Tag Archives: Adobe

Mac20Q Podcast 48 LearnMacsOnline

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I got talking to Annette Quirke, we had a great chat about Mac and her LearnMacsOnline  website. She does some graphic work in Adobe Illustrator so we were able to talk a little about vector drawing and beziers. Annette comes from Ireland so we had a bit of a connection there, seeing as I spent 12 years in Co. Cavan Ireland.

Announcing  Learn Macs Online. Everything you need to help you learn about your new mac.
Easy to understand step by step tutorials, short entertaining videos, mac news and software reviews and tips.

Annette goes to a Mac users group and teaches things at the meetings, helping new users and that is what led to the production of LearnMacs Online. Very keen on photography and has recently bought a Canon SLR, wishing she could have waited a little while seeing as Canon now have an SLR that will also do video.

I had a great time talking with Annette and I am sure you will enjoy the interview too.

Mac20Q Podcast 30 Michael King

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Michael is from Houston in Texas and has a plethora of Mac computers that he uses for business and pleasure. He makes training films using Final Cut Pro and is a heavy user of Aperture. Michael has a pedigree with Macs going back to the Apple 2. Obviously this amounts to a huge amount of experience with the Mac.

He tells us a little about using classic and changing to OS X. He is not keen on using a Mouse preferring to use a trackball. He uses a Heil PR40
and USB Edirol mixer to connect it up. He reckons his PR40 is the best mic to use when you consider the antique clocks he has chiming in the background from time to time.

I use a Samson C03U mic similar to the Samson Multi-pattern Condenser Mic
both are USB mics.
I recommended AmadeusPro to him and he said he is off to the shop to buy it after we finish recording. I even passed on some tips about selecting part of a sound wave to delete so that you don’t get and extra clicks in the audio.
He reckons that Adobe will probably take some time to get a version out for Snow Leopard because they can drag their feet a bit some times in reaction to new operating systems. Multi Threading is going to be the big thing with Snow leopard and being about to make use of the multi core computers.
He told me there is a huge difference between having 2GB and 4 GB in the MacBook. So I will have to do something about putting in the extra in my MacBook too.
The office he works in is a mixture of Macs and Windows and has to use MS Excel because it is the only spreadsheet that will open the spreadsheets that get sent to him. For his personal office type of thing he will use iWork. He wishes that it wasn’t totally necessary to revolve around microsoft products in business.
Not quite a cool aid drinker but will always recommend a Mac to people when the ask what sort of computer to get.
Michael likes to use Firefox for the add ons you can use and will sometimes go back to Safari and now and then Camino. Depends on which is working the best right now, and for now it is Safari 4. Fluid gets a mention also, this is an app which you use to make a application specific to a web site.
Oovoo is used for some video chatting  with his mates which include Mark Sheppard who was featured in the previous podcast and Rob Saunders who will be in a Podcast here soon and Michael  uses a Logitech web cam to get the video in.

Recommended sites

Michaels pictures

  • http://gallery.me.com/mking8#100058
  • http://gallery.me.com/mking8#100074

michaelking@im-podcast.com

Elaine Giles Mac20Q Podcast 10

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I’m talking to Elaine Giles, an IT consultant based in Manchester, UK.In her professional life Elaine runs training courses in applications for end users, develops web sites, works as a system administrator and generally undertakes a myriad of other computer related tasks.

Elaine is also Co-Chair of the North West Institute of IT Trainers and User Group Manager of the North West Adobe Users Group there are regular meetings so if you’re in the vicinity feel free to say Hi.

Elaine  switched to a Mac in April 2006 after what proved to be a life changing visit to an Adobe event previewing Lightroom.

Elaine likes to use a Fujitsu ScanSnap S510M scanner to create a paperless office. She scans everything and organises it with Devonthink Office Pro which has OCR capabilities. She even uses the computer for the TV program watching, something I would like to set up  and for this the hardware is EyeTV Hybrid from El Gato

BROWSERS! Thats right Elaine has an addiction. I was listening to the podcast and she claimed to have 17 web browsers, so I think there are some that have been left off this list.
- Safari
- Opera
- Firefox
- OmniWeb
- Shiira
- Camino
- iCab
- Sunrise
- Netscape Navigator
- Fluid

Microphones are really important because Elaine is a podcaster too, mostly she uses  the Blue Snowball Microphone and has a Blue Snowflake to use with the MacBookPro.

Back Up software

Backing up is important for all of us and here are two of Elaines’ recommendations SuperDuper and  ChronoSync

Software Pick

Scrivener I have been trying this one out also on a recommendation from Andy Inhatko last week on the Mac Break Weekly Podcast. It is a very good toolkit for writers.

iPhone Apps

OmniFocus for being organised, Evernote for collecting information and being more orgainsed, and Tweetie for telling everyone how organised you are.

PODCASTS

MacBites *of course* because she is the co host of the podcast.
PhotoshopUserTV
InDesign Secrets
Instant InDesign
Layers Magazine
Pixel Perfect with Bert Monroy