Things to Know Before Installing WordPress

Before you begin the install, there are few things you need to have and do.

You need access to your site and its directory and software to proceed with the installation. These are:

• An access to your web server (via shell or FTP)
• A text editor
• An FTP Client (if you need to install WordPress on a remote server)
• Your web browser of choice

Things You Need to Do to Install WordPress

Begin your installation by:

1. Checking to ensure that you and your web host have the minimum requirements to run WordPress.
2. Download the latest release of WordPress.
3. Unzip the downloaded file to a folder on your hard drive.
4. Be prepared with a secure password for your Secret Key
5. Print this page out so you have it handy during the installation.

Famous 5-Minute Install

Here’s the quick version of the instructions, for those that are already comfortable with performing such installations. More detailed instructions follow.

1. Download and unzip the WordPress package, if you haven’t already.
2. Create a database for WordPress on your web server, as well as a MySQL user who has all privileges for accessing and modifying it.
3. Rename the wp-config-sample.php file to wp-config.php.
4. Open wp-config.php in your favorite text editor and fill in your database details as explained in Editing wp-config.php to generate and use your secret key password.
5. Place the WordPress files in the desired location on your web server:
   • If you want to integrate WordPress into the root of your domain (e.g. http://example.com/), move or upload all contents of the unzipped WordPress directory (but excluding the directory itself) into the root directory of your web server.
   • If you want to have your WordPress installation in its own subdirectory on your web site (e.g.http://example.com/blog/), rename the directory wordpress to the name you’d like the subdirectory to have and move or upload it to your web server. For example if you want the WordPress installation in a subdirectory called “blog”, you should rename the directory called “wordpress” to “blog” and upload it to the root directory of your web server.Hint: If your FTP transfer is too slow read how to avoid FTPing at : Step 1: Download and Extract.

6. Run the WordPress installation script by accessing wp-admin/install.php in your favorite web browser.
   • If you installed WordPress in the root directory, you should visit: http://example.com/wp-admin/install.php
   • If you installed WordPress in its own subdirectory called blog, for example, you should visit:http://example.com/blog/wp-admin/install.php

That’s it! WordPress should now be installed.

Detailed Instructions

Step 1: Download and Extract

Download and unzip the WordPress package from http://wordpress.org/download/.

• If you will be uploading WordPress to a remote web server, download the WordPress package to your computer with your favorite web browser and unzip the package.
• If you have shell access to your web server, and are comfortable using console-based tools, you may wish to download WordPress directly to your web server using wget (or lynx or another console-based web browser) if you want to avoid FTPing:
  • wget http://wordpress.org/latest.tar.gz
  • Then unzip the package using: 
    tar -xzvf latest.tar.gz  

    The WordPress package will extract into a folder called wordpress in the same directory that you downloadedlatest.tar.gz.

• If you do not have shell access to your web server, or you are not comfortable using console-based tools, you may wish to deploy WordPress directly to your web server using ZipDeploy.

Step 2: Create the Database and a User

If you are using a hosting provider, you may already have a WordPress database set up for you, or there may be an automated setup solution to do so. Check your hosting provider’s support pages or your control panel for clues about whether or not you’ll need to create one manually.

If you determine that you’ll need to create one manually, follow the instructions for accessing phpMyAdmin on various servers, or follow the instructions for Using cPanel or Using phpMyAdmin below.

If you are installing WordPress on your own web server, follow the Using phpMyAdmin or Using the MySQL Clientinstructions below to create your WordPress username and database.

If you have only one database and it is already in use, you can install WordPress in it – just make sure to have a distinctive prefix for your tables, to avoid over-writing any existing database table.

Using cPanel

Main article: Using cPanel

If your hosting provider uses cPanel, you may follow these instructions to create your WordPress username and database.

1. Log in to your cPanel.
2. Click MySQL Databases.
3. If a user relating to WordPress does not already exist under the Users section, create one:
   1. Chose a username for WordPress (‘wordpress‘ is good) and enter it in the UserName field.
   2. Choose a difficult-to-guess password (ideally containing a combination of upper- and lower-case letters, numbers, and symbols), and enter it in the Password field.
   3. Write down the username and password you chose.
   4. Click Add User.
4. If a database relating to WordPress does not already exist under the Databases section, create one:
   1. Choose a name for your WordPress database (‘wordpress‘ or ‘blog‘ are good), enter it in the Db field, and click Add Db.
5. Under Databases, select your WordPress username from the User dropdown, then select your WordPress database from the Db dropdown. Make sure All is checked under Privileges, then click Add User to Db.
6. When you return to the main MySQL Account Maintenance screen, cPanel will list information about the database you just created. You should see the username you just added to the database (with ALL PRIVILEGES), as well as a few sample Connection Strings for you to use in Perl or PHP scripts to connect to the database. The PHP code will have the following format:

$dbh = mysql_connect("hostname", "username", "<PASSWORD HERE>") or die ("message");
mysql_select_db("databasename");

Write down the values of hostname, username, databasename, and the password you chose. (Note that hostname will usually be localhost.)

Using phpMyAdmin

If your web server has phpMyAdmin installed, you may follow these instructions to create your WordPress username and database.

