I haven't used Poser in a long time. I do check in here to see what is being created and honestly some of what is here is simply breathtaking.

Anyone that doesn't consider this to be art has realy lost the ability to open thier mind to what it is they are seeing.

Keep rendering folks, guys like me completely enjoy what you are producing.

Thanks for the info. Don't think this machine will run 5, so until I can upgrade or buy a new machine I'll be sticking to 4.

Thanks I've been out of it for a bit, time to get back into it all.

There are no "tubes" for PhotoShop. Tubes are only used in Paint Shop, and if you search google you'll find a load of them.

XP came loaded on my latest laptop; as soon as I began installing my software problems popped up. Yep its all been updated and service packed all to hell with M$ latest bug fixes; but the truth of the matter is simple too date far too many problems with XP. My PS 7 froze repeatedly even after turning off color profiles and using a default. RAM was set to 80% Windows was stripped down to the minimum requirements to run. My solution to the problem; I dumped XP and loaded in my win 2000. Since doing so I've had absolutely no problems, everything runs faster, memory usage is far more effecient and I can run Illustrator, PhotoShop and Dreamweaver MX simultaneously without a lock up. Change your OS for something more stable and wait for the bugs to be flushed from XP pro.

Elements was designed for the home "enthusiast" ie someone with a camera that got a lot of bad images. Everything you can do in Elements you can do in PhotoShop, as mentioned earlier, the reverse isn't true.

Your choice depends on what you want to do with the software. If all you plan to do is play with it at home, maybe touch up an image or two, put old Aunt Gertrudes head on a donkey, then stick with Paint Shop. For the price you can't do better. However if you are planning to seriously get into graphics and work with the software then don't waste time with a PhotoShop wannabe. True the software is expensive, yes the learning curve is steeper, but in the end the results outweigh it all. Not trying to sound like a commercial here, but there is a reason why PhotoShop is the industry standard. Its ability to interface with the rest of the Adobe line and its competitors, makes it one of the most powerful tools you can learn to use.

OK here goes: In Win 2K go to Local Disk then "Documents And Settings" Look for your folder, it should have your log on name listed. Inside the folder you will see an "Application Data" folder. Look for the Adobe folder. In the Adobe folder you will see a "PhotoShop" folder. Inside that folder you will see "adobe photoshop 6 prefs.psp" Delete the file. Reboot your machine, start Photoshop and you will find yourself back at factory defaults for your settings.

There is no beast as a raster gauge.

Both vertical and horizontal production cameras use a halftone screen when photographing to make a negative for the printing plate. It is that screen that determines the halftoning or moire patterns that you see.

The finer the screen the finer the pattern. A lithographic press ie Heidelberg, AB Dick, 4 colour do not use a screen in any shape or form to distribute ink. A thin sheet of foil is used as a plate and transfers ink to the paper.

A gravure press like the ones used to print newspapers use a much larger and more cost effective way of distributing ink. The negative plate is usually made from a fiber that contains "wells" which hold ink. Think of it like carving a potatoe and pressing that into paper. There is no screen involved anywhere in the process other than the original halftone for photographs. Which explains the large halftone dots clearly visible.

A platen uses metal stamping.

So the only type of printing left is silk screening and as you know, there is little anyone can do about a moire pattern in a silk screen.

To remove moire patterns, or "descreen" images in PhotoShop one of the simplest ways is to use the "smart blur" filter. Trial and error comes up with the correct settings.

As for the original camera screen, they are not available for personal use. The cost is the factor involved. Kodak can supply you with more information about plate screens as they are known.

CMYK (Cyan, Yellow, Magenta, and Knockout)will display differently from one monitor to another for one simple reason. Monitors are calibrated to display RGB. The standard CRT monitor as you already know uses the red, green,and blue colour gun, and as such cannot properly display CMYK no matter what gamma settings you are using. Every ones eyes see colour differently. set your gamma in the morning, then set it again a few hours later, you will see that change for yourself. The standard ICC profile settings in PhotoShop (SWOP) V2 only represent a standardized working space for attempting to maintain colour consistency. The operative word is "attempting" There is only one way, ok two ways to ensure exact colour. Specify Pantone ink colours to be used once seperations are made, and the other swear up and down that it was meant to be that way.

Using PhotoShop since the days when it was known as Aldus Image Styler, I can honestly say there have been aload of improvements over the years. That being said, PhotoShop 7 does not warrant its release as a new version. The addition of a healing brush, and image viewer makes it nothing more than an upgrade. While these tools may someday prove usefull; I for one will not fork over the cash for them. I have an image viewer. A healing brush? I don't understand the concept behind that or the reasoning for it. Adobe has a fine product, we all know that but this "new version" hasn't added much. Simply my opinion.

Ask away, and what books did you buy?

There are very few filters for CMYK. Most that exist do not work well, and are really not necessary. My suggestion to you is a simple one. Create your separations for the printer, and specify either Pantone or Spot colour inks. Use the correct inks and you'll be fine. Most service bureaus will walk you through the process if you are unsure, and at the same time will help garauntee the final outcome. Proofs can be printed most times for next to nothing.

