Penpower Chinese Expert (Pen Scanner)

Penpower Chinese Expert (Pen Scanner)

Penpower Chinese Expert (Pen Scanner)Penpower Chinese Expert is a complete Chinese learning tool. By integrating mini ScanEYE II (pen scanner), you can fast scan any document into Penpower Chinese Expert and utilize all the listening, reading, speaking, writing, and translation features this software has to offer.

The included PENPOWER mini ScanEYE II can scan and recognize Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese and English into your computer via the USB interface. Effortlessly scan in with the transparent scan tip. Whatever you see, you can scan.

Three Main Interfaces
The three main user-friendly interfaces are designed to help users access and understand the functions of Penpower Chinese Expert, making learning Chinese easier and faster.

– Chinese-English Translation Interface
– Sentence Segmentation Interface
– Phrase Database Management

The best Chinese input and translation device
This software tool connects to the computer through USB port and bundle in a 3-in-1 function of scan, recognition and translation. When scanning, it can recognize both horizontal and vertical aligned characters. Once in the file, the software can provide you with pronunciation and phrases structure of the text, plus the correct writing sequence of the characters.

Thousands of Chinese Characters Recognized
The pen scanner recognizes more than 13,000 Traditional Chinese characters and more than 6700 Simplified Chinese characters as well as English words, numbers and punctuation.

Now available at an academic discount price of $180.

Penpower Chinese Expert (Writing Pad)The Penpower Chinese Expert (Writing Pad) is another Chinese learning tool from Penpower. With the writing pad, you can write or modify any Chinese text easily and use Penpower Chinese Expert for listening comprehension, reading, speaking, writing, and translation.

For East Asian languages, handwriting is the most natural way to enter characters into a computer. If you do not know any keyboard-based input methods, such as hanyu pinyin, or zhuyin, then inputting by handwriting is definitely for you.

Now available at an academic discount price of $117.

5 Reasons every designer should own a Wacom Cintiq Tablet

5 Reasons every designer should own a Wacom Cintiq Tablet

b15497.jpgRecently I purchased at Wacom Cintiq LCD Pen Table (12WX). I have broken my review down into 5 points, but basically I think the Cintiq is the best thing since sliced bread. I must tell you that I am in no way affiliated with Wacom, nor have I been paid to write this review. I think this is such a great product I think other designers can benefit from it.

I would highly recommend anyone looking to improve their creative abilities to invest in a Cintiq. I truly think unlike other computer hardware purchases it would be an investment. I think the Cintiq is going to help me grow as an artist. From my illustration work to the animation I create in Flash it will help keep pushing me foreword into undiscovered country.



How Adobe Supports Open Source

How Adobe Supports Open Source

Adobe supports open source activities in multiple ways. We work directly with contributions to existing projects, such as WebKit and Eclipse. We work indirectly by supporting Adobe products on open source operating distributions, such as supporting Adobe Reader and Adobe Flash software on Linux distributions. We do pure research on development and make those implementations open source, such as the work with the Adobe Source Libraries. And we are releasing substantial code and products as open source.These models reflect two types of involvement: hybrid and direct.

Computer Arts reviews 3D Studio Max 2008

Computer Arts reviews 3D Studio Max 2008

For this release, Autodesk is concentrating on consolidation and not on adventure. The speed improvements on their own mean this version offers more productivity than any earlier release. While there’s a worry that from now 3D Studio will be refreshed slightly rather than being reworked, there are enough changes to make this a significant update, if not quite a major milestone. This is the same old 3ds Max but slightly easier to use, with better modelling, faster previews, and much faster rendering – and that should make existing owners very happy.

NVArt: Amazing Creations Winners

CGSociety – NVArt: Amazing Creations Winners

NVArt_Amazing Creations Winner

Photoshop CS3 ExtendedFor “Growth of cubic bacteria’, Vaclav wanted to create an interesting form that looked like a photograph of small structure micro-organism. “It is all generated in Xenodream 1.5 and done by so-called six holons. I use fourteen lights to light up the object. Then I rendered straight into it. Xenodream has something like voxel rendering technique, so it can feature very tiny details. I take this raw render into Photoshop and resample the image. Next I create a background, simulate depth of field, simulate fake chromatic aberration, make some color correction and finally I add digital grain.

