Signature and animation experiments

Click on the "s" above to access the humble animation I devised today.

Although I was rubbish in class last night I really can't fault my work ethic since.

I spent an hour or two after the lesson at home doing some wild experimenting with banners and video. It was rewarding because, for the first time, I uploaded a thirty second piece of film onto Dreamweaver. A small victory but a victory nonetheless.

This morning I struggled for a while on animation. This was intensely frustrating because I had cracked it in class.

However, with the help of How To Do Everything With Photoshop CS2 by Colin Smith I worked out how to make a word move across the screen. Again this was very satisfying.

Finally, thie morning, I experimented with my signature. I think signatures on web pages look very good and I've struggled in the past to work mine into some kind of decency.

Well, I was lucky today because some of Colin's tips on animation helped me.

I opened my scanned signature in image ready and then dragged it into a web banner - I didn't realise there was a web banner option in ImageReady but not Photoshop.

I duplicated a series of layers to make my signature look stronger. Then I just experimented with Multiply, Hard Light etc.

The options "Difference" and "Exclusion" created a very nice effect. I then moved a layer of the signature a touch, just to see what happened, and I was quite pleased with the result.

What I learned today was patience is a huge virture in Photoshop (and Dreamweaver). At times I become totally flummoxed and frustrated...but with patience the simplicity of how a task is done comes through.

I also think it's good to have more than one photoshop book to hand for guidance.

Photoshop CS2 in Easy Steps is great but its explanations didn't quite help me crack animation. Thankfully, Colin Smith's book did.