Sharing my digital learning journey

Creating forms in MSWord

2009-02-21T12:25:00.002-05:00

One of the best things that happened to me this month was getting a free copy of Microsoft Office! Wooohoo! Although I had already mastered Open Office Impress and Writer.

For my business, I have been wondering how to best create interactive fillable forms for use with my clients. I haven't as yet figured out how to convert the forms into fillable PDF. But that is my next task.

I successfully created a form that has been working well so far with clients. I'm so proud of myself.

A chance to explore microsoft programs!

2009-02-04T19:55:00.002-05:00

I'm working on becoming skilled in MS Access and perfecting my Excel Skills...

I'm having to dig deep inside me for motivation coz those programs aren't as fun as Adobe Creative Suite, but they sure do look good on a resume:)

Projects I am presently working on

2009-01-25T03:02:00.003-05:00

FOCUS: FollowOneCourseUntilSuccessful!

I am working on the following projects over the next three weeks:

1. Renewing & redoing my business website

2. Completing my wellness video

3. Finishing my audio recordings

Good timez. Stay tuned - lots of Flash, html, soundbooth, premiere elements lessons to be learned...

I am now an Adobe SoundBooth Master!!!

2009-01-16T21:37:00.002-05:00

I just completed the lynda.com tutorial on SoundBooth!!! I will be sharing my projects using my newfound knowledge. Keep checking back on this space!

Soundbooth Tutorials

2009-01-15T01:01:00.003-05:00

I was able to answer some questions I had. I learned how to cut of part of a sound clip in the middle - it's simple highlighting with the cursor and pressing the delete key.

I also learned about frequency & how the human ear can only hear between 20Hz & 20KHz of sound. Oh sound theory...you remind me of my high school physics days!

One of the best things about Soundbooth is the task history menu that allows you to visualize the steps you've taken and delete them one by one in any order you need to.

Another super cool thing is how you can add and edit custom scores to your work. Example - if you want some jazz melody to be part of your sound projects, Soundbooth comes with various sounds which you can manipulate & use!! hooray:)

I have another question about merging sound files. I hope I can do this in sound booth because my o my do I have some awesome ideas for fun projects that involve sound combinations!

More to come!

I love Adobe SoundBooth!

2009-01-12T11:01:00.007-05:00

This morning I discovered Adobe SoundBooth in all its glory.

I've had this program on my computer for a while but until this morning I'd never bothered to open it. Wow. I've been missing out. I'm in the process of creating a personal audio CD and I started out the process by using the lame SoundRecorder that is listed under accessories on my computer. That sound recorder is so basic and only lets me record 60 minutes of audio at a time. I mustn't put it down entirely though because I have made some really cool voiceovers in the past using that basic program. Time to move on!

Wow- you can do SO MANY AMAZING THINGS USING ADOBE SOUNDBOOTH. I swear nobody is paying me to say this. Today I created some gorgeous audio files. The possibilities are endless. I could do this all day. I am having a hard time dragging myself from the program so I go to my appointments.

I love this feeling. Of passion. That's the feeling I get when I explore a new computer program and dabble in it's possibilities. That's the feeling I get when I dare to be creative.

Meanwhile, please take a moment to listen to one of the audio files I created this morning. The file is below as a mov. since blogger only lets you upload movies.

There are some things I figured out how to do in soundbooth:

-how to cut beginning or end of a sound clip

-how to add effects to a sound clip

-how to reduce the pops & clicks in a sound clip.

-how to convert my wav files to .mov so I can upload them to blogger!!!

I need to figure out the following:

If I want to cut out a sound that is in the middle of my clip, how do I do that? If you can help, please let me know.

"I dwell in possibility" Emily Dickinson

How to set up a professional blog

2009-01-11T08:01:00.003-05:00

I want to begin working on a professional blog and I have questions regarding this process:

-what is the cost of buying a word press hosted blog without the wordpress extension in my url name?
-how do I gain traffic for the blog?
-how can I make money from the blog?
-how do I market e-books on the blog?
-how do you choose a professional looking theme and font?

The blog is about health & wellness and encourages people to take their health into their own hands while debunking myths. The trick will be how to get the message across without stirring online arguments between the allopathic folks and the natural healers.

On this space, I am seeking answers to these technical questions. I will re post answers to these questions once I am ready to launch.

Open Office vs Ms Word

2009-01-04T16:06:00.002-05:00

Yes it's free! Make the switch is easy. The problem seems to be psychological on my end. I'm so used to Microsoft word and the whole suite that comes along with it. I feel a little like a cheapskate and pauper for opting for the free version of something.

Let's be positive and use the terms RESOURCEFUL and CREATIVE.

