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Vertex is the event connecting all areas of the UK visual effects community, for a day of presentations, workshops, recruitment and discussion. Come to watch talks by some of the world's biggest names in VFX, including Scott Ross, Chris Nichols, Brett Ineson, Sébastien Deguy and more. Book tickets for workshops run by some top artists, from Glen Southern to Mike Griggs among others. If you want to get your hands on the very latest tech, then the expo access tickets are for you and are even free but you do need to register to get the tickets, so book now over at the Vertex site. Knowledge is 3D power Our speakers will be sharing their wealth of knowledge on a variety of topics set to inspire and educate. In his talk, Christopher Nichols, founding member of the Wikihuman project, will share insights his team have learned while trying to create the most realistic digital human possible. Founder of Digital Domain Scott Ross will use the benefit of his industry experience to discuss what he thinks the pitfalls and opportunities are for the VFX industry. Brett Ineson will talk through translating actors into entirely different species for Justice League and Warcraft – which boasts the largest recorded mocap volume to date. Brett will also reveal behind-the-scenes secrets from Gears of War 4 that powered the game's biggest stunts. For more details about other speakers and workshop leaders, head to www.vertexconf.com. Build your career Vertex is the place to head if you are looking to take the next step in your career. Are you an enthusiastic hobbyist looking to take your first role in VFX, a student about to graduate, or an experienced pro? Then head to the recruitment fair, talk to studios about openings they have and even have a portfolio review, to learn how to best promote your skills. You even have the opportunity to ask questions directly to leading professionals in our Ask An Artist segment. How to get tickets to Vertex There are a variety of tickets available for Vertex, to suit your needs and budget. You can get a free expo pass, student tickets and Access All Areas passes. No matter which ticket suits you best you need to head to the Vertex site and register or buy direct. Be sure to register for the newsletter while you are there to stay up to date with the latest news, discover what's added to the schedule and learn about new speakers we've crammed into the packed day. We look forward to seeing you there! Related articles: The ethics of digital humans Scott Ross to talk at Vertex Behind the scenes on Transformers VFX View the full article

Researchers are warning of a default-configuration vulnerability in the enterprise-class keyless entry products made by AMAG Technology. View the full article

HP released an update that fixes debugger code that could allow an attacker to use a Synaptics Touchpad driver as a keylogger. View the full article

Getting the itch to learn some new skills, either for fun or to advance your career? With access to Stone River eLearning, you'll be able to work through a massive library of online courses and learn any new tech-related skill that you can imagine. Get a lifetime subscription for just $85 (approx. £64). Stone River eLearning's library is packed with the skills you've been dying to learn. With over 140 courses and 2,000 hours of educational videos, you can get a lifetime’s worth of knowledge from this great base for tech learning – and new courses are added all the time so you'll never run out of topics. Pick any course and you'll be given professional instruction that you can apply to your job or use to pursue in your own time, from coding and design to 3D animation and more. Plus, you'll get to test your skills with certification exams. You can get lifetime access to Stone River eLearning's online courses for just $85 (approx. £64). That’s a massive saving of 99% off the retail price. Learn anything you’d like and do it at your own pace by grabbing this deal today. About Creative Bloq deals This great deal comes courtesy of the Creative Bloq Deals store – a creative marketplace that's dedicated to ensuring you save money on the items that improve your design life. We all like a special offer or two, particularly with creative tools and design assets often being eye-wateringly expensive. That's why the Creative Bloq Deals store is committed to bringing you useful deals, freebies and giveaways on design assets (logos, templates, icons, fonts, vectors and more), tutorials, e-learning, inspirational items, hardware and more. Every day of the working week we feature a new offer, freebie or contest – if you miss one, you can easily find past deals posts on the Deals Staff author page or Offer tag page. Plus, you can get in touch with any feedback at: deals@creativebloq.com. Related articles: 95 top Photoshop tutorials 11 huge web design trends for 2018 How to draw and paint - 100 pro tips and tutorials View the full article

Colour is a wonderfully evocative design tool, with the right palette packing an emotional punch as well as boosting aesthetic appeal. Issue 274 of Computer Arts magazine has three striking covers – one for each trend. As these covers attest, these trends are fluid, expressive and adaptable, covering everything from products to fashion, graphic design to make-up. Buy Computer Arts issue 274 now Here are some of the great articles you can expect to see in issue 274, on sale now. Christmas offer: Save up to 47% on a subscription to Computer Arts Franklin Till describes upcoming trend 'playful' In Computer Arts' annual colour trend report in issue 274, forecasting agency and long-standing CA contributor FranklinTill identifies three distinct movements for the coming year with accompanying palettes. Succeed as a designer-maker with advice from those who have made the leap Elsewhere, you’ll find an in-depth guide to making it as a designer-maker – whether you’re tapping the lucrative Christmas gift market, or keen to kick off the new year with an exciting new income stream. Thanks to the inexorable rise of Etsy, Not On The High Street and other global platforms for crafty creatives, it’s never been easier to put your talents to good use by creating and selling products. And this feature also doubles as a handy gift list for anyone keen to avoid chain stores and support independent artists. Behind the scenes at London studio Koto Computer Arts also pays a visit to Koto, a young studio that combines infectious passion with a strong work ethic, and has made a splash on the design scene in just three short years, largely thanks to its global rebrand of Fanta. Find out how it built a global reputation overnight in this issue's Video Insight. Ricardo Cavolo reveals why he loves vibrant colours Gain insight into Ricardo Cavolo – the Spanish artist known for his large-scale murals – with this issue's Q&A. Find out why he enjoys depicting 'life on the B side,' as well as how he faces creative challenges while taking care of his mental health. Also in Computer Arts 274 Get tips for improving your typesetting Look ahead to the Tokyo Olympics with creative challenge Coke x Adobe x You Nadieh Bremer on how she visualised The Netherlands' top 200 songs chart The hottest new design, illustration and motion work Subscribe to CA today from just £11.25/$15 Computer Arts is the global design magazine – helping you solve daily design challenges with insights, advice and inspiration. Buy Computer Arts issue 274 here. And to make sure you never miss an issue of Computer Arts – including the special collectable cover of upcoming issue 275 – subscribe here today. Digital subscriptions start at £11.25/$15 per quarter. Special Christmas offer: Save up to 47% on a subscription to Computer Arts for you or a friend for Christmas. It's a limited offer, so move quickly... View the full article

