How To Learn Photoshop CS5 3D Function in One Day

All right, ya'll.  I'm supposed to be making books and sewing stuff and not Blogging, BUT my new computer won't talk to my old printer, and I'm waiting for parts/adapters.

Plus, I couldn't wait to tell you how to learn Photoshop CS5 Extended's 3D Function in one day, flat.

First, Set The Stage:

1.  Husband must leave before 10:00 AM to go to a Fishing Tournament far, far away.
2. Your printer, etc. must be legitimately down so that you can legally say you need to be productive in another area.
3. You must be passionately in love with Photoshop, and willing to only get up from your chair to grab a sandwich and hot tea, and do the necessaries.

Then, open some photos from your files...this is early morning on the Island:

And make it do this with some of  Photoshop's Fab Tools:

 

Or you can pick another one from the same morning...

Change the exposure and get rid of the railing with Content Aware Fill: 

And then make it look like this:

HOWEVER.

Here is the REAL Fun I learned today!  Photoshop 3D!

You can change all the colors and wrap the images around stuff!  I kid you not!

Here's the Boat image wrapped around cans:

Are you believing this???

Look at my Coral Bouquet Book Cover, wrapped around Bangle Bracelets!!

And my new Fishie Fabric, wrapped around a box like a big Present~

I am flabbergasted.  What will They think of next??  There are simply not enough hours in the day.

Speaking of that, Husband is only going to be gone 36 hours...gotta go do a load of Laundry, quick!

Never Ignore Your Mother (Board)

Well.  This has been a really, really expensive week for me.  Thankfully, I had the exact right person nearby to  dig me out of the Abyssal Depths of Computer Crash in less than 24 hours flat.  But it wasn't cheap, and I'm now in the red on my budget.  But I have all my files.

Here's what happened.  I sailed away from Ocean Isle in early July, KNOWING that there were odd little hang-ups and burps going on with my computer that I use here in NC.  I didn't worry too much, because I had never been on the Internet with this unit, so I thought it was safe.  Thought that I had just loaded too much into the memory.  But there were enough hiccups that I was concerned.  I had even told my computer guru that I was going to drop it by on my way out of town and let him take a look at it.  But I didn't.  I just left it here in the hot old basement.

Which apparently pushed the Old Guy over the edge.  When I arrived back here after a month and pushed his Belly Button, he just sat there in grumpy silence.  Nothing.  Perplexed, I tried the CTRL-ALT-DELETE thing, and Nothing.  Unplugged, replugged.  Silence.  Next day, I hauled his frumpy little ass over to the tech, and a couple hours later, the tech called and gave me the bad news.

The Mother Board was fried, gone, kaput.  Who knows why, but that's it.  He advised biting the bullet and getting a new computer.  And By The Way - Hurry Up, because he was leaving town for two weeks, very much wanted to help me, but was on a rigid timeline.  As in, You've Got One Hour, then I'm outta here!  I needed him because he could transfer all my files over from the old computer.  I blazed a trail to Office Depot in Shallotte.  Exactly 23 minutes later, I was speeding down Village Road...

HP Pavilion p7 - 1020

With this computer...

Life's Good Flatron E2360 Monitor.

and this monitor. 

And thinking about the fact that I was over $800.00 in the hole, and STILL had to pay my tech to move my files.  If I could get there in time.  And if I didn't, I was down until I could bring my backup from Atlanta.  I made it with 7 minutes to spare.

This morning, I picked up  my new unit from Shane.  He had carefully combed my old drive, and had picked up every file for me and moved it to my new computer.  Cheerfully.  Before he left for California this afternoon.  What a guy.

Now here is the Moral and Lesson to the Story...because I KNEW something was going on in there, I had backed up every single file to an external drive before I left.  And took the backup to Atlanta so I would have a current version for the new computer there.  The glitch here is that I left that drive in Atlanta, so I had no backup, no files, nothing in North Carolina to work on.  

BUT, even if Shane had not been able to move my files over - if he had airline reservations for early this morning...I would not have lost a thing.  Because I backed up.  Externally.  I would've lost time, but not hard-earned files.  Now here's the good part.  Knowing how I move back and forth, Shane advised that I start using a virtual backup, otherwise know as Cloud Storage.  Like Carbonite, Acronis, or better yet, one of many that are freeware.  That way, I can access all my files - no matter where I am.  How amazing is that?  How Secure is that??!!

