After the wildly successful first run, I’m delighted that Coudal is gearing up for another season of Layer Tennis, which are live creative matches using Creative Suite software. Heard of Photoshop tennis? It’s a more riveting version of that, since matches will use more than just PSD layers and will play with motion and sound!
The rules: two players—renowned designers like Shaun, Veerle, Jason—must build on each other’s “volley” for no more than 15 minutes. A coin toss by the referee to determine who goes first, which serves as the creative teaser for the weekly matches. And while waiting in between plays, we’ve got witty commentary from the likes of Gruber and Kottke. After 10 rounds, a winner is decided upon by voting in the forums.
Truly a star-studded yet downright geeky spectacle. Every single aspect of Layer Tennis is hilarious, and the attention to detail is just admirable. The icing on the cake? They actually have Adobe as sponsor, again. And why not, since you’d expect them to use PS and Flash anyhow.
Do you have your season pass yet? Don’t forget to subscribe, follow, and fan.
We’re not sure when Adobe Creative Suite 4 will actually arrive, but now that beta releases, reviews, and even rumors are starting to clog the internet pipelines, we’re starting to get a clearer picture of what the programs will be like.
Try it
Adobe has just announced that the newest versions of several Creative Suite titles, namely, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, and Soundbooth, can now be downloaded for a test run.
There’s a catch. If you’re not currently using the CS3 versions of Dreamweaver and Fireworks, the trial period for these programs will end within 48 hours. Otherwise you can request serial numbers to use them during Adobe’s prerelease period.
As for Soundbooth, the same rules apply except that you can use the serial number of any CS3 product. That is, “including but limited to Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, etc.”
If you’re curious about what these CS4 versions have in store but don’t or can’t try them for yourself, CNET has a brief rundown of new features. For example, Fireworks “finally resembles those of other applications in the Creative Suite” and “features compatibility with Adobe’s AIR, Flash, and Flex Builder as well as HTML”.
Here are more in-depth reviews of the three programs:
Widgetize it
John Nack says that CS4 applications will be extended with “lightweight, cross-platform, network-aware widgets…via SWF panels (palettes) created in Adobe Flash or Flex.”
It seems inevitable to employ widgets in this day and age, whether you’re a desktop app or a web app. And Flash is really taking center stage in Adobe’s pursuits.
Abuse it
Nack also shoots down rumors that the next Photoshop will be released this October 1st, and that it’s not really called “CS4″. But since the CS4 moniker is already plastered all over place, we might as well shrug our shoulders on that one.
But the rest of TG Daily’s report on GPU acceleration support for CS4 programs seems real enough. Clearly, Adobe is continuously looking for ways to harness hardware power and push the capabilities of its graphics programs, regardless of rumors.
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