Youtube tutorial:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1RT81kW2x8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8eLQIwVHKs

Tutorial overview:
A successful logo design needs to be both professional and functional. It might be the first piece of branding someone sees relating to a company, so it should make a positive impression. So I’ll share my techniques and experience in Logo Design behind the Scenes. I walks through the fundamental decisions, such as what information to include, what size and orientation the logo should have, and whether to use in corporate identity, TV production, Web publishing. I demonstrate how to set up a template and work with type alignment and color. Also discusses animation techniques and preparing the file for printing, TV production, Web Publishing. How to integrate and fill the gap between 6 software is my goal in this tutorial. I’ll use Adobe Photoshop, Autodesk Maya, Adobe Illustrator, and Adobe after Effects, Adobe Flash and Adobe Dreamweaver.

Topics covered:

Quick Sketching
Logo Exploration
Logo Modeling
Producing Logo to several illustrators formats
Animation approach
Animation Composition
Web Animation and production

Chapters:

Part 1
01: Intro Goals
02: 1st stage Sketching ideas
03: Modeling, Texturing, Lighting, Rendering and Detail Design.
04: Put the logo into Layout
05: Illustration stage
06: 2nd stage animation

Part 2
07: animation composition and finalize exporting HD
08: 3rd stage Web Production
09: Final Design, animation inside HTML page.

Details:
01: Intro Goals
In the first stage we have a look to our goals before we start working to know who exactly we should do. We will prepare our logo to be ready for printing, TV production and Web Publishing. As a designing apprentice I have always asked myself what is the best method for designing something or that particular logo. It is evident that you can apply different methods for doing the same logo, but the quality of the output might vary according to the method you use.

02: 1st stage Sketching ideas
Then the process of swirling out your ideas begins. It doesn’t matter if the sketch looks like monotone; you are just throwing ideas down onto a white blank page at the moment. I used tablet here. Just try to find ideas and concepts using balance. What I mean with balance is our logo should be physically balanced inside our design. Just imagine if you create that logo in real life with clay or wood and try to put it on a flat surface it should be stable balanced. Once I had placed some ideas down on paper you can scan them in and dive into your image editor of choice if you would like. I’m using Adobe Photoshop for this one. The method I use to create logo could be wildly different from someone else so go with whatever method feels comfortable. The end result will be a series of scaled resources that the OS will use in different views.

03: Modeling, Texturing, Lighting, Rendering and Detail Design.

Modeling
For a non-organic bending object such as the subject of this tutorial it is wise to use polygonal modeling unless you care about the quality. Polygon modeling has always fascinated me especially with the accuracy it provides for making industrial models and its flexibility. The good thing about Autodesk Maya is that it provides both a strong NURBS system and a multi-optional NURBS to polygon conversion dialog, where by we can convert our detailed NURBS model to a polygonal object with the desired number of faces.

The aim of this tutorial is to provide a practical guide for the novice Polygon modeler, whereby he/she can practice the basic methods through designing a somewhat complex object. Of course, this tutorial does not cover all Polygon commands but rather most of them.

Now observe and contemplate the above sketching image for a moment; try to visualize it from front, the front view: that’s the key point in making the logo.

First we will begin with a set of primitives for different logo parts. I make a sphere (polygon sphere) then 4 twisted cubes. To make twisted cubes in Maya it’s just easy. Make a cube then go to deformers panel and use the twisting toll. After made a 1 twisted cube, duplicate it 3 times with 90 degrees. Then put them together to fitting in the sphere.

That’s exactly my idea represented. I have a point in this logo which I can say the sphere represent the red word and the 4 twisted cubes represent how mush it’s secured.

The next step is to create mental ray subdivision from approximation editor panel. I like to make the N subdivision as a 2.000 points for sure that’s give me a good smoothed mesh and also at any time I can go back and make any changes in low poly mode.

Texturing
The texturing stage is the most important part. Everyone who’s worked before with 3D texturing knows that every texture have an advantage and disadvantage. We can see that the Lambert shading absorb lights. Also we knows about the phonge shade it’s reflect lights with angels and have a different characterizes instead of blinn shade.

So I render the logo 3 times 1 with blinn shade, 2 with mia_material and phong shades. By this way we mention that we have the logo in 3 different characteristic so we can use this 3 together in later steps.

Lighting and Rendering
Let’s talk about lights. I use in this scene 9 lights. Our goal in lights is how to use a minimal number of area and point lights to recreate all direct and indirect light sources for a logo. They are 8 area lights and 1 point light. The 8 area lights have a very small intensity. Also I used the white light color. In This technique we use Global Illumination and Final Gather.

