Easy ParticleIllusion
Wondertouch’s particleIllusion is basically a monster particle system in a box. The application is not a plugin, so you don’t need to have a host application to run the particle simulations. The application can export to just about every format, so you can make it work with other video software. Additionally, particleIllusion has a new library of presets every month for free, so it’s almost : PICK, CLICK, RENDER for stunning particle animations.
Free Flex Builder 3 Pro for Education
If you are a current student or faculty member at an educational institution, you can get Adobe Flex Builder™ 3 Pro free.
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QuarkXPress Curriculum Kit
Quark is excited to announce our comprehensive Curriculum Kit, which is FREE for all QuarkXPress class instructors. Our theme, “Take On The World,” encourages design students to test their skills with the latest features in QuarkXPress® 7 and Quark Interactive Designer™.
QuarkXPress 7 is available at an academic discount price of $197.
DAV’s TechTable: ** UPDATED March 2008 ** Working with Adobe Encore CS3 and Blu-ray
 During our internal CS3 beta cycles of Adobe PremierePro CS3 and Adobe Encore CS3 , I spent most of my efforts on HDV and Blu-ray workflows while prepping for NAB 2007. The idea was to come up with a simple workflow allowing the user to ingest HDV and end up with a playable Blu-ray disc for the Sony Playstation 3, which is currently the least expensive Blu-ray player. In the Adobe booth we demo’d Blu-ray authoring on an Intel QuadCore Mac and playing burned media on a Playstation3. We had 2 Blu-ray discs, one encoded as MPEG2 Single Pass (draft mode) and a H.264 Two Pass (High Quality Mode)
** UPDATE ** Since this article was written last year, I have spent my early 2008 efforts on working with Panasonic P2 footage and Blu-ray and have been very happy with the workflow. P2 footage to Blu-ray works amazing well with Encore. Look for an upcoming article. Once you go tapeless , it’s hard to go back to tape. I’ll also be working with Sony EX tapeless footage this year as well – Stay tuned.
Premiere Pro CS3 is available at an academic discount price of $345.
Pinnacle Studio Video Editing Software Turns Gaming Sessions Into Video Masterpieces Ready To Be Shared
 Pinnacle Systems, Inc., the consumer division of Avid Technology, Inc. (Nasdaq: AVID), reported today that Pinnacle Studio™ 11, its award-winning video editing software, is attracting customers from the booming game market. Coupled with video capture devices such as Pinnacle Video Transfer, Pinnacle Studio lets game enthusiasts have a fast, easy way to create and post videos that prove their record-breaking achievements and share their techniques for improved scores.
As Benoit Boudreau, who uses Pinnacle Studio to create and post videos of his record-breaking game scores on the Web explains, “Video is the most widely accepted method of proof. But I also use it to create how-to videos, showing my hand movements in slow-motion to help others learn how to improve their scores. High-quality videos tend to get more views than lower quality videos, so Studio is great for that.”
Pinnacle Studio Plus 11 is available at an academic discount price of $74.
Diskeeper 2008 now certified for Windows Vista
Diskeeper 2008 Pro is now certified for Windows Vista and Diskeeper 2008 Server is now certified for Windows Server 2008!
New Diskeeper® 2008 with InvisiTasking™ defragments in real-time, invisibly in the background. Intelligently monitors and utilizes only idle system resources, while users continue to work. And with fragmentation completely eliminated, your performance flies. Systems are maintained at peak performance and reliability at all times—Automatically! Once Diskeeper 2008 is deployed, a system runs faster and more stably—period.
Speed Up Windows Vista – Wired How-To Wiki
The flash and polish of Windows Vista seduced you, but so far the glamorous interface is just sucking the life out of your PC. Fear not, this guide has everything you need to turn Vista into the beautiful *and* speedy OS you were dreaming of.Keep in mind though, that, while these tips can help you speed up Windows and recover hard drive space, you aren’t going to see the sort of speed boost you’d get from upgrading your hardware. If you’re unhappy, for instance, with the speed of Vista on a machine where Windows XP used to scream, these tips will help. But you might want to consider a new graphics card, more RAM and perhaps even a faster processor.
Researchers Look to Spot Photo Hoaxes
 Sometimes, a photo is simply too good to be true. Tiny details in an image, for instance, may be too similar to have occurred naturally, suggesting a cut-and-paste maneuver. Or the color patterns may be too “normal” – beyond the limitations of sensors on digital cameras.
A growing number of researchers and companies are looking for such signs of tampering in hopes of restoring credibility to photographs at a time when the name of a popular program for manipulating digital images has become a verb, Photoshopping.
Adobe Systems Inc., the developer of Photoshop, said it may incorporate their techniques into future releases.
“There’s much more awareness and much more skepticism when (people) are looking at images,” said Kevin Connor, a senior director of product management at Adobe. “That’s why we think that’s something we need to get involved in. It’s not healthy to have people be too skeptical about what they saw.”
Photoshop CS3 Extended is available at an academic discount price of $295.
Technical Communication: RoboHelp – A journey from a Dead product to a modern Innovative product
 This Monday, we release “RoboHelp Packager for Adobe AIR”. This is a brand new utility that converts WebHelp generated from Adobe RoboHelp 6 and Adobe RoboHelp 7 into a single installable Help file. The Help is based on Adobe AIR, and has the best of both worlds – desktop and web, and provides customers the power and flexibility of sophisticated, modern, branded Help systems. I don’t think I can explain you the power by writing more about the same, you will have to experience it yourself. So visit http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/robohelp/, download the utility free of cost and experience what Help would look like in Web 2.0.
RoboHelp 7 is available at an academic discount price of $410.
Quark Deluxe Edition for Education Offers a Complete Set of Design and Imposition Tools
New Product Offering Brings Educators and Student Designers QuarkXPress 7, Quark® Interactive Designer, Quark Print Collection and Quark XPert Tools Pro in One Discounted Package
 “It is important that students and faculty have access to the design tools that will help them be successful in multi-channel creative environments,” said Cherie Walker, director of channel sales for Quark. “The Quark Deluxe Edition for Education is a collection of Quark products for page layout, interactive design and imposition priced to be an exceptional value for individuals and educational institutions.”
QuarkXPress 7 offers designers leading graphic design and page layout capabilities including precise transparency control, Composition Zones® for live collaboration on QuarkXPress documents, compatibility with Mac OS X Leopard and Windows Vista® certification. Combined with Quark Interactive Designer, Quark Print Collection and Quark XPert Tools Pro, Quark Deluxe Edition for Education delivers a power publishing solution in a single box.
— Quark Interactive Designer: Allows for the code-free creation of Flash® output files within QuarkXPress that includes video, motion, sound and interactivity.
— Quark Print Collection: A sophisticated tool that makes prepress and imposition quick and easy –- in either QuarkXPress or Adobe® Acrobat®.
— Quark XPert Tools Pro: A collection of popular modules for better scaling, improved guides and powerful text-linking to be used with QuarkXPress.
Quark Deluxe Edition for Education is available at an academic discount price of $239.
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