Stock isn’t just about stunning still photography, illustrations and vectors – Shutterstock offers a huge library of gorgeous stock video footage, too. This footage opens up a whole new level of creative possibilities beyond what a static design alone can offer. In fact, Shutterstock boasts a catalogue of over 8.5 million royalty-free stock videos ready to be used in resolutions from web-ready all the way up to to Full HD and even 4K. Priced from just £19, and with Shutterstock’s footage plugin now compatible with Adobe Premier Pro, it’s the perfect time to access this store of high quality video clips. Here are 5 great uses for video that you might not have thought of. 01. For Facebook Sharing your work or services on social media is a key part of self promotion. As we shared in our article How to make social media work for you, Facebook’s algorithms give video top priority in people’s newsfeeds over all other types of content, so you can be sure that video footage will get you seen. So if you want to drive more potential clients to your portfolio site or let everyone know about a cool project you’ve been busy working on, think of what you want to say and choose an appropriate video. As external players such as YouTube and Vimeo no longer play in users’ Facebook feed, for the best results, you need a video you can upload directly to Facebook. The video clip like the sped up footage of a New York cab above can grab attention and complement a message about how you’ve been going the extra mile to finish your latest design on time, and are looking forward to sharing the results soon, for example. 2. For website landing pages Why use a still image on a homepage when you can embed a beautiful piece of footage that makes people get excited about who you are and what you do? Agencies such as WONDR, based in Dublin, use mesmerising footage paired with music on their website homepages to convey what they’re about. This dive footage carries you along the tropical reef with you, taking you on an exciting journey just like you do with your clients. Shutterstock also has a library of royalty-free music, by the way, so you could pair this clip with the almost ethereal-sounding Breathe at the Top of the City by Oliver Liu, or the more upbeat A Key to Happiness by Big Score Audio. 3. For conveying ideas When mocking up app designs, web designs and even printed projects, sometimes a video demonstration is the easiest way to communicate your vision for the final project to clients and potential customers. So when A/B testing your designs, running user research workshops or pitching your concept, some stock footage of people interacting with ‘your design’ can help no end in showing what it can do. Shutterstock has heaps of videos like the one above with elements filmed against a green screen, which you can adapt with your own designs and even backgrounds. Check out our guide, courtesy of Vimeo, How to green screen: create great video effects for some tips, as well as Rocketstock’s guides How to Realistically Replace Digital Screens in Mocha and After Effects and Advanced Spill Suppression Techniques in After Effects. 4. For inspiration and reference 3D artists, animators, illustrators and other artists and designers seeking to capture the likeness of a creature that moves may find it difficult to find willing models to replicate a specific movement over and over again. Instead, affordable footage of magnificent animals moving at different speeds, on a variety of terrain, gives you reliable references that you can watch and rewatch while you plan your own composition. Investing in these video clips means you can build your own library of references that you can call on as often as you need to while you perfect your creations. 5. For your own videos When editing your own video projects, you might find that you need a little extra footage to lend context to the main action. Add cutaways, establishing shots, timelapses and crowd scenes such as this clip to lend perspective to the rest of your film, without the hassle of having to source a location, secure filming permissions, organise transport for the crew and kit. You might also like these articles: 6 tips for finding the perfect photo for your project 11 spectacular winter images to make your projects shine View the full article

Few things are more fundamental to artists and designers than the deceptively humble notebook. They might just look like blank pages bound together in a sturdy cover, but over the years they've been used to write masterpieces, record stunning pencil drawings, and document world-changing ideas. Time moves on, though, and just like everything else sketchbooks have had to change to keep up with the world. But how do you redesign something so simple and effective as a sketchbook? Read on to find out how various companies have given them a 21st century boost with the help of apps, smart pens, synthetic papers and more. 01. reMarkable $599/£579 from the reMarkable store Are you a paper person? The team at reMarkable are. That's why they've created the reMarkable tablet, a device that digitally emulates the feeling of working on paper. Thanks to reMarkable, creatives can say goodbye to desks and shelves cluttered with assorted notebooks and journals, as the tablet collects them all together in one easy-to-transport tool. With an anti-glare display, reMarkable feels just like paper when you read from it. You can even lean on the page as you're writing and drawing and you won't confuse the screen (or get a dirty side-palm.) 02. Moleskine Smart Writing Set Create in two places at once with the Moleskine Smart Writing Set It wouldn't be a list of quality sketchbook alternatives without mentioning Moleskine. The popular and superlative stationery supplier has waded into the world of digital sketchbooks with Moleskine's Smart Writing Set, a collection of devices that allows users to edit and share what they create on paper in real-time, all without taking a photo, scanning pages or uploading files. The set is made up of three elements, namely the Paper Tablet, the Pen+, and the Moleskine Notes app. The tablet itself looks and feels just like a traditional Moleskine journal, rounded edges and all. Meanwhile the Pen+ is a stylishly slender aluminium pen with a camera that traces and digitises everything you create and sends it to the app. 03. Wacom Bamboo Folio The petite Bamboo Folio is tailor-made for travelling creatives In a similar vein to the clutter-curing reMarkable, the Wacom Bamboo Folio is a smartpad geared towards creatives who have the unfortunate habit of losing track of their work. Designed for on-the-go note-taking, the A5 device can turn handwritten notes and sketches into a digital backup file at the push of a button. Released as part of the Bamboo family of Wacom tablets, the Folio smartpad is integrated with cloud services and the Wacom Inkspace app – a clever device that allows designers and artists to easily edit and access their files wherever they are. 04. Rocketbook Everlast Create lots of different projects in one book with EverlastOne company that continues to innovate when it comes to sketchbooks is Rocketbook. The Rocketbook Everlast is a smart journal filled with synthetic polyester pages. Confused by the science? Well, the practical upshot is that users can write and draw on a page then wipe it clean with a damp cloth. Don't worry, the pages won't get soggy. In fact you can send your notes and pictures wherever you want thanks to a code of symbols at the foot of each page. Simply assign a symbol to a destination using the Rocketbook app, cross off the corresponding icon, and hey-presto, your notes are neatly organised digitally just the way you want. Related articles: Best Wacom tablet deals The best drawing tablet: our pick of the best graphics tablets in 2017 How to use Instagram as a digital sketchbook View the full article

Clip Studio Paint is a digital painting app specifically aimed at people creating comics or manga art – although it's great for any kind of digital art. We wonder if more people aren't using it because they don't know about it, or because they're not sure how to use it. Either way, that's about to change. In this round-up, we'll share some of the best Clip Studio Paint tutorials, and where you can find them. We'll kick off the list with some general, all-around Clip Studio Paint tutorials to help get you up to speed (numbers 01-05), then once you have a solid foundation, we'll move on to some more specific tutorials that will help you out (06-11). Hopefully we'll see a lot more tutorials as people realise how powerful this software really is, and what can be done with it. 01. Reuben Lara Reuben Lara is a freelance artist and illustrator, offering mainly Clip Studio Paint tutorials. He offers both paid and free tutorials for beginner-to-advanced artists and Clip Studio Paint users. Lara speaks clearly, his tutorials are easy to follow, and they're jam-packed with lots of useful information. You can find out more about Lara on his website, and you can watch more of his free videos on his YouTube channel. 02. Flyland Designs We've chosen Brian Allen at Flyland Designs for this list because he offers some of the most fantastic tutorials – and not just because he loves zombies. Allen's tutorials take you through the process of sketching, inking, and colouring in Clip Studio Paint. He also shares his tips and techniques along the way, as well as his Clip Studio Resources, like brushes, tools, and templates. Want to learn more about Allen? Check out his interview on Roundabout: Creative Chaos. 03. Kendrys Draws Kendrys Diaz, the voice behind Kendrys Draws, offers laser-focused Clip Studio tutorials covering a broad range of topics. Many of his videos show you how to use the 3D tools available in Clip Studio; he also has a heavy focus on manga art. Diaz's presentation style is a bit gruffer and more abrupt than other tutorials on this list, but don't let that put you off – the content is spot on. Note: Diaz has recently published a Character design sketchbook that might be worth a look. 04. David Arroyo David Arroyo is the creator of the webcomic IMMERSION. He's created a series of Clip Studio Paint tutorials, hosted by Astropad, in which he takes you through how to use the tool start to finish. That's right! The whole process. Arroyo's calm speaking voice and clear instructions make his tutorials bookmark-worthy. 05. LearnCSP.com LearnCSP.com is an independent site, owned and operated by Augie De Blieck Jr, who launched the site back in 2016. Ever since, De Blieck has been steadily adding Clip Studio Paint tutorials to this site, with the aim of creating content he wishes had existed when he first started. The website is focused on new Clip Studio Paint users, but it's useful for intermediate and advanced users too. 06. How to ink in Clip Studio Paint Pro In this inking tutorial, Chris Martinez covers the inking tools available to you in Clip Studio Paint, and how he uses them when he's inking his drawings. Although Martinez talks about pens he hasn't used, he's honest about it and encourages people to try new things. Inspirational? Absolutely! The only thing we're not wild about is the background music. If you can get past that, this tutorial is one to watch. 07. How to ink in Clip Studio using the GPEN Another great inking tutorial comes from Tim Michael at Draw2Much. In this Clip Studio Paint tutorial, Michael shows you the ins and outs of using the G-pen. Although Michael's walkthrough style isn't the typical one you might expect, this video gives you an insight into how he inks his drawings, and is worthy of a watch. 08. Digital Painting Tutorial OK World of Warcraft fans, this one's for you! In this tutorial, Robert Marzullo teaches you how to digitally paint Orgrim Doomhammer using Clip Studio Paint. If you like this tutorial, Marzullo has a new tutorial, available on Udemy, where he teaches how to work in perspective in Clip Studio Paint. 09. Reference Layers For Coloring More of a quick tip than a long-form tutorial, Matt Chee takes you through the process of using reference layers for colouring. But don't stop with that one. Chee has a large collection of tips and tricks to help you work smarter in Clip Studio Paint. Check 'em out. 10. Creating and Using Custom Brushes Custom brushes are a handy feature in Clip Studio Full disclaimer: I'm an official Smith Micro Influencer, and this is one of my own Clip Studio Paint tutorials. In this written tutorial, I show you how to create and use your own custom brushes in Clip Studio Paint. If video is more your style, this tutorial is also available at DayOfTheIndie.com in video format. 11. Smith Micro Graphics Of course, no Clip Studio Tutorial List would be complete without a mention of the Smith Micro Graphics tutorials. It has a lot of great resources, but if you're looking for something specific, check out the ones from Doug Hills, like the video above. You won't be disappointed. Read more: The ultimate Christmas gift guide for freelancers 8 inspiring digital art portfolios and why they work 19 best iPad art apps for painting and sketching View the full article