So that's the lesson:  Never, Ever, Ignore Your Motherboard's vapors and swooning.  It's a precursor to Utter Doom.  Back up, back up, back up!  And do it virtually, on a daily basis.

Here are some links:

Carbonite Virtual Backup

A Drive (Free)

Freeware Cloud Storage

That's it for now, I'm off to reload software!

Time to Get To Work

I've been in Atlanta for a month now, with my own fast connection to the web (unlike the Beach Cottage, where I share with Husband), and this afternoon, I'm looking at my abandoned sewing room and workshop, wondering why I am spending most of my days preparing Blog Posts.  I'm an artist, for God's sake!  I make things. I'm very physical - designing, drawing, and then procuring the raw materials to make my visions and designs a reality, using the equipment I am so blessed to own.  

I've had a wonderful, beautiful time connecting with friends from all over the world, BUT...Instead of being in the workroom, designing and making new products, I am spending HOURS every day or so preparing a Post.  Which means I must be on an ego trip...to see my words and life out on the global web every week...with responses - which I Love!

I love the preparation of the Blog Post (it's all about the journey for me), and the sweet connections I have made with this medium, but Holy Cow, it is taking over my life.

It is time to get back into the studio.  Time to get to work making my equipment hum.  Sourcing out my raw materials.  Going to Markets.

I love what Blogger has created, but I need to stop the diary, and get back to work.  Doesn't mean I will stop Blogging, but does mean that I am going back to physical, real-time studio work, and putting the pedal to the metal.  And the Blog Posts will be less frequent, but more intense. 

Time to Get To Work.

I Love You All, and hope you will continue to read my updates, but it is time to Rock 'N Roll in the studio.

Atlanta Studio, just ready for me to get back to work.  Poor Sewing Machine, with the cover on!  And the Cutting Table, all empty!  With about a Ton of Fabric, stored away...just waiting to emerge.

And the Beach Cottage Studio, which I spent months arranging for production for books and stationery...all silent.

See what I mean?  Time to get away from Blogging, as much as I ADORE it, and Get Back To Work!!

Love You All So Much,
Linda

Sticky Frog Gets All Pretty with Content Aware Fill

Just a quickie - then I'm off to bed.

We've cleaned up the kitchen, put the clean sheets on the bed, and it is time to jump in it.  BUT, I couldn't stand it, and came to the studio to clean up the Sticky Frog...this took about 5 minutes!!

Tummy all scrubbed clean, Green Suit pressed and smooth, Eyes clear and bright, and ready to Party.

I am besotted with my new Photoshop software.  Mr. Printer, I will dance with you tomorrow!

Photoshop CS5 Extended Butters my Bread - Twice!

Holy Moly.  The past two days have been spent installing my new Ricoh 430 DN printer, a 23 inch Life's Good  LCD monitor, and....Ta Daaah!  My new (kisses on the lips) Photoshop CS5 Extended!

It's Love.  Or maybe it's just that I've come all the way from Photoshop 5 (mid 90's?) and a CRT monitor that I bought in 1999 to the current, and zoomed about 15 years through time, and I'm experiencing Time Warp Euphoria.

I played around with some photos taken through my windows to see how all this new stuff works ~

 

BEFORE shot of Chickadee outside my studio.

Here's the same shot - the branches disappeared!  So Fast!

The AFTER image, using the Content Aware Fill function.  I've no clue what that Pipe-Looking thing is growing out of the tree.  It isn't a branch, and it's too high up to get a closer look at.

The Content Aware Fill Function is powerful, but you have to use it judiciously - look at that area behind the Chickadee, and you can see the Wonky - looking leaves.  It was quick, quick, quick - but wanted to fill that area with the tree, the bird, etc.  More practice required.


If you don't mind looking at Frog Privates, here's a test run of the new levels correction tool in CS5...

Pretty murky BEFORE...

What sped this correction up was that I used the Quick Selection Tool to help me isolate areas I needed to brighten...

Sorry about the dirty window...time does get away from you when you have so many new toys to play with!

Spider Ma'am started out really large...

Her web is pretty messy...looks like some Honky-Tonk nights have been going on in Spider Land.

