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Create a Searchlight in Photoshop
How-Tos: Written by Colin Smith on September 3, 2008
Whip up a Hollywood-style spotlight effect with realistic-looking beams of light in Photoshop CS3.
Create Nondestructive Text Effects with Photoshop's Smart Filters
How-Tos: Written by Russell Brown on August 25, 2008
Apply Photoshop's Smart Filters to text to get special effects you'll love and still keep the text live.
HerGeekness Says: Convert Any File Part II
How-Tos: Written by Anne-Marie "HerGeekness" Concepcion on August 18, 2008
In case of file-conversion emergency, start with a PDF!
Make Vector Splashes
How-Tos: Written by Chad Neuman on August 13, 2008
Get all Jackson Pollock and make a splash -- literally. Then use Illustrator's easy Live Trace feature to bring your art into the digital world.
Transform a Busy Photo into a Strong Silhouette
How-Tos: Written by Chad Neuman on July 30, 2008
When you want a clean, strong image for a print or Web project, use Illustrator to turn a photo into a striking silhouette.
How to Break into T-Shirt Design
How-Tos: Written by Sean Ashcroft on July 27, 2008
T-shirt design is huge, and thanks to online stores like Threadless, you don't have to open a brick-and-mortar storefront or even build your own Web site to see success.
Protect Your PDFs
How-Tos: Written by Joel Geraci on July 23, 2008
Digital files can end up in the strangest places. Before you send another PDF to a client, coworker, or anyone else, find out how and when to password-protect your work.
Rehabilitate Old Photos
How-Tos: Written by Sara Frances on July 14, 2008
Good photo rehabilitation goes beyond repairing typical tears and fading to rebuilding important, but initially unsatisfactory, images that recover the emotional impact of an event. And clients pay a lot for that!
QuarkXPress Tips: Graphically Speaking
How-Tos: Written by Jay J. Nelson on July 7, 2008
Good design does not live by text alone. To master QuarkXPress, add these image-oriented tricks to your workflow.
Create Web Animations in Photoshop CS3
How-Tos: Written by Pariah Burke on June 22, 2008
Animate banner ad and graphic objects; transform their shape, size, color; or replace them entirely.
Dreamweaver How-to: Create "You Are Here" Navigation Links
How-Tos: Written by Dave Sawyer McFarland on June 13, 2008
Use this simple technique to create a nav bar button that changes to reflect a visitor's location in your site, then make it work across the site using Dreamweaver CS3's Template.
Make Editable Arrows in Photoshop
How-Tos: Written by Anne-Marie "HerGeekness" Concepcion on June 4, 2008
Create vector arrows you can color, warp, resize, flip, shadow, emboss, and more.
Bake Up a Batch of PDF Files
How-Tos: Written by Donna Baker on June 2, 2008
Open a file, change the header, save the file to a new location, close the file... repeat more times than you can count. If that sounds familiar, help is on the way.
Use Any Font in a Web Site Design
How-Tos: Written by Pariah Burke on May 28, 2008
There have always been two certainties in Web design: You can never have enough bandwidth, and all Web design must rely entirely on fonts installed on the viewer’s computer. But thanks to sIFR, at least one of these so-called inescapable certainties is wrong.
Create a Reflection Effect in Photoshop CS3
How-Tos: Written by Russell Brown on May 23, 2008
Mirror, mirror, how do you get a realistic reflection of your image? In Photoshop CS3, it's easy to mirror images using the Clone Source feature with the Clone Stamp Tool and Healing Brush.
Sidewalk Serendipity
How-Tos: Written by Mason Resnick on May 19, 2008
Street photography hones your vision, improves your technical skills, and heightens your reflexes. Plus, it's free and legal!
Get Dynamic in Photoshop
How-Tos: Written by Colin Smith on May 12, 2008
HDR is one of the hottest trends in photography. Learn how to shoot, merge, and tone-map photos to extend the dynamic range and produce those painted-looking results so in demand right now.
Slim Down Your PDFs
How-Tos: Written by Donna Baker on May 7, 2008
Follow these tips to shrink a PDF's file size and help it display faster.
View Source: Make Your Links Unforgettable
How-Tos: Written by Dave Sawyer McFarland on April 30, 2008
Most Web usability books (for example, Steve Krug's excellent Don't Make Me Think) emphasize that the less you make a visitor think and work, the more likely they'll visit, enjoy, and benefit from your site. The typical HTML link is one of those things that make visitors work -- a single linked word, for example, is a small target that requires good aim to hit. That's one of the reasons Web designers make navigation bars with buttons that are larger than the text inside them.
InDesign Transparency: No Longer the Forbidden Fruit
How-Tos: Written by Mordy Golding Renee Dustman on April 28, 2008
With this advice, you can reap the rewards of transparency and never hear those dreaded words, "It won't print!"