Final step in lighting and rendering is to render the logo in 3 different images every image with a different shade.

04: Put the logo into Layout
lets go to Adobe Photoshop and open the 3 images we exported from Maya. Actually I like to export images as a .TIF images. Taking the 3 images and put it together in Adobe Photoshop blind them together. I used overlay blinding mode. Then finish by company name and the caption.

Also I simulate a deep shadow behind the logo. Its give me a nice look.

In this stage if u would like to represent that logo to the client u have or to your boss. That’s will fair enough.

05: Illustration stage
For the first time I present this tutorial someone ask me… hay the logo u created now is fine but do u think is it ready for print in big scale like billboards?..

Actually it’s a very good question because for sure we need the logo to be ready in everything from print to TV production to web production as we agreed in statge1. So I’ll start now to give u my approach for how to export our logo as a vector (scalable) shape. We will go back to Maya and use logo model and exporting into a different illustrator types. I used here Maya vector render and I use some options like
Curve tolerance and detail level to end up with different logo versions. 1 with dark colors, bright colors, and wire frame, etc… everything is vector we can export it as an AI file and import it to adobe illustrator. Easily u will find that our logo is now ready to use it in printing elements safely if we need to print it in higher printing elements or huge billboard.
We finished now the stage 1 which is creating a 3d logo ready for print production.

06: 2nd stage animation
Okay… Let’s animate. We will go back to Maya and starts animate our logo. I start by prepare my timeline with 72 frame. This will give me 3 seconds (24X3=72). Animate the sphere shrink in then shrink out until its stop. Then about the 4 twisted cubes I animate it in 360 digress reversed. So it’s give me a very nice effect. So what we have now is shrink sphere and 4 rotated cubes. I think it’s Looks good for me now. For sure I’ll go to the timeline and play the frames fast, slow, reversed, etc… Check if anything looks weird or out of scene.

So we have now 72 frames let’s render it in .PNG sequence of images. And have a look for the animation when it’s finish render.

07: animation composition and finalize exporting HD
So we end now with 72 PNG sequences of images. If u thinks about composition for sure we will think about Adobe after Effects. You can import the 72 images directly to Adobe after Effects but in this tutorial I convert this sequence to 1 MOV file using quick time. So I open quick time then open the sequence of image and save as a MOV file.
So let’s import the MOV file to Adobe after Effects and start composition. First effect I have used is the auto level effect. It’s just makes the logo looks fine and has a deep look. Also I just check some other effects like rippling and bouncing and I end up with the 3D rippling animation. I make a radial gradient for the background to give me nice look when the logo animate. So I’m happy for what I end up with now

Let’s render our MOV file from Adobe after Effects and finally the logo now composite fine and ready for TV production.

09: 3rd stage Web Production
After we have our composite MOV file let we think about web animation. Actually Adobe Flash is the solution. First I prepare my stage in Adobe Flash 640X480 as we rendered our files and also prepare my timeline and frame rate 24 FPS. Now we are ready to import our animation file. But the MOV file has a huge size and we shouldn’t use it for web. That does will take a lot of time in loading. So I think about converting this file to FLV file using Adobe Flash CS3 Video Encoder. Start encoding and we have now a small FLV file. So import the FLV file and check it in Adobe Flash. After everything is looks fine and small size the only one problem is the frames looping. So I add one Action Script behavior to stop the animation when it’s finished (played for 1 time). So our file now ready for publishing from Adobe Flash we will end up with HTML file contained the flash SWF file.

10: Final Design, animation inside HTML page.
The last step in our entire tutorial is to open the HTML into Adobe Dreamweaver and center the flash object (SWF file) and we can easily type welcome to red secure website and it’s now ready for Web Production.

Go back to the main menu: www.youtube.com – Changing eye color in Photoshop! Images from wwww.Pixmac.com

Phantasm CS range of Adobe Illustrator(TM) plugins published by Astute Graphics Limited – www.astutegraphics.com Copyright Astute Graphics Limited, 2009

Happy with our training? Donate! tinyurl.com Visit www.PhotoshopTalent.com for more tutorials, contests and more! Creating a starburst effect in Photoshop Music Kevin MacLeod

In this HD voice tutorial we make and design our own logo in Adobe Illustrator CS5. Enjoy, and remember to check out how to import this into cinema 4d! Dan

Photoshop beauty retouching tutorial. See more at www.photoshopmama.net. This is actually a real tutorial showing the steps of how to do glamour photo retouching in Photoshop.

