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Derry and I flew to Orlando to attend my tenth year of Photoshop World — a conference on the latest and greatest of all things Photoshop, including digital photography — being held at the Orange County Convention Center in “sunny” Orlando. We got an upgrade to First Class both going to returning, which was fabulous!  I’d love to fly across country or overseas in such a chair.  It reclined to a full bed position!

Our pre-session day class was with Faye Sirkis, The Art of the Contemporary Painting in CS5.  I’ve taken several classes with Faye in the past, but I was interested to see how she uses the new mixer and other brushes in CS5.  The last few hours of the class were very good.  And, I was the lucky winner of one of Faye’s training DVDs.

Sunny Florida, right?  Wrong.  The  only day it was sunny was the day we landed and the evening Photoshop World ended.  Otherwise, it rained.  It poured.  There were thunder and lightening storms.  There were daily tornado warnings with tornadoes touching down in surrounding areas.  At times it sounded like the roof might cave in! But, so it goes!

The opening keynote has the feel of a rock concert where everyone eagerly awaits the start of the show (much like the days of Steve Jobs giving the opening keynote at Macworld). This year’s theme was Project Photoshop — a take off on Project Runway.  The huge workbook cover, however, included the tag line, “The Feel. The Fashion. The Filters,” which reminded me more of “he look, the feel, of cotton, the fabric of your life,” rather than Project Runway.  Small nitpick, I know.  Anyway … the opening video featured Julieanne Kost playing the Heidi Klum character and David Ziser playing the Tim Gunn character, each having a different take on the name.   A team of NAPP teachers were the Photoshop designers and the fabulous photographer Jay Maisel, and instructors Fay Sirkis and Terry White were the judges. After the video Scott Kelby started the show, and the models strutted down the runway with garments created by Florida fashion design students.  Each garment was based on a different Photoshop tool, such as the paint bucket,  pen, type tool, and so on.

Color swatches on the left and the pen tool on the right.

Based on the bucket tool, this design was the winner.

Scott Kelby among the models.

Another set of models showcased designs printed on silk.

The winning design.

I was very happy to see designs ink jet printed with pigment ink (I was told with an Epson wide format) onto silk fabric.  Later I obtained a sample pack of the fabric from an Adobe employee and was very surprised to see the name of the company on the package.  Without naming the company, it’s one that I used extensively in the past but have not ordered from in some time due to delivery problems.  Hmm..

Johnny L. among the models.

Johnny Loiacono (aka Johnny L.), an Adobe Executive, also gave an overview of some of the latest Photoshop advances, which is always fun to see.  He and Bryan Hughes (another Adobe person) demonstrated some future concepts. I’m looking forward to some of the new iPad apps coming out, such as “Toolbar meet Palette,” which puts Photoshop navigation on your iPad, meaning more screen real estate!

The rush of the crowd leaving the keynote.

The keynote concluded, and the rush to classes began.  While I took many, a few were stand-outs.

Jeff Schewe.

The Art of the Digital Print was excellent.  I’ve taken a full day panel discussion on digital printing, with Jeff being one of the instructors, and have taken classes with him at prior PSWs (including one with the late Bruce Fraser which was amazing). However, he continues to be one of the most knowledgeable teachers going, and I jump at any opportunity to learn from him.  I also enjoyed the panel talk on The Art of Digital Photography.  At the concluding keynote, a talk given by Dave Black was one of the most inspiring talks I’ve heard.  He talked extensively about how a college teacher took an interest in him and literally changed his life.  It bought him to tears and most people listening to tears.  And so another Photoshop World concluded.

There are so many sharing teachers, classes, and incredibly talented people at the show that it can be overwhelming.  I left feeling very humbled, but very inspired.  And, the sun was finally out!

As it was a couple years back, Photoshop World was held at the Orange County Convention Center which is the second largest convention center in the country. In other words, there was a lot of walking each day.

Every day and every night we made our way through the long corridors.

The place has very cool lighting.

On Tuesday, we had a pre-conference class with Deke McClelland on channels and masks.  He’s an excellent teacher who can wax on at incredible length on anything Photoshop-related.  Even so, I found myself a bit bored during the class.  This is most likely due to having many classes with him over the years and possibly actually learning what he taught. :)  On Wednesday morning, we gathered in the alumni room until we were ushered into the auditorium  for the keynote.

