O'Reilly Digital Media: Creativity

dekePod 018: Photoshop and the Andy Warhol Silkscreen Effect

2009-06-11T06:24:39-08:10

Have you ever wanted to create an authentic looking Andy Warhol silkscreen? One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, Warhol was known for his avant-garde paintings and screenprintings. Remember Warhol’s garishly colored celebrity images of Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, or Mao Zedong? In the studio he called The Factory, Warhol took an assembly-line approach to his high-contrast, silkscreens and produced art as a mass consumable, like a t-shirt or a pack of gum. It’s not surprising that his art is still popular today, and there are lots of one-click Warhol solutions. But if you want the real thing, join Deke McClelland in the final episode of this dekePod series, as he dissects Warhol’s process, and shows you how to use Photoshop to render your favorite portrait in bona-fide Warhol magnificence.

dekePod 017: Photoshop and the Visual Communications Makeover

2009-05-28T07:28:00-08:11

Signs are our friends. They help us observe the rules when we actually need to know the rules. We don’t all speak English, and tourism is a huge industry, so signs need to be language-independent. Which is why a vocabulary of immediately identifiable symbols is essential to every working artist and designer. So if symbols are so important, why are most such an indecipherable mess? Computer icons! Laundry instructions! Or Deke’s favorite: What you shouldn’t throw into an airplane toilet! Learn what works and what doesn’t in this laugh-out-loud episode of dekePod.

dekePod 016: Photoshopping the Great Masters

2009-05-14T05:19:20-08:12

They say you can’t be too rich or too thin. So how about getting rich by making others thin? Plenty of experienced retouchers make small but enviable fortunes shaving body fat off already lithe models. But rather than showing you a present-day example--honestly, how many underfed waifs do we need to see made skinnier?--Deke takes us back to a time when ideas of beauty were very different: the High Renaissance. In those times of mean circumstances and manual labor, body fat was a thing to be envied. How best to take a well-fed model rendered by the likes of Raphael and make her look like a modern work of art?

Web Presence for Publishers . . . What Works?

2009-03-13T17:50:41-08:13

On March 21, I'll be leading a workshop on “Web Presence” at BAIPA's annual Get Published Conference in San Anselmo, California. I put that in quotes because it's a wonderfully vast topic, and I'd love to hear your thoughts. What creative ways have you discovered to promote (or find) books online?...

CS-4U - Creative Stimulus For You!

2009-03-06T15:20:22-08:14

No doubt these are tough times - times that can get one down, emotionally and creatively. But heck, are you going to let a tanking stock market sink your digital imaging creativity? Hope not! However, if the winds have been knocked out of your creative sails, here are a few ideas that may stimulate the creative artist within. At the very least, I hope they distract your from the stock market chart, which looks like a bad - a very bad - histogram.

Vizualization on Visual Innovation at VizThink 2009

2009-02-24T13:50:37-08:15

I attended a session here at the Viz Think conference yesterday, facilitated by Eileen Clegg and O'Reilly's own Robert Schanafelt. The purpose was to collaboratively identify trends in visual innovation, and then, well, put them together in a visual way that helped display the collaboration in a functional and informative way. Participants were first asked to identify moments of visual...

The Fat Man and Circuit Girl: Fun. Music. Boys and Girls. Technology. Creativity.

2009-01-19T16:19:45-08:16

I've got a great Nerd Treat for y'all! If you are too smart to be cool and too cool to be a nerd, you are a Scientiste. That's what Circuit Girl and I call you. That, and our friend. And we've been working on creating a community that's worthy of your attention and participation....

The End Is Near for Battlestar Galactica

2009-01-14T08:46:42-08:17

It’s the best of times and the worst of times for fans of Battlestar Galactica. The second half of the season premieres on Friday, January 16 on SCI FI Channel (yay!), but it’s the series’ final season (awww). VFX Supervisor Gary Hutzel hints at what’s in store for the explosive finale, plus takes us behind the scenes of the stunning Cylon versus Pegasus sequence from Battle Galactica: Razor and the spectacular “continuous shot” introducing Cylon U-87 from the upcoming Caprica—as well as reveals a few juicy details about what may be Ron D. Moore’s "lost" series, Virtuality.

Free O'Reilly Webcast: Youth & Creativity

2009-01-10T18:19:36-08:18

On January 21, O'Reilly will host a 60-minute webcast called Youth & Creativity: Emerging Trends in Self-Expression and Publishing. Here's the concept: Youth are approaching digital self-expression and publishing from a more organic, collaborative angle than previous generations. They jump right in when the creative urge strikes, collaborating with others from around the globe, and "publishing" an ongoing stream of...

