How to become an Adobe Certified Expert (ACE)

Don't forget that I blog for my friends at InDesignSecrets on a more-or-less regular basis. I just wrote up a detailed post about How to become an Adobe Certified Expert (ACE) on InDesign. Check it out!

3 resources for DPS info

Here are 3 relatively new Adobe resources for deep info about Adobe Digital Publishing Suite (DPS):

The newest resource is the Digital Publishing Suite Developer Center. This will be a home for more of the technical aspects of "pushing the envelope" of DPS.

Second, the Adobe Digital Publishing Suite Cookbook is a repository for tutorial-style "recipes" for creating different types of DPS content.

Third, check out the Adobe Design Center | Digital Publishing for designer-centric stories and tutorials about DPS.

 

Cool utility for iPad demos

Here's a cool utility: Reflection lets you display the contents of your iPad 2 or iPhone 4S on your Macintosh screen. Perhaps you're projecting your Mac on a screen using a projection system, and you want to be able to quickly switch to projecting your iPad on the screen also.

Reflection uses Airplay on the iPad/iPhone to send the screens to the Mac over your wireless network. Very easy to use, and works well.

Adobe to discontinue Adobe CS Review

When CS5 was released approximately two years ago, Adobe included a free trial of what they call the "CS Live" services. They've now announced that two of those services, Adobe CS Review and SiteCatalyst® NetAverages™ will be discontinued on 4/12/2012.

The CS Live services are accessed via a link in the upper right corner of the screen in InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, or Adobe Premiere Pro.

 

 

Adobe CS Review allowed you to share an InDesign layout (or Photoshop image, Illustrator artwork, or Adobe Premiere Pro video) over the Web with a client or co-worker. They could add comments and markup to the layout, and you could then gather those comments and markups and see them displayed right on the InDesign page. It provided a simpler, more integrated review process than doing a PDF review.

I didn't see any clients or acquaintances of mine get excited about this and actually use it. I suspect that this was true for many others as well, and thus the demise of Adobe CS Review. The service was difficult to explain and demonstrate, and was somewhat clunky in execution.

The remaining CS Live services: Adobe BrowserLab, Acrobat.com, and Adobe Story will remain. See this FAQ for more information about CS Live online services and the services that are being discontinued.

IDUG meeting this Thursday evening!

There are 185 people registered so far for the next InDesign User Group meeting this coming Thursday evening. Won't you join us?

Thursday, March 1, 2012, 7:00 PM
Minneapolis College of Art & Design (MCAD
)2501 Stevens Ave.
Minneapolis, MN 55404

The meeting is free, but registration is required. Click here to register.

Paul Trani, an Evangelist at Adobe Systems, will be joining us to demonstrate Adobe Muse and Adobe Edge!

Adobe Muse is Adobe's new InDesign-like tool for designing and publishing HTML websites without writing code. Seehttp://muse.adobe.com/

Adobe Edge is Adobe's new tool for creating animated Web content using HTML5. See http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/edge/

What do these two products have to do with InDesign you might ask? As InDesign grows into a layout tool for creating print and screen layouts, you will need to learn to incorporate Web and animated content into your layouts. Muse and Edge are tools that are very accessible to the average designer for creating that content!

Following Paul's Muse and Edge presentation, Keith Gilbert (http://gilbertconsulting.com/) will give a brief demonstration of how to use Muse and Edge content in Adobe Digital Publishing Suite (http://www.adobe.com/products/digital-publishing-suite-family.html). 

The evening will conclude with fantastic door prizes.

As always, Twin Cities InDesign User Group meetings are FREE and open to the public, thanks to generous support from the Minneapolis College of Art & Design (http://mcad.edu) and Central Coast Solutions (http://centralcoastweb.com/).

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Agenda
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6:30 - 7:00 p.m. Registration and mingling
7:00 - 7:05 p.m. Welcome and announcements
7:05 - 8:15 p.m. Paul Trani: Adobe Muse and Adobe Edge demonstration
8:15 - 8:45 p.m. Keith Gilbert: How to use Muse and Edge content in Adobe Digital Publishing Suite
8:45 - 9:00 p.m. Drawings for door prizes