1-28-11

Winter/Spring 2011 Schedule

 

 

 

I am currently teaching digital photography courses for PV Net or Palos Verdes on the Net. Generally speaking these are not the same courses I teach for the South Bay Adult School or the Torrance Adult School. Their structure and/or content are different. The classes are taught in a building adjacent to the Rancho Palos Verdes City Hall off of Hawthorne Blvd.

 

PV NET is a non-profit organization and has been in existence for many years offering courses and other services. More recently they have begun to offer courses in digital photography. They provide a nice teaching environment and are using Photoshop Elements 8. Below are the descriptions of classes I will be teaching this winter and early spring, as well as those I have recently taught for PV NET. The classes generally run for five weeks (10 hours of class time)

 

Working With Camera RAW Images

 

Many cameras allow you to take and save images in the camera’s RAW format, rather than the standard JPEG format. Using the RAW format will generally result in a significantly higher quality image. Additionally, the RAW format provides you more flexibility when editing it without any loss of quality that occurs when editing a JPEG image.

 

In this class, we will use the Adobe Camera RAW (ACR) editor built into Photoshop Elements 8 to enhance your RAW images. You will learn how to take advantage of many of the capabilities of the ACR even if your camera allows only JPEG images to be written to the memory card.

 

During the class, we will cover taking RAW images, the ACR screens, its tools, and a suggested workflow when shooting and processing RAW images. After taking the class, you may discover that you prefer to use the ACR editor for much of your photo enhancing, even if you shoot only JPEG images.

 

To register for the class, please email Emily Chen at   emilyc@palosverdes.com or call her at 310 544-5395.  Better yet drop by and visit Emily in person to register for a class. She is generally in the computing learning center office Monday through Wednesday, and Friday from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm. However, this can vary, so it is best to give her a quick call first.

 

 Mondays, 10:00-12:00 pm, beginning January 17, 2011 (5 Meetings)
No Class January 17, 2011

Home Video Editing – Multimedia Production

 

Not only do most digital cameras provide the ability to take videos, new models produce HD or near HD quality videos. Sharing these high quality videos is now becoming much easier. This class is an excellent way to learn the basics of video editing and multimedia presentations.

This class could also be subtitled Introduction to Movie Maker. Microsoft’s Movie Maker program comes installed in Windows XP and Vista, and a version is available as a free download for Windows 7. In this course, you will combine a series of photos and video clips to produce a movie that can be shared with family and friends in a variety of ways. You will learn how to edit the video clips, add background music, add special effects and titles, and finally produce the finished movie. In this class you will learn how to burn a DVD that can then be played back on a DVD player attached to your television. This is an excellent course for you, if you are just beginning to explore digital video editing and production.

To register for the class, please email Emily Chen at   emilyc@palosverdes.com or call her at 310 544-5395.  Better yet drop by and visit Emily in person to register for a class. She is generally in the computing learning center office Monday through Wednesday, and Friday from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm. However, this can vary, so it is best to give her a quick call first.

Mondays, 10:00-12:00 pm, beginning February 28, 2011 (5 Meetings)

 

Introduction to Digital Photography – The Basics

Are you new to digital photography? Did you just get your first digital camera and are wondering what comes next? This class may be just what you are looking for. In the course you will begin by taking a series of pictures of Point Vicente Park and the PV coastline. During the course, you will use Photoshop Elements 8 to upload your pictures to the computer, organize them so they can be quickly found, improve their color and brightness, make a simple slide show and other creations, and finally learn how to share them via email, ordering prints, or uploading them to photo sharing websites.

Mondays, 1:00-3:00 pm, beginning March 7, 2011 (5 Meetings)
No class April 4th

Photoshop Elements 8 Editing Tools Workshop 

With each new version of Photoshop Elements, new or improved editing tools and features are introduced. The latest version, Photoshop Elements 8, has continued this practice. These tools add entirely new capabilities or semi-automated tasks that heretofore could only be done manually, which required a far better understanding of the program.

 

In this unique class, we will concentrate on exploring these new features that are often not that visible even to those who have some experience using the program. Although we will be using Photoshop Elements 8, several of the editing tools are also available in recent earlier versions of the program.

 

A small sampling of some of the tools/features we will use include Group Shot, Photomerge Exposure, Magic Extractor, and Scene Cleaner, as well as several others. Additionally, the course will be taught in a workshop environment allowing the student to bring in their own photos on which to work.
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Mondays 10:00-12:00 noon, beginning April 11, 2011 (5 Meetings)

 

 

The Classes Below May be Offered Again in The Future

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Taking & Creating Panoramas Using Photoshop Elements 8

This is a short focused class on taking a different multiple series of pictures and then using Photoshop Elements 8 to stitch them into panoramas. This class will help you to more fully explore the panorama stitching capabilities of Elements even if you have used it somewhat already.

We will meet at the Point Vincente Interpretive Center to take several series of photos. The types of panoramic views we will explore will include the standard landscape, portrait landscape, vertical, mini-pans, and multiple row sequences.

On the way back to the PV NET computer center, we may stop at another vista point for some additional shots if there is time.

Back in the computer center we will upload our pictures and use Elements to stitch the photo sequences together. You will discover there is much more to finishing off your panorama than simply using the Photomerge command.

In addition to bringing your camera, you may want to bring a tripod if you have one. However, this is not necessary.

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PowerPoint 2003 Primer

 

In this one day, four–hour class you will learn the basics of PowerPoint. Some of the specific concepts and skills that you will be introduced to include understanding the various PowerPoint workspace views, designing the your slide show using preset design templates, working with the master slide template, and using various slide layouts. You will learn how to import pictures and other objects, use transitions and apply basic animation to your slides to make your presentation more interesting to your audience. Online class handouts will be provided. After taking this class, you will be able to create basic multimedia slide presentations.

 

 

 

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