Clip Studio Paint is a digital painting app specifically aimed at people creating comics or manga art – although it's great for any kind of digital art. We wonder if more people aren't using it because they don't know about it, or because they're not sure how to use it. Either way, that's about to change. In this round-up, we'll share some of the best Clip Studio Paint tutorials, and where you can find them. We'll kick off the list with some general, all-around Clip Studio Paint tutorials to help get you up to speed (numbers 01-05), then once you have a solid foundation, we'll move on to some more specific tutorials that will help you out (06-11). Hopefully we'll see a lot more tutorials as people realise how powerful this software really is, and what can be done with it. 01. Reuben Lara Reuben Lara is a freelance artist and illustrator, offering mainly Clip Studio Paint tutorials. He offers both paid and free tutorials for beginner-to-advanced artists and Clip Studio Paint users. Lara speaks clearly, his tutorials are easy to follow, and they're jam-packed with lots of useful information. You can find out more about Lara on his website, and you can watch more of his free videos on his YouTube channel. 02. Flyland Designs We've chosen Brian Allen at Flyland Designs for this list because he offers some of the most fantastic tutorials – and not just because he loves zombies. Allen's tutorials take you through the process of sketching, inking, and colouring in Clip Studio Paint. He also shares his tips and techniques along the way, as well as his Clip Studio Resources, like brushes, tools, and templates. Want to learn more about Allen? Check out his interview on Roundabout: Creative Chaos. 03. Kendrys Draws Kendrys Diaz, the voice behind Kendrys Draws, offers laser-focused Clip Studio tutorials covering a broad range of topics. Many of his videos show you how to use the 3D tools available in Clip Studio; he also has a heavy focus on manga art. Diaz's presentation style is a bit gruffer and more abrupt than other tutorials on this list, but don't let that put you off – the content is spot on. Note: Diaz has recently published a Character design sketchbook that might be worth a look. 04. David Arroyo David Arroyo is the creator of the webcomic IMMERSION. He's created a series of Clip Studio Paint tutorials, hosted by Astropad, in which he takes you through how to use the tool start to finish. That's right! The whole process. Arroyo's calm speaking voice and clear instructions make his tutorials bookmark-worthy. 05. LearnCSP.com LearnCSP.com is an independent site, owned and operated by Augie De Blieck Jr, who launched the site back in 2016. Ever since, De Blieck has been steadily adding Clip Studio Paint tutorials to this site, with the aim of creating content he wishes had existed when he first started. The website is focused on new Clip Studio Paint users, but it's useful for intermediate and advanced users too. 06. How to ink in Clip Studio Paint Pro In this inking tutorial, Chris Martinez covers the inking tools available to you in Clip Studio Paint, and how he uses them when he's inking his drawings. Although Martinez talks about pens he hasn't used, he's honest about it and encourages people to try new things. Inspirational? Absolutely! The only thing we're not wild about is the background music. If you can get past that, this tutorial is one to watch. 07. How to ink in Clip Studio using the GPEN Another great inking tutorial comes from Tim Michael at Draw2Much. In this Clip Studio Paint tutorial, Michael shows you the ins and outs of using the G-pen. Although Michael's walkthrough style isn't the typical one you might expect, this video gives you an insight into how he inks his drawings, and is worthy of a watch. 08. Digital Painting Tutorial OK World of Warcraft fans, this one's for you! In this tutorial, Robert Marzullo teaches you how to digitally paint Orgrim Doomhammer using Clip Studio Paint. If you like this tutorial, Marzullo has a new tutorial, available on Udemy, where he teaches how to work in perspective in Clip Studio Paint. 09. Reference Layers For Coloring More of a quick tip than a long-form tutorial, Matt Chee takes you through the process of using reference layers for colouring. But don't stop with that one. Chee has a large collection of tips and tricks to help you work smarter in Clip Studio Paint. Check 'em out. 10. Creating and Using Custom Brushes Custom brushes are a handy feature in Clip Studio Full disclaimer: I'm an official Smith Micro Influencer, and this is one of my own Clip Studio Paint tutorials. In this written tutorial, I show you how to create and use your own custom brushes in Clip Studio Paint. If video is more your style, this tutorial is also available at DayOfTheIndie.com in video format. 11. Smith Micro Graphics Of course, no Clip Studio Tutorial List would be complete without a mention of the Smith Micro Graphics tutorials. It has a lot of great resources, but if you're looking for something specific, check out the ones from Doug Hills, like the video above. You won't be disappointed. Read more: The ultimate Christmas gift guide for freelancers 8 inspiring digital art portfolios and why they work 19 best iPad art apps for painting and sketching View the full article