She was harder to deal with, so I decided to crank her up and use lots of the new functions to see what would happen:

Now you can REALLY see her messy house!

I've got to stop playing with Photoshop CS5 Extended and get back to work...the new printer is waiting to be calibrated to the monitor, and Husband is going to want something to eat soon...dirty dishes in the sink, the sheets on the bed need to be changed, and the Pomegranate Book KNOWS there is a new printer in the house. 

But Man, I feel like somebody just came along and put double layers of Butter on my Bread!

Diagonals and Happiness

This week, I've been working on my entry for the Spoonflower Shark Design Contest, and after hours and hours of work and still coming back to the same design, it occurred to me why I'm doing that.  It's because the visuals that automatically get my attention and make my shoulders relax for a moment always have diagonal lines them:

That Trellis just had to be in there...had to.

Most all flowers make me smile, but the ones that were on top of the Rocky Mountains just grabbed me by the heart and eyes...take a look at all those diagonals pointing back to their centers:

Look at me, Look at me!

In Art School, they teach you the Rule of Threes and all about Diagonals leading in from the Upper Left, Lower Right, Lower Left...you get the picture.  They point to things and make your eyes Happy that they don't have to look around for the Most Important Part!

And then there are the Complicated Diagonals:

The Diagonal in this group is...the group of Hot Pink and Purple blooms spilling down from upper center left to lower right.  

Those hot pink and purple flowers spill diagonally across the picture, but what gives me so much pleasure in this group is the gentle curve in the line...feels soft and sensual, like relaxing against someone you love.

The very Stylish Vera knew all about the lines in any arrangement~

Look at this early photo of my Mother-In-Law, Vera.  She knew that the single diagonal strap on her bikini top was the perfect style point to catch the eye...not to mention the placement of her right arm and left leg for this photo.  They lead your eye right to her face, and the strap emphasizes...well, you know!

When we were traveling from Denver up to Keystone Lodge, we stopped about halfway to check out Georgetown, an old mining town that looked intriguing - plus it had a rest stop.  When we got out of the car, we were greeted with cool, dry air.  Which made us grin.  And all around us were towering peaks...diagonals pointing to the blue sky and back down to the perfect valley!

And it was there that I snapped the Happiest Diagonal photo of the trip:

I have no clue who this man is; when he saw I was taking enthusiastic pictures of the mountains with my Iphone, he happily jumped in front of the camera and posed with his arms raised in the classic, universal sign of Happy Victory.  Victory for escaping the heat of the plains below.  We laughed at each other without speaking - he moved away to his car and we got in ours.  I can't believe we never spoke, but shared such a happy moment. A Happy Diagonal moment.

 

Adobe Illustrator CS5 Live Trace

Now that the Snapping Turtle Saga is (hopefully) over, I can get back to work on Adobe Illustrator CS5.  The tutor, Jay Montgomery from WyzAnt came on Friday, and we covered the Live Trace function.  He was great!

Basically, Live Trace "traces" a raster image - a raster image is a photograph, (the Flower Photos from Colorado!) or a graphic created in Photoshop - in preparation for turning it into a vector image.  The resulting line of the trace is called a Path, with hundreds of little anchor points along the way.  In order to turn the raster image (groups of thousands of little colored squares) into one or more flat planes of color which have  numerical values which can be blown up to the size of a building,  Illustrator "Traces" the image and starts you down the Path to simplify the image and turn it into planes of solid color.

I won't run through the steps to get here - there are literally Hundreds of tutorials on the web about how to use Live Trace -  but essentially, this is the command center in Illustrator that begins the process:

Why do this?  Because if you were to take a photo (a Raster Image) and try to enlarge it to a Building Sized Image, it would get all Pixelated - blurred and confused with millions of little squares trying to be much bigger than they can be.

And this isn't even Near Building size - see what I mean?

 
You can simplify the image in Photoshop before you "Place" it into the Illustrator CS5 program by cleaning up the Noise, separating parts of the image so that you have individual components that make up the whole, and making sure to save it as a PSD image. 

Now, here is the most beneficial thing to come out of the Friday session - there is a tool in Illustrator CS5 that is so exciting, I can hardly wait to get proficient on it.  You see, when I upload a design file to either Spoonflower Fabric Printing or Adaptive Textiles Fabric Printing, to get the best color match I need to use LAB color. 

