Wall
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Quickie: Tips to make Photoshop love you more

March 2, 2010

So recently on GraphicRiver, a forum thread came up that basically outlined the following: “PHOTOSHOP IS SO SLOW WHY GOD WHY?” In further investigation the author did admit he had some aging hardware, which really should be addressed.

For those of us – myself included – that cannot simply afford to drop good coin on a 9-dimensional quantum quad core extreme dx processor, 5 gigatonne atomic video card, and RAM the equivalent size and girth of China, we have to make do with what little things we can.

In this case I’ve come across a selection of little tweaks you can do to speed up Photoshop. Maybe not by a massive amount, but when you’re used to 10 seconds of lag, taking a couple seconds off that can make a huge difference. To your sanity, and to the survival of you and those near by.

And so I’ve opted to take them from that forum and post the tips here, complete with screenshots. I apologize in advance as these screens are done on my mac. The concepts should still be the same though.

Castle Crashers – The Behemoth (2008)

February 5, 2009

It’s been a long, long time since I’ve played any real arcade-style games. Last time I picked up a controller to play any sort of side-scrolling, button-bashing, streets-of-fury style game I was a much younger person. With SNES controller in hand, my friend and I playing the likes of TNMT: Turtles in Time, Contra III or Battletoads & Double Dragon.

See the problems with my playing these sorts of games are:

• I’m no good at them.
• I lack the toned fore-arm muscle of the veteran gamer.
• I lacked a console.

Well I now have a console, so I have no excuse as to whether I could try to play them or not. Turns out I still suck at them, but that doesn’t stop me from trying. The forearm muscle is a slow process, and I’ve already given myself muscle strain resulting in a fantastic carpel tunnel attack. You just don’t feel like a man until you’ve got to ice your forearm because of extreme button mashing.

Or is it “You just can’t feel like a man when you have to ice your forearm because of extreme button mashing”?

Either way, it hasn’t stopped me from playing Castle Crashers with extreme vigor.

LEGO Indiana Jones – LucasArts (2008)

January 29, 2009

Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve done a game review. Could be because It’s been a while since I’ve played a game through to completion. Sadly I am finding it hard to make time to dedicate to playing games when things like school and work are in the way. Pesky thing, responsibility.

Having said that, with my school giving me far too much time off over the Christmas break, I managed to get my hands on a shiny new XBox 360. Granted that was a bit of a fiasco, in the end I landed me a couple of games. One of those games (obviously, I think, at this point) was LEGO Indiana Jones.

I recall my brother getting LEGO Star Wars, back when it came out. He was obsessed with it, and at the time I couldn’t really figure out why. Sure it was LEGO, which we were clinically addicted to growing up, but at the time I couldn’t see what the big deal was. Of course once I started playing LEGO Indiana Jones, my opinion has quite simply 180-ed. I’m just going to go ahead and assume that 180-ed is a term I can use.

Anyways.

360 Degrees of Failure

January 6, 2009

I’ll preface this by saying that since getting my XBox 360, I’ve been enjoying it thoroughly. It works fairly well, It’s shiny, I can now play games from my bed, it treats me nicely. I know a lot of people will hate on me for getting a 360, what with the red ring of death issue, blah blah blah. I’ll say now that the Wii needs elbow room, the PS3 has absolutely nothing on it that I want to play (that’s a lie, Little Big Planet interests me greatly) and I don’t feel like having to repeatedly upgrade my computer just to play games that almost always come out for a console. I’m going for the hassle-free approach.

The irony in that statement will become apparent as you continue to read. It blows my mind how much effort and extra money all of this cost me.

Also it should be mentioned that the span of all of the following events took place over a week and a bit, because I was only at my home for about two days over the entire time-line.

Cannot insert the value NULL into column Name, Thanks SharePoint

March 7, 2008

I tried to create a Custom List. I had event receivers attached to custom lists and i got this:
Cannot insert the value NULL into column ‘Name’, table ‘[somesharepointcontentdatabase].dbo.EventReceivers’;
column does not allow nulls. INSERT fails.
The statement has been terminated.

I found out what this means and how to get around it.

Inconsistency Melts Brains

March 6, 2008

Everyone’s done it. We get lazy, we’re pressed for time, or we otherwise don’t care enough to standardize our stuff. I can note this most prevalently in code, but it easily extends into design and every day life.

I cannot claim to be innocent of this crime, nor would I. It takes effort, experience, and an iron will not to cut corners in everything you do.

Cause and Effect

March 3, 2008

So recently Microsoft was doing something. I say something because I don’t know what it was they were doing, only that it affected many users of the popular chat client Live Messenger (MSN Messenger for those not bothering to keep up). Basically it cut off a good section of people – myself included – from the service. The best part is that different people were getting different error messages, and there were different workarounds that worked some of the time.

SharePoint 2007: What the hell, man?

January 31, 2008

So I just spent four hours of my life fighting with SharePoint 2007. I can’t explain all the details because my employer pays me, which in turn pays the bills and they frown upon my telling of company secrets. I can, however, bitch about some things that have been irritating me over the past while. As it turns out everything I hate converged on me today.

Let the story begin!

SharePoint 2007: Thoughts on Branding

November 9, 2007

I’ve started to read RSS feeds related to art and design. Considering it’s the field I wish to get into, I figured it to be a good move. Our designer at work has about 50 more then I do (I’ve only started so this is a given) and he linked me to a post on Cameron Molls website. I’ve read through it at least twice now, and to be honest: it’s pretty true. Now I’m going to make my own comments on the subject as best I can given my job, the work I do, and the firing I would receive if I gave away anything. Thankfully, I think I can do so here. If not… well if anyone knows a good programmer/designer job… well you get the idea.

Fingers Crossed!