If you've ever got into a conversation about the biggest problems plaguing web and digital product development today, you probably heard someone refer to the 'design-development gap'. At the mention of this, several heads probably nodded sagely, and then you all moved on, content to observe the problem without necessarily resolving it. After all, there's probably an app for that, right? Maybe we just haven't found it yet? In reality, there are several apps for that. And, as with most problems, numerous other possible solutions exist. I'll talk about several of those here, but before we solve the problem, let's make sure we understand it, shall we? What is the design-development gap? Put simply, the 'design-development gap' refers to what's missing in communication between designers and developers during the product development process. The problem proves most daunting in companies where waterfall processes dominate, when a designer simply 'throws the design over the wall', dusts off their hands, and says, 'Well, I'm done with that!' As any vegetarian who's tried to order a burrito sin carne can attest, a lack of a shared language can lead to big problems In such a scenario, the gap leaves developers interpreting the designer's intent on their own. Which leaves plenty of room for off-brand animations, links that go where they shouldn't, and rounded corners that are just a pixel or 50 off the mark. No biggie, right? Sure – as long as you're not the person looking after the bottom line, squinting at the project hours in the quickly fading hope that, if you look at them funny, those numbers will fit the project budget. Of course, the design-development gap doesn't just plague waterfall teams. After all – in the absence of experience and sustained, mutual effort – designers and developers speak different languages. And as any vegetarian who's tried to order a burrito sin carne can attest, a lack of a shared language can lead to some big problems. The problems Of course, the problems that emerge from the lack of an available translator aren't the only things that make the design-development gap problematic. To get more specific, some of the more common issues teams run into include the following. 01. Designers creating 'impossible' designs Anyone who's wrangled a little CSS knows it can't do everything. But designers who don't know the ins and outs of CSS and are looking to push their creative boundaries can easily create designs in Sketch or Photoshop that can't be brought to the web (easily, or at all). For this issue, bridging the design-development gap means ensuring that designers understand the capabilities of CSS enough to avoid designing impossible solutions. 02. Time-consuming documentation Documentation can help – but it is a time-suck One of the most common tools used to bridge the design-development gap is documentation: redlines, spec docs, component diagrams, and so on. Whatever your team calls them, they all amount to documentation, and they mean a significant amount of time is spent working on something no end user will ever directly experience. Of course, that's not to say they don't have values – most digital products can benefit from design, language, and development documentation. But questions of their value aside, redlines and other forms of documentation take a long time to create, and aren't especially fun for anyone. For this issue, bridging the design-development gap means finding faster and easier ways to communicate specifications. 03. Prolonged feedback cycles Feedback is inevitable, even when your designers create with CSS in mind and put together detailed documentation. And it's always valuable. But it can become a drain on resources and significantly impact employee morale when the loops go on too long. Contradictory feedback from one cycle to the next crops up, stakeholders muddy the waters with interpersonal disagreements, and everyone loses sight of the overarching strategy. For this issue, bridging the design-development gap means finding ways to cut out unnecessary feedback loops. How to bridge the gap Now we understand the nature of the design-development gap, and the issues it can introduce to the process, let's talk about solving the problem. There's software designed to help – and for that take a look at my list of 5 tools for bridging the design-development gap. But there are also some so-called 'soft' skills that can help. Because, hey, we can't expect apps to solve all our problems, right? Software can't solve everything While the modern workplace relies on digital tools to tackle most problems, there's often no replacement for good ol' interpersonal skills – especially when the core problem is essentially one of communication. With that in mind, let's take a look at three absolutely free methods for bridging the gap between your design and development teams. 01. Communicate early, often, always Designers and developers working on a project should always be working together. And that means a lot more than commenting on the same GitHub tickets or working from shared Sketch files. Ask how the development team would like you to communicate designs It also, and much more importantly, means talking. So, designers: talk to your devs about how you're tackling your current challenges. Verify that your solution is feasible from a technical standpoint. Have them look at your designs and call out areas where visual elements can't be reproduced. Ask if flowing in real data will break the formatting. Find out what the best way to name your design layers might be – from the people who have to work with them. But most importantly: Ask how the development team would like you to communicate designs, interactions, and so on. Once you understand their preferred formats for communicating specs and changes, you'll instantly be communicating more effectively. 02. Be agile Now, I'm not a process policeman, so I won't tell you that you have to be working in agile manner, or that you need to adopt GV's sprint format. But to my mind, there's one part of the agile methodology every team can borrow. Namely, its emphasis on cross-functional teams – including people with a variety of specialities in the process. That ensures regular and consistent collaboration between design and development, nipping potential problems in the bud. I'd also personally recommend involving your friendly local content strategist or copywriter in your cross-functional team from day one, but that's another story, for another post. 03. Speak each other's language When proponents of the 'designers should code' philosophy speak up, one of their core arguments tends to be that it'll help them better understand what their dev colleagues do, as well as what's feasible for the web. Which I wholeheartedly agree with! However, I'd point out that you don't have to be able to write code to understand what's possible with code. Same goes for design. Simply speaking to your colleagues can solve a lot of problems For example, I'm not much of a visual designer myself – but I voraciously consume anything I can learn about it. And that's got me to a point where I can talk about design principles and best practices with my design colleagues and feel, if not fluent, then at least conversant. I've also worked in the digital design world long enough that I can usually gauge what a dev could do with an interface, and make recommendations on what would be best from a user experience standpoint. Also, not being a practicing coder doesn't stop you from my one stupid-simple trick for gauging feasibility: asking someone. It's crazy how far a simple question will get you. Related articles: Advent calendar delivers daily web design treats 10 Sketch plugins you need to know about The best Christmas gifts for web designers View the full article

It's time to design your festive products, and a greeting card template can help you initiate the creative process nicely. Christmas and greeting cards are passed around during the holiday season in their hundreds and thousands. While many will opt for the standard and often boring array of offerings in the shops, we've compiled a list of inspirational greeting card templates to make yours a little more individual. We love to spoil you with free resources – check out our encyclopedia of free fonts for designers, these 15 free resume templates and our run down of the 32 best free WordPress themes for a start – so add a spark of creativity to your cards this season, with these free festive greeting card templates. 01. Christmas snowflakes A cosy colour scheme and modern style that will suit all tastes Free This vector template looks a bit like a Christmas jumper and can be used as a background or to decorate an email, webpage or printed material. It comes as an Illustrator file and also as an SVG, so will come in useful for many of your wintry designs. 02. Christmas reindeer Ding-a-ling! There's nothing like a mysterious reindeer vibe to add a little gravitas to your Christmas cards Free Handsome Mr Reindeer with his festive bell is well-drawn and will add a cute yet noble presence to your Christmas designs. He comes in AI, EPS, PDF and JPG formats so he'll fit in anywhere. 03. Silver baubles This template's easy to edit in Illustrator if it doesn't have enough balls for youFree This festive design from Vecteezy is described as a Christmas background with balls, and who are we to disagree? It would make a perfect Christmas card design and it's supplied as an .AI file, so you can open it up in Illustrator and tweak it to your own taste. 04. Santa's sleigh These cold, bold vectors would look great as a cardFree Another vector design suitable for fiddling with in Illustrator, this Christmas card design by VectorLady has a lovely festive layout complete with Santa and his reindeer, plus plenty of snowflakes and Christmas trees, all framed by an intricate swirling surround. 05. Abstract Christmas tree Catch the eye of your loved ones with this greeting card templateFree This free greeting card template is perfect for any creative who needs that little extra help when it comes to designing the perfect offering. Coming with bold colours and cute icons, this greeting card template will certainly catch the eye of your loved ones. Plus, it comes ready to use with Adobe InDesign, Illustrator, Microsoft Word, Publisher, Apple Pages, QuarkXPress or CorelDraw. Phew. 06. Retro tree Put your own personal touch on this retro style templateFree This retro styled greeting card template is perfect for those of you that love experimenting in Adobe Illustrator. To alter the image, just download the vector and get playing in the software to put your own personal touch on your greeting card. 07. Blue Christmas It's going to be a blue Christmas with this greeting card templateFree This greeting card template allows for a little more creativity with a simple blue background and a few adorable snowflakes thrown in for good measure. Pop it into Adobe Illustrator and put your own creative flair on the design for a very blue Christmas indeed. 08. Red burst Give yourself a burst of creative inspiration with this red rays templateFree Burst onto your loved ones' mantel pieces with this red ray vector greeting card template. It allows you to customise it just enough to put your own spin on it, while still keeping it super festive. We love the use of negative space with the snowflakes. Related articles: Free Christmas vectors for your festive designs 16 wonderful window display designs 56 best free fonts for designers View the full article

