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THE COMPUTER-MEDIATED PROFESSIONAL (CMP) |
Photoshop is the most widely used graphics computer program. The simplified "Elements" version is useful, but you should buy the professional version as soon as you can afford it. The reason for this is that it takes time to learn how to use Photoshop's many powerful tools, and the sooner you start learning, the better your skills will become.
National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) -- membership in this organization provides an excellent monthly magazine devoted to tips on how to make better use of Photoshop as well as access to a website with many tutorials, tips, and features. Many Photoshop users belong to this organization.
Photoshop makes use of "plug-ins", which are specialized modules designed by companies other than Adobe that extend Photoshop's features. These vary in cost and utility. Some of the more widely used include: Xenofex and Eye Candy (Alien Skin), Intellihance (Extensis), Sharpener (NIK), Mystical Lighting (Auto F/X) and others. Some of these duplicate tools that already exist in Photoshop, so it is probably better not to begin buying your plugins until you have spent considerable time learning how to use Photoshop itself.
Other useful software include such as Illustrator (Adobe) or Freehand (Macromedia) for doing "line-based" or "drawing" graphics, and a wealth of other painting and graphics tools.
Dreamweaver organizes the files that make up your website and presents them in an easy-to-use format. It communications with your web server so that you can upload and download files. It provides a visual editor for designing and constructing web pages, and a code editor for working directly with the source files.
While programs like Dreamweaver will let you create web pages without any knowledge of computer programming, professionals need to be able to work with the "raw" code in which web pages are written. Here are the major web languages.
HTML: Hyper-Text Markup Language is the original web construction language, and it is still the most widely used. HTML is not difficult to learn, and every web professional should be familiar with its basic codes. There are a number of good HTML online tutorial and reference sites, and HTML textbooks and reference manuals abound.
My favorite HTML website is: NCD HTML Design Guide. My favorite HTML reference book is HTML & XHTML: The Definitive Guide.
XML and XHTML: Extensible Markup Languages are advanced versions of HTML that provides additional control over the web environment. They are primarily used by large organizations, but their popularity is spreading. Any web professional should at least be familiar with the basic ideas behind XML.
Javascript, Perl, Visual Basic, Applescript: These popular languages provide extra control over specialized computer environments. Javascript is used to supplement HTML in web browsers. Perl is used to program web servers. Visual Basic controls the Windows operating system. Applescript controls the Macintosh operating system. You won't have time to learn all of them. If I had to pick just one, I'd go with Javascript as being the most generally useful. I know Applescript and Basic and can code in Javascript if I have to.
The web may be new medium of choice, but a lot of data is still distributed on paper. For myself, I used to use a forerunner of these programs (it was called Aldus, and later Adobe, Pagemaker) that disappeared a few years ago. As I only work online these days, my paper layout skills are now way out of date. The moral of this story is: you can't do everything -- so pick and choose your skills.
Microsoft Word works well for basic text production: letters, memos, invoices, and the like. But if you are producing a magazine, a newsletter, or a similar publication, you will find that Word slows you down. For awhile Quark Express was the leader in publications layout software, but now Adobe InDesign is rated as good, or perhaps slightly better, than Express.
For simple animations (like this: 
) you can use the Animated GIF format and create the file in Photoshop. Isn't that animation annoying?! The human eye is addicted to motion. It's really a bad idea to use animation on a web page unless it's very very very carefully designed and tested. Macromedia's Flash is probably the most widely used program for creating more complex web animations. Although Flash has a visual interface that works for basic graphics creation, knowledge of its Actionscript programming language is a requirement for commercial work. Luckily, Actionscript is similar to Javascript (see above). I learned Actionscript pretty quickly when I was using Flash ... and forgot it just as quickly when I stopped using Flash.
If you have already begun to work with digital audio, then you know that the enterprise demands a lot of skill and time. If you haven't done much work with digital audio, then what you need to know is: 1) the hardware is expensive, 2) the software is expensive, and 3) it takes hours and hours of time to create even short amounts of quality audio. I use Digital Performer, mostly because it interfaces well with Reason, which is where I generate most of my sound.
As with digital audio, digital video is expensive and time consuming. A basic editor and effects package are just the beginning. You'll also need software to copy your computer files to film, DVD, video or whatever delivery medium you plan to use. Online video is still in its infancy and requires an entire new level of expertise in order to make the movies small enough for delivery via the web.
On the web you send computer code to the audience and their browsers recreate your work. Since you cannot count on everyone's browsers having the same fonts, most web work is done in the five or six basic fonts that everyone has.
On paper you print a master copy of your work and then replicate it. This allows you to use as many of whatever fonts and faces you desire. There are thousands of computer fonts available. To find free (and less classy) fonts, just do a google search on "fonts". For a good survey of commercial fonts try the "Best Seller" list at MyFonts.com.
Thousands and thousands of images and graphic design elements are available online. As usual, the free ones are less interesting than the commercial ones ... but if you need something simple and small, in a pinch a free one will often do the trick.
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Online culture has assigned the symbol string "home" (in English) with the meaning "the top or main page in the hierarchy of this web site" to the icon of a little house. Did I draw the icon I'm using here? No - I copied it from a collection of royalty free clip art. Remember, image production is cheap, value lies in the organization and presentation of works that others have created. |
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