Note: These instructions are written for phpMyAdmin 2.6.0; the phpMyAdmin user interface can vary slightly between versions.

1. If a database relating to WordPress does not already exist in the Database dropdown on the left, create one:
   1. Choose a name for your WordPress database (‘wordpress‘ or ‘blog‘ are good), enter it in the Create new databasefield, and click Create.
2. Click the Home icon in the upper left to return to the main page, then click Privileges. If a user relating to WordPress does not already exist in the list of users, create one:
   1. Click Add a new User.
   2. Chose a username for WordPress (‘wordpress‘ is good) and enter it in the User name field. (Be sure Use text field:is selected from the dropdown.)
   3. Choose a difficult-to-guess password (ideally containing a combination of upper- and lower-case letters, numbers, and symbols), and enter it in the Password field. (Be sure Use text field: is selected from the dropdown.) Re-enter the password in the Re-type field.
   4. Write down the username and password you chose.
   5. Leave all options under Global privileges at their defaults.
   6. Click Go.
3. Return to the Privileges screen and click the Check privileges icon on the user you’ve just created for WordPress. In the Database-specific privileges section, select the database you’ve just created for WordPress under the Add privileges to the following database dropdown. The page will refresh with privileges for that database. Click Check All to select all privileges, and click Go.
4. On the resulting page, make note of the host name listed after Server: at the top of the page. (This will usually belocalhost.)

Using the MySQL Client

You can create MySQL users and databases quickly and easily by running mysql from the shell. The syntax is shown below and the dollar sign is the command prompt:

$ mysql -u adminusername -p
Enter password:
Welcome to the MySQL monitor.  Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MySQL connection id is 5340 to server version: 3.23.54

Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the buffer.

mysql> CREATE DATABASE databasename;
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.00 sec)

mysql> GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON databasename.* TO "wordpressusername"@"hostname"
    -> IDENTIFIED BY "password";
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.00 sec)

mysql> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.01 sec)

mysql> EXIT
Bye
$

The example shows:

• that root is also the adminusername. It is a safer practice to choose a so-called “mortal” account as your mysql admin, so that you are not entering the command “mysql” as the root user on your system. (Any time you can avoid doing work as root you decrease your chance of being exploited). The name you use depends on the name you assigned as the database administrator using mysqladmin.
• wordpress or blog are good values for databasename.
• wordpress is a good value for wordpressusername but you should realize that, since it is used here, the entire world will know it too.
• hostname will usually be localhost. If you don’t know what this value should be, check with your system administrator if you are not the admin for your WordPress host. If you are the system admin, consider using a non-root account to administer your database.
• password should be a difficult-to-guess password, ideally containing a combination of upper- and lower-case letters, numbers, and symbols. One good way of avoiding the use of a word found in a dictionary, uses the first letter of each word in a phrase that you find easy to remember.

If you need to write these values somewhere, avoid writing them in the system that contains the things protected by them. You need to remember the value used for databasename, wordpressusername, hostname, and password. Of course, since they are already in ) or will be, shortly) your wp-config.php file, there is no need to put them somewhere else, too.

Using Plesk

See: Plesk 7 at tamba2.org

Step 3: Set up wp-config.php

For the next part, following the instructions in Editing wp-config.php as a guide to generating and using your secret key password you will need in the following section for WordPress 2.7 versions and above.

The code you will be looking to change is as follows:

// ** MySQL settings ** //
define('DB_NAME', 'putyourdbnamehere');    // The name of the database
define('DB_USER', 'usernamehere');     // Your MySQL username
define('DB_PASSWORD', 'yourpasswordhere'); // ...and password
define('DB_HOST', 'localhost');    // 99% chance you won't need to change this value
define('DB_CHARSET', 'utf8');
define('DB_COLLATE', '');
// Change SECRET_KEY to a unique phrase.  You won't have to remember it later,
// so make it long and complicated.  You can visit https://www.grc.com/passwords.htm
// to get a phrase generated for you, or just make something up.
define('SECRET_KEY', 'put your unique phrase here'); // Change this to a unique phrase.

1. Returning to where you extracted the WordPress package in Step 1, rename the file wp-config-sample.php to wp-config.php.
2. Open the renamed wp-config.php file in your favorite text editor and fill in the following information, per the example above:

   DB_NAME 

   The name of the database you created for WordPress in Step 2 .

   DB_USER 

   The username you created for WordPress in Step 2.

   DB_PASSWORD 

   The password you chose for the WordPress username in Step 2.

   DB_HOST 

   The hostname you determined in Step 2 (usually localhost, but not always. See some possible DB_HOST values).

   DB_CHARSET 

   The database character set, normally should not be changed. See Editing wp-config.php for details.

   DB_COLLATE 

   The database collation should normally be left blank. See Editing wp-config.php for details.

3. Save the file.

• For more extensive details, and step by step instructions for creating the configuration file and your secret key for password security, refer to Editing wp-config.php.

For information on enabling SSL in WordPress 2.6, see SSL and Cookies in WordPress 2.6.