Each year there is a theme to the keynote.  This go-around was the usual cast of NAPP teachers starring in a spoof of the VH1 series “Where are they Now?”  It was a lot of fun watching the video and then watching the “reunion” of their version of Kiss take the stand and sing “I want to Photoshop all night, and retouch every day” (rather than “I want to rock and roll …”)

Scott Kelby making some opening remarks after he and his NAPP band played.

Russell Brown, the creative director of Adobe, going through a very entertaining twenty year history of Photoshop.

Photoshop CS5 is coming out in April.  During the keynote, Katrine Eismann gave a demonstration of one of the new features, a content aware healing brush.

It was quite impressive when in a couple keystrokes she removed some of the graffiti from the wall.

More images coming soon …

Here we go …

This year’s keynote centered around a football theme. As always, it was full of laughs.

Notice the number of blog posts and cans of Red Bull consumed in one year.

The amazing Russell Brown on the left and John Loiacono, the Senior Vice President of Adobe.

Scott Kelby on the left with John Loiacono

After everyone piled out of the keynote, waiting in the wings is the always helpful Peter Bauer, the Photoshop answer man!

This morning’s classes were excellent — one was on fixes to a variety of of image problems and the second on the CS4 adjustment and mask panels. I consider myself an advanced Photoshop user, yet there are always tons of new things I learn.  Oh, I missed a photo opp …
“Photoshop, because learning is hard as crap” — one of the tag lines during the keynote that was on the screen.

Next up was a run through the tech expo. It was crowded and had more classes going on.   One piece of cool news is that Wacom released a new Intuos4 Pen Tablet (sporting a new look, a new pen with more pressure sensitivity,  an illuminated display of the user-defined shortcut keys, and more).  It’s available for purchase starting today (but, alas, it’s not coming home with me this time around!).

Back to it …

Off to Boston to attend Photoshop World.  Of course there is a delay at Newark Libery International.

Flying over the Hudson River

Flying over Scituate Harbor in Mass.  I’m in a new fiber group, and our first image needs natural lines.  This may serve as some good inspiration.  We’ll see.

I’m not sure where … but coming into the Logan Airport area (I’ll have to look on Google maps).

Arriving

Derry

Ahhh …

Looking through the ceiling at the Shops at the Prudential Center building.

A quick shot of flowers while passing by a flower stand (no flash and a slow shutter speed such by accident – a happy accident.

Okay, work is caught up, blog is caught up, it’s time for food and classes.  Sorry about the obnoxious looking copyright symbols.  It’s part of the script I use for resizing images, and I’m too lazy to redo the script right now.  :)

I mentioned that Photoshop World East was held at the Orlando Convention Center this year. The building has many interesting contemporary architectural angles and such going on. Here are some of the photos I’ve taken. I wasn’t alone. There were cameras snapping nearly everywhere I looked!

At the Photoshop World pre-conference, I took a half day class with Stephen Johnson, author of Stephen Johnson on Digital Photography. His bio is quite impressive, which you can read more about here. I was (and continue to be) so humbled by the beauty of his photographs.

The class was on Photographic Exhibition and basically was about
the techniques and practices relating to exhibiting photographs. I took the class, however, to also relate it to quilt exhibition. I am including some of his information here, as it may be of interest to quilt makers who are considering or who are exhibiting their work.

The issue of the “Giclee” (zhee-klay) came up. The term basically means “to squirt” as in squirt out ink, as in what happens when using an inkjet printer. It evolved as a way to distinguish early inkjet Iris proof prints from fine art inkjet prints. it was also a way to avoid using terms such as “digital” and “computer” because of the negative connotation associated with them in the artworld. More recently Giclee is associated with a print using fine art paper and archival inks. Today, however, Johnson noted that the term is overused to the point that it no longer has any meaning. Anyone with an inkjet printer using archival ink can say the print is a Giclee. Also, the words digital and computer no longer have a negative association in the art work. Stephen’s opinion (as well as many of the professional photographers in the class) is to avoid using the Giclee term because it’s not taken seriously by most professionals. If this is so remains to be seen, as I continue to see people using the term associated with their prints. However, I suspect that for individuals doing short runs of their work using an inkjet printers, use of the term will fade.