There are two basic digital ways for printers to receive artwork. As a high resolution PDF (a more preferred up-to-date method) or everything collected together (usually a QuarkXpress, Adobe InDesign or Illustrator document with images and fonts).

Before this can happen there are many things to check in the artwork which is covered in my article entitled Preparing artwork for print at http://robcubbon.com/wordpress/?page_id=26

But let us assume that you’ve done all that. Everyone is happy with what they’ve seen of the job and it needs to go … now … what do you do?

Collecting artwork

This is becoming a less preferred method. Basically, it means everything collected together a QuarkXpress, Adobe InDesign or Illustrator document with images and fonts. (Obviously, I’m assuming you’d own the fonts and therefore are at liberty to send them out). The reason it is less preferred and the reason for problems with this method is compatibility.

You must make sure which software version they have at the printers. It may be necessary to save your Quark document to an earlier version. I remember having to save Quark 6 documents down to Quark 5 so that I could open them in Quark 5 to make them Quark 4. Hopefully that’s not going on anymore! It’s an illustration of how this method is open to error.

Sometimes printers can find that the fonts don’t load successfully another thing that can go wrong.

If this is what you have to do, here’s how you do it.

In Quark, go File > Collect for Output, it will ask you to save the document if you haven’t already, check everything in the checkboxes, although it’s not necessary to include the Color Profiles. Select where you want the folder saved, hit OK and it’ll do it for you.

In InDesign, go File > Package… hit Continue and, again, I would check every checkbox. And, same with Quark select where you want the folder saved, hit OK and it’ll do it for you. InDesign has a good Preflight feature in the File menu. It checks if the fonts are OK and alerts you to any colour space errors with the images.

Illustrator has no collect or package tool so you have to do it the old-fashioned way! Go Type > Find Font… and write down your fonts. Go Window > Links and write down all the linked images and where they are on your system. Embedded images need not be collected. Then you have to find the fonts on your system make sure you get exactly the right file names, Adobe Garamond is not the same as ITC Garamond. A more usual way to artwork an Illustrator file is to embed all the images and turn all the type into outlines therefore negating the need to collect the artwork.

But this brings me neatly on to the preferred alternative to collecting artwork, the high resolution PDF.

High resolution PDFs

A PDF or Portable Document Format, it you want to use a lot of syllables is an open file format created by Adobe Systems, encapsulating a composite description of a document that includes the text, fonts, images, and vector graphics.

The advantages of high res PDFs over collected artwork are numerous, here are four

* There’s only one file not loads

* It’s a smaller size

* There won’t be any problems with fonts not loading or images going missing because … er … the fonts and images are embedded into the PDF.

* One has a better idea of how the job will print.

There are 101 ways to make a PDF. Many printers will specify their own and may even supply their own Acrobat Distiller settings. However, many times I am asked to provide a high resolution PDF for a wide variety of printed output. This is what I’d do based on the various guidelines that I’ve read.

First of all, top quality reliable PDFs can easily be exported direct from InDesign and Illustrator. The same can not be said for Quark. Do not, repeat, not send a PDF to the printers that has been exported direct from Quark.

How to create a PostScript file from Quark

The only way to make a high res PDF from Quark is to first create a PostScript file. Go File > Print and click on the first tab Layout. Here you can specify whether you want your layout to be output as spreads or not (usually not) and Registration should be set to Centered to put crop marks on each separation of the PDF. Leave everything else unchanged.

Then click on the next tab which is Setup. For Printer Description choose Adobe PDF 7.0 or whatever version of Acrobat you have loaded. For Paper Size select Custom and enter a value roughly 40mm more than the width (double if you’re printing spreads), leave the Paper Height. Paper Offset and Page Gap should both be zero. Reduce or Enlarge: 100% obviously. Leave the Orientation at landscape and Page Positioning at Left Edge.

The next tab in the Quark Print dialog box is Output. In Print Colors it should be Composite CMYK, even if it is a mono job or has special colours, the Halftoning should be Conventional. Resolution, I usually go for 2400 dpi, but Frequency (this is where guidelines differ wildly) anything between 175 and 400 lpi depending on output quality. 175 lpi would be sufficient for average quality magazine ad.

Next up is Options. Leave Quark PostScript Error Handler unchecked. Page Flip should be None, Output; Normal. Data, Binary. These are all defaults. However, Overprint EPS Black, I usually leave unchecked, but Full Resolution Tiff Output should definitely be checked.