Step 4: Upload the files

Now you will need to decide where on your web site you’d like your blog to appear:

• In the root directory of your web site. (For example, http://example.com/)
• In a subdirectory of your web site. (For example, http://example.com/blog/)

Note: The location of your root web directory in the filesystem on your web server will vary across hosting providers and operating systems. Check with your hosting provider or system administrator if you do not know where this is.

In the Root Directory

• If you need to upload your files to your web server, use your favorite FTP client to upload all the contents of thewordpress directory (but not the directory itself) into the root directory of your web site.
• If your files are already on your web server, and you are using shell access to install WordPress, move all of thecontents of the wordpress directory (but not the directory itself) into the root directory of your web site.

In a Subdirectory

• If you need to upload your files to your web server, rename the wordpress directory to your desired name, then use your favorite FTP client to upload the directory to your desired location within the root directory of your web site.
• If your files are already on your web server, and you are using shell access to install WordPress, move the wordpressdirectory to your desired location within the root directory of your web site, and rename the directory to your desired name.

Step 5: Run the Install Script

Point your favorite web browser to start the installation script.

• If you placed the WordPress files in the root directory, you should visit: http://example.com/wp-admin/install.php
• If you placed the WordPress files in a subdirectory called blog, for example, you should visit:http://example.com/blog/wp-admin/install.php

The following screenshots show how the installation progresses. Notice in the screen, Entering the details, you enter your Weblog title and your e-mail address. Also displayed is a check-box asking if you would like your blog to appear in search engines like Google and Technorati. Leave the box checked if you would like your blog to be visible to everyone, including search engines, and uncheck the box if you want to block search engines, but allow normal visitors. Note all this information can be changed later in your Administration Panels.

Version 2.7

 

WordPress Version 2.7, Entering details

 

WordPress Version 2.7, All done!

Install Script Troubleshooting

• If you get an error about the database when you run the install script:
  • Go back to Step 2 and Step 3, and be sure you got all the correct database information and that it was entered correctly into wp-config.php.
  • Be sure you granted your WordPress user permission to access your WordPress database in Step 3.
  • Be sure the database server is running.

Common Installation Problems

The following are some of the most common installation problems. For more information and troubleshooting for problems with your WordPress installation, check out FAQ Installation and FAQ Troubleshooting.

I see lots of Headers already sent errors. How do I fix this?

You probably introduced a syntax error in editing wp-config.php.

1. Download wp-config.php (if you don’t have shell access).
2. Open it in your favorite text editor.
3. Check that the first line contains nothing but <?php, and that there is no text before it (not even whitespace).
4. Check that the last line contains nothing but ?>, and that there is no text after it (not even whitespace).
5. If your text editor saves as Unicode, make sure it adds no byte order mark (BOM). Most Unicode-enabled text editors do not inform the user whether it adds a BOM to files; if so, try using a different text editor.
6. Save the file, upload it again if necessary, and reload the page in your browser.

My page comes out gibberish. When I look at the source I see a lot of “<?php ?>” tags.

If the <?php ?> tags are being sent to the browser, it means your PHP is not working properly. All PHP code is supposed to be executed before the server sends the resulting HTML to your web browser. (That’s why it’s called a preprocessor.) Make sure your web server meets the requirements to run WordPress, that PHP is installed and configured properly, or contact your hosting provider or system administrator for assistance.

I keep getting an Error connecting to database message but I’m sure my configuration is correct.

Try resetting your MySQL password manually. If you have access to MySQL via shell, try issuing:

SET PASSWORD FOR 'wordpressusername'@'hostname' = OLD_PASSWORD('password');

If you are using a version of MySQL prior to 4.1, use PASSWORD instead of OLD_PASSWORD. If you do not have shell access, you should be able to simply enter the above into an SQL query in phpMyAdmin. Failing that, you may need to use your host’s control panel to reset the password for your database user.

My image/MP3 uploads aren’t working.

If you use the Rich Text Editor on a blog that’s installed in a subdirectory, and drag a newly uploaded image into the editor field, the image may vanish a couple seconds later. This is due to a problem with TinyMCE (the rich text editor) not getting enough information during the drag operation to construct the path to the image or other file correctly. The solution is to NOT drag uploaded images into the editor. Instead, click and hold on the image and select “Send to Editor.”

Installation Instructions in Other Languages

For installation instructions in other languages, see WordPress in Your Language.

Installing Multiple Blogs

Detailed information about Installing Multiple Blogs is available.

Installing WordPress on your own Computer

If you have a sufficiently powerful home computer and a sufficiently fast broadband connection, you may want to avoid certain hosting charges by using your own computer as a server. The following tutorials will show you how to setup a server environment and install WordPress on your home computer.

1. Lightbox 2 uses the Prototype Framework and Scriptaculous Effects Library. You will need to include these three Javascript files in your header (in this order).

   <script type="text/javascript" src="js/prototype.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/scriptaculous.js?load=effects,builder"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/lightbox.js"></script>


2. Include the Lightbox CSS file (or append your active stylesheet with the Lightbox styles).

   <link rel="stylesheet" href="css/lightbox.css" type="text/css" media="screen" />


3. Check the CSS and make sure the referenced prev.gif and next.gif files are in the right location. Also, make sure the loading.gif and close.gif files as referenced near the top of the lightbox.js file are in the right location.

