Archive for September, 2007
As you might be able to tell by the title, this isn’t an advanced feature, but because of the wildly popular “Illustrator Quick Tips” I’ve been publishing, I’m starting a new series of simple, yet very useful tips aptly named “Illustrator 101.” (I will also be doing this for Photoshop, so keep an eye out for “Photoshop 101″ tips coming soon as well) Sometimes the simplest things can be the most helpful, so to kick of the Illustrator 101 series, we’re going to save ourselves some transforming headaches, and harness a simple scaling option in the Transform palette.
Part 10 of the free vectors is here, and it’s gears! I also included a bonus Illustrator brush set so you can make your own custom gears, if you feel the need. I had to make some brushes in order to make this freebie set, and I wouldn’t feel right with the brushes sitting on my hard drive when they would help you make your own custom gears (easily). Hope you like them, download below, brush installation instructions at the bottom.
For all of you who have been drooling over the much-talked-about graphics editor for the Mac, Pixelmator. . . wait no longer! The first version of Pixelmator (1.0) is out of Beta and has been released to the public. Head on over to Pixelmator.com and download a free trial, and remember, the price tag on this software is a mere $59. It may not be (and probably isn’t) as powerful as Photoshop, but it definitely packs more features than what $59 brings to mind.
This article was big in the social-media scene, but in-case you missed it, it’s one of the best Photoshop articles I’ve come across in a long while. Let’s face it. Time is money. If you’re constantly looking for ways to improve your Photoshop workflow, the folks over at the brilliantly-designed WebDesignerWall.com have a fantastic must-read post on hidden, or undocumented Photoshop shortcuts. If you want to learn, or even to test your Photoshop knowledge head on over for a good read, and you might want to sift through the comments for even more shortcut goodness.
I don’t even know where to start. Clicky is a new web analytics service (free, or pro for a small fee) that is so feature-rich it’s hard to imagine everything that Clicky can do. Not only do they offer the normal set of analytics features, they have tons more that leave competitors in the dust. Some cool new features include a WordPress plugin, A live Spying feature (like Digg), Access to the API, File Download Tracker, Stats Via RSS, Integration with iGoogle, the list goes on and on. The only dissapointment I’ve found so far is the fact that Clicky isn’t offering their (killer) service to websites with more than 20,000 page views per day : ( They claim to be adding hardware to make this possible soon. One more thing. . . If you sign up for their affiliate program, it’s possible to get the premium service for free. And I hope they hurry. Move over Google Analytics, Clicky is where it’s at!
A reader recently asked me about using the eyedropper tool to adjust the (one of 2+) colors in an Illustrator gradient. If you’ve never witnessed this frustration, it is quite annoying. In Illustrator, when using the gradient palette, (Adobe should have figured this out by now) you can’t double-click on one of the gradient color sliders to bring up the color picker? Furthermore, if you click on one of the color sliders of your gradient, and then use the Eyedropper Tool to change that color, Illustrator replaces your gradient fill with a solid color. Every. Time. Although I don’t have a 100% fix for this, I do have a keyboard shortcut to ease your pain…
Something that just came to my attention is the contest that Vecteezy.com is holding for it’s contributors. Today (Sept 20th, 2007) is the last day (**UPDATE Vecteezy has extended the deadline to: Monday Sept 24th, 2007, winners announced Tuesday**) to submit your original vector designs and the winner gets an iPod shuffle, and a $15 iTunes gift card. 2nd place gets a $25 iTunes gift card. All submissions must be Nature in theme and no auto-tracing or Live Trace is allowed. I wish I could have gotten wind of this sooner, but if you have a nature-themed vector collecting dust on your hard drive, might as well submit. (I don’t think there are a ton of submissions at this point, so your chances of winning are actually pretty decent) Contest Details Here >>
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- New Post: http://t.co/yq8XkgjK
- New Blog Post: How To Create A Set Of PS Brushes From A Single Texture Photo: Creating Photoshop brushes is rath... http://t.co/ljZ39pJf
- New Blog Post: Free Texture Tuesday: 5 Split Wood Textures: http://t.co/GcEkrC6z
- New Blog Post: Freebie Friday: 6 Abstract Lines Brushes: Happy Friday everyone! Today I’m releasing this set of... http://t.co/xhCZBTPq
