May, 2011 | CreativePro Network

Why is the Effects Panel Grayed Out?

Have you ever tried to apply effects to a text frame, but the whole Effects panel was grayed out? Here’s why.

Build HTML 5 Animations on the Mac

A company called Tumult has released a new app, Hype, which you can use to create animations for the Web and smart phones. One benefit of these animations is that they don’t require Flash (a program shunned by Apple’s iPad and iPod); instead, the animations are powered by HTML5. That benefit is also Hype’s downfall, […]

Keep Your Camera Close, No Matter What

It’s a common dilemma for photographers: If you wear your camera around your neck, it bounces and swings. If you keep it in a bag, it’s not readily accessible. There are specialty camera straps that try to solve the problem, but they don’t work for everyone. Peter Dering thought he had the answer. This engineer […]

Help for Pricing Questions

The team at Marketing Mentor is always giving sound marketing and business-development advice to creatives in many forms. Now the company is bundling just the advice that applies to pricing your services into one bundle, and offering it at an affordable $99. The bundle includes two hourly rate worksheets, two estimating worksheets, seven written articles, […]

FontHaus Enters Stock Photo and Vector Image Market

FontHaus sells the fonts of many type foundries, from Adobe to URW. Recently, FontHaus entered a new market by launching a new site: StockandFonts.com, which offers royalty-free stock photos, vector images, and fonts. Here are the pricing options for the subscription service: 1. 10 image credits costs $99, and you have up to 12 months […]

Splash an Image with Water Droplets Using Photoshop

Displacement maps are one of the least frequently used features in Photoshop, but they provide a function that’s found nowhere else in the program: the ability to distort images based on the brightness values in a second image. This means you can move around pixels to create refraction effects, such as the view through water […]

Scanning Around With Gene: Rejected Column Ideas

To make an installment of “Scanning Around With Gene” interesting, I need at least 10 to 15 themed images, and I often scan many more before settling on the final line-up. So my typical problem is that I have too many images. But every so often I come across a topic that has great promise, […]

PDF2ID Now Compatible with InDesign CS5.5

Now that the CS5.5 version of InDesign is available for sale, applications that interact with InDesign are updating, as well. One of those is Recosoft’s PDF2ID, which converts PDF files to documents that InDesign can open and edit. In addition to supporting InDesign CS5.5, the updated PDF2ID also improves font mapping and app stability. PDF2ID […]

See a Hypnotic Direct Mail Piece in Action

Trish Witkowski is the paper expert behind FoldFactory.com, an online source of information and templates for people who want help creating folded print products, such as custom mailers and complicated brochures. One of those resources is her “60-second super cool fold of the week” video feature, and this week Trish recorded her 100th of these […]