4. Part 2 – Activate

5. Add a rel="lightbox" attribute to any link tag to activate the lightbox. For example:

   <a href="images/image-1.jpg" rel="lightbox" title="my caption">image #1</a>


   Optional: Use the title attribute if you want to show a caption.

6. If you have a set of related images that you would like to group, follow step one but additionally include a group name between square brackets in the rel attribute. For example:

   <a href="images/image-1.jpg" rel="lightbox[roadtrip]">image #1</a>
<a href="images/image-2.jpg" rel="lightbox[roadtrip]">image #2</a>
<a href="images/image-3.jpg" rel="lightbox[roadtrip]">image #3</a>


   No limits to the number of image sets per page or how many images are allowed in each set. Go nuts!

Download Lightbox 2

Camaras in V-ray

understanding step by step the camaras settings in V-ray

Image: © courtesy of Chaosgroup

The cameras in VRay generally define the rays that are cast into the scene, which essentially is how the scene is projected onto the screen. VRay supports several camera types: Standard, Spherical, Cylindrical (point), Cylindrical (ortho), Box and Fish eye. Orthographic views are supported too.

Override FOV – with this setting you can override the 3dsmax’s FOV angle. This is because some VRay camera types can take FOV ranges from 0 to 360 degrees, whereas the cameras in 3dsmax are limited to 180 degrees.

FOV – here you specify the FOV angle (only when Override FOV is turned on and the current camera type supports FOV angle).

Height - here you can specify the height of the Cylindrical (ortho) camera. Note: this setting is available only when the Type is set to Cylindrical (ortho).

Auto-fit - this setting controls the auto-fit option of the Fish-eye camera. When Auto-fit is enabled VRay will calculate the Dist value automatically so that the rendered image fits horizontally with the image’s dimensions.

Dist – this setting applies only to the Fish-eye camera. The Fish-eye camera is simulated as a Standard camera pointed to an absolutely reflective sphere (with a radius of 1.0) that reflects the scene into the camera’s shutter. The Dist value contorts how far is the camera from the sphere’s center (which is how much of the sphere will be captured by the camera). Note: this setting has no effect when the Auto-fit option is enabled.

Curve – this setting applies only to the Fish-eye camera. This setting contorts the way the rendered image is warped. A value of 1.0 corresponds to a real world Fish-eye camera. As the value approaches 0.0 the warping is increased. As the value approaches 2.0 the warping is reduced. Note: in fact this value controls the angle at which rays are reflected by the virtual sphere of the camera.

Image: © courtesy of Chaosgroup

Type – from this list you can select the type of the camera. The available types are Standard, Spherical, Cylindrical (point), Cylindrical (ortho), Box, Fish eye. See the Examples section for a more detailed discussion on camera types.
Standard – this is a standard pinhole camera.
Spherical – this is a spherical camera which means that the camera lenses has spherical form.
Cylindrical (point) – with this type of camera all rays have a common origin – they are cast from the center of the cylinder. In the vertical direction the camera acts as a pinhole camera and in the horizontal direction it acts as a spherical camera.
Cylindrical (ortho) – in vertical direction the camera acts as an orthographic view and in the horizontal direction it acts as a spherical camera.
Box – the box camera is simply 6 standard cameras placed on the sides of a box. This type of camera is excellent for generation of environment maps for cube mapping. It may be very useful for GI too – you can calculate the irradiance map with a Box camera, save it to file and you can reuse it with a Standard camera that can be pointed at any direction.
Fish eye – this special type of camera captures the scene as if it is normal pinhole camera pointed at an absolutely reflective sphere which reflects the scene into the camera’s shutter. You can use the Dist/FOV settings to control what part of the sphere will be captured by the camera. The red arc in the diagram corresponds to the FOV angle. Note that the sphere has always a radius of 1.0.
Depth of field
On – turns the depth-of-field effect on.

Image: © courtesy of Chaosgroup

Aperture – this is the size of the virtual camera aperture, in world units. Small aperture sizes reduce the DOF effect, larger sizes produce more blur.

Center bias – this determines the uniformity of the DOF effect. A value of 0.0 means that light passes uniformly through the aperture. Positive values mean that light is concentrated towards the rim of the aperture, while negative values concentrate light at the center.

Focal distance – determines the distance from the camera at which objects will be in perfect focus. Objects closer or farther than that distance will be blurred.

Get from camera – when this option is on, the Focal distance is determined from the camera target, if the rendering is done froma camera view.

Sides – this option allows you to simulate the polygonal shape of the aperture of real-world cameras. When this option is off, the shape is assumed to be perfectly circular.

Rotation – specifies the orientation of the aperture shape.

Anisotropy – this option allows the stretching of the bokeh effect horizontally or vertically. Positive values stretch the effect in the vertical direction. Negative values stretch it in the horizontal direction.

Subdivs – controls the quality of the DOF effect. Lower values are computed faster, but produce more noise in the image. Higher values smooth out the noise, but take more time to render. Note that the quality of sampling also depends on the settings of the QMC sampler as well as on the chosen Image sampler.
Motion blur
On – turns motion blur on.

Duration – specifies the duration, in frames, during which the camera shutter is open.