ZBrushCore ($149.95 for a single user licence) is a simplified version of ZBrush that serves as an introduction to digital sculpting. It has some of the key features of ZBrush and it's easy to learn. Here we'll share various workflows for 3D sculpting using ZBrushCore, with an emphasis on particular processes and features that will help you produce professional-looking objects and 3D art. Christmas offer: Save up to 47% on a subscription to ImagineFX DynaMesh is a clever process that removes the technical barriers when sculpting in 3D. There are a few concepts that you might have heard of, such as polygons, geometry or topology, and they generally refer to the structure of a 3D object. Often, when you edit a mesh or an object in 3D, you need to be aware of how the changes you're making affect the structure. DynaMesh takes care of all of these technical aspects, enabling you to focus on sculpting and designing your object. Think of this as working digital clay. You can push, pull, flatten or stretch areas of your model without worrying about the distribution of polygons. If you start sculpting and the mesh becomes distorted, you can run the DynaMesh process to redistribute and create more polygons that will help you describe the shape you're trying to make. 01. Enable DynaMesh A switch filled with orange means that the feature is active [click the arrows icon to enlarge this image] When you first open ZBrushCore, you'll see a sphere that's loaded by default and you can select any of the brushes at the bottom of the UI to start adjusting the mesh in different ways. Click the DynaMesh sub-palette on the right-hand side of the screen to expand it. You'll see the DynaMesh switch is orange, which means that it's turned on. 02. Get the hang of re-DynaMeshing Simply click and drag to deform a sphere in interesting ways [click the arrows icon to enlarge this image] Let's turn Polyframe on so we can see the underlying structure by pressing Shift+F. Go ahead and select the Move brush: you can use the shortcuts from the bottom of the screen or the brush's thumbnail to access the library. Click the sphere and drag to create an interesting shape. The polygons are now getting stretched, but we can hold down Ctrl and click and drag on an empty space to re-DynaMesh. 03. Adjust the DynaMesh resolution Keeping the polygon count low makes it easier to move larger portions of the mesh around [click the arrows icon to enlarge this image] During the blocking stages it's good to keep the amount of polygons very low so that we can perform large proportional changes. You'll notice a few other options under the DynaMesh sub-palette. Select the Resolution slider and reduce the number from 128 to about 32, so the next time you perform a re-DynaMesh action (Ctrl+click drag), ZBrushCore will maintain the shape but with fewer polygons. 04. Polishing the model There's a clear difference between leaving the Polish feature off (left) or on (right) [click the arrows icon to enlarge this image] I increase the resolution slightly (64) and work on some details. However, there are areas that feel a bit 'bumpy'. You can use the Smooth brush (holding the Shift key) to even out these areas or simply enable the Polish switch from the DynaMesh sub-palette. Once Polish is turned on, the re-DynaMesh process will also perform a polishing operation on the model. 05. Apply blur Before and after applying the DynaMesh process with both Smooth and Polish enabled [click the arrows icon to enlarge this image] I add a few more details and definition using the ClayBuildup brush. At this point we probably need more resolution to work on more details, so I increase the Resolution. The Polish switch defines the planes of the face after DynaMeshing, but you can also use the Blur slider to smooth all major details on the model: high values produce a smoother surface, while a value of 0 will respect the smaller details. This article was originally published in issue 152 of ImagineFX, the world's best-selling magazine for digital artists – packed with workshops and interviews with fantasy and sci-fi artists, plus must-have kit reviews. Buy issue 152 here or subscribe to ImagineFX here. Special Christmas offer: Save up to 47% on a subscription to ImagineFX for you or a friend for Christmas. It's a limited offer, so move quickly... Related articles: Sculpt realistic anatomy in ZBrush ZBrush tutorials: 30 ways to sculpt and paint in 3D The best digital art tools of 2017 View the full article

You're reading What is Conversational UI, and Why It’s Important, originally posted on Designmodo. If you've enjoyed this post, be sure to follow on Twitter, Facebook, Google+! Conversational UI is simply a chatbot experience that processes language in a natural way as if you were texting or speaking with another human being. A typical experience with technology, this included computers, websites and mobile apps, is conducted in a way that requires people to click on different icons or links in order to […] View the full article

2017 has been a busy year for illustration tools, and it seems that companies are trying harder than ever to make the lives of illustrators easier. But with so many new goodies coming onto the market all the time, it can be difficult to keep up. In this post, then, we bring you our favourite new and newly updated tools for illustration released in 2017 so far. Read on to discover how they could help you become more productive and creative in 2018 and beyond. 01. Kyle’s Brushes More than 1,000 brushes from Kyle Brush are now available free to Creative Cloud subscribers There was one set of Photoshop brushes that everyone’s been talking about this year: those from Kyle T. Webster. That’s because he’s partnered with Adobe to make over 1,000 brushes available free to Creative Cloud subscribers. You can access them in Photoshop in the Libraries panel (select the 'Kyle Brushes' library). Harry Sussams, a freelance illustrator living in Bristol, is a big fan. “Kyle’s Brushes has changed my digital work,” he says. “There is a wide range of different brushes for Photoshop out there, but I think that his sets are some of the best. “As I really enjoy the combination of traditionally made lines and textures with digital colouring, they’re a fantastic tool for mixing the two. The quality and variety of them are great for expert digital artists, as well as illustrators who like hand-made textures, but want to start creating digital work.” 02. Wacom tablets Wacom continues to be the number one tablet choice for digital illustrators In 2017, we’ve seen more and more graphics tablets aimed at digital illustrators, and the tech is improving all the time. But while there’s a lot of great brands out there, what we’re hearing from illustrators time and time again is their love for Wacoms. “The Cintiq 13HD is my latest acquisition and it’s brilliant,” enthuses Jane Faraar, a freelance illustrator and designer based in Cheltenham. “I was recommended it by an illustrator on a creative Facebook group I’m in, when I asked about the best hardware to draw straight on to. “It’s like a Wacom with a pen, only it has a screen so rather than drawing onto the pad and looking up at the screen I can draw onto the screen,” she explains. “It’s A4 size, light and on a long lead so it can be moved about like a real page to optimise curves, etc, or even brought onto my lap and taken away from the desk. “With Photoshop CC’s lovely range of brushes and its options to adjust the speed of the stroke, it works a dream,” she concludes. “I can’t say it’s as good as pen and paper but it’s the closest I've come and I will often use it as an alternative to drawing and scanning.” This year’s new releases by Wacom include the Cintiq Pro 13 and 16-inch tablets and the Wacom Mobile Studio, both of which pushed functionality and features forward significantly. Check out the best Wacom tablet deals for Christmas 2017 here. 03. Adobe Illustrator CC 22.0 Access your colour themes directly within Illustrator CC via the new Color Themes panel Still the industry standard for creating illustration digitally, Adobe’s vector editor got a big update this April in celebration of its 30th anniversary. And the big news is that you no longer need to switch to Photoshop to crop your images; a new Image Crop tool lets you do it directly in Illustrator. Now, when an image is placed into a document, you’ll see a crop option that will enable you to adjust simple crop handles. Cropped images discard the excess parts of the image, thus reducing the file size and improving performance of files. The 2017 version of Illustrator CC also came with a new Colour Themes Panel, which lets you create, save and retrieve colour themes across the different Adobe apps. And that’s not all. At Adobe Max in October, the company brought out another new version of Illustrator, 22.0, with the headline feature being a new Puppet Warp tool. Replicating the same tool in Photoshop but for vectors, this lets you place pins on objects and pull them around to warp them. You can find a summary of all the new features in Illustrator 22.0 here. 04. Affinity Photo for iPad Affinity Photo is not just a photo editing tool, but good for illustration too; and now there’s a full version on the iPad If you’re used to illustrating in Photoshop, but are tiring of Adobe’s subscription model, there was a new reason to switch to high-end alternative Affinity Photo this year: the release of a full featured iPad version. Yes, you read that right: this is not a basic version of the tool, but an all-singing, all-dancing equivalent for Apple’s tablet: something Photoshop is unable to offer at the moment. To learn what it’s like using it in practice, check out our tutorial: Get drawing with Affinity Photo. 05. Corel Painter 2018 Corel Painter now lets you slap on digital paint in thick layers, just like in real life Digital art tool Corel Painter came up with a big new update this year. And the big news with the 2018 release was Thick Paint, which aims to replicate the feel of traditional, physical paint on a digital canvas. Special new digital brushes and palette knives enable you to apply digital paint in layers, which means you can pull, push, scrape and build it up with your stylus just like with real paint (except without all the mess). The 2018 version also boasts the Texture Synthesis tool, which enables you to select a particular area of an image and automatically generate a larger image based on its texture. Discover the new features in Corel Painter 2018 here. 06. CorelDRAW 2017 The new version of CorelDRAW uses AI to make tablet drawing more natural CorelDRAW is a popular vector illustration and graphics tool for the Windows platform. Released in April, the 2017 version offered a number of updates, but the one that grabbed all the headlines was the LiveSketch vector tool, which offers nothing less than artificial intelligence-guided sketching. The idea behind the new feature is to make drawing directly on a tablet screen with a stylus feel more natural. LiveSketch uses AI and machine-learning technology to intelligently interpret your hand-drawn strokes, adjust them and combine them with existing vector curves for results that better match your intentions. The idea, then, is you will end up with illustration that looks more like what you would have produced using a physical pen and paper. You can read our full review of the latest version of CorelDRAW here. 07. ArtRage 5 ArtRage has been beefed up in the latest updateArtRage is a popular digital painting and drawing tool from Ambient Design Ltd for both desktop and mobile devices. Originally launched as a hobbyist tool, it’s become increasingly professional over the years. And that trend has continued with the release of ArtRage 5 for Windows and macOS this February. Along with an entirely new (optional) interface, ArtRage 5 comes with several major new editing and painting tools, including a custom brush designer, perspective, guides and a more realistic Pencil tool. It also includes additional image-editing effects that enable you to add highlights, drop shadows, emboss, and liquify effects to a layer. 08. Moleskine Smart Writing Set The Moleskine Smart Writing Set makes it easier to digitise your sketches across multiple devices All artists and illustrators love their Moleskines. So in recent years, the Italian notebook guru has been trying to find new ways for paper and pixels to work together. And its latest release ties the two together like never before. The Moleskine Smart Writing Set features a Paper Tablet, a special Moleskine sketchbook that works in tandem with the Pen+, a digitally enabled pen that recognises the notebook and tracks the user's movement. The Pen+ works together with an app, so that any notes, sketches or drawings you make on paper can be instantly digitised, for editing or sharing with others. If that all sounds overly complicated, it really isn’t. You can see how it all works in practice in this video. 09. Inkscape 0.92 The new version of Inkscape comes with mesh gradients and new path effectsInkscape is a free and open-source tool for creating vector graphics on Windows, Mac and Linux. While this community-driven software lacks many of the features of paid-for vector editors, it’s still pretty powerful, and the latest version, which arrived in January, came with a flurry of new features. These include mesh gradients, improved SVG2 and CSS3 support, new path effects, interactive smoothing for the Pencil tool and a new Object dialog for directly managing all drawing elements. 10. Autodesk SketchBook 8.4 The latest version of SketchBook Pro is optimised for Surface DialSketchBook Pro is a drawing application aimed at professional artists and technical illustrators for Windows, Mac, iOS and Android. In March, Autodesk launched a new version of the software for Windows 10, updated to take advantage of Microsoft’s Surface Studio and Surface Dial (shown above). For example, you can now zoom in and out of your canvas using the Surface Dial, as well as undo and redo with a quick twist of the Dial. You can learn about the update in this blog post. Related articles: 5 free apps that can boost your creativity 7 biggest illustration trends of 2017 14 free resources to improve your illustration skills View the full article

