Do You Need to Know EVERYTHING?

[Brian Stoppee]

Do you really need to know EVERYTHING about an Adobe app?

Media technology is ever-changing. There was a time when creative professionals were pigeon-holed as: Photographer, Designer, Illustrator, Writer, Director, Producer, Editor, etc.

Today, one job description may require one primary skillset, but also a series of subset skills. By way of example, many people are in charge of web content for their employer. When they started their jobs, a few years ago, they may have been quite good with working in Adobe Photoshop.

With proper training that employee became an Adobe Photoshop ACA (Adobe Certified Associate: http://www.adobe.com/training/certification.html). As that person grew into the job, some skills with Adobe Bridge and Adobe Camera Raw were natural progressions. Soon Adobe Lightroom became helpful. Next, their employer wanted them to touch-up some documents in Adobe Acrobat, to add PDFs to the website. Now that person’s supervisor needs a few new documents created as PDFs so, our web content creator needs to learn some Adobe InDesign.

In the last sentence, “learn some Adobe InDesign” is the important part. That employee just needs some basics. The work that person is going to do uses pre-designed templates. So, a trained designer he/she is not.

We have enjoyed teaching Adobe 100 Level courses to these people, in a public college setting. Most of those students are in the 29-59 age range and have very good skills with macOS or Windows 10. They also know their way around the Adobe CC UI (user interface). So, they’re ready to learn the basics of an app, quite quickly.

Do they want to take a deep dive into the features of those Adobe apps? Not at this point.

They’re not looking at the scenery from 50,000 feet up. But, that student isn’t timid, either. They’re ready to land and get out and inhale the local air. But, they’re not interested in buying some InDesign real estate, pouring a foundation, and building a permanent home, either.

But, isn’t that what the full Adobe Creative Cloud subscription is all about? That collection of desktop apps serve the multimedia professional quite well.

In short: a permanent InDesign residence? No.

A pigeon-holed job? Today, those things are for the birds. Multimedia professionals are capable of taking skills, reaching out, and constantly growing their own personal capabilities. They gain confidence in building their own workflows.

[Ussnorway]

testing is only really useful when it happens BEFORE a major policy is changed or lots of $$ spent... after that there is too much push to get it out into the public (no matter what errors are found) and Adobe has made their mind up.

I do want to say a good word about Adobe so I'll give an example of them getting it right... the Max release of Muse was a disaster and people got very upset about it but Adobe did listen to their ACP, staff and testers to provide the option to get back to a stable version of Muse Install Adobe Muse version 2017.0.4 and 2017.0.2

[pziecina]

Just thought i would point out that in the example questions shown, question 4 for the html5 'nav' element usage, does not have a correct answer.

Answer 'D', to correctly mark up the main navigation element for a page comes closest, but is itself wrong, as a page can contain multiple nav elements, (you could even include one in a footer element).

See example number 9 in the specs for nav at -

https://www.w3.org/TR/2017/REC-html52-20171214/sections.html#the-nav-element

Plus the use of Dw behaviours is now obsolete, and in 99% of cases they should be replaced by css.

[Brian Stoppee]

TriciaLawrence  wrote

This could possibly be a good thread to include the new tutorial videos Adobe has just produced to help beginners get going with our software:

Photoshop Get Started

Illustrator Get Started

InDesign Get Started

Premiere Pro Get Started

After Effects Get Started

Lightroom Classic Get Started

Yesterday, we suggested extending this series to the web/mobile apps.

Today, we'd like to present a higher priority for the people who opt for the photography plans. Not everyone will edit images in Lightroom. When they enter the CC world with the $9.99/month Photography Plan, chances are, they have camera, right?

In addition to a Get Started for

• Photoshop and

• Lightroom…

…don't they need a Get Started for:

• Camera Raw and

• Bridge?

(Subscribers still get ACR and Bridge with the Photography Plan, right?

[Kat Gilbert]

My response is to the orig. question as I comprehend it... IF you knew everything there would be no questions... and IF you knew everything what would there be nothing left to explore... and IF you knew everything your head would explode!

We all aspire to work with these apps that is in accord to our purpose whether it be teaching, creating, or exploring the universe; so my question is: do the apps fulfill their purpose according to what one seeks?

[Brian Stoppee]

https://forums.adobe.com/people/Kat+Gilbert  wrote

do the apps fulfill their purpose according to what one seeks?

It's kind of like great wine: you will always want more in your wine cellar!

[Kat Gilbert]

Wine helps the creative process--- I agree, but do the apps fuel creative thinking or only fulfill the process according to the thought?

As many traditionalist say- digital art isn't true art but something just manipulated by the the application. Since this has been around since the 50's you would think that perception would have caught up to the process.

[pziecina]

One thing i have noticed over the years is that one has to often relearn parts of what one has previously learned.

I am not bad at html, css and javascript, but i often find that if i have not used a particular item often, i have to read and play with using it again before i remember exactly how it worked.

[Brian Stoppee]

pziecina  wrote

I am not bad at html, css and javascript, but i often find that if i have not used a particular item often, i have to read and play with using it again before i remember exactly how it worked.

100% agree.

Around the turn of the century, Janet & I both had some nasty cerebral trauma, which caused us to learn more about the brain than we planned to ever know.

There's some fascinating research which shows you can have great expertise in many, many complex tasks, which you do quite frequently. However, if the tasks are complex enough, in a period as short as two weeks or as long as four weeks, your efficiency with those tasks will diminish.

So, if you revisit a book or video or working with a sample project, it'll start coming back, because those familiar learning tools have built-in triggers to your memory. (Unless, of course, you have had way too much wine!)