The color blankets are from Adaptive Textiles, the fabric swatch of Fishing Coral is from Spoonflower.

Since I normally work in sRGB mode (because that is the color mode the monitor is), I've had to calibrate the monitor to the printer as best I can and then print it out in CMYK color.  Because that's the color mode the printer is.  Then spend hours and hours trying to match the color on the hard copy to the color blankets that Adaptive Textiles sent to me.  Sometimes Days.

Well.  Illustrator CS5 has a little color wheel icon parked right in the upper toolbar that is Powerful, Powerful, Powerful!  When you select your artwork, you can click on the icon:

And it opens this function:

Now, here's the good part. I can change the color mode while I am in the Recolor Artwork Screen to LAB color mode.

There is a tiny little icon that lets you change the color mode to LAB.

And then, all I have to do is plug in the numbers from the Adaptive Textiles color blanket for the color I want, and BOOM!  I'm done.

How cool is that?  I mean, how COOL is that?  I'm off to practice now!

Saga of the Snapping Turtle

You know from reading this Blog that we have this pond on our property that attracts all sorts of wildlife.  And we love it.  There's lots of action, and you can read about our feisty little hawk HERE and Geese with Bad Behavior HERE.

Most of the time, it is a beautiful preserve for us to enjoy:

Like watching these wild Pond Lilies bloom every morning, and close up in the evening.

However.  For the better part of 10 years, we've suffered (along with our fish) a reclusive inhabitant who resides in the murky bottom and slaughters baby ducks and geese, our fish, and anything else he decides looks toothsome enough to eat.  Occasionally, he surfaces and scares us half to death with his evil looking beak and enormous head.  Years ago, we identified him as a Snapping Turtle, and research told us we HAD to get him out of the pond or he would kill everything.  Easier said than done.

He has provided my Husband with years and years of hunting activity...and on Thursday night, after the longest hunt in history, Husband snagged him with his innovative bait/trap, and we were able to man/woman-handle him into a big garbage can.

Check out the claws, the beak, and the horns on his tail...those yellow spurs tucked around his rear end!

We performed High Fives all over the yard.

And Whooped and Hollered.

Our pond critters were Safe At Last!

We loaded him into the truck and traveled some distance away to release him into an active creek.  He was mad as hell by the time we drug the can through the woods to the creek:

There is a bank in front of him, and he raced right toward it and tumbled down to the bottom rather than just climbing down.  Things were moving pretty fast here, as you can see by the camera blur.

He immediately took off for the water in a huff:

Take a look at that horned tail...can you believe this prehistoric creature was in our idyllic little pond??

He moved with great purpose toward the creek, and just dove in...

He was moving VERY fast at this point.

As soon as he got into deeper water, he paused in a little area and positioned himself so that he could look at us...which was just unnerving.

He is looking straight at us.  Scary.

We had to delay dinner for awhile to have celebratory drinks on the deck.

We emailed friends and family, who cheered our success, and congratulated us on having our peaceful pond back again...we discussed how to re-stock the pond.  I thought ahead to next Spring and a batch of wild baby Wood Ducks that didn't get eaten up by a vicious prehistoric monster.

And then this morning, when Husband went out to check the pump that aerates the pond, that same evil head popped up out of the water, and pinned him with the kind of glare that says, "You Are Now Officially On My S--t List, you idiot."  Same turtle, just tired and hungry.  And mad.  Mad.   

I checked the Snapping Turtle website and it says in fine print that after you have managed to trap your troublesome tenant, you're supposed to take it at least 10 miles away.  That is twice the height of Mt. Everest.

Back to the hunt.

News Flash!! News Flash!!

 

It wasn't the same turtle!  I think it is his wife!  I was just getting ready to publish this Post, when I heard Husband shout out to come and help.  I ran down to the pond and positioned my garbage can, while Husband manned the line and rake.  We're getting to be pros at this!

Here she is - smaller but even more furious than her mate:

She was Hissing at us, nonstop.

I declined to attend the release this time so that I could finish this post and get it published.  Do you think our pond is safe, NOW?

Please let that be the last one - Please?