Those in the 3D design and VFX industry will be used to rendering eating big chunks of their days. But did you know that specialised rendering equipment can significantly reduce render times, leaving you free to get on with improving your 3D designs? Workstation Specialists' Intel Dual Xeon rendering nodes – which are available in a rackmount model or a space-saving deskside version – are designed to do just that. What's more, readers who register their interest before the end of December 2017 can save up to £2,000 on their system. Read on to find out more. Technical specs Intel's specially engineered dual Xeon processor is key to how these nodes work – its multiple cores are designed to dramatically speed up rendering. If you need further convincing, you can see just how much time you could save with this render ROI calculator. Workstation Specialists started life as a software house, and prides itself on knowing what professional creatives need. It recognises that finding the right rendering system for you is a tricky process, which is why it has a pre-sales consultancy team to help find the right setup for your needs. These nodes don't just come off a production line either – experienced engineers will custom build and test your system, as well as guiding you though render node setup and helping resolve any issues that might arise. Rackmount node The RS-R4220-U1 Rackmount twin-node model comes with Intel's specialist Dual Xeon processors, which means it's basically two systems in one – you get two lots of two CPU nodes in a 1u chassis. As each node is completely independent, if one fails you don't need to worry as the other will be unaffected. It's compatible with all the common render management utilities, including Backburner, Qube, AFANASY and RenderPal. You can manage the node remotely, and over time this option is far cheaper than using online cloud rendering services. Deskside node For freelance 3D designers or those who are short on studio space, there's also a deskside variety. This bit of kit offers the same speedier rendering times, but fits into a small unit that can sit on top of your workstation, next to your desk or anywhere on your network – no need for a server room, and no messing around with air con units or dedicated racks. The RS-D2220 Deskside Render Node comes as a personal Intel Dual Xeon Render Node and boasts quiet operation, so there's no need to worry about being disturbed by noisy processing. Save £2,000 To express your interest in these magical machines (or if you have any questions), visit Workstation Specialists' dedicated enquiry page. If you register your interest before the end of the year (31 Dec 2017) you could also save up to a whopping £2,000 on their render nodes – all you have to do is fill out the short form. View the full article

An Android vulnerability called Janus allows attackers to inject malicious code into signed Android apps. View the full article

https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2017/12/08/phishing-embraces-https-hoping-youll-check-for-the-padlock/ … View the full article

