DTG News and Else
DT&G: Vol. 13, Number 12, December, 2003 ~ The eZine for Design, Typography, & Graphics   (since 1990)  

December Editor's Column

Another Year Gone By

Well, here we are again, another perfectly wonderful year flown by faster than we can remember. This was a good year, and an eventful one. Guess what? Toward the end of next year, 2004, we'll be ....
CELEBRATING OUR 10th ANNIVERSARY ON THE WEB.
And you won't want to miss that!

What's up next?
Well, in addition to slowly getting all our departments and pages converted over to the 'new' CSS look, we'll be implementing a content engine. That means Photoshop 911 links and cases will be posted as they happen, and Design Bookshelf books will enter the site as we receive and review them. So content will become a continuing stream rather than a big monthly gulp. What else? Lots -- you'll just have to stay tuned to the Design Center

Pick up your holiday Gifts

The gifts department of the Publishers' Warehouse will be open through December, and you're invited to discover all the items we've posted there over the years, including a number of all new items for 2003

Congratulations Winners...

The Fall Fonts Festival is over, and all our final winners for the free Font Team, Fonts CD-ROM have been posted. Congratulations! Congratulations!

Digital Gift Idea

Our Single Sheet 16-Page Book is a great idea for any pocket-sized booklet, but during the holidays it's an extra special project for a seasonal gift. It's easy and it takes but a single sheet of paper

Mr. Pixelsmith gives Warm Color Advice

Mr. Pixelsmith gives some warm color advice to this "Mommy" site -- and more than a few solutions! Harmonizing Color for Unity Harmonizing Color for Unity

Top 10 New Year's Resolutions for Clubs

Pump some new life into that local civic organization or club with any or all of these resolutions... (this one is posted a bit early, actually it's for January, 2004 -- so you can pass it along during December!)... 60-Second Window #165

The Top Ten Tips for Using Email:

In this 164th edition, we reflect on an article posted ten years ago on AOL to see if the same rules of email still apply... 60-Second Window #164

Photoshop: images, jaggies, and even Illustrator

  • Photoshop: Hollywood Image Editing -- A reader asks how to "white out" an image like the Beyond Borders movie poster
  • Photoshop: Photoshop vs. Illustrator -- When someone asked this question, we thought some explanation was in order! Which is BEST: Photoshop or Illustrator?
  • Photoshop: Why are my images jaggy? -- Again and again people ask why their GIF files don't look so good... here, one surfboard site gets the real poop when we illustrate using Photoshop to fix those GIFs right
All in the Photoshop department

Feature Web Sites for December:

There are quite a few new sites this month, from standard business sites to a few you might just call bizarre... give them a look the Web Reviews Department

Show your support

Since arriving on the web in late 1994, the Design Center has welcomed and hopefully benefited some 21,000,000 readers. Have you ever been helped by any of our articles? Have you ever learned a new trick or picked up a link to a product or web site that really helped? That's why we're here. But, did we ever ask for payment? No.
     Those of you who would like to show your support for all the benefits we provide can become a "Friend" of the Design Center. With your donation of $10 or more you can select a book from the Design Bookshelf, and display the "Friends of the Design" button on your web site.
     With a donation of $25 or more you become a "Patron" and get the above, plus a listing in our "Patrons" page listing. Now, nearly a quarter-million readers per month may see your link and click to it. Most importantly, you'll be helping us continue our work here online. All donations can be made safely and securely via your PayPal account. Show your support now!

Password is not a 4-letter word

If you are not a subscriber to the Design Cafe, then you probably haven't read about my ordeals last week with a relative's case of stolen identity. It's an important story -- about identity theft and protecting your passwords. Read it then pass this link it along to others - protect yourself.

Best Gift for digital camera users?

Several people on my list this year will be getting Derrick Story's second edition of the "Digital Photography Pocket Guide." Why, because I know they're new digital camera users and I don't want them calling me for support all the time! Seriously, this pocket (sized) guide will prove useful to anyone who uses a digital camera. I believe it's the perfect gift for anyone just getting started with a digital camera. Digital Camera Guide

Digital SLR Camera now Affordable

Good news for those who may be yearning for a professional level SLR (Single Lens Reflex) digital camera for under the $1,000 price point. Nikon's new D70 Digital SLR Camera with the "F" lens mount will be available by spring of 2004. The D70 will enable photographers to utilize existing camera equipment like any DX Nikkor or AF Nikkor lenses. See Nikon SLR.com

Hacking PDF Files

Nothing's more frustrating than locked PDF files. Now, RecoSoft's PDF2Office v1.0., the comprehensive PDF document conversion and data extraction tool, lets you convert PDF documents into fully editable MSWord, RTF, AppleWorks, HTML etc... files re-creating the original construct and layout of the document. You can even unlock the contents stored in locked PDF documents (Mac) RecoSoft.com

