Digital Technology Centre

Kevin Ames is teaching at our Centre

2008-03-27T14:31:00.003-04:00

Kevin Ames is teaching the system of archiving your digital negatives this week to our class. It is an intensely interesting experience that will pay off in the future for the photographers. He is teaching in Adobe Lightroom the techniques and sharing his skills with the class. Next week he is off to Orlando to teach at Photoshop World. He is an amazing teacher and he brings a good sense of humor to the the classroom.

Heading to the NAPP event with Ben Willmore in Tampa on Friday

2008-01-24T12:09:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow I am off to the National Association of Photoshop Professionals tour stop in Tampa. This is the Photoshop CS3 for Photographers with Ben Willmore event. I will be doing the Wacom Technology tabletop at the event showing off the new Cintiq 12wx. Hope to see you there.

Canon introduces new Digital Rebel XSi

2008-01-24T11:54:00.000-05:00

Canon introduced today a new DSLR for the pro-sumer called the XSi. It is a 12.2 megapixel CMOS Sensor with the integrated cleaning system and live view for $799 body only. It does not take compact flash cards but SD/SDHC card. Pretty nice camera.

Apple introduces new Macbook Air

2008-01-15T22:39:00.000-05:00

Steve Jobs gave his keynote at Macworld today. Introduced the new Macbook Air weighing in at 3lbs. You give up some connectivity. The 13 inch laptop only comes with a headphone jack, one USB 2.o port and micro DVI. So no ethernet, no built-in CD/DVD, not extra battery capable. One model comes with a 80 gig hard drive and the other comes with a 64 gig solid state memory for $1799 or $3098.

Link to Apples website

Imaging USA 2007 Tampa

2008-01-06T22:54:00.000-05:00

Worked the Wacom Technology Booth at Imaging USA in Tampa. This is the tradeshow and conference for the Professional Photographers of America. 9000 attendees. Went to several of the Adobe Lightroom workshops while I was there.

Lighting workshop with Master Photographer, Carmen Schettino

2007-08-20T23:11:00.000-04:00

Today we had a lighting workshop taught by Carmen Schettino. The morning was spent in the studio photographing a mother and baby. Then after lunch we we went offsite to a local church. The group of seven students photographed the priest first then Susie our bride. It was an excellent workshop. Carmen teaches this lighting class at the Centre monthly.

Kids Photo Camp with Boys and Girls Club

2007-08-10T12:09:00.000-04:00

The centre hosted a 3 Day Photo Camp for the Boys and Girls Club of Sarasota. This was our first time hosting something like this and it went great. Day 1, we had Thomas Bender a photographer for the Sarasota Herald come and speak about his job. Then the students each with their own camera took photos the rest of the day. Day 2, we met at Marina Jacks and photographed. Then back in the studio for the rest of the day in Adobe Photoshop and Bridge. Day 3 was spent retouching, creating a slide show and printing the best piece.

I want to thanks my teacher assistants for their great help. Cliff, Paul, Jim, Bert and Tim I could not have done it without you guys.

Teens from St Pete TASCO program visit the Centre

2007-07-27T17:11:00.000-04:00

Eleven kids visited from the City of St Petersburg teen program today. These kids are taking an eight week digital design program. They are learning the Adobe products and photography. I showed them the centre and explained what we do. Then we all jumped into Adobe Photoshop and spent a couple of hours learning how to use a Wacom pen tablet.

My friend Rob Norton is running the program and is doing a great job. I was surprised at how well the kids knew Photoshop. Too bad these kids live a hour away.

Need to find out if Sarasota or Bradenton has any program like this one. Very cool. The first two weeks in August, the centre is running a program for the Boy & Girls Club and the YMCA. It will consist of a three day photo camp with photography, photoshopping and printing.

Corel Painter 3 Day workshop with Marilyn Sholin

2007-07-18T17:40:00.000-04:00

Marilyn Sholin taught a 3 day workshop here at the Centre. The first day was a beginner day followed by two days of advanced Painter. Students printed on canvas using an Epson 4000 then the next day embellished them.

Take a look at the video posted on YouTube

Click here

New England Camera Club Council convention 2007

2007-07-15T10:16:00.000-04:00

Just got back from the 62nd Annual New England Camera Club Council Convention held at the Unive

rsity of Mass. at Amherst. I was a speaker for Wacom Technology at the convention. What a show!! 80 camera clubs and 1200 people at the convention.

Plus I have never been treated at a convention as well as these folks did. My hat off to Antoinette Gombeda and Susan Mosser for putting on a great show.

The conventions website is www.neccc.org

Joe McNalley was the main presenter at the convention. I was lucky enough to hang out with Joe and his wife Anne Cahill, who happens to be the Nikon Professional Marketing Representative for the Northeast. His work for National Geographic, Life, Sports Illustrated, Time and Newsweek was outstanding. Plus Joe is really, really funny.

There were some other great speakers as well; Rick Sammon, John Paul Caponigro and Vincent Laforet. Oh yea, I also did three lectures on how to use a Wacom pen tablet in Adobe Photoshop.

2007-06-27T12:30:00.000-04:00

Just got back from the National Educational Computing Conference in Atlanta, Georgia. Had some great conversations with Apple, Adobe and Corel about how they can help support the Digital Technology Centre in the future. I got a good glimpse into how educators are using technology in the classroom. They sure didn't have anything like that when I was growing up.

Apple Aperture Workshop

2007-06-19T17:15:00.000-04:00

Bob Farrington, our resident Apple Aperture Certified Trainer had a workshop today. With Aperture you have the ultimate Mac photographers workstation.

If you are interested in purchasing Aperture, LexJet is offering $30 off the box cost and a free Aperture book to the first ten people who buy. Contact Tom Hauenstein at 941-330-1210.

Epson printers arrive

2007-06-12T16:43:00.001-04:00

Today was a very exciting day here at the centre. A very big Watkins truck showed up at our back door and dropped off four Epson 3800's. Dan Steinhardt, marketing manager from Epson has agreed to sponsor the centre for the upcoming year. Besides the printers, they are setting us up with four of their best Epson Stylist Pro instructors. Our regular workshops now will include a printing aspect to them as well.

Matt Kloskowski workshop

2007-06-12T12:59:00.001-04:00

Saturday we had "photoshop guy" Matt Kloskowski teaching an Adobe Photoshop workshop on layers. Matt enjoyed teaching the hands on workshop for twelve people.

Dave Cross Workshop

2007-05-19T19:45:00.000-04:00

Dave Cross taught today at the Centre. He is a really good instructor even though he is from Canada.

This is what the class covered.
1. Shooting for Photoshop
A model shoot (outside if weather permits) where we'll take images with Photoshop in mind, in other words taking shots that we'll composite in Photoshop
2. Selection techniques
Various ways to make accurate selections - quickly - including some of the new functions in CS3 3. Creating flexible documents
Using the most flexible ways possible to work in Photoshop: layers, adjustment layers, layer styles, masks
Here we'd use the images we shot earlier in the day
The section would include portrait retouching using Smart Filters
4. Finishing Touches
Special Effects, borders, edge effects, color effects, printing techniques
Maybe a little Lightroom thrown in here

Dave is author of Photoshop Finishing Touches, Photoshop CS2 Help Desk Book, co-Author of Illustrator CS2 Killer Tips. Speaker, Trainer, writer for Photoshop User magazine. Featured on a number of training DVDs and one of the "photoshop Guys" on Adobe Photoshop TV. Adobe Certified Expert and Instructor, Photoshop CS2 and Illustrator CS2.

Today was the first day of our blog

2007-05-06T17:10:00.000-04:00

Yea, this is the start of our blog.