You may be surprised how much a walk around your local high street or shopping mall could inspire you for your next project or design portfolio entry. With a good design eye, clothes, shoes, CDs, games and even food can be combined to create a stunning window display. Originally set up to entice shoppers through the door, the art of window display has come a long way in the past few years. We've searched the world's shopping streets to bring you the very best examples of window display design from the very best creative directors, graphic designers and artists across the world. Enjoy! 01. Tiffany & Co. Tiffany & Co's 2017 Christmas window displays feature metallic artists' mannequins like this, and our main image Every year, flagship shop in New York gets a magical Christmas makeover. Past window displays have featured frosted cityscapes and opulent interiors, and this year's designs are equally delightful. The 2017 window displays are a vision in Tiffany Blue and silver, and feature blinged-up artists' models whittling down diamonds, fishing for gems, or pushing stacks of jewellery boxes through the snow. 02. Harvey Nichols Harvey Nichols has opted for all-out glam in its Christmas 2017 windows Forget subtlety – for its 2017 Christmas window display, Harvey Nichols has gone for all out disco glam. The scheme is based around stars, neon lights and plenty of glitter (each of the mannequins has a face-full of the stuff). To create this traffic-stopping extravaganza, the store in Knightsbridge, London, used 5,370m (17,618 ft) of LED strip lights, 5101 baubles, neon balls and stars, over 2,000m (6562 ft) of sparkly vinyl, 3555 vinyl stars, and 382 rotating mirror balls. Phew. 02. Davit Muradyan for LaGalleria LaGalleria is an Armenian luxury boutique LaGalleria is a boutique in the heart of Yerevan, Armenia, and to publicise its Spring-Summer 2017 collection, retail marketing specialist Davit Muradyan created a set of stunning jungle-themed window displays. This isn't your average jungle gear Showcasing hot new arrivals from luxury brands including Fendi, Valentino and Saint Laurent Paris, Muradyan artfully arranged the display so that the season's hot gear would stand out against a dense background of foliage. 03. Elemental for Ermenegildo Zegna Elemental got to take over all 23 of Harrods' window displaysDesigning, producing and installing the full set of 23 windows at Harrods might seem like a tall order, but that's what Elemental pulled off for the launch of Ermenegildo Zegna's Couture Collection by Stefano Pilati. The displays for Ermenegildo Zegna used every visual trick in the bookUsing an epic film created by Pilati for its Milan catwalk show as reference, Elemental's designs incorporated optical illusions, soundscapes, animated lighting effects and some incredible technology, including an enlarged view of a Zegna shoe that passers-by could manipulate through their own body movements, via infrared sensors. 04. Kate Spade and eBay Residents of NYC weren't going to miss this striking yellow window display from Kate Spade Designer brand Kate Spade teamed up with online auction site eBay to offer a unique shopping experience – bringing a whole new meaning to the phrase 'window shopping'. The striking yellow window display, located in Manhattan, not only showcased the items on offer beautifully, the interactive display also allowed consumers to shop the store window from their smartphones. 05. Artem for Selfridges Artem created a stunning mechanical model of the solar system for Selfridges' displayThis isn't the first time the quintessentially British department store will appear on this list, and for good reason. For Christmas 2015, Selfridges got the edge on the competition by bringing in SFX company Artem to create a stunning mechanical model of the solar system, which formed the centrepiece of a cosmos-themed window display. The 2.8m gold and chrome model rotated all day, every day until the New Year, with each of the planets orbiting independently. Read more in our news post from the time here. 06. Okamoto Studio for Barney's Shintaro Okamoto, founder of Okamoto Studio, demonstrates his mastery of the art during a live performance in “The Ice Carvers”Ice sculptures transformed this window display of New York department store Barney's – Okamoto's own 'studio away from studio'. The world-renowned ice carving collective got to work carving intricate ice sculptures as shoppers watched on in awe, right next to the Ice Castles installation – a large-scale, immersive ice formation set inside the Madison Avenue window, which was transformed into a freezer just for the festive season. 07. Kristjana S Williams for Fortnum and Mason Williams' illustrations are brought to 3D life in the Fortnum and Mason displaysIllustrator Kristjana S Williams began working with luxury London department store Fortnum and Mason on its Christmas packaging, before being commissioned to apply her richly imaginative style to the shop's windows, too. The 3D designs featured no fewer than 300 owls, roosters and macaws adorned with gems, headdresses and crowns. 08. Tiffany & Co: The Great Gatsby These opulent windows show off jewellery from The Great Gatsby Another entry from Tiffany & Co is this opulent display in celebration of the release of Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby in 2013. The displays were designed in collaboration with the film's costume and production designer Catherine Martin, who has scooped Academy Awards for her work. Champagne glasses, hazy lighting, glass bubbles and plenty of jewels create a sumptuous 1920s vision – as well as showcasing jewellery pieces designed exclusively for the movie. See more of these gorgeous displays on Tiffany & Co's Facebook page, or take a look at the original sketches here. 09. Tequila Patrón for Selfridges The window display design was inspired by Bruce Nauman "It takes 60 hands to make one bottle of the world's finest ultra premium tequila," reads the tagline on this inspiring window display design. Designed by Harlequin, the Patrón Selfridges window focused on the 60 individual hands that make one bottle of Tequila Patrón. The concept for the window was inspired by Artist Bruce Nauman’s show in 1996 entitled 15 pairs of Hands. 10. Zim & Zou for Hermes Duo Zim & Zou created a charming fox den out of paperZim & Zou are one of the forerunners in the medium of paper art, producing incredible masterpieces based on animals, foods, clothing and more. Everything in the window display was crafted by handThe duo showed off their skills with an incredible window display design for French boutique Hermes. Only using paper and leather, they created a stunningly intricate fox den filled with trinkets, crockery and clothes. Read more in our news post about the project. 11. Kyle Bean for Diesel Leading designer Kyle Bean applied his skills to window display, with stunning resultsAfter working with the likes of Wallpaper*, Gucci, Casio, and Wired, designer Kyle Bean has turned his hand to window displays. This scene was created for Diesel's flagship store in London and features miniature models, vines and an impressive temple. Bean specialises in tactile artworks12. StoreyStudio for Hermes StoreyStudio's displays were inspired by the rock stacking practice 'gravity glue' StoreyStudio is a London-based set designer and art direction studio that has built up a reputation for exquisite window display designs, and worked with the likes of Topshop, Harvey Nichols, and Victoria Beckham. In Summer 2016, the studio created a series of whimsical landscapes to sit in Hermes' shop windows. The designs feature precariously balanced rocks, plants and figures, and were intended to 'explore the fragility and fine balance found in nature'. 13. Emily Forgot for Vertu Forgot's window display promotes Vertu's concierge serviceEmily Forgot is the alias of London-based graphic artist Emily Alston. Since graduating from Liverpool school of Art & Design in 2004 she has amassed a diverse range of international clients. This stunning window display appeared in Harrods' window, and was designed to highlight the concierge service offered by Vertu Boutique – a luxury mobile phone manufacturer. Art direction was taken care of by Kristina Eriksen. 14. StudioXAG for Christian Louboutin A 'lost in space' theme appeared in Louboutin stores in summer 2016 To launch its Spring 2017 collection, Christian Louboutin wanted a space age theme, and StudioXAG obliged. Christian Louboutin boutiques across the world were adorned with glittering moon rock, jewel-toned cabochon lights, star-filled backdrops and glamorous astronauts. In the window of the Paris flagship store, a UFO pod was blown up to fill the entire window, with the new collection hovering between chrome panels. 15. Becky Sloan for Selfridges Bright Young Things is a pioneering project by Selfridges that seeks out and champions the most exciting young creators in the UK. Whether it's fashion, graphic design, illustration or food, Selfridges gives young adults the chance to show off their skills on a yearly basis. This year, artist and popmaker Becky Sloan created this cute, character-based window display for one of Selfridges' stores in London. With one million people walking past the famous windows every week, the displays provide an incredible launchpad for these fledgling designers to showcase their creations to the public. 16. Breakfast for TNT To promote TNT's crime-solving show Perception, design firm Breakfast revived a sign-making technique of yesteryear to create an anagram-solving experience on the streets of New York. Made up of over 40,000 physical dots spinning from black to white at 15 times faster than originally designed to, the screen reflects back the image of anyone walking by. This is a window display unlike any other. Read more: The best boozy Christmas ad campaigns 10 ingenious bus wraps that will make you look twice 40 must-see examples of billboard advertising View the full article

Apple said it has fixed an undisclosed vulnerability in its HomeKit framework that could have allowed unauthorized remote control of HomeKit devices such as smart locks and connected garage door openers. View the full article

