Adobe Software - Academic Purchases for Home Use

The Foundation for California Community Colleges works with ComputerLand for student and staff software purchases of Microsoft Software and now is offering Adobe Software from October 15, 2007 through March 15, 2008. This is a terrific opportunity, when I bought just Acrobat Professional v8 at the academic price the cost was $150! :-0

http://www.uscollegebuy.com/0ab/asl.htm

The ComputerLand employee purchase requires verification of employment using either

• Photo ID AND official, current institution paycheck stub (you may block personal information)
• Photo ID AND official letter on school letterhead verifying employment from your manager

See the How To Order/FAQ page for details.

Acrobat Professional 8 ($64.00) and Photoshop Extended ($179.00)- or the combination packages of the Creative Suite v3 -- which are really sweet deals :-)

• Publishing Rich Print and Online Content: CS3 Design Standard for Windows or Macintosh includes PhotoShop, Acrobat Pro 8, InDesign (think PageMaker), and Illustrator for $214.00
• Adding Dreamweaver & Flash: CS3 Premium for Windows or Macintosh includes PhotoShop Extended, Acrobat Pro 8, InDesign (think PageMaker), Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, After Effects, Premiere Pro, SoundBooth and Encore for $314.00
• Adding Video, Audio and Animation: CS3 Master Collection for Windows or Macintosh includes PhotoShop Extended, Acrobat Pro 8, InDesign (think PageMaker), Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, After Effects, Premiere Pro, SoundBooth and Encore for $519.00

I recommend the Design Standard Suite ($214) because when I add up the individual cost of Acrobat and Photoshop, you save money! If your interests are animation or video production, consider spending the addition money on Premium ($314) or go for the gold and purchase the Master Collection ($519).

The computers in the New Media Lab have the CS3 Premium Suite and we are developing some workshops to introduce these tools individually and in combination.

Slide Scans to Powerpoint

Jennifer Griffin (Art Department) stopped by to checkout the new Nikon slide scanner. She will be scheduling time in the lab for scanning work. Over the last 18 months, Jennifer has become an expert in scanning and I look forward to learning her tricks. Already she has offered to help me fine tune the post scan BATCH processing to (1) create contact sheets of the images and (2) create a two-step process to resize images and change them from TIF to JPG. Then the images can drop right onto presentation slides. "Yes," she says, "I've attended the PhotoShop Scho0l of Hard Knocks and I can save you from some headaches!"

Right away Jennifer made an important suggestion: use the filename to distinguish vertical and horizontal slides. The batch process will change all slides to one length and vertical slides will loose image area. An alternative method is to have an additional folder for vertical images.