Staff Development: Adobe Illustrator CS6 Master Pro Techniques for Print & Web

Released on April 23, 2012, version CS6 is the 16th generation of Adobe Illustrator. Many new features were added in order to fix bugs and increase performance. When first opening the program, most obvious is the new user interface. The default workspace was redesigned from white to grayscale, with the ability to adjust for comfort for the eyes. Aside from appearance is a "buffet" of upgraded features, such as the distinct improvement to converting raster images into vector art. I frequently use the "image trace" feature to render a perfect vector image of my scanned artwork, and appreciate the ease and accuracy with which this can be accomplished.

Adobe Illustrator CS6 is my daily "workhorse" software of choice for KSDL graphics. This past fiscal year, I enrolled in an online Udemy course to become more proficient at using this powerful software. The course consists of 49 modules, to be taken at one's own pace. So far, I've completed about half of the course and still have much left to learn!

Learning key commands, so far, has been my greatest benefit in improving speed and efficiency while working with Illustrator. I know I'm still only scraping the surface of what this software is capable of, and look forward with enthusiasm to continuing my course in the months to come!

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Geotagging

A "wouldn't it be nice" idea that's been around a while is the ability to tag a map with images that are linked to more information about the site. Kelly C suggested it as a way for students to share knowledge about a cultural/historic site or the geographic area they live in with classmates. (right, no addresses!) There are now cameras and even storage media that embed latitude and longitude into images as they are shot. But you don't need fancy new toys to do this. I tried Flickr's geotagging map and it's fun and supereasy. Want to try it? Log in to Flickr http://www.flickr.com Sign in as " techedine " password " wist101 " yea, corny. Click the " You " tab then the " Your Photostream > Map " or Organize > Your Map links. Click the Satellite link in the upper right. Cool view! (you may need Google Satellite downloaded). Images along the bottom of the screen with colored dots have already been droppe...

Scratch - OWAU discussion 10/28

Aloha kākou, I while back, I learned about this product from a presentation at the eSchool conference. The speaker was so excited about Scratch and was having so much fun demonstrating it that my mind began racing immediately. "I could use it in `Ike Hawai`i courses and I bet I could use it to develop tons of activities for the A`o Makua `ōlelo Hawai`i courses". Then, reality set in as I returned to work intending to try it out after I finished my "next" task. Well, you know how that goes. 7 months later, I finally took a stab at it out of necessity of course. I really wanted some type of activity to teach my students about different Kapu in old Hawai`i without having them just read a list of them. So, what it Sratch? Simply put, it's a developer's tool (a very inexpereinced developer like myself). It allows you to create activities and games using "coding" that is in a drag and drop format. The codes are pre-written & range from phrases like ...

Zoho Creator

I thought I’d share this web application I came across in my quest to find a relatively simple app to help us manage our mentoring data in the DL Orientation. Our specific needs were that it be a free online database, password protected, had the capability of rapid form development without too much programming knowledge and was easy for the end user to use. The application that met these requirements was Zoho Creator ( http://www.zohocreator.com/ ) a part of a suite of online applications including word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, wikis, organizers and more. What’s great about Zoho Creator is that they have an online repository of applications already developed that you can download to your account and use for free. Initially, I tried some of these applications, but it was overkill for our needs. Zoho Creator can do a lot if you know programming and they have a pay model where it allows you more flexibility and features. I think Zoho Creator would be a useful tool for both...

Kamehameha Schools Distance Learning (KSDL) Owau

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