If your document has bleed then specify it, obviously, in the bleed tab usually as 3mm clipping at bleed edge.

Finally, ignore OPI, check the Preview to see if the crops and bleeds all fit within the black square and, if you have a Profiles tab, make sure all Profiles are off as this can create havoc with your PDF.

Lastly, the actual saving of the PostScript file. In the Print dialog box click on the Printer button at the bottom, in the next box where it says Copies & Pages select Output Options the pull down menu, then check Save as File and in Format select Postscript, hit Save. If there is no Output Options in the drop down menu a shortcut is down on the left of the dialog box in the form of another button called PDF with a triangle pointing down, choose Save PDF. A browser window will pop up, select where you want the PostScript file saved then hit Save and then back to the Quark Print dialog where you hit Print.

Then go and get yourself a coffee!

Once Quark has finished creating the PostScript file it just needs to be dragged to Acrobat Distiller to be turned into a PDF. But before I discuss which Distiller setting to choose am going to explain the (much simpler!) process of creating a PDF direct from Adobe Illustrator and InDesign.

How to create a PDF from Illustrator and InDesign

In Adobe Illustrator, simply go File > Save As… and select Adobe PDF as the Format, choose where you want your PDF to be saved and hit Save. In the Save PDF dialog box that follows you can choose the Adobe Preset which I will discuss later. The tabs on the left side will be largely left to the default setting of the preset. But you may want to add crops and bleed as desired and it is worth looking through them to see if anything looks awry or if there are any warnings. Then hit Save PDF.

In Adobe InDesign it is a very similar process only this time go File > Export… and select Adobe PDF as the Format, choose where you want your PDF to be saved and hit Export. In the Export Adobe PDF dialog box that follows you can choose the Adobe Preset which is discussed soon. Again, you may want to add crops and bleed as desired, but leave the setting as per the default Preset you have chosen, just flick through to check if everything looks OK. Then hit Export.

Which Distiller Setting/Adobe Preset should I choose?

There is a very good article and discussion about this here http://indesignsecrets.com/choosing-the-right-pdf-preset.php .

The three default Presets that you should be concerned with for high resolution print output are: PDF/X-1a:2001, PDF/X-3:2002 and Press Quality.

The first two presets follow PDF/X standards. To reduce printing errors and enable the successful exchange of files, Adobe worked with vendors and professional users to develop the PDF/X family of standards designed for print workflows. They’re a good choice if you’re not sure what your printer wants. Both of the PDF/X presets in InDesign set Acrobat 4 compatibility which flattens transparency. Therefore, if you choose either of these, be sure to select the High Resolution Transparency Flattener Preset whilst on the Advanced panel.

PDF/X-1a:2001 is designed to provide the most robust and, to some extent, least flexible delivery of PDF content data. It requires that the colour of all objects be expressed in CMYK or spot colors, prepared for the intended printing conditions.

PDF/X-3:2002 allows slightly more flexibility in that colour managed workflows are also supported – elements in Lab, and with attached ICC source profiles may also be used. This PDF/X preset is similar to PDF/X-1a except that it also supports embedded RGB profiles and color management. This standard is more widely used in Europe than in North America.

Use the Press Quality preset for high-quality commercial printing where the printer is comfortable receiving a PDF with live transparency which is rare. It is a good choice if your printer is sending this to an imagesetter or platesetter from Acrobat 7 Professional.

If you are sending an advert to a magazine you may be asked for a “pass4press” PDF, if this is the case you can download a zip file of the preset or .joboptions at their website http://www.pass4press.com and once downloaded and unzipped, go Settings > Add Adobe PDF Settings… in Distiller and choose the file. The settings are similar to the PDF/X family.

With all these presets it is always necessary to check various things. You may want to add crops and bleed and remember to check that the Transparency Flattener is set to High Resolution.

Paramount to all of this is the printer. Liaise with the printer and find out their preferred option.

Checking the high res PDF

So now you have your high resolution PDF on your desktop. Open it in Acrobat Professional and have a good look at all of the job it might be the last time you see it and maybe you can spot some errors.

One thing I always do is go Advanced > Output Preview in Acrobat Professional as here you can see all the separations individually. Make sure you have a CMYK Simulation Profile selected at the top. Here spot colours can be checked as well as if the elements you want are overprinting or knocking out.

Also, run your mouse over the job an you can see the CMYK and spot colour percentage values in the Output Preview panel. This is your last chance to see if your colours will be printed correctly.