Promising Glimpse of Thursday Night's Apple Store Panel

2009-01-06T17:50:05-08:19

The intelligent, engaged crowd at, a fabulous old-school bookstore Book Passage in Corte Madera (Marin County) got a preview Sunday of an upcoming Macworld event. Derrick Story moderated a panel of our digital imaging experts, Lisa Snider-King (Photoshop CS4 Missing Manual), Mikkel Aaland (Photoshop Lightroom 2 Adventure) and Deke McClelland (Adobe Photoshop One-on-One and Photoshop Channels & Masks One-on-One.) Hot...

Chris Baty on Hobbies, Work, and the Creative Life

2009-01-05T07:20:11-08:20

This year I took a crack at November's National Novel Writing Month (aka NaNoWriMo). Didn't get as far as I'd like, I'll admit. But even my little trek was a great reminder of the importance of making something every day. One of the many perks of the NaNoWriMo experience are the email exhortations you get from a variety of guest-authors, as well as from Chris Baty, NaNoWriMo's founder and program director. The last one he sent out at the end of the journey, was a lovely essay on hobbies, work, and living the creative life. I asked his permission to repost it and he graciously assented.

"HDR" Performance Art on Your Street

2008-12-31T10:20:16-08:21

In our photo blogs, there are some stunning examples of high dynamic range (HDR) photography, which creates a hyperreal image by combining different exposures. What if that technique were applied to other media? You might get...this.

Creative (Suite) Self-Destruction

2008-12-23T14:49:54-08:22

What do you do when your primary creative tool stops working? It's an increasingly common problem as our tools become digital. I've lost great programs from companies that tanked, but when a program from a company that's still in business refuses to launch, it really chaps my hide.

John Adams Interviewed on KQED

2008-12-23T21:49:50-08:23

Michael Krasny gabs with John Adams on KQED's Forum about his music, book and life. A must listen. And don't forget to enjoy his opera "Doctor Atomic" about Oppenheimer and the creation of the atomic bomb. Playing now on your local PBS station....

XO Laptop delivered in Columbia

2008-12-23T21:49:50-08:24

I haven't mentioned the OLPC XO laptop for kids in a while. But, it's worth noting that Nicholas Negroponte has delivered XO laptops to Columbian children in an area that was once controlled by guerrillas. In this TED Video he discusses the project, on the road, and why laptops are important for children around the world. This line stood out...

A Creativity Interview with Novelist Dana Reinhardt

2008-12-16T15:50:08-08:25

For the last year or two I've been interviewing artists about their creative process. A new interview went up this week, with young-adult novelist Dana Reinhardt, and I thought I'd post an abridged version here, including questions about her writing routine, how she pushes through when she isn't not feeling particularly inspired, and why she doesn't use notebooks to capture her thoughts. If you'd like to read a little more, you can find the full interview right here.

The $5 Self-Publishing Workshop

2008-12-11T02:49:38-08:26

In the last five years, I've published five books — the first through a traditional royalty publisher and the rest at home. One of the most valuable resources I've had in that adventure is BAIPA, and in 30 seconds, you can see why.

Does Brainstorming Actually Work?

2008-12-11T13:31:03-08:27

It's a staple of corporate retreats: gather staff, whip out the flip chart and announce that "there are no bad ideas". Many attendees just groan inwardly. Are they just cynics, or are they onto something? Apparently several studies back up the Dilberts of the world, at least to an extent. According to an article in this past Sunday's New York...

Impossible Images

2008-12-09T09:49:54-08:28

Variety is the spice of life, and it is certainly part of what I enjoy about photography. Having a camera is an excuse for being anywhere and examining anything. Those of you who follow my blog or my photostream on Flickr will know that my subjects range from kids and flowers through the night landscape. I'm also intrigued with the...

dekePod Episode 011: Giving It Up For the Family

2008-12-09T05:19:11-08:29

Creative professionals are routinely roped into frivolous art projects for their families. You don't want to spend much time on them because who wants to do more of what you already do all day? But you don't want to do a lousy job because your cred's at stake. Oh and because, sure, you care about your family. In this episode of dekePod, Deke shows you how to create a spectacular birthday party invitation, with little effort, using a combination of found art and Photoshop.