boss, time has come to change your rip-off attitude, the global market is looking for global pricing.

More about Adobe CS5 pricing shortly.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Lightroom Presets for Landscapes

Presets area handy start … to create your own presets, adapted to your needs, taste and the purpose of your visual communication.

Landscapes are just an example and if I just use here another mediocre picture from the cheap $50 cam, it’s to demonstrate that for the purpose of basic online publishing, most any lens will do.

Here some of the presets we will use at tonight’s call:

By the way: the above images can be better viewed in the Photo Ycademy Gallery: HERE

For the purpose of tonight’s workshop, here are some more presets you may want to grab:

[download_box]Download Lightroom Presets 2[/download_box]

Enjoy!

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Lightroom Presets

Tonight’s Ycademy call and Workshop will deal with Lightroom presets. How to import them and how to use them. To start with we will exercise on a landscape photo.

This will give us also the opportunity to get acquainted with the typical workflow using Lightroom: from the camera output to online publishing.

Join tonight’s Workshop at 8 pm London at yorGOtalk.

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Praz sur Arly

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Praz sur Arly Holga

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Praz sur Arly Funky Senior

Here are some presets you may want download; we will install them together tonight at the call.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Create your Photo Gallery

Nice, your work! What’s next? We need an attractive and accessible way to share our photo- or other graphic work.

Looking at Photo Galleries online, you will notice: most of them look alike with a typical flow from the thumbnail to a medium sized image (often not bigger than 500 pixels wide).

Lightroom lets you generate such galleries.

Ycademy Photo Gallery

The purpose of presenting Photos is to maximize the power of the image by allowing for optimized display on viewers monitors. In other words: think big!

Personally, I just cannot get a real kick out of thumbnails and the greedy presentation of great images in small size. Sure, if you want to sell your photos, you don’t just want to give them away by putting them up for grab on your site.

But then, you could do with the thumbnail or a watermarked version and show a full size, maximum quality excerpt of the picture by cutting out a captivating part of the pic.

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Ycademy Gallery

The main format we have selected for the Ycademy Photo Gallery is based on the image height of 600 pixels. This will fit and look good on any current monitor size. The width is not important as the scrolling is horizontal. The human eye prefers to scroll or scan horizontally rather than vertically.

Looking at the above picture for the purpose of the blog: I use the “thumbnail” size of 480 wide and load the image with 1680 pixels width. The thumb looks somewhat cropped, while the magnifying glass presents the original size view with astonishing detail. When you click on the pic and it opens in overlay, it will then go as big as your browser or full size depending on how I embed it. As a visitor to the post, you get really quite some views for your money :-).

The image in the header of the post expands first to browser size and then to original size, even if that is larger than your screen (top right click). Smashing!

Back to the Ycademy Gallery: the Gallery is a great piece of script for visual presentation of most anything you can pack on to an image.

Have a look at it from HERE.

Limitations

For the time being we will only deliver the script to Ycademy Pros and Seminar Participants. The Commercial Version will be available shortly. The difference being: the educational script we deliver for your personal use can be branded and and configured without editing flash, which makes it comfortable to use, the content, editing and configuration cannot be protected and secured. It’s therefore definitely not something you want to give out of your hands.

If you purchase the script from the Semiomantics Shop, please contact Bianca after the purchase by mail for delivery: bianca (at) ycademy.com

PS: The above image can be viewed live on site HERE

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Lightroom

At Ycademy we are committed to Lightroom, the smashing Adobe image management and editing tool. Lightroom is a professional product which will help also amateurs to keep track of pictures, edit them and finally it allows anyone to quickly publish the final output on the internet. Integrated Gallery templates paired with a PayPal shopping cart provide a quick way to commercialize your shots.

The Interface

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Lightroom 2

The sleek interface is well structured based on an efficient workflow model; it guides you almost step by step from importing pictures through the development process all the way to printing and publishing.

What is not visible on the above screen-shot are the hundreds of features and thousands of possibilities Lightroom offers to improve, tweak or post-edit images.

Lightroom Ycademy

For the purpose of the Digital Photography Ycademy I will keep the focus on each participants needs and elaborate a workflow model with Lightroom which can be easily implemented, learned and efficiently used in no time.

Understanding Lightroom means understanding Photography. Working our way through Lightroom will therefore give us the opportunity to fill in some gaps and solidify our knowledge.

The best of all: you will be able to tune your pictures like a pro and to come back with results your friends and family will enjoy!

We will spend next week’s daily calls to set up, configure and learn working with Lightroom.

Example

I have shot the above picture last Tuesday in a local Souvlaki Place here in Vouliagmeni, my niece Laura being the model. The camera used is a low cost $50, 7 MP supermarket cam (it does not even have a brand).

Above you see the steps from the original color pic to the final output, copy here below:

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Laura

Hey, this is what Lightroom basics do for you!

The model was happy with the picture and so  am I.

Join tonight’s Ycademy Call at YorgoTalk (8 pm London Time) where we will continue with Digital Photography basics: Camera Settings.

Get your Digital Photography Ycademy Ticket from HERE.

Once you have purchased the ticket, please send a mail to Bianca Gubalke with your contact info: bianca (at) ycademy.com. You will then receive all the course materials and info you need to become a Digital Photo Pro in 15 days :-).

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

The Tools for Ycademy in April 2010

In order to profit from Ycademy and it’s Seminar in April 2010 you will need to dispose of some professional tools we will introduce during the month.

A Digital Camera

I will not make a religion out of a camera band, nor make any brand specific recommendation, since you will be able to find great shots originating from material of about all professional brands. In fact, a good picture taken on a low end cam is often better than a badly composed shot from a high end lens. We are not selling cameras nor software, but we want to show you, how to optimize your digital photography with what you have.

