Encounters of the 3rd Kind

A simple explanation of 3-D

By now, most of us know what 3-D is. Remember looking through those funny plastic glasses that had the red and green (or blue) lens? The ones you would wear whilst squinting vainly at the screen and certain publications trying to ignore the inevitable headache that would appear (anyone remember those dinosaur magazines that would make the T-Rex leap out at you or going to the IMAX to watch Planet Earth?) Thankfully technology has advanced to the point where you don’t have to compromise your fashion sense anymore and still get all the awesome effects of 3-D.

In a nutshell, true 3-D (three dimensional or stereoscopic vision) is defined as something that has width, height and depth. Our physical environment and the way we perceive and move around in it is 3 dimensional. We are able to observe the spatial (distance to and from) relationship between different objects by looking at them, which is known as depth perception. Before, it was very difficult to create this effect in film or video, with artists striving to recreate it through “flat” art media with less than impressive effects.

As to the first making of 3-D films, Hollywood has always been accredited with the honor, with Bwana Devil taking the credit for the first full colour 3-D film ever released in 1952 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bwana_Devil). However, there has been some scandal as to who exactly can be credited with this growing phenomenon. Talk around town is that it was the Nazis who started the entire movement, with the films discovered from as early as 1936. Check out these links and decide for yourself :

Were the first 3-D films Nazi propaganda films?

Nazi 3D films from 1936 discovered

Discoveries aside, 3-D film has grown exponentially since the 1950′s, although have only now come under sharp focus with the advent of large scale 3-D movies such as Avatar.

Previously, it was just too expensive to record and produce 3-D films or videos due to costly hardware and editing processes. However, that has all changed and companies like Sony are now offering full 3-D recording devices in a handycam sized unit. This means that consumers are now able to go out there and produce professional content. And for the more adventurous and technically inclined, using a two camera system is also possible, by linking them next to one another on a frame. This can be tricky though, the cameras must each have the exact same settings and a sync tool is essential.

With regards to editing 3-D footage, we would recommend Apple Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere or Adobe AfterEffects. Whilst they don’t have native 3-D tools built in, it’s easy to acquire the necessary standalone tools from CineForm who cater for all Apple and Adobe programs. The tools themselves are fairly basic and there are a few limitations such as being unable to use some standard techniques and effects simply due to their unavailability. 3-D has yet to be streamlined into a single technology or standard, but it is looking positive that with time, it will happen. Check out the best 3-D clips around.

Our conclusion? Don’t rush out just yet to buy that fancy new TV or Camcorder, but do get ready for an 3-D explosion and keep an eye on the news.

Adobe InDesign Essential Skills

Convenient, instructor-led, foundational.

• Course Name: Adobe InDesign Essential Skills
• Level 1: Basic to Intermediate
• Course Code: INDD-100E
• Prerequisite/s: General knowledge of the Win / Mac operating environment.
• Course Classification: Evening, part time, Print publishing course
• Duration: 4 weeks
• Next Course: 20 Feb 2012 – 14 Mar 2012
• Then: 28 May 2012 – 20 June 2012
• Times: Mon – Wed, 5:30pm to 8:30

Intro:

Whether it’s a magazine spread, a poster, or even a Web page, nothing connects or communicates like an effective layout. Layout design, the art of what goes where on a page or editorial spread, is a creative challenge for any graphic or digital designer. Learn how to build strong foundations for your page design, explore creative applications for lines and shapes, and discover how to break the rules while maintaining the underlying structure of a page.

Description:

Learn to typeset single and multi-page documents with professional results. Learn about document set up and typography basics, modifying documents and workflows, drawing techniques, advanced typography and tables, and preparation of documents for final production, print settings and preventing problems. With Indesign CS3 you have the ability to output your final files to a broad range of formats for print and the web. Course includes practical projects.

What our students say about us

“I have studied in a lot of different schools and think that Friends of Design is absolutely one of the best! Very professional and of high level. I can only say great things about the time I had here, I will be back and I will definitely recommend you to other people.” Liz (May 2010 Indesign Essentials)

“Great – all round DTP Part Time course, well done Friends of Design!” Justin (Feb 2010 Indesign Essentials)

“Throughout school and college, this is probably the place where I learnt the most. Very good lecturers and training, and amazing teaching. I leave happily knowing that I can work well in InDesign” Lindsay Ansell (Feb 2011 Indesign Essentials)

“I thoroughly enjoyed it!” Natasha Morris, Marketing Associate – Investec (August 2011 InDesign Essential Skills)

“I enjoyed the course a lot and will be back to do Illustrator CS5. I will recommend Friends of Design!” – Mariana Hudson (November 2011 InDesign Essential Skills)

Extra Info

Have you checked the general info on this type of course and when it is scheduled?

Enrolment form

Download enrolment form here or contact us to enrol.

Pricing also available for customised, on-site and group training.

Reboot and Renew

Friends of Design is certainly at the cutting edge of design, experimenting with the latest industry tools and making them available to designers of all types and levels.

Above: Design Times Issue by Friends of Design

Our most recent escapade was that of using Adobe’s new Digital Publishing Suite (DPS), in collaboration with Design Times Magazine to DT’s first experimental Digital Edition for iPad. And it was a huge success! Mark Rosenberg showcased it at their stand at this year’s Design Indaba Expo at the ITCC in Cape Town. It attracted a lot of attention, to say the least.

It seems everyone is absolutely embracing the technology and the opportunities around designing and producing content for mobile devices. Creatives are rising to the challenge, exploring new tools, thrashing out new standards for this medium and literally mentally “rebooting” their approach to layout and immersive user experience. Exciting times indeed! And the iPad is only the beginning.

In response to the keen interest – and, of course, in the interest of keeping all you creative people up to scratch with latest technologies – we will be offering a new customizable specialist course called “InDesign for ePublishing” as an intermediate layout and publishing course.

This course will become available for bookings as soon as Adobe releases the full working version of their DPS. We hope that it will be as soon as this month (March), but we will keep you updated via our newsletter and mailshot, so subscribe to either our Facebook fan page, follow us on Twitter or subscribe to our newsletter to keep yourselves in the digital know.

Above: Design Times Issue by Friends of Design

Friends of Design’s founder and owner, Eva Csernyanszky, will be demoing the software and technology in BETA version this month (see details below). Don’t miss the chance to see the process in action, and live on the iPad.

The demo will include:

1. Layout best practices for devices such as iPad.

2. Creating static content that is “safe” for display in both horizontal and vertical mode.

3. Using the Overlay Creator plugin for InDesign CS5 to create attractive interactive content such as hyperlinking, panning & zooming, 360 degree product shots, slideshows, embedding sound & video, panoramas and web linking. DPS includes the Content Bundler app for preparing the content into a “folio” for display on the iPad and this will be demo’d too. Also uploading as a public or private edition to the Adobe server and downloading onto the device via iTunes. Best to see it in action!

So, if you are on an online team or you are interested in learning how to publish interactive content for mobile devices and tablets such as iPads then contact us today for details on the workshop and/or our new “Adobe InDesign CS5 for ePublishing” course.