Interval center – specifies the middle of the motion blur interval with respect to the 3dsmax frame. A value of 0.5 means that the middle of the motion blur interval is halfway between the frames. A value of 0.0 means that the middle of the interval is at the exact frame position.

Bias – this controls the bias of the motion blur effect. A value of 0.0 means that the light passes uniformly during the whole motion blur interval. Positive values mean that light is concentrated towards the end of the interval, while negative values concentrate light towards the beginning.

Prepass samples – this controls how many samples in time will be computed during irradiance map calculations.

Blur particles as mesh – this option controls the blurring of particle systems. When this is on, particles will be blurred like normal meshes. However, many particle systems change the number of particles between frames. You can turn off this option to compute the motion blur from the velocity of the particles instead.

Geometry samples – this determines the number of geometry segments used to approximate motion blur. Objects are assumed to move linearly between geometry samples. For fast rotating objects, you need to increase this to get correct motion blur. Note that more geometry samples increase the memory consumption, since more geometry copies are kept in memory.

Subdivs – determines the quality of the motion blur. Lower values are computed faster, but produce more noise in the image. Higher values smooth out the noise, but take more time to render. Note that the quality of sampling also depends on the settings of the QMC sampler as well as on the chosen Image sampler.
Notes
• Depth of field is supported only for the Standard camera type. Other camera types do not produce depth of field effect at this time.
• When DOF and motion blur are both enabled, they are sampled together using the higher of the two Subdivs parameters.

http://designer-uae.com/

A free version of V-ray (1.09.03)is avaiable here (must login first)

A demo version of the last released version of V-ray (1.47.05)is avaiable here (must login first)

After spending a few weeks working with a beta version, I’ve concluded that there’s just enough that’s better in the CS4 updates to Photoshop and Photoshop Extended — most notably, usability improvements for core features — that many people will find themselves sighing, biting the bullet, and upgrading. That bullet-biting stems from Adobe’s traditionally steep upgrade pricing — in this case, £139 (ex. VAT) for Photoshop and £275 (ex. VAT) for Photoshop Extended — combined with the knowledge that in 18 months Adobe will be asking for another upgrade because it only partly ported over the interface changes and that 2009’s latest version will have delivered on the promises of this version’s technology upgrades.

In some ways, this version feels like a necessary evil. Adobe has obviously put a lot of work into it, but most of it is under the surface — way under the surface from the perspective of the everyday user. The entire 3D engine (in Extended) has been migrated from a PDF-based architecture to OpenGL, and the company has seeded OpenGL support throughout the application. The panels architecture is now extensible via Flash, allowing Adobe, or third parties, to create their own panels or modify some of the existing ones. And via the release of the Pixel Bender SDK, the filter library is not only extensible but has integrated GPU and multi-core acceleration. All of this is essential in order to allow future versions of Photoshop to evolve. However, the move to support 64-bit Windows, and multi-touch inputs and 16-bit printing on the Mac, are probably the only technology changes that will significantly impact users of this version.

Extended users will benefit more immediately from these underlying changes than Standard users. For the latter, OpenGL support primarily manifests itself as some whizzy screen zooming and rotation tools that demo impressively but are unlikely to be used much. However, Adobe has greatly improved Extended’s 3D support. It now offers most of the essential render settings and view controls, plus the ability to create primitives (and extend the library of primitives), necessary to work with 3D models. You edit and paint on textures simply by double-clicking on them in the Layers palette, then see your changes applied when you toggle back to the model — not quite real-time, interactive painting, but close enough for now. And now there’s basic keyframe animation for 3D scenes. Still there’s room for improvement: it needs better lighting handling and the ability to tile textures, and several aspects of the interface, like the Rendering options, are still far too dialogue-driven.

That mixture of real-time and dialogue-driven still permeates the interface of Photoshop in general, despite some advances. For example, if you use Photoshop for web or print production work, the move to modeless Adjustment and Masks panels for real-time adjustments and previewing of changes in mask feathering and density is potentially a huge time-saver. But all the ancillary operations, such as the Radius, Contrast, Smooth, (another) Feather and Contract/Expand parameters controlled by Refine Mask, remain in a modal dialogue box.

So while there are a few tweaks, such as the new tabbed windows (you can still float them, though) and jarring all-caps text, long-time users won’t encounter a lot to slow down their workflow. On the upside, tool shortcut keys now behave in what Adobe refers to as a ’spring loaded’ fashion. That means that if you hold down the shortcut key for one tool while another is selected in the toolbar, it temporarily overrides the toolbar until you release the key. Very nice. On the other hand, I don’t particularly like the iconic representations of the adjustments in the new panel — you can’t tell what they are without mousing over them and reading the text — but you can just ignore them and use the adjustment layer pop-up on the Layers palette as always.

Aside from the real-time adjustments, there’s not a lot new here for Photoshop’s core photo-editing audience. Adobe Camera Raw is now up to version 5, and has been brought more into sync with the way Lightroom handles files. It includes local retouching brushes like that application, although I suspect the quick fixes for which they’re intended are less important when opening into Photoshop than in Lightroom. And now that you’ve trained yourself not to use Dodge, Burn and Sponge — because they’ve worked so poorly for the last 10-plus versions — Adobe has fixed them, by limiting the areas of the tonal range to which they apply. The Vibrance control, a saturation adjustment that preserves skin tones and which has made it into all the other Adobe photo applications, finally comes to Photoshop as well.

