Costs less. Does more. Is easier to use: If this is the conclusion you've reached when comparing InDesign CS with its two long-time rivals (QuarkXPress and PageMaker), you're ready to make the switch. This guide shows you how! Throughout this compact guide, the focus is on leveraging your skill in the other leading desktop publishing packages to get up to speed fast in the new leading publishing package! As the perfect companion to the more comprehensive Real World InDesign CS, this tightly focused guide details the most common tasks and techniques you need to know to get your job done in InDesign CS. Clear, concise instructions enhanced by plenty of screen shots and sample layouts show you how to create and navigate documents, import and style text and objects, manage long projects, work with color, and more. You¿ll also find good coverage of all of InDesign's newest and most unique features: the Story Editor, a Separation Preview palette, nested styles, the Package for GoLive command, and more.

The Shade family of 3D programs, developed by e-frontier, inc., has long been popular in Japan. Now, California-based Curious Labs brings Shade to the English-speaking market for the first time. Shade 7 Designer LE, the entry-level version of the product, provides an easy and inexpensive introduction to the world of 3D graphics. Shade 7 designer LE: Model, Animate, Render, written by a team of experts assembled by e-frontier, teaches you the basics- not only of Shade, but of 3D graphics as well.

The step-by-step tutorials in the book cover beginning modeling, the basics of textures, rendering and radiosity, an introduction to keyframe animation and more.

Shade Masters are computer graphics artists, illustrators, engineers, and teachers who have years of experience working with Shade. They have pooled their knowledge and expertise to produce these tutorials.

The decision was an easy one: With a feature set that equals or exceeds its competitors and an increasingly tight integration with the other Adobe tools that are key to your workflow, InDesign cs was a no-brainer when it came time to update your page layout capabilities. Problem is, you've still got to learn the thing, and learn it well: Your job, after all, depends on it. No one understands that better than the authors of this book, who draw on their own real-world professional knowledge to deliver all the industrial-strength production techniques and timesaving tips you need to start laying out, proofing, and printing pages with InDesign cs in record time. You'll find everything you need here to successfully master InDesign's advanced page-layout tools; manage color; create, link, and unlink text frames; and run your own custom InDesign scripts. You'll also find complete coverage of all of InDesign cs' new features: an updated Story Editor, nested styles, separation previews, the Package for GoLive command, and more.

Noodling around with Photoshop to create interesting composite artwork is all well and good. But if you rely on Photoshop to meet tough production challenges in a fast-paced professional environment, noodling won't cut it! You need results, and you need them now: This book delivers! In this copiously illustrated volume, best-selling authors David Blatner and Bruce Fraser offer scads of hands-on production techniques--as well as clear explanations of the concepts that drive them--so that you can get the best results possible on your own Photoshop CS projects. You'll learn about managing color, getting great scans, correcting tones and colors, and more. You also find complete coverage of all of Photoshop CS' newest features: an improved File Browser; nonsquare pixel support; cool, new Photomerge technology (which allows you to create seamless panoramas out of multiple images); and more. Throughout, the emphasis is on efficiency: the time-saving tips and professional shortcuts that will allow you to work faster, smarter, and more creatively with Photoshop CS.

This Apple-authorized guide to Motion lifts the curtain on Apple's revolutionary new software for motion graphics design. A comprehensive book-DVD combo, it starts with motion graphics fundamentals and takes you step by step all the way through Motion's powerful advanced features, delivering comprehensive training-the equivalent of a three-day course-in one project-based book. Professional, hands-on projects help you learn as you go. All the files you need are on the DVD. Readers will harness the magic of Motion's Real-Time Design engine, behavior-based animation, and remarkable gesture-driven workflow using a graphics tablet. Topics covered include particle dynamics and behaviors, multi-layer composites using transfer modes, keying and compositing bluescreen elements, stylized title animation, and DVD motion menus, plus dozens of visual effects techniques using filters and transformations, and much more. Whether you're just entering the motion graphics field or are already an accomplished designer, this book will have you working in Motion in record time.

Excel can be daunting: that empty grid just stares you in the face when you start the program, challenging you to fill in the cells with thenumbers you need to crunch. How do you start? What do you do?

