TechNick

Name: PDFCreator
Company: pdfforge (http://www.pdfforge.org/)
Price: Free
Platform: Windows

Have you ever wanted to save a webpage as a PDF? Or maybe you wanted to export a Word document to a PDF and email that to a colleague who might not have the correct fonts installed. PDFCreator by pdfforge is the right utility for you.

Adding itself to your list of printers, PDFCreator creates a PDF instead of wasting paper.

PDFCreator does everything a normal printer does, just without the need for paper.

Pros

• Handy feature
• Free

Cons

• None

With a price tag like this, what is stopping you from using this?

PDFCreator is developed by pdfforge and is available for free from the PDFCreator download page.

Have you ever been in the middle of doing work in a program, realised that you need to do something in a different program but wanted to continue working in the first program until you are ready, without being interrupted?

There is an easy way for you to do this. When double-clicking the icon, simply hold the SHIFT key and the new application will start minimised, keeping the focus on the currently open program.

PowerToys add fun and functionality to the Windows experience. What are they? PowerToys are additional programs that developers work on after a product has been released.

Color Control Panel Applet
Professional-level photographers and designers know that getting consistent, accurate color from file to screen to print and beyond is a requirement for great results. This new tool helps you manage Windows color settings in one place.

SyncToy
With new sources of files coming from every direction (such as digital cameras, e-mail, cell phones, portable media players, camcorders, PDAs, and laptops), SyncToy can help you copy, move, and synchronize different directories.

RAW Image Thumbnailer and Viewer
Are you a serious photographer? Now you can organize and work with digital RAW files in Windows Explorer (much as you can with JPEG images). This tool provides thumbnails, previews, printing, and metadata display for RAW images. Download or learn more.

ClearType Tuner
This PowerToy lets you use ClearType technology to make it easier to read text on your screen, and installs in the Control Panel for easy access.

HTML Slide Show Wizard
This wizard helps you create an HTML slide show of your digital pictures, ready to place on your Web site.

Open Command Window Here
This PowerToy adds an “Open Command Window Here” context menu option on file system folders, giving you a quick way to open a command window (cmd.exe) pointing at the selected folder.

Alt-Tab Replacement
With this PowerToy, in addition to seeing the icon of the application window you are switching to, you will also see a preview of the page. This helps particularly when multiple sessions of an application are open.

Tweak UI
This PowerToy gives you access to system settings that are not exposed in the Windows XP default user interface, including mouse settings, Explorer settings, taskbar settings, and more.

Power Calculator
With this PowerToy you can graph and evaluate functions as well as perform many different types of conversions.

Image Resizer
This PowerToy enables you to resize one or many image files with a right-click.

CD Slide Show Generator
With this PowerToy you can view images burned to a CD as a slide show. The Generator works downlevel on Windows 9x machines as well.

Virtual Desktop Manager
Manage up to four desktops from the Windows taskbar with this PowerToy.

Taskbar Magnifier
Use this PowerToy to magnify part of the screen from the taskbar.

Webcam Timershot
This PowerToy lets you take pictures at specified time intervals from a Webcam connected to your computer and save them to a location that you designate.

These can be downloaded from the Microsoft website.

You are probably aware of the keyboard button Print Screen (sometimes PrtScr or other variations of that).

However, were you aware that instead of capturing the whole screen, you can use a keyboard command to just capture a specific window?

All you need to do is resize the window to show as much or as little as you want and then press ALT-PrtScr. All you need to do now is paste (CTRL-V) the image into your favourite image editing application (such as Adobe Photoshop, The GIMP or even MSPaint) and save it.

When creating a website, sometimes your code becomes messy and hard to read. However, Dreamweaver CS3 has an inbuilt function to make your code easier to read.

Simply open up the file that you wish to tidy up.

In the Commands menu, click on Apply Source Formatting.

Below is an example of how this changes the code:

Before:

After:

At school, we have an on demand video system (they’re educational) which uses DivX encoded videos, probably due to keeping file sizes down. These videos are normally split into multiple parts, like a DVD has chapters. Every time a part of a video loads, the DivX logo shows up in the bottom right and I find myself getting annoyed at it.

However, there is a way to turn it off.

In the Start menu, go to All Programs > DivX > DivX Codec > Decoder Configuration Utility.

If you have version 5 of the DivX codec, you need to check the box next to “Disable Logo” on the “Quality Settings“.

If you have version 6 of the DivX codec, you need to uncheck the box next to “Show DivX logo watermark” on the “Toolbar” tab.

From now on, the DivX watermark shall never again annoy you.