Also useful (some might say overdue) the Clone Stamp and Healing brushes now display a preview of what it will be stamping or healing, and brush size in general is now interactive.

Adobe has also tweaked the Color Range Select tool, adding the ability to limit the selection to ‘Localized Color Clusters’. It sounds nice, but I couldn’t get it to work well in any meaningful way; rather than limit it to contiguous colours that meet the specified criteria, as I expected, it seemed to limit the range to a user-specified-size circle around a sample point. An extension of the old Auto Align and Auto Blend capabilities combines the sharpest areas of several layers of similar images, which Adobe promotes as delivering an extended depth-of-field image. In practice, you have to be very careful or end up with an odd mixture of blur and sharp that bears no resemblance to anything producible with a camera. Those image combination scripts have also been beefed up with vignette (edge darkening) and fish-eye distortion correction when creating panoramas.

Also nice in theory, but not so much in practice, is Content-Aware scaling, Adobe’s implementation of seam-carving technology. This feature looks and acts like a first stab at an interesting capability; the results are unpredictable and frequently not up to the standards of a typical Photoshop user. Photoshop also has ostensibly better integration with Lightroom 2 (still in beta), but the workflow still seems fairly clunky to me. You make adjustments in LR, then save the metadata, open it in Photoshop, make changes and save; then you have to force a read of the metadata to update the display in LR. Given that LR 2 hasn’t shipped yet, let’s hope Adobe comes up with something a bit more elegant.

And, of course, there’s the inevitable disappointment with the stuff Adobe hasn’t changed, such as the poor print layout controls and embarrassingly primitive text handling. Performance conclusions will have to wait for final code, and only time will tell if Adobe has fixed its heinously annoying updater.

There’s more, of course, but nothing that screams ‘I’m going to make your life easier!’ Which is why I suspect users will be sighing when they lay down the cash for the upgrade rather than eagerly anticipating all the fun times ahead. Maybe that will come with CS5, when the fruits of Adobe’s technological labours have ripened.

Photoshop CS4 Extended: a first look

Is there enough new in Adobe’s Photoshop CS4 to justify the upgrade price? Here are our first impressions.

Adobe Creative Suite 4 Master Collection: a first look

Adobe’s Creative Suite 4 updates over a dozen design and editing tools. The first of our previews examines the all-encompassing Master Collection.

Google Chrome (beta)

Google has launched Chrome, an open-source browser that sends a clear challenge to Microsoft in the way it lets users work with applications.

Internet Explorer 8 beta 2: a first look

IE8 (beta 2) should satisfy Microsoft’s loyal browser base, but it’s unlikely to lure committed Firefox users back to the fold.

View all Previews

Slideshows

Photos: Adobe Creative Suite 4

Take a look inside Adobe’s new Creative Suite 4, which unifies the interfaces of all the constituent applications to give a more seamless experience.

Inside Firefox 3’s security features

Security takes front and centre in the new release of Firefox. Here’s a tour of the main features.

Inside Firefox 3

Take a tour of the basic features in Mozilla’s new Firefox 3 web browser.

Annoying software: a rogues’ gallery

Which software is guilty of annoying us the most? Here’s an identity parade of the chief suspects.

View all Image Galleries

Products in Action

Google Chrome

Josh Lowensohn examines some of Chrome’s top features including the deeply integrated search, minimalist interface and smart use of privacy

Opera Mobile 9.5 beta

The newest version of Opera’s browser for Windows Mobile phones inches closer to the desktop-browsing experience with a spruced up UI and more powerful features

Windows Mobile 6.1

Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.1 is a small upgrade to the mobile operating system that brings easier setup and improvements to Interenet Explorer

Run Windows on a Mac

Use Boot Camp, included in Mac OS X Leopard, to install Windows

View all Videos

Texture and Lighting

Lighting is one of the most important parts in 3D visualization rendering. It brings not only the look and feel for the image, but also helps to visualize the design in reality. There are several different ways to set up lighting for a render, however, for L5 we setup our lighting with the V-Ray render plugin. This was done by using its Environment and V-Ray light sphere. We find this is a simple and quite effective way to light up the scene.

1. Modeling

The interior is modeled based on a CAD file. We import the CAD plan into 3D Studio Max and start to model by drawing closed line along the outline of the CAD file to create walls for the interior. (Fig 01)

[Click here for large image]

After that, use Extrude modifier and apply to those lines created earlier to make the wall.
Use this same procedure for the floor, ceiling, window, doors, etc. (Fig 02)

[Click here for large image]

Tip

It is good practice to name all the objects in your scene and organize them in the layer manager. This will help to speed up the work later on and also make it easier to manage when there are too many things in the scene.

2. Adding Details

When the basic model of the interior is complete, we start to put more details into the scene such as the base around the wall, doorframes, handles, window details and furniturea€|to add more realism to the render.

