I wrote this over a year ago, but for some reason I never posted it. Since writing this, Creative Suite has been released for Intel Macs along with the Multi-Touch trackpad for the MacBooks.

As I work on my four year old G4 I can’t help but imagine that graphic designers are becoming useless to the likes of Apple and to a certain extent Adobe. I can think of very few software or hardware upgrades that were made in the last couple of years that have made our job significantly faster, better or easier. Sure we will be able to work faster when Adobe comes out with software that is ported for Intel machines, but do we really need anything much faster? When it seems that iTunes takes up about as much processor speed as Photoshop, I realize that it is not designers that are driving the technology anymore. So what industry is driving the market for faster computers? The obvious answer is video.

I have to admit that I love new technology and software just as much or more than the next guy. But many times I agree with those nay-sayers that argue that we don’t need software beyond Photoshop 7 and InDesign CS. Unless you are in the market for more filters and better drop shadows, what have we really gained from the last several Adobe upgrades?

So what can these companies do to generate a little more need (as opposed to sheer want)? As you might have gathered from the above graphic, I am hoping for iPhone multi-touch technology in the next generation of iMacs. If Apple takes away the mouse and keyboard and truly connects the designer to their computer, then the designer demand will be unstoppable. Then we will all be closer to feeling what the early twentieth century typesetters felt when they physically locked up that type in the chase. I know Apple wouldn’t be the first to have touch screen computers, but as they have proven with the iPod, you don’t have to be the first … just the best. Wasn’t it Malcolm Gladwell that pointed out that the originators and extreme innovators usually fail? Sometimes the market isn’t ready and primed for a certain innovation. For example, the Newton.

Since Apple appears to have mastered the multi-touch technology, when will we see it in their computer line? Jobs did make a special effort to note that this technology was heavily patented. Is it time that Apple starts paying a little more attention to the loyal designer base and work with Adobe and others to deliver a truly innovative product? Here’s to “pinching” instead of (command) + (+) or grabbing that antiquated old magnifying glass.

Sites all over the internet are reporting that Toshiba is finally, finally pulling the plug on HD-DVD. Thank GAWD. Not that my wife is going to allow me to pick up a Blu-Ray player anytime soon, they are still far too expensive, and the movies are even more overpriced than DVDs.

It’s WIRED, though, that offers the best assessment of the situation: “This leaves Blu-Ray as the presumptive victor in the irrelevant optical disk format war. It now must face up to the real competition: the continuing success of DVD and the growing popularity of downloads, both on the internet and on-demand cable TV.”

Well, that’s all well and good. I personally still prefer to have a physical disc that I can take around, watch on my computer, watch on my TV, watch whenever the hell I want to, as opposed to say, getting a 30-day window to watch something one time over a 24-hour period that is only actually available on your newest line of products so fools like me that spend $5 on them get shafted by your staunch refusal to either refund my money or support my still-functioning fifth-generation iPod. Dicks.

When I set out to create this post, I was thinking that we might be able to determine the outcome of the Blu-ray vs. HD DVD format war by the quality of their logos. I wanted to determine from recent history if the format with the better logo usually won. While I don’t really like the Blu-ray logo, I simply cannot stand the grafted unbalanced nature of the HD DVD logo. So my vote is for Blu-ray even though I have no real knowledge (or care) of either format. And with Apple’s support of Blu-ray, aren’t we always supposed to agree with their decisions?

With two other video format wars represented in the above logos, I would have to pick the DVD over the DIVX logo. And yes, I do know that DIVX wasn’t a completely different format, just a different setup for movie rental. When I found the Betamax logo and put it next to the VHS logo, I was surprised that I liked the Betamax logo just a little more. Although … I don’t think either is all that strong.

Wouldn’t it be easier if we could determine a corporate success on the quality of their logo?

“To convert the originals, engineers essentially took a commercial television camera and aimed it at the monitor. The resulting image is what was sent to Houston, and on to the world.

‘And any time you just point a camera at a screen, that’s obviously not the best way to get the best picture,’ says Richard Nafzger, a TV specialist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. He worked with Apollo’s lunar TV program, and says that conversion was the best they could do at the time.”

Somewhere between 1969 and now the footage has been lost. They have some ideas where it might be, but they are not sure if they will find it.