I tried. My system is a dual processor P4 2.2's loaded with 1536 megs of RAM. This machine contains a 15 gig drive for the OS, and 4 SCSI 60 gig drives for everything else. I also at times have had to use a RAID array for some video capture which can also be connected for use with PhotoShop or any other app. I am heavily into graphics and teach multimedia design at the college level and have been using PS since it was known as PhotoStyler from Aldus. (The reason for my "baby".) I have to admit this little quirk you have mentioned has me wondering, and thinking. So for that reason I sent a message to a friend at Adobe asking about this. Now I'm curious!

RAM Use and Available Hard Disk Space in Photoshop Adobe Photoshop manages image data in two ways: first it allocates hard disk space, also known as scratch disk(s), for all image data, then it uses random-access memory (RAM) to cache this data for editing images. The amount of hard disk space that is available to Photoshop determines the maximum amount of RAM (i.e., working space) Photoshop can use. This document will help you understand the relationship between available hard disk space and RAM usage in Photoshop. Because it much faster to access information in RAM than it is to access information on a hard disk, Photoshop processes image information using RAM to decrease the number of times it must read from and write to the hard disk. The more RAM you allocate to Photoshop, the more data Photoshop can cache and process in RAM, and the quicker Photoshop can process an image. Photoshop will only use the amount of RAM equal to or less than its scratch disk space, no matter how much RAM is installed or allocated to it. Therefore, the amount of available hard disk space set for your scratch disk(s) must be equal to or greater than the amount of RAM you want Photoshop to use. For example, if you want Photoshop to use 200 MB of RAM, you'll need at least 200 MB of available hard disk space designated for Photoshop's scratch disk(s). If Photoshop seems to take longer to process images than you expect, you may have less available hard disk space than RAM allocated to Photoshop. This means you may need to free additional space on the hard disk(s) designated as Photoshop's scratch disk(s), or specify one or more additional scratch disk. To ascertain whether you need more hard disk space, first determine the amount of hard disk space available to Photoshop and the amount of RAM allocated to Photoshop. Then, compare these values. To determine Photoshop's RAM and Scratch Disk allocations: 1. In Photoshop choose File > Preferences > Plug-Ins & Scratch Disks. 2. Note the disk(s) listed in the Scratch Disks section. Click Cancel. NOTE: Startup is the disk containing the Windows directory. 3. Choose File > Preferences > Memory & Image Cache. 4. Note the Photoshop RAM value under the Physical Memory Usage area. Click Cancel. 5. From the Desktop, double-click the My Computer icon. 6. Right-click a hard disk noted in step 2 and choose Properties. 7. Note the Free Space value in the second column and it's unit of measurement (e.g., MB or GB). Click Cancel. 8. Repeat steps 6-7 for any remaining hard disks noted in step 2. 9. Add the values from steps 7-8. 10. Complete steps under Converting and Comparing below. Hard disk space is generally measured in megabytes (MB) or gigabytes (GB) while RAM is generally measured in kilobytes (K). To compare your available hard disk space value to Photoshop's RAM allocation value, both values need to be in a common unit of measurement (e.g., MB or GB). Thus, you will need to convert Photoshop's RAM allocation value from K to MB or GB, whichever is the unit of measure used for your available (Mac OS) or free (Windows) hard disk space. Use one of the methods below to convert K into the same unit of measurement as your hard drive. After you have a common unit of measurement, use the instructions under Comparing to subtract the RAM value from the available hard disk space value and analyze the results. Converting from K to MB If you noted MB as the unit of measurement in step 7, divide the value you noted in step 4 by 1,024. This will give you the amount of allocated RAM in MB. You will compare this value to your available hard disk space value (see Comparing). For example, if the value noted in step 4 is 22968K, your equation will look like this: 22968K 1024 = 22.429688 MB indicating you have 22.429688 MB of RAM allocated to Photoshop. Converting from K to GB If you noted GB as the unit of measure in step 7, divide the value you noted in step 4 by 1,048,576. This will give you the amount of allocated RAM in GB. You will compare this value to your available hard disk space value (see Comparing). For example, if the value noted in step 4 is 22968 KB, your equation will look like this: 22968K 1048576 = 0.021903991GB indicating you have 0.021903991GB of RAM allocated to Photoshop. After you convert your allocated RAM value to the same unit of measure as your hard disk, subtract the RAM value from the hard disk space value (determined in step 9 above) and analyze the results. For example: If the value determined in step 9 is 50 MB, and your converted, allocated RAM is value is 22.429688 MB, your equation will look like this: 50 MB - 22.429688 MB = 27.570312 MB If the value determined in step 9 is 5 GB, and your converted, allocated RAM is value is 0.021903991GB, your equation will look like this: 5 GB - 0.021903991 GB = 4.978096 GB If the difference is zero or greater (i.e., a positive number), you have the same amount of or more available hard disk space than RAM allocated to Photoshop and Photoshop is able to use all the RAM allocated to it. If the difference is less than zero (i.e., a negative number), you have less available hard disk space than RAM allocated to Photoshop and Photoshop is unable to use all the RAM allocated to it. To enable Photoshop to use all its allocated RAM, you need to free additional space on the hard disk(s) specified as Photoshop's scratch disk(s), or specify one or more additional scratch disk(s) in Photoshop. In simple terms, placing a temp file on the disk when loading means that the available RAM PhotoShop is set to use; is simply not there.