3. Texturing

Before lighting, apply some of the basic materials to the model and furniture. (Fig 03)

[Click here for large image]

For those objects that have the same material on them (for example the doors, walls, window glass), it is a good idea to collapse them into one piece of Poly so it is easier to access and keep things organized.

Note: When using V-Ray render, it is important to use V-Ray materials for all objects in the scene.

4. Camera View Setup

View selection is one of the most important parts in making a perfect image. Try to choose the view so that it keeps the image balanced and draws the viewer’s eyes into the main part of the image that you want to focus on.

For this scene, we initially created around 15 to 20 views. In the end, we chose three views and decided to use this one. (Fig 04)

[Click here for large image]

5. Lighting

Before doing any lighting to the scene, make sure you have in your mind what kind of lighting/mood you want to create; should it be daylight, sunset or a night light? After that, it is necessary to look for some real-life lighting reference images. You can find them everywhere, whether they are online sources, magazines, or even your own photo collections.

In this shot, we chose a morning lighting mood. After looking at many reference images, we started to light up the scene.

Start with the environment/ambient light. This kind of light will decide the look of the image so we need to get it right. Since we aimed for daylight, the environment must be slightly blue. (Fig 05)

[Click here for large image]

Use the V-Ray render plug-in to render the image, utilizing the Environment color in V-Ray Environment setting to create the ambient light that we want. In this image, we used a blue color for the environment with the value of 8.0.

Exponential color mapping type was used for this image; Gamma value was set to 1.5 to brighten the scene, especially at the corners. (Fig 06)

[Click here for large image]

We used a very low setting for the test rendering of images in order to get a quick preview of the image. (Fig 07):
_ Irradiance map was set to low
_ Light cache with Subdivs at 200 and sample size at 0.02

[Click here for large image]

At this stage, we’ll begin to tweak some of the materials by adding reflection on the floor, wood material on the furniture, carpet, mirror, etc.

After several tests to get the right value of the ambient light, we’ll add sunlight to the scene. V-Raylight (sphere type with no decay) was used to simulate the sun. For the early daylight shot, we add more yellow (multiplier 3.2) for the sun and also make the radius bigger (10′) to create a softer shadow in the interior. (Fig 08 and Fig 09)

[Click here for large image]

[Click here for large image]

5. Render Setting For Final Image

For final render images at the size of 3000 pixels, we change the setting so that it is higher than before to bring more quality to the image.

For GI method, we used Irradiance map for Primary bounces and Light cache for Secondary bounces at a high setting. (Fig 10 and Fig 11)

[Click here for large image]

[Click here for large image]

We choose Adaptive QMC for Image sampler and Michell Netravali for Antialiasing filter. (Fig 12)

[Click here for large image]

For post work, we also rendered out the Reflection pass, Specular pass and ZDepth pass (you can add these passes by going to Render Elements and click on Add button)

6. Post Work

We use Photoshop for post work. Level adjustments and Color Balance are used to improve the contrast and color for the image.

Reflection and Specular passes are used to add more reflection and highlight for the image to provide more realistic effects. (Fig 13)

[Click here for large image]

And that is about it! As you can see, the lighting setup is simple but pretty effective. However, lighting is not the main key to create a great render. It is all about the visual, the camera view, the materials, and the style.

Other parts of tutorials in this series:
Part 1 Tutorial-Composition and Camera Placement

Hell of Tutorial in Photoshop

“We like this move by Google and believe it can help to increase or at least maintain its leading search market share,” Needham & Co. analyst Mark May said in an e-mail. “As the starting point for nearly every user’s Internet experience, the browser is important online real estate. The market share gains by Firefox in a short period of time show to us that users are looking for better browser experiences.”

One feature will allow consumers to run Web-based applications independently, which means that if one program crashes it won’t take down the browser.

By improving the reliability of such online services, Chrome could mark another step in the browser’s drive to supersede the computer operating system in importance, said Matt Rosoff, analyst with Directions on Microsoft, a research firm focused on Microsoft products and strategy.

Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft holds a virtual monopoly in operating systems, but their importance in the computing landscape is diminishing as Web-based programs become the starting point for many users.

Chrome will be an open-source product, meaning anyone can modify the software code and add features.

Internet Explorer General Manager Dean Hachamovitch called the browser market “highly competitive” and said he remained confident that consumers would stick with Microsoft’s product.

Google executives have expressed concern over the years that Microsoft could use its dominant browser to route consumers to its own search engine, which has sputtered despite years of effort and billions of dollars in investment.

Explorer 8 enables a user to surf the Web without the sites he or she visits being tracked. Google and other Internet companies — including Microsoft – use such information to finely target the ads they display. People who use Chrome could give Google even more information about their online habits.

Launching a browser war with Microsoft is a bold move for Google because Microsoft controls nearly 75% of the market. It also could cause trouble for Firefox, a free browser that is gaining popularity but still trails far behind Explorer.

The nonprofit Mozilla Foundation, which manages Firefox, has benefited from engineering help and money from Google. In 2005, Google hired the lead engineer behind Firefox, who splits his time between Google and Mozilla. Just last week, the two extended their partnership, which makes Google the browser’s default search engine, through 2011.