So there are a couple of different ways that this can apply to designers today. The first is to not feel too guilty about the stupid things we have done as designers. Maybe, like me, you have sent an RGB image to press or sent the old non-revised version of an InDesign file to print. Of maybe you lost a backup drive and had to spend a week recreating an entire brochure. Share your “degradation” and “misplaced” file stories and we can make this a continuation of the Confessional post.

The second way is less trivial and much more fascinating. I will quote the NPR article again.

” . . . in retrospect, the murky images that got broadcast on TV were thrilling. Their strange quality just underlined that this was an unearthly event.

‘Walter Cronkite said, you know, it was really ghostly-like. It was really what it should have been,’ Lebar says. ‘If it was full-up resolution as standard television, nobody would have thought it was as great.’”

Since these images were “ghostly” and “degraded” this colors all of our views of the first moon walk. There are so many things to take from this portion of the story, I don’t know where to start. Here are a few thoughts . . .

- Sometimes abstraction or hints of reality are more effective than perfect clarity.
- Imagination is just as important for the viewer as it is for the creator.
- Use images that communicate the theme of your piece.
- Style and image truly do affect the way people view your piece.
- Work with and push the technology you have access to, and more likely than not, the outcome will reflect the message.
- Be true to the medium.

These are not new ideas, but things to think about when you design. Wether you decide to take extensive notes on your archiving process or you view image creation and presentation in a renewed way, I think every designer can take something from this story. Since the “degraded” images are forever implanted on my mind, I’m hoping to one day see the original high quality images. It would be interesting to view them through the lens of history and speculate how our perceptions would have been different if we had never seen the “ghostly” images.

Here’s a review:

Overall, it was great. Probably the most interesting seminar I’ve been to in a few years. But maybe that’s because I love color management and already had a lot of questions in mind. The instructor was very knowledgeable, and was able to answer every question from the class. The course content was just right: some review of fundamental concepts at the beginning, but enough detail spread over enough different areas, to keep the day moving right along. However, I must admit I did slip into Information OVEROAD in the last hour.

I learned all the scenarios for when you want to “convert to profile” versus “assign profile.” I also learned Quark 7 has some nice color management features that do more than similar areas in InDesign CS2. Yet, I have to wonder if this was only mentioned since the Quark rep was in the audience. Quark was one of the sponsors, after all . . . Anyway, I wrote down that information, too, in case I need to work in Quark some day.

Speaking of writing stuff down . . . I found it odd that our notebook had the presentation thumbnails in black/white when there were examples showing color on the screen. In our particular hotel meeting room, the screens weren’t large enough or positioned so the whole class could easily see; people wanted to see the color in the notebook. Oh, well. Pays to get there early for a good seat. Included on a CD in our packet was a PDF of the presentation.

We went through all the specific menu choices for CS2 and Quark. I learned the (now) obvious Adobe solution for my workgroup: distribute 1 color settings file (.csf) to every workstation, instead of making the choices on each individual machine, and saving with various names. This is easier to make updates to, and notice when it’s non-standard.

They give you free stuff, like a Pantone/gretagmacbeth huey. As I write this, my huey is adjusting my display for changing levels of ambient light in the room. I wouldn’t say it competes with the gretagmacbeth Eye-One, but it might work fine for advanced amatuers. It uses settings named like “Web Browsing & Photo Editing,” “Gaming,” and “Special: Warm, Medium Contrast.” The Graphic Design & Video Editing settings uses D65 and 2.5 gamma. It was bright and showed a lot of contrast. The “Special” setting I’m currently using is D50 and 2.2 gamma. I have yet to find D50, 1.8 gamma. I miss the luminance measurement to which I am accustomed with the Eye-One Display. Sadly, Huey 1.0 appears to only work with one display at this time. In order to get it to calibrate the external LCD attached to my PowerBook, I had to change my computer to treat the external display as the primary display. I set my huey to adjust for room lighting conditions every two minutes. This means it needs a dedicated USB port. If I disconect the huey, and then plug it in again later, it doesn’t seem to work again until I log in or restart.

Also included in the goodie bag is a DVD with more training to share with coworkers, a CD of the presentation, and marketing materials from the sponsors. My biggest gripe, which I included on their review form, was that the notebook was in black/white. However, at least they had a comment/review form.

All in all, it was a good 1-day seminar. Now I’m a bonified Color Control Freak. I learned a bunch of stuff, and reviewed everything I already knew, which boosted my confidence to convince coworkers: color management is a good thing.

How many of us are actually going to upgrade (or switch back) to Quark?