It’s like with every profession: you first learn the technique and then you apply it with tools which suit your needs and means. Your needs will depend on your purpose. If you do predominantly landscape photography under good daylight and weather conditions, then your technical needs are not the same as if you were to burn nightlife scenes to your chip.

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Compact Camera

The Digital Photography Ycademy will focus in April on technical basics first and then advance to more specific online publishing and media related topics.

Important is the camera. There are cameras for every need and wallet and yet, in a way there is a lot of common sense to the whole issue: you basically get what you pay for. If you have a good camera, your photo editing will be easier, because you dispose of more data per picture and because the initial quality of the picture requires less post editing to result in the touch and feel you have been researching when you took the shot. If your camera is from the lower end of the scale, you will probably spend more time editing the images knowing that your initial handicap will never be completely compensated for even by the best editing tools.

What is a good camera anyway?

The best camera is always the one you are taking the shot with! Meaning, any cam is better than no cam.When it comes to choosing your camera, you will see that the market offers a product for most any need, purpose and wallet. In recent years digital cameras have become extremely sophisticated without however always improving the basic quality of the output. What has changed are namely user interfaces and the menu of presets has increased.

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Professional Top End Camera

There are a few criteria I am looking at when buying a camera:

1. What and how will I use the camera?

Being equipped with heavy professional high end SLR material I am looking for a handy camera I can easily take along wherever I go and which delivers better pictures than any mobile phone (otherwise, I’d rather use the mobile phone which on top allows for instant publishing online). But then I am not a reporter with time constrains and in as much as photography is concerned, I like to select and edit my pictures if needed before publishing them.

So, my first choice would be a point and shoot camera, compared to a bulkier and more sophisticated DSLR.

As size is a priority, the second question is: how many of my basic quality requirements can be found in this class of cams.

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Cheap cam paired with good editing soft

2. What are the technical criteria and priorities?

Based on the typical work-flow in digital photography, and given the fact that I don’t mind doing some post-editing, I actually would not need any of these automatic features and presets, since good image editing software can more than making up for a low end cam’s built in software.

What is more important is the file size and format I can export from the cam into my editing software on my computer. Ideally I wold like to be able to export RAW or Adobe’s DNG format, or at least TIFF, which is also a loss-less format. Most cameras allow for exporting in different JPEG formats and some manufacturers insist on their own brand format which often limits the choice of editing software.

On the lower end you probably will have to bend to the limitations of JPEG; in any case I would refrain from purchasing a cam which prevents the use of common professional editing software, such as Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom or Aperture.

I am looking for a good lens! Small cameras have already the handicap of size often paired with a lack of allowing for manual settings; to make up partially for these handicaps, I am definitely looking at the quality of the lens. In fact, the two most important components are the lens and the sensor. This is where the image is created and the light inflow is converted to a picture. I am looking to a minimal loss of quality and data at this point.

Of course with point and shoot pocket cameras you can not expect miracles but you will find substantial differences between different makes, brands and types.

For the purpose of the Ycademy Digital Photo, we will base the assumptions on the fact that participants can export JPEG format from their digital camera and that the camera offers an interface with more or less simple menus for presets and other features. A very basic digital camera will do.

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Unedited Bee

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Bee edited

Work-flow Management and Editing Software

At Ycademy we have chosen Photoshop Lightroom namely because it offers many features from Photoshop without being as costly as Photoshop and because it offers comprehensive image management and editing features which are appreciated by many professionals and studios.

A nice definition I read recently in a forum brings it to the point:

“Lightroom enables a quick and easy workflow with functionality to ease professional display for web and print. You can get the same job done in Photoshop it’s just less streamlined. Workflow is the name of the game when it comes to Lightroom.”

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Digital Photography and Photo Editing

Participants at the Ycademy March Seminar have decided: The month of April 2010 will be devoted to Digital Photography and Photo Editing.

This decision comes as no surprise since we have reached a good level of image editing with Photoshop and publishing to high quality flash driven sites from Semiomantics Evolution; Semiomantics Evolution is about entirely driven by images and their quality.

No surprise neither that everyone today owns a digital camera, be it a web cam, a mobile phone with an integrated cam or a digital camera.

There is of course a huge difference between a professional DSLR and a cheap low resolution cam; however, they all use the same technology. Whatever your means are, understanding the technology and making the best use of it will improve the image quality and ultimately your impact on your audience and visitors to your website. Also, producing your own media will allow you to produce and to use your own copyrighted media and as the case may be sell your production to a growing market of stock photos.

Example:

YorgoMan shot with a cheap $50 Camera

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YorgoMan

As the cams auto-focus works only in the center of the frame, the subject appears centered in the quick original shot. Also, you may notice that there is quite some noise. The white balance on the above has been corrected with basic auto adjust means.

YorgoMan after image editing: the goal was to make a more vibrant and interesting picture from the initial JPEG above using Lightroom and Photoshop.

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YorgoMan B/W

From there you may add graphic elements for advertising or other purposes …

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YorgoMan Daydreaming

as well as your watermark or signature and maybe a frame:

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YorgoMan by studio yorgo

Studio Yorgo or Yorgo Studio, that’s the question when you decide about your signature. It can then become a www and I may register yorgostudio.com to publish my collections, using for example Semiomantics Evolution Media Publishing Modules.

I will post shortly the agenda for Photo Ycademy April 2010 as well as the list of educational materials needed to fully profit from a great, glossy and colorful month of April with Ycademy.

Please invite your interested friends to Ycademy to let them as well profit from our steep learning curve as well as from the exceptional educational toolbox we have put together for the occasion.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.