PC World – CorelDraw Graphics Suite X4 Review

PC World – CorelDraw Graphics Suite X4 Review

CorelDraw Graphics Suite X4 As the centerpiece of Corel’s Graphics Suite X4, CorelDraw X4 ships with significant new features that, while not flashy, are practical, and substantial enough for professionals to find the upgrade worthwhile. Even the interface has been redesigned to present a clean, intuitive workspace.

CorelDraw Graphics Suite X4 is available at an academic discount price of $92.

Adobe Soundbooth CS3 Review – Software Editorial

Adobe Soundbooth CS3 Review – Software Editorial

Adobe Soundbooth CS3

In plain simple terms Adobe Soundbooth CS3 is “Audio Editing Made Simple”. Overall this shows that Adobe has taken into consideration that professional video editors are not necessarily experts in audio mixing and enhancement. They need the right tools that will help them accelerate the tasks that they are not so familiar with and thus avoid unnecessary costs and time employing an audio expert. Adobe Soundbooth CS3 is a completely new tool that is reminiscent of the other applications in the Production Premium suite, it has resizable grey windows and moveable tabs and icons. As a debut product it has many outstanding features which include introductory audio import and basic recording, as well as various editing and enhancement tools.

Adobe Soundbooth CS3
is available at an academic discount price of $95.

Maya and LightWave bring to life the new Terminator

Maya and LightWave bring to life the new Terminator

Terminator T-888

“Being a designer/visual effects supervisor, I was designing like a good engineer designs in terms of the economy of later for when I actually had to build this thing. We did build an extremely articulate, expressionistic, emoting Terminator. It’s a very complicated Maya model that we animated, but we downshifted and translated it into LightWave so it’s more usable for TV. We can put him it as many scenes as we want to. We spent a lot of time modeling and texturing it so it was a very series friendly character. To my great joy, it makes quite a few appearances in the series, so it’s not like we are holding back and just teasing the audience. It’s something we use a lot. Even though it’s a hell of a thing to render it is series friendly and that stems from its design. And the interesting thing is that it’s a completely spherical object, where you can into it through its mouth and into its chest so all of that had to have detail.”

MindManager 7.0 Mac a “Killer App” at MacWorld 2008

MindManager 7.0 Mac a “Killer App” at MacWorld 2008

MindManager 7 MAC

One thing that really made an impression on me at the show was developers really enjoy making great, cool looking, and functional applications for the Mac. As I perused around the show I found some that really stood out.

I had heard of the concept of mind mapping before the show, so when I had the chance to visit with Mindjet’s Bill Creekbaum I jumped at the opportunity. Mindjet makes an application called MindManager that enables you to blast your screen with ideas in a node-based workflow. You can add notes, links, photos and other media to enhance your ideas. I picked this up and have been using it non stop since the show. It is powerful and effective for brainstorming your ideas. For more information, visit www.mindjet.com

MindManager 7 Mac
is available at an academic discount price of $99.

Color Efex Pro 3.0 – New Features

Color Efex Pro 3.0 – New Features

nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 Complete

Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 has been significantly updated to provide photo enthusiasts and professional photographers alike with the most powerful yet easy to use set of photographic filters ever created. DSLR owners will revel in the wide range of quick and easy fixes to dramatically improve their photos with just a few clicks of the mouse. Professional wedding, nature, commercial, and portrait photographers will appreciate the speed of workflow and advanced features designed to support uniquely creative styles and deliver class-leading power.

Check out the new features of Color Efex Pro 3.0, the photographer’s choice for photographic filters for Photoshop and Photoshop Elements, with a 15-Day Free Trial.

Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 Complete is available at an academic discount price of $169.