Go to Advanced and make sure Overprint Preview is checked. This will give you a screen representation of the job with the overprints and is not checked by default. So if you have had black type overprinting on a tinted background it will appear darker whilst using this preview. This can be a life saver as white elements that have erroneously been set to overprint will disappear here and on some presses. Go back to your advanced distiller options and uncheck Preserve Overprint Settings.

Markzware FlightCheck and Enfocus PitStop

I should mention at this point that there is software out there that is reputedly excellent at prepress checking. Markzware FlightCheck should be used on Quark, Illustrator and InDesign files, and Enfocus PitStop can check print PDFs.

Personally, I never found them very useful but they are highly thought of in the industry and I’m ready to eat my words.

Sending the files

Now you must transport, physically or digitally, your files to the printers.

If time is not tight, which it hardly ever is, then you can burn a CD or DVD and put it in the post along with your proofs or low res PDF clearly marked up for pagination.

If time is tight there are a variety of options. if the file is less than 10MB, then you can try email, of course you’ll have to check with the receiver. ISDN still lives on in the UK although it has largely been superceded by DSL as a technology.

FTP is the preferred method of transporting large amounts of information between two computers over the internet. To do this it is best to use some sort of FTP software or “client”. There are many clients out there for Mac and PC, both shareware and for money. For PC users, Filezilla is generally recommended. Personally, for Mac users, I would recommend Fetch and Transmit if you want to spend money and Cyberduck if you don’t (for Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later).

To upload to a remote site you will need three bits of information from them to input to your FTP client the IP address, a user name and a password. If these are accepted you can view the remote site and put the files there.

In this video, I go over how easy it is to slap some simple things together to make a good looking wallpaper. I basically shared this wallpaper with my friends on twitter and right away people requested a tutorial. So here it is. **The video is pretty long, but I didn’t want to rush the video. In realtime when you are making the wallpaper, it’ll take maybe 1/4 the time if that. Brushes I used: Grids: www.brusheezy.com Tech Rings: www.brusheezy.com Technoid Font: www.dafont.com LINKS: VvPhonevV Channel: www.YouTube.com My website: www.VvCompHelpvV.com My Blog www.VvCompHelpvV.info Follow Me On Twitter www.Twitter.com Make Some Money Online: www.CashCrate.biz

Rss Feed Icon Vector For Free

The amount of free vector art coming out each day is astonishing, most of which are created by professional freelance vector artists or design studios! Many designers and studios will give out free vector art as a way to showcase their talent and gain exposure. This is a great way to get traffic, but its also great for designers who need fresh design elements for websites and other graphic design projects.

I collect some free high quality shopping related icon set. You can find icons of shopping cart, shopping bag, credit card, home, sale, delivery, shopping basket, tag, calculate, gift box etc.

Vector [EPS]

I got some queries from friends about where did I get those free Adobe Photoshop Brushes, royalty free vector graphics and textures since my last post about Royalty Free Vector Graphics, Photoshop Brushes and Textures. Well my friend, I’m stick why my best answer for this… Just google it and you will find tons of those royalty free vectors, brushes and textures. It’s true! I’m not joking about it. All you have to do is browse through the result and you’ll find a lot of those valuable resources. You will find most of them are free and ready to be downloaded.

For those who are new with vector graphic, it is also called geometric modeling or object-oriented graphics. Vector Graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves, and polygons, which are all based upon mathematical equations to represent images in computer graphics. It is used in contrast to the term raster graphics, which is the representation of images as a collection of pixels. There are various format of vector graphic you can download. The most common format available is EPS, PDF, WMF and SVG. Don’t be sad if you see the size is so small because this type of graphic is scalable. You can open, resize and edit this type of vector art file in most vector graphics editor such as CorelDraw, Adobe Illustrator or Xara Extreme.

However, I’m glad to share my list of selected free vector graphics, Adobe Photoshop Brushes and textures as my appreciation to you… the loyal visitor of this blog. Feel free to bookmark this post as I will update the list when I found other worthy links.

In this video, I will show you how to create a really nice looking magic/eye candy looking effect with photoshop. If you apply these effects to a banner you are making, you are sure to wow your crowd. Blog I found effect tutorial on: www.isfx.org Get The Font I Used: www.searchfreefonts.com **Thanks www.YouTube.com for finding the font Links: My Website: www.VvCompHelpvV.com Twitter www.Twitter.com Make Money Together: www.CashCrate.biz featured Failblog failblog.org LetsVlog.com (Friends Website): www.LetsVlog.com