Preserved Topic: My first tutorial (Page 1 of 1)

Hello All,
I've tried my hand at writing an Adobe Illustrator/Photoshop tutorial. It's a little harder than I expected, I'm not sure if my explanations are adequate or if more detailed instructions are necessary.
I'm curious to get some reactions from folks with differing skill levels in case I need to improve my explanations. Take a look and let me know if this is usefull , lame , or just plain confusing . http://www.lvcm.com/jedart/tuts/window.html

Me Again?

urggh... I hate it when I am replying and then my *%##^$ browser crashes!!! any way....


I looked at your tute, it is an interesting technique, and I will go through it/follow it later when I have some free time, but a few things struck me right off...

1) Your body-text is a little too large. You have it declared at 14pts, and on my machine it looks huge! I would say maybe try setting it at around 80%, also that way your user can decrease/increase the text.

2) Your images are also quite large, physically, I am not sure about file-size-wise, but that could also be a problem for those unfortunate dialupers! Perhaps you could have a smaller size on the page, with the option of clicking to launch the full-size in a pop-up. I say this because your images are really nice and detailed, but the large size interrupts the "flow" of the tute, because your reading, scrolling, reading, scrolling back...

3) In Step 2, you say that you used gradient fills. I would say maybe it would be good to go a little farther in to this, because Gradients in Illustrator are quite flexible, as in one can do a lot with them, but it takes a little getting used to, especially for those that know Pshop better than Illustrator. I would reccommend that you might want to show an example of how you used your gradients, as in " I created this gradient using red and light orange, and set the fill to 90 degrees" or "I used the gradient draw tool, and dragged from top left to bottom right" , etc, The gradients are an important part of the tute, without them it would not work, so I say maybe give some users a better understanding of what you did with the gradients, to help keep them on track.

Overall, I think you are doing a great job, so keep it up!

It's a good tutorial idea, but you need to work a little on the formatting. Like Lotiss said the pictures are large along with the text. A smaller font size along with thumbnails images would be a major improvement.

[Edit] Correcting some spelling mistakes [/Edit]


[This message has been edited by Lao is good (edited 10-12-2001).]

I like it a lot! Good show for a first tutorial. It *is* harder than you could ever have imagined, isn't it?

I especially like the screen shots. Ummm. I get all tingly when I see my familiar Mac interface


I'm going to go back and read it again. It doesn't do as much hand holding as some might need/like, but there's no arguing with the end results. Do another one - soon!

The end product is very impressive, and the tutorial looks very detailed... but it seems to start rather suddenly in Illustrator. It just reads to me like I'm already halfway through the Illustrator section of the tutorial when I first started reading it.

I love what there is though.

Big, detailed pix I don't mind so long as they load OK on my dial up. They did. The text is too big but scrolling isn't a hassle if I go full screen (1280x1024). I'd like to see more specifics on the Illustrator end since I am far more inexperienced w/Illustrator than Photoshop. The other thing I wondered was why this couldn't be done with the PS6 vector tools and gradients, eliminating the need to jump between programs and (for me) get frustrated with Illustrator 9's bugs again.

-cyoung

WOW way koool
Yes could this be done in PS. Thats all i have now. Or should i be begging for illustrator. Im already begging for Flash.

I saw some flash stuff and am drooling with animation possabilities.

I need a bigger paycheck.

Apok

If I try and fail, then i contradict my actions. Trying is not failing, failing is not trying.

Nicely done. More info on how you made the bump mask might be helpful, too. (Is it a desaturated copy of the red frame layer or did you select and fill each area ?)
and how you selected the horizontals ( is this an Illustrator thing, masks ?)

Only other nit pics are on the window construction itself. ( I`ve never liked fixed windows. personal thing) A sliding section and some hardware would make it near perfect.

Outstanding first effort.



Why, yes. I was raised by Apes. How did you know ?

Wow. Thanks for all the advice folks, this will be a big help to me for future tuts. I haven't used this forum before and I was a little unsure what to expect. DocOzone's tuts served as an inspiration for me to learn photoshop so I was happy when I saw he had this forum available.

I've recieved a lot of response suggesting I delve deeper into the illustrator steps, I have in mind leaving this tut alone and adding a link to an "illustrator basics" tut. I'm not sure what would be better...A) a detailed step by step of the entire process (that could appear overwhelming) or B) leave it as is with links to more information for those who need it (that could be annoying to folks who just want to read a step by step)

lotiss, your right about the font. I've been a graphic designer for years and I'm kind of a control freak when it comes to fonts (a bad habit for web designers). I'll try using the 80% attribute to allow for flexibility on the users end. I'm not sure about the pics though, I'll look at them again and see if some can be smaller, but you need to be able to read the screen shots.

Human Shield, this is the part of tut writing I found hard, what to include without making it over complicated. I've found that most folks want more instructions for illustrator.

cyoung, I found the controls in illustrator a bit easier to use, I almost always start in ai and move the finished layout to ps for final tweeks and that was really the whole point to this tut. The interesting part about your comment is the timing - I was just thinking about doing an ai tut to teach a technique for intertwining letters, it's easy to do with clipping paths and looks real cool, people cannot understand how it is done by just looking at the finished art. I was thinking "this can ONLY be done in illustrator" then it hit me...Clipping Path (ai) to Layer Mask (ps). I think I have an idea for a new ps tut.

docilebob, the horizontal selection and bump map were all done in illustrator. Once you have made the basic image, it is easy, with a little pre planning, to make all the masks and whatnot right in illustrator. Before ps6, the best way I knew to get a good chiseled bevel out of ps was to create the bump map in ai with the blend tool.

Me Again?

[This message has been edited by jedart (edited 10-12-2001).]

How about "Part One: Illustrator" and "Part Two: Photoshop"?

That way, you have some kind of product at the end of One (the line drawn picture/window frame, which can then be carried on to Two, if the person wants to. Just link the two together and I think it'd be golden!

An introduction page would be nice. Just skimming over what the tutorial will do, what applications will be needed and what kind of "real world applications" the tutorial could be used for.

You could also put it at the Guru's Network if you wanted a place to store it and/or increace it's traffic. And maybe Pugs'd stop harassing us for tutes for a week or two...



Very nice work by the way, and welcome to the asylum. Someone should be along with a straight jacket any time now...

Well, maybe for a couple of days, at least....