Free Photoshop Plugins

The Plugin Site has rolled out PhotoFreebies, the third product in its popular PhotoWiz product series. PhotoFreebies is a collection of 10 Photoshop-compatible plugins for performing useful photo manipulations and effects including: sepia effects, saturation gradients, b/w conversion, color space transformations and more. Best of all, PhotoFreebies is currently FREE for Windows users with a Mac version in the works. The Plugin Site

Put your photos to work... or as gifts

Pictures Presentation Maker (PPM) allows you to create 3D pictures show and screensavers standalone executable files using your own photos and pictures in any picture format (BMP, JPEG, TGA, GIF, PCX and others). You can make the presentation of your photo album then burn it on a CD or DVD. All pictures and audio become one exe file or scr file. It has a lot of image features but also lets you define background music or recorded audio. For Win95, Win98, WinME, WinXP, Windows2000; Shareware $24.95 USD See: Pictures-soft.com

Holiday Graphics made easy

Create a 10-foot poster form a scanned ID photo... print posters and banners by effortlessly joining multiple pages... add text, bubbles, sharpen, blur, cut, crop, negatives and jitter and do much more to more than 20 image formats, including BMP, DIB, ICO, CUR, GIF, JPG, ANI, animated GIF, PNG, TIF, DLL, EXE and others I've never heard of! It's called "MyOddIcon" and it's shareware for most Windows versions -- MyOddIcon.com

Solving Windows Printing Problems...

Active Printer is a small but mighty printer utility which appears in your system tray and lets you choose your active printer (the printer you are about to use) with just one mouse click. This is a particular boom for situations where there are multiple printers connected to the network and you need to switch between them... $ 14.95, shareware for most Windows versions Active Printer.com

No more smudged JPG images...

Unfortunately the jpg format introduces JPEG artifacts and that blotchy mottled look in digital camera images and others that have been "over" optimized. On the Mac side, the ImageDoctor repairs these images but until now the Windows people have had to suck pixels. Now, JpegEnhancer repairs JPG files under Windows. It's a must-have tool for publishers, design studios and web pros needing uncompressed ready-to-publish and ready-to-print files. See: vicman.net

Alien Skin Filters on Holiday Special

You've heard me rave about Alien Skin's Image Doctor, Splat!, and Xenofex 2 -- well from now until the end of December you can own all these for only $199 (Which would normally cost you $357). You won't get another chance.

Digital Music? You've Got Ears

You've got some music lovers on your holiday list? Why not give them a new set of ears? Er, uh, ear-buds that is! So you thought professional earphones used in recording studios and live performances were too expensive, right? Well, Future Sonics, the people who make those earphones, have extended and unbeatable 50% off until January 30, 2004! Pick up the ultimate "Ears" (EM3) for just $99.00. Tell'em Fred sent you. Future Sonics

Spammers take the offensive

If you've followed any of my anti-spam efforts, or read the September through November columns of 60-Second Windows, you already know there are some creative solutions for fighting spam.
      You also know that those who really analyze the spam industry have proven that most spammers are criminals. We've known that all along. After numerous articles and memos to Wired, last week's Hot Wired released this story:
      Spammers Tap Unwitting Users' PCs Much of the junk e-mail clogging inboxes likely comes from so-called zombie machines compromised by Trojan horse viruses and worms. In fact, you could be blanketing the world with Viagra ads and not even know it. Hotwired.com
      Then, this rather disturbing news item hit -- confirming what we've been saying all along, that the spammers have joined the criminal element distributing virus and worms:
      Worm Aims to Disarm Spam Fighters - A new Internet worm is designed to use infected computers to launch denial-of-service attacks on anti-spam organizations. See: Spam Attack
      Then, this rather disturbing news item hit -- confirming what we've been saying all along, that the spammers have joined the criminal element distributing virus and worms:
Worm Aims to Disarm Spam Fighters - A new Internet worm is designed to use infected computers to launch denial-of-service attacks on anti-spam organizations. See: Hotwired

Happy Holidays.... Happy 2004

Unfortunately we didn't receive any holiday greetings or promotionals at all this year -- but December is not quite over yet, so hopefully we've yet to receive yours.
      Go ahead and visit the GIFTS department and take advantage of all we have to offer. If you'd like to contribute, just drop us a note at the address below, we'd love to hear from you.
      Here's all the best to you and yours for this December 2003... and we wish to you and yours a very wonderful, safe and prosperous new year 2004. Enjoy.

Thanks for reading

Fred Showker
Editor / Publisher, DT&G Magazine

Parting words: on the subject of sharing...

The miracle is this:
the more we share, the more we have.
        Leonard Nimoy

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