Coffee Design Fabric Contest Open for Voting

Just a quickie - thanks so much to all of you who voted for my "Fishie Coral"  entry in the  Spoonflower Fabrics  design contest in June: 

Although I wasn't in the top 10, I was thrilled to place in the top 50 - not bad for a first time entry - thanks to all of you!

Now the Coffee Design fabric contest is open for voting - the rules were harder, as you could only use three colors - here's my entry:

A Cuppa Caffe'

You can view all the designs from the many talented fabric artists out there by clicking on this link:  Vote for Coffee Design Favorite.

The Coffee Fabric Design Contest ends August 4, so I hope you'll cruise on over and vote!  Next subject in the Fabric Design Contest......SHARKS!  Now THAT will be a toughie, but I'm on it!

Rocky Mountain Flowers and Adobe Illustrator CS5

Here we are, back down close to sea level.  I miss the mountains and their clear air and astonishing vistas.

 Summer River running through Breckenridge.

 And I miss the Rocky Mountain Flowers that were bursting with brilliance and juicy with moisture.  Since I didn't take my Nikon (spur-of-the-moment-trip, you know) I had to settle once more with taking photos with my Iphone.  Which didn't do too bad.  Take a look:

Just look at the Juice in those Pansies!  Yumm.

Here's a group of very buttoned-down Daisies, with their white gloves on, hats tilted just right, and looking like they just stepped out of a Band Box:

All is right in their Daisy World.

Everywhere you looked, there were flowers.  Everywhere.  I took dozens of photos - how could you not??  What a library to work from for future designs...the colors are already worked out, and the shapes are divine.

The Hanging Baskets were great, because the flowers were looking down at you as you passed underneath.

If you take these shapes and colors, and reduce them to lines...Paths in Illustrator...then the sky is the limit for what you can do with the resulting shapes.

These Lupines were glorious - so happy in the cool Rocky Mountain air that they looked luminous.

So, back to work and the work is truly cut out for me now.  Realizing that it would take me months and months to figure out the vector tools in Adobe Illustrator CS5, I went online and started searching for local classes that I could attend.  And, I discovered a tutoring service, called WyzAnt.  There are tutors for Everthing - and they will usually come to your home.  The best part is, they are under $50.00 per hour, and you can get discount packages.

This afternoon, my new Adobe Illustrator CS5 tutor is coming to the studio to help me get my head around vector graphics instead of the raster images I'm so used to working with in Photoshop.  We'll see how far we get today.

Pansies Images Underway!

Rocky Mountain Sunset

I'll give you a full tutoring report tomorrow - if I can learn Adobe Illustrator CS5 in the comfort of my own home without breaking the bank, well - then - is this a marvelous world or what?

Colorado Rocky Mountains in the Summer

How amazing is This?  My Husband drug me off to the Colorado Rocky Mountains...told me he had booked the flight, so find us a hotel.  And by golly, I did.  Can you believe this view?



This is the view from the Keystone Lodge upper balcony - and where we escaped to for a few days.  You simply cannot believe how gorgeous the Colorado Rocky Mountains are in the Summer!

 Although the sun is hot and brilliant (we are two miles closer to the sun than normal), in the shade it is chilly when the breeze stirs.  And last night, it was in the lower 40's!  How lovely is THAT?

We played on the mountain at Breckenridge Ski Resort today, and here are some shots of people doing what we did - we couldn't take pictures of ourselves, because the rides were too fast and furious.



This was a screaming fast ride that went on and on, down the slopes at Breckenridge.  From the top, where we boarded this sled, we could see all the Rocky Mountains around us.  It was sort of like the Olympic Luge, only not laying down.

 And here is a shot of the downhill Coaster, which made both of us scream and grab the brakes of our respective vehicles:



This was a blast, but was over 'way too fast, because the darn thing went about 80 miles an hour from the top of a slope and almost straight downhill.  Some loop the loops in the middle of the run, where I left my stomach and heart.

 Here's another shot - I never imagined last week that I would be piloting a roller coaster car down the slopes of the Rocky Mountains this week.  Just goes to show you - never get too comfortable in the quietness of the studio - an antsy-pantsy Husband can yank you right out of there!

Tonight, we're eating at the Snake River Saloon...this could get really interesting!

You seriously cannot do better than a get-away to the Colorado mountains in the Summer - do it!