Also potentially vulnerable are Opera and Apple Inc.’s Safari, which have captured much smaller fractions of the user population.

News about Chrome broke Monday after the website Google Blogoscoped reported receiving a comic book from Google that outlined the details of the new browser. A Google blog post later explained that it had inadvertently released the news. “We believe we can add value for users and, at the same time, help drive innovation on the Web,” the post said.

The browser, which Google says was built from scratch, has been in the works for two years. It is intended as a “modern platform for Web pages and applications” that can run faster and be more responsive, the post said.

Even coming from a universally known brand such as Google, the browser might not catch on. Google may encounter resistance from consumers, who typically switch browsers out of frustration, not for new features, Enderle said.

Rosoff said Google will attract its share of “curiosity seekers” and can rely on distribution deals to increase its market share.

“I think this could be a real contender,” he said.

What is Flex? Why Use It?
by Devin Columbus aka dColumbus  |  9 March 2008

There seems to be some confusion as to why anyone would bother using Flex. I can understand this to a degree since I felt the exact same way when I first heard about Flex. But logically, there must be a reason why Adobe decided to continue it as one of their products; and that is exactly what I plan to explain here.

In a nutshell, Flex was designed in order to give Flash Developers an edge when developing Rich Internet Applications (RIAs). Although RIAs can be built from within Flash, there are various limitations, especially when it come to a developers time. I’m not going to get into the specifics, but as you become familiar with Flex, you’ll begin to understand why this is.

What makes a up a Flex Application?
A Flex application at it’s very basic level is a Flash .swf file embedded in a generated HTML file. Since Flex outputs it’s data as a .swf, this allows you to utilize everything that Flash Player is famous for; dynamic animations, sound and video handling, and of course, the Flash Drawing API. The HTML that Flex spits out has the necessary JavaScript code in order to detect whether the user has the Flash Player installed, or whether they need to update to the current player.

One of the major reasons why Flex is becoming more and more popular is because it utilizes ActionScript 3.0. In fact, developers we’re creating AS 3.0 applications in Flex even before AS 3.0 was released for Flash Developers. But, since Flash CS3 was released, AS 3.0 has become the new standard, and for me at least, is why developing in Flex has become even more exciting.

How is a Flex Application created?
One important thing to note, is that the Flex environment does not use a Timeline. This does not mean that it is limited. Rather, Flex has been developed more for programmers and less for designers. It ends up meeting somewhere in the middle, which is exactly where I found myself as a Designer/Programmer, whatever. Again, this will become apparent as you begin actually developing in Flex.

You design a Flex Application by selecting pre-defined visual components (i.e. Button, ComboBox, ListBox, DataGrid, etc) that you’re most likely familiar with from Flash. If you’ve never used components before, they’re wonderful. Although some will tell you that you can create far smaller (in size) components by developing them on your own, and while that may actually be true, the pre-defined components work well and are highly customizable – especially the latest set released with Adobe Creative Suite 3:

[ an example of a few controls arranged in Flex Builder 3 ]

You then arrange your components on the stage in a orderly, easy to use, manageable user interface. There are various Containers that allow you to align your components however you’d like. As an example of one of these containers, there is one named the VBox. This Container tells everything that lives within it to align vertically to one another – extremely usefully when developing Forms.

You’ll then use be able to use styles and skins that will customize the entire look and feel of your application. CSS Formatting and the complete customization of the visual components (as I mentioned above) will make your Flex Application stand out above the rest.

Now that you have your visuals in place and you like the way your application looks, you can start to utilize ActionScript 3.0. Assign event handlers and create or import ActionScript functions or classes to make your Flex Application live up to it’s full potential. This will allow you to react to what the user does and to events that are generated by Flex itself. Also, and this is a HUGE also, you’re able to connect to ColdFusion and other Flex Data/Communication Services. Remember this one thing when you’re contemplating whether or not Flex is right for you: Flex and ColdFusion are meant for each other.

Now it’s time to publish your application and present it to your client or the world.
Honestly, there is so much more that could have been elaborated on in this article, but that’s what the later tutorials are there for. This was meant as an introduction or sorts to Flex in a Flash world. If you haven’t given it a shot, why not test it out for yourself. Until more tutorials are released here on Kirupa.com, please visit the following links in order to satisfy your curiosity.

Download the latest Flex Builder 3:
http://www.adobe.com/products/flex/

The Adobe Flex Developers Center:
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/

The Official Adobe Flex Overview:
http://learn.adobe.com/wiki/display/Flex/Animated+overview

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Aqua Buttons Tutorial

First, create a new image, 250×100 pixels and fill the background with the color that you like.

Use Custom Shape Tool [U] to draw a shape that you want your button to look like.

Now is the time to add Bevel and Emboss to your shape. Right click on the text layer and select Blending Options…

Layer Style window will open, select the settings that you see on the s(FIVE)

In the Layer Style window select Contour on the left and use settings that you see on the screenshot.

In the Layer Style window select Color Overlay on the left and use settings that you see on the screenshot.

In the Layer Style window select Gradient Overlay on the left and

use settings that you see on  the screenshot.

Press ok when you done and your image should look like mine.

Congratulations, now you know how to create aqual buttons in Photoshop.

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