For printers, however, using the term is another matter. The Giclee Printers Association has a nine-point standard and official logo for its member prints. One standard is “The artisan producing (or supervising the production of the work) has been certified as a Master Printer by the G.P.A.” Interesting stuff.

Also, if you’re interested to learn more about digital printing, see this book: Nash Editions: Fine Art Printing on the Digital Frontier, by Garrett White.
It includes many essays, photos, and a huge amount of information centering around what is considered the world’s premier fine-art digital printmaking studio, Nash Editions, which Graham Nash (yes, of Crosy, Stills, Nash and Young) co-founded with R. Mac Holbert. The book includes, “more than 100 illustrations include Nash Editions artwork, photos of artists in the studio, images of the machines used in digital printing, and illustrations of the proofing process.”

Stephen recommends a labeling system on the back of all work which at least includes name, title, year, printer, inkset. He includes this information, along with copyright information, on the back of his prints. He uses two stamps, with archival ink, with the base info in print and he then completes the specifics using a pencil. The information is again printed on a 6” label (a neutral pH label applied using polyvinyl accetate (PVC) glue – which you can get from Light Impressions), and also includes his address, the type of paper the image is printed on, and care information, which goes on the back of the frame insert and the back of the frame itself.

I noted that he didn’t note model machine or whether it was K3s Ultrachomes and such. I also noticed when going through the exhibited photos in the show that the labeling system for each print was very similar. No where did I see the term “Giclee.” Currently I am not selling prints of my quilts. However, if I do, I will use the labeling system such as he suggests.

Additionally, he had some excellent advice for framing and matting. He took us through the entire process, and used all archival materials. Not once did the print ever touch anything not archival. In other words, no glues or tape or anything of the sort was used with it. Instead, archival photo corners, the mat sandwich being held with linen tape and so on.

Also of interest was how adament he was on everything being of the absolute highest quality as possible. No dust, no fingerprints, if a hair is discovered after framing, to take it apart and remove it, and so on. He made it very clear that if you don’t take your work seriously, no one else will. In that regard, he said “Spend the money for a professional website. It is the first thing people will generally learn of you and your work. Don’t skimp, and get a site that you can maintain yourself.” For obvious reasons, I smiled at those comments!

A short list of some of his recommendations:

• Label your work.
• Have a professionally-created website that you can maintain yourself.
• When exhibiting your work, be absolutely sure of who is responsible for what. In other words, who is handling shipping fees, insurance, what is the commission fee, when is it paid, how are you notified of a sale, and so on.
• Discuss gallery lighting and consider bringing you own lighting if the lighting conditions are not optimal. He recommends 4700KLighting from Solux:
• When framing, use archival materials, including linen tape for constructing the matt, and photo corners rather than any type of glue or tape (these will buckle with time).

This is just an overview of some of the highlights of the class. If you have the opportunity to take a class from him, do so. In addition to the class on photographic exhibition, he does several classes on digital photography. Additional information about exhibition is included in his book noted above, and he’ll have a new book out this summer.

Orlando, Florida – April 1 – 4, 2008

This year Photoshop East is being held in the South Building of the Orlando Convention Center, which we learned is the second largest in the country. That’s me in front of the Center. I’m here with my business partner, Derry, and we did a lot of walking. After the first hour and blisters on my feet, it was clear I didn’t take the correct shoes. I found a surf shop and quickly bought myself a pair of Teva’s. Ahhh … relief!

The opening of the show had a Star Trek theme – “The Evolution” – which got a lot of laughs.

Johnny L from Adobe Corp. gave some details of what’s coming up in Photoshop CS4 and also provided some laughs.

Because of being alumni, Derry and I were able to sit in the front during the keynote

which sure was better than being in the back!

Scott Kelby, President of NAPP and author of more books than seems possible, welcomed in various NAPP teachers and special guests through the familar trekkie-sounding whoosh of an opening door.

After the keynote, the crowds in the hallways venturing off to their selected classes.