Creating Spreadsheets and Charts in Excel: Visual QuickProject Guide answers those questions and puts you on the straight track to getting the job done. This new addition to Peachpit's Visual QuickProject Guide series by Excel guru Maria Langer uses full color screen shots and numbered steps to walk you through the process of creating an Excel workbook file. You'll learn how to build a worksheet from the ground up, enter data, write formulas, and copy cell contents. You'll then see how to duplicate and modify worksheets to fine-tune them for your needs. The project's steps also include creating a consolidation worksheet, formatting all worksheets, creating a colorful pie chart, and setting options for printing your work. There's no time wasted in this book; Maria shows you the quickest and most efficient way to perform each task and doesn't waste paper with lengthy explanations or alternative methods. This slim book is all you'll need to get started creating spreadsheets and charts with Excel.

Cubase SX 2 is a powerful digital-audio recording, sequencing, and mixing tool--and, like its competitors--can save you thousands of dollars in studio time and hardware gear. However, even though many of its onscreen tools resemble their analog hardware counterparts--using a tool as complex as Cubase introduces you to a steep learning curve. Cubase SX 2 Visual QuickStart Guide makes it easier to learn the program by teaching it with step-by-step, task-based instructions. Like all other books in the Visual QuickStart series, you can either use it as a reference tool or read the tasks in sequence as an instructional book. Author Thad Brown makes Cubase SX 2's myriad features accessible, even fun, while teaching you how to record, edit, and mix audio and MIDI. If you're a new user, you'll appreciate the strong visual approach and easy-to-follow, no-nonsense format, and if you're a veteran user, you'll seize on the information about SX 2's new features, including its Freeze feature for MIDI tracks. The book takes you from beginner-level topics, such as set up and recording, to more advanced ones like continuous controller messages, routing, and mixer automation. As an added bonus, the SX 2 book features an appendix with a hands-on remixing example, complete with a downloadable source file from magnatune.com.

If you thought you were producing fairly sophisticated DVDs before, wait 'till you see what you can do with Apple's just-released DVD Studio Pro 3! With its stunning QuickTime-based movie transitions (Alpha Transitions) and a brand-new Graphic View that lets you interact with your project in a storyboard environment, DVD Studio Pro 3 promises to bring a whole new level of sophistication to your DVD projects. This task-based guide ensures that you start taking advantage of it immediately! In these pages, you¿ll discover how to build on your existing DVD authoring skills to master version 3's many powerful new features--including more than 30 additional transition styles, superb HD-to-MPEG-2 encoding, and more. Veteran author Martin Sitter breaks down each DVD Studio Pro task--from setting chapter markers to adding subtitles and creating scripts--into concise step-by-step instructions accompanied by informative screen shots. By the end of the volume, you'll be juggling multiple audio tracks, creating custom transitions, creating smart buttons, and more in the quest of DVD perfection!

With its powerful combination of visual layout tools, application development features, and code editing support, Dreamweaver MX 2004 is sure to become the constant companion of many Web developers. Here to get you hands-on with it fast is the definitive project-based training on the topic from one of the master teachers at Linda.com training. Using a combination of project-based lessons, guided exercises, and QuickTime tutorials, veteran author Garo Green walks you through all the Dreamweaver MX 04 basics: navigating the new interface, creating and managing Web sites, and linking among pages. You'll learn about frames and forms, cascading style sheets, and Fireworks and Flash integration, and gobble up Garo¿s suggestions about best layout and typography practices. You'll also find extensive coverage of all of Dreamweaver's newest features: dynamic cross-browser validation, improved CSS support, built-in graphics editing, and more. Throughout, Garo shows you not just how to do something but why you¿re doing it and the results of your actions.

You've waited a long time for the missing link in Adobe's digital home-studio lineup. Now, with the introduction of the brand-new Audition music creation software, it's finally here-if only you could figure out how to use it! Because Audition started life as CoolEdit (before Adobe purchased the program from Syntrillium Software), its distinctive interface has little in common with Adobe's other content creation stand-bys Premiere and After Effects. Not to worry. This no-nonsense, task-based guide uses step-by-step instructions and a boatload of visual aids to turn the key on Audition's interface, so that you can begin using the software immediately to create and polish audio tracks for your film, video, and DVD projects. You'll quickly get up to speed on all of Audition's audio recording, mixing, analyzing, looping, and editing capabilities, so that by the end of the day, you'll know everything you need to about its noise reduction and audio restoration features, sophisticated spectrum and phase-analysis tools, extensive sound-editing capabilities, and more.