Name: EffectsLab Pro
Company: FXhome (http://fxhome.com/)
Price: $149 USD, £89, €129
Platform: Mac OS X, Windows 2000/XP/Vista

I have been a member of FXhome since June 2004 and in that time, FXhome has gone from being a “small” community of just 16,213 people to 79,001 and growing each day. The main reason for the boom is the release of their new range of products in late 2005 known as “The Lab Range” which include EffectsLab (special effects), CompositeLab (compositing) and VisionLab (which has the features of EffectsLab and CompositeLab plus more).

Fact: Since the full release of EffectsLab and CompositeLab on the 23rd of November 2005, the community has almost tripled in size!

Today I will be reviewing EffectsLab Pro.

This is probably the most difficult step that you will encounter while using the program. You need to buy the software. (I’m not saying its difficult, I’m saying that the program is so easy to use that this seems like Everest compared to the matchbox that is working the program). This can be done from the FXhome store, Amazon.co.uk and certain retailers also have the products in stock.

If you buy it from FXhome.com, you can have it running on your computer within 10 minutes because it is offered as a download. However, if you buy it from Amazon or your local retailer, you have to wait or go out and get it yourself.

Installation couldn’t really be simpler. Follow the prompts and you’ll be good to go.

When you first load up the program it asks you which language you would like to use. Although FXhome is a British company, users come from all over the world and have translated the programs into French, Spanish, Italian and German. The program only asks you which language you want to use when you install or upgrade.

TIP: You can change your language settings at any time by going to Edit –> Preferences

After you have chosen your language you are shown the welcome screen which is like “home base”, everything starts from here. You can start a new project using a movie file or an image stream you have, use a blank canvas, or open a previously saved project. The welcome screen also has the latest news from FXhome.com so you can see what is new on the site if you decide not to visit it.

Once you have loaded/imported your footage you can now start “playing” with the effects engines. You have a choice of the “Neon Light” engine which can be used to make neon signs, lasers and even lightsabers as seen in Star Wars, the “Muzzle Flash” engine which, as the title suggests, creates muzzle flashes that are seen when a weapon is fired, the “Optics” engine used for creating lens flare and almost anyother type of light effect that you can think of and the “Particle” engine (known in the community as “Penguin”) which can create almost anything you can imagine!

Adding effects to your footage is as simple as just clicking and dragging the effect you want. Of course, you will have to place the effect where you want it to appear on your footage but that is easy too. When using the neon light 4-point engine its as simple as clicking your mouse four times. With muzzle flashes, optics and particles you have just one point to drag around the canvas. Try and tell me that your more expensive programs are that simple!

Also, FXhome have a huge preset library where you can download “premade” effects from other FXhome users to save you time if you are looking for a certain effect. EffectsLab can also import stock footage, image streams and still images for you to add to your project too.

Once you are happy with what you have its time to render. To do this, set the “in” and “out” points on your footage that you want to render, select the menu item Render –> Render Settings, set the settings, hit “OK”, choose the menu item Render –> Render and wait while EffectsLab does its magic.

TIP: If you are happy with your render settings you won’t need to change them each time.

EffectsLab can export Apple Quicktime (.MOV) and Directshow (.AVI) files and import PSD, BMP, JPEG, PICT, PNG, SGI, TARGA, TIFF as well as .MOV and .AVI.

If you are having trouble working out what you need to do with your new program, you can use the Support section of FXhome.com which includes video tutorials, text tutorials and support forums where you can ask other FXhomers and Team FXhome themselves!

When you feel your masterpiece is good enough, or you want some constructive criticism, you can submit your movie to their online cinema and let the community voice their opinions.

A fully functional, non-time limited version of EffectsLab Pro can be downloaded from the product demo page.

Well I guess this just about wraps up this review of EffectsLab Pro.

Design: 4/5
Realism: 4/5
Ease of use: 4/5
Support: 5/5
Value: 5/5

Brining the total score to 85%

System Requirements:
Mac OS X

• 1GHz PowerPC® processor (G5 recommended)*
• Mac OS X v10.3.2 or greater
• 512MB of RAM (1024MB or more recommended)
• 100MB of available hard-disk space for installation
• 32-bit (millions of colors) color display adapter
• QuickTime 6.5 software recommended

*Compatible with Intel® processors but not a Universal Binary.

Windows

• 800Mhz Intel® Pentium® III processor (or equivalent) and later
• Microsoft® Windows® 2000 with Service Pack 4 or Windows XP Professional or Home Edition with Service Pack 1 or greater or Windows Vista
• 512MB of RAM (1024MB or more recommended)
• 100MB of available hard-disk space for installation
• 32-bit color display adapter
• Microsoft DirectX 9.0b software required
• QuickTime 6.5 software recommended

Useful links:
FXhome.com
Store
Cinema
Support
Online forums