Last night I sent some professional documents attached as odt files (the open office version of .doc file). Five seconds letter I had a funny feeling so I resent them as word files. In open office, you can go to file, save as and you can save the document as a word document even though it was created with Open Office Writer. Saving it as a word document erased any doubts in my mind that the recipients might have a difficult time opening and viewing the document.

My next task is so see if an .odt file is just as easy to open as a .doc file.

My advice to you. Try open office. I'm trying it and I will share my discoveries on here as I make my journey.

Writing on a path made so easy!!!

2009-01-03T12:30:00.005-05:00

I first learned about writing on a path a year ago when I was introduce to Adobe InDesign for the first time. I'll take a moment here to be blatantly honest. I would LOVE a job or internship in magazine layout, advertising etc. The possibilities of InDesign blew me away and I dreamed for a few weeks...

Back to reality.

When I designed my logo last month, I was attempting to write on a path in illustrator. Given the nature of my logo, I was finding it hard to create the correct alignment because I ended up with millions of vectors and controlling everything was a delicate matter. Mind you it was fun, but slightly annoying. I found an easier way today...

Using Adobe Photoshop CS3!!! You can write on a path in two seconds. If you choose the text icon on the toolbar on the left hand side, you can start writing, change your font etc, then hightlight your text and look at the top of your screen for the text warp icon. Just press that and play around with all the formats available to warp text. You can even change the parameters of different things to achieve the exact effect you want. Yay adobe photoshop. I will definitely use you more in the future. This program has grown immensely in the past 5 years. It used to provide such basic services. Now - wow:) I was just playing around this morning. I needed some inspirational quotes for my project. Those pics above are what I created.

My first flash animation!!!

2008-12-31T21:33:00.004-05:00

This is like first grade. I totally love to learn things from scratch. I am so proud and happy. I want a gold star on my forehead. I'm did spend a few minutes trying to figure out how to embed it to my blogger post on here. Here is the process I went through. I called it Operation "i thought it would take two seconds to load my flash animation to my blog"

1. My normal route. I clicked on the "Add Video" icon in blogger. Blogger refused to upload the swf file and I kept getting an error message. I tried this on both my opera and my ie browser. It shouldn't matter which browser I use, but to be honest, sometimes opera crashes and doesn't deliver the goods I want in the ie way I'm used to. But I still love opera and it's handy dandy tools and widgets. (that's another discussion). So I guess blogger doesn't support swf files.

2. If at first you don't succeed...I published my swf file to my Googles sites page. The great thing about this strategy is that it introduced me to Googles site. I can create a whole new internet space for myself which is an exciting idea. After publishing my swf to this page, I unsuccessfully attempted to embed it to my page via html route. Then I tried the good ole linking method. Half successful if you reload the page by clicking here.

3. I published the swf on my Adobe share page. Which I didn't know I had until now!!! It's an exciting online file sharing program that can be checked out by clicking here. . This method creates an awesome interface, but somehow it still required the viewer to download the swf to their own computer before they could see it. how ancient is that?! This is 2009 dammit.

4. Success for : Operation "i thought it would take two seconds to load my flash animation to my blog" !!! I ventured back into my Flash CS3 program to the original .fla file. I explored some publishing settings. Then I decided to use the same methods I use to create avi videos from my Premiere elements files. So while in Flash CS3, I went to file, export, export movie. And voila. I was able to save my movie to my computer in a format that blogspot would love right away. The sweet scent of success!!! Enjoy:) This is just the beginning :)

Greetings!

2008-12-30T07:36:00.000-05:00

Well...hello reader!!

Welcome to my space. Not the cheesy skanky site. But my online thoughtville. I am in the process of exploring and learning a little bit about various programs. Two years ago I was introduced to the Adobe Creative Suite 3 software. I immediately fell in love. Due to the busy life I led at the time, I didn't have time or access to software to do much except dream about the possibilities that Adobe InDesign offered. However I was able to play with Premiere Elements a few times. I have two slide show videos to show for it. If you wish to view my rudimentary premier elements projects, let me know and I will gladly send you a file.

Back to my greetings. My personal goals for the winter & spring 2009 are to learn more about the following programs and also create a project for each. Some will be easier than others because I have dabbled in them. Some are entirely foreign to me. This is all just my way of passing time and avoiding reading. I love to create things and somehow these topics can keep my attention span going for hours on end! Here is my list of Winter/Spring 2009 self education curriculum:

Adobe Flash Professional CS3

Adobe Illustrator CS3

Adobe Premiere Pro

Adobe Photoshop

HTML

PHP

Open Office (Impress, Math, Draw, Calc, Base...)

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

One step at a time. Come with me. Watch my journey. Help me. View my results.

Future posts: I will share things such as : logo design 101, How I built my website, my first flash animation!!!

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