Snippets from Previous Meetings
AT THE TIMARU HERALD
Wayne Doyle, who works as a Graphic Artist at the Timaru Herald, gave a very interesting talk describing his work and the use of Macintosh computers at the Herald. Some of the points he made included:
- The Herald was one of the first NZ newspapers to be computerised, having been using Macs for 10 years, and has 20+ machines in use.
- Computers are used for many printing layouts: commercial brochures, newspaper advertisements.
- Computers save the Herald money, because they reduce the number of people involved in pasks.
- New skills are always being required as both hardware and software develop.
- Visual communications, involving graphic design, gives market appeal to printed matter.
-
Touching up of photos is a general practice - few are used just as taken.
- Applications used include Quark Express, Pagemaker, Photoshop, Illustrator and Freehand.
- Mac G4s are great machines, but can still crash... often 5 applications are needed to be in use simultaneously!
- Using electronic files (eg PDF) in publishing has enabled fast, high quality transfer of files.
- Digital cameras are increasing being used by newspaper photographers.
Wayne also outlined the use that computers have as drawing tools, being able to use techniques such as airbrushing and multi-layering, and having facility to make changes, view history, alter scale, etc. During his talk he displayed examples of computer-generated printed material, and concluded by showing and explaining about a number of pieces of graphic art.
Thanks for a very informative session, Wayne!
GENERAL BUSINESS
HANDY MAC-HINTS (Tony Climo presented a variety of hints and tips to help with Macintosh operation. A summary of some of these will be attached to next month's minutes. QUESTION & ANSWER The usual session was held, and included some discussion on conflict caused by printer drivers, which may be resolved by removing unwanted drivers from the Chooser. MAC BASICS Barry Robinson explained some AppleWorks basics, particularly in relation to customising the Button Bar.
Allan Rutherford, President of AUGC (Apple User Group of Canterbury) has advised that AMUG members may availl themselves of AUGC's Help
Barry proposed that the Aladdin demo software that we received earlier in the year be raffled at the November meeting.
'Tone' publication has indicated that it intends to produce a New Zealand Macintosh magazine - we'll look forward to seeing what it has to offer.
REMINDER
Next meeting is on Friday 30 November
ALL WELCOME - BRING A FRIEND
Bring your computer if you would like Mactropolis software installed.
[Committee Meeting on Mactropolis: Tuesday 20 November at 9:00pm.]
Tony Climo
Secretary, Aoraki MacIntosh Users Group