Inclusive design is about putting people first. It’s about designing for the needs of people with permanent, temporary, situational or changing disabilities, placing an emphasis on how disabled users might experience content. Christmas offer: Save up to 47% on a subscription to net The Inclusive Design Principles are a set of seven considerations to help inform design thinking. They are not a set of ‘how tos’ but a framework that can be used alongside established accessibility guidelines to take products beyond compliance – to ensure all users can perceive, operate and understand content regardless of the hardware or software used to access a website or application. These Principles remind us to put people, not their disability, first. We are not designing for stereotypes of ‘screen reader users ’, ‘voice input users’ or ‘keyboard users’ but for parents, colleagues, friends, children, students, teachers – you name it. Products should adhere to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines so that the output – code, styling and behaviour – is both accessible and compliant. It’s a technology-led approach to complex human experiences that places a greater emphasis on code over design, output over the final outcome and compliance over experience. Disabled people access the web at home, in the office, while travelling, while under pressure, passing the time, or for the first time, or for the hundredth time. All of this has a big impact on how we interact with and utilise the web, regardless of disability. So, let’s look at what the principles are, with examples of how they can be applied to make products both accessible and usable for disabled people. Provide comparable experience Subtitles on BBC iPlayer shown on iOS use colour coding for different speakers, making content easier to read Ensure your interface provides a comparable experience for all, so people can accomplish tasks in a way that suits their needs without undermining the quality of the content. This principle challenges us to really try to understand what the experience is for someone with a disability when using your product – not how accessible or compliant it is, but if it’s easy, usable and engaging rather than time-consuming, frustrating or confusing. You may wonder why we use ‘comparable’ rather than ‘equivalent’. We questioned whether it was possible to provide an equivalent, like-for-like, experience for someone who cannot see or hear. Consider alternative formats such as alt text, Audio Description and subtitles (Closed Captions in the USA). Is hearing alt text in place of seeing a cartoon a like-for-like experience? Is listening to an Audio Described horror movie ever going to be an equivalent to seeing the expressions on characters faces? Are subtitles ever going to be able to convey that sense of dread in a horror movie so expertly created by ominous music in the build-up to a gory climax? Often an equivalent experience is rooted in well-crafted editorial for alternatives. When creating the logo for the Inclusive Design Principles we decided to give it alt text rather than consider the image decorative and hide it from people who use screen readers. If the logo is there to provide the visual look and feel, why shouldn’t it provide the ‘audible’ look and feel? The Inclusive Design Principles logo has the alt text of “Three hot air balloons hang together in a calm, sunny sky” As Léonie Watson said: “I used to have sight so I appreciate descriptive alt text on decorative images because it evokes memories of things in my mind.” We cannot assume that one disabled person’s experience is everyone’s. For this we have user research and usability testing – two key areas where the Inclusive Design Principles can be included and referenced in day-to-day project work. To be accessible to deaf people, audio in video must be subtitled and synchronised. If you did just those two things you would be meeting this WCAG requirement for captioning: 1.2.2 Captions (Pre-recorded): Captions are provided for all pre-recorded audio content in synchronised media, except when the media is a media alternative for text and is clearly labelled as such. (Level A)While content complying with the WCAG checkpoint is accessible, is it usable for people who are deaf or hard of hearing? The BBC Subtitle Guidelines provides numerous guidelines around editorial and visual presentation for subtitles such as text size, style, positioning and colour coding for different speakers. All of these make subtitles easier to read and the editorial more comparable to the original experience. To pick just one example, colour coding different speakers makes following dialogue and understanding who said what much clearer. Just because an exact equivalent experience can’t be provided, doesn’t mean you don’t aim for equivalence. This is a good example where accessibility is a champion of creativity and innovation rather than the enemy. Consider the situation Facebook on mobile automatically shows subtitles on the assumption that the majority won’t be able to hear content when out and about People use your interface in different situations. Make sure your interface delivers a valuable experience to people regardless of their circumstances. We need to consider how disability impacts an individual’s situation as well as how people's situation might impact usability. For example, mobile is disabling due to small screens, glare from the sun and small fonts, noise and so on. Our dexterity can be reduced due to rain on the screen, or using devices one handed. Our hearing is reduced due to noisy environments and no headphones. To accommodate a lack of hearing due to the situation an individual is in, content providers are now producing more subtitled video. Facebook automatically shows subtitles on the assumption that most users will not have sound available. This is a good example of how meeting the needs of disabled people solves issues around situational disability for all. Be consistent Use familiar conventions and apply them consistently. This principle cuts across design, editorial, hierarchy, structure, functionality and behaviour. As a result, it’s the principle most often referenced when I am reviewing designs and proposed functionality for accessibility. Heydon Pickering categorises consistency into two broad groups: Internal consistency - ensuring an interface is consistent within itself. For example, via an accessible pattern library. Cultural consistency - ensuring an interface is consistent with the external design patterns across the web. The Web Accessibility Initiative Accessible Rich Internet Applications Authoring Practices Guide (WAI ARIA APG) describes approaches to making widgets, navigation and behaviours accessible using WAI-ARIA roles, states and properties. The APG is primarily aimed at developers, however, designers should have a level of familiarity with this document in order to design and document features that are consistent with both internal and external design patterns. This ensures that the keyboard behaviour for widgets, such as a tab panel, behaves consistently with tab panels internal and external to the website. This is important so that people with a screen reader, keyboard or other non-mouse input device don’t have to work out how to use different tab panels. Editorial consistency for text alternatives is a crucial way of supporting people who use screen readers, such as people who are blind, low vision or have reading or cognitive impairments. If you have a website, iOS and Android app using the same editorial for linked images, buttons and controls, it has the dual effect of making the website and app sound more familiar as well as providing audio branding much in the same way that visual design does. Give control YouTube on iOS search uses autocomplete and voice search, which supports people who struggle with inputting text Ensure people are in control. People should be able to access and interact with content in their preferred way. Control is about functionality. It’s about avoiding content changes that have not been initiated by the user unless there is an obvious way to control it. It’s also about not taking away platform settings that give the user control over content. Seemingly simple things such as fixed screen orientation on a mobile device can prevent access. Fixed orientation is not covered by WCAG 2.0, and yet not supporting changes in orientation renders content completely inaccessible for someone in a wheelchair with no upper body movement who has a tablet fixed in portrait mode on the front of their chair. This is a good example of where WCAG, which was written before mobile took off, overlooks key features on mobile that can be broken by design. The Mobile Accessibility Taskforce have proposed this for inclusion in WCAG 2.1: 3.4.1 Orientation: Orientation of the content is not locked to landscape or portrait, except where orientation is essential.You can see more details on Mobile Accessibility WCAG Extension. Auto playing video is another example of loss of control. Screen reader audio becomes drowned out by the video audio. People using screen magnification software may not see the video if it’s located off screen. People who are deaf may miss the opening subtitles. However, it’s wrong to assume all blind, low vision and deaf people will not want auto playing video. This is where considering the situation in which a user is consuming content has an impact. When I worked on BBC iPlayer blind screen reader users requested auto playing content for catch up TV. They were frequent iPlayer users who understood the site and what to expect. They wanted to activate a link to a programme and watch it. They didn’t want to open the page, navigate to the media player, and find the play button. To balance the conflicting needs of screen reader users who are frequent iPlayer users with the needs of first-time users who may not want auto play, the solution is to provide a setting to opt in and out of auto play. This means the content is both accessible and a better user experience for disabled users. Offer choice The iOS Mail app supports swipe to delete as well as tap to delete, therefore supporting people with different dexterity needs Consider providing different ways for people to complete tasks, especially those that are complex or non-standard. While not limited to features, this principle has a huge impact on what features are provided and how they are implemented. As we know one size does not fit all, even when highly accessible. The iOS Mail app is built with choice in mind. Via the inbox, you can either swipe to flag, delete or perform more actions. Alternatively you can tap an email to open it and reach the same functionality. The impact for end users is significant. Some people with dexterity issues find swiping difficult, others with shaking hands may find tapping buttons accurately problematic. Equally, while swipe to delete is a standard iOS function, there is no visual affordance. This means people who are not familiar with the feature may miss it entirely if no alternative is provided. When layouts are complex, giving the user control over the page can help. People with reading or learning difficulties might find a grid layout with large images easier to negotiate than a listings page with more text. When designing screens with listings consider adding a button to switch between a grid and list layout as well as filters to remove unwanted results. Prioritise content Help users focus on core tasks, features and information by prioritising them within the content and layout. Prioritising content is about editorial, layout and presentation. As a disabled user, it’s likely you must work harder to understand the landscape of a screen and what the editorial is telling you. This impacts us all, but if key content is not prioritised pages can become verbose, diluting what people with screen readers need to hear or people with learning difficulties can read. It’s also a significant overhead for people with alternative input devices such as speech, head or foot switches or sip and puff to navigate to content when it’s low down in the content order. Extraneous content such as banner ads, especially video, are an inconvenience for all users, but they can stop people with cognitive or learning difficulties going any further. They are too distracting and easily confused with the main content, which prevents people getting to the content they want. People with cognitive or learning impairments who are more familiar with the tools available in the browser often zoom into content so they can minimise the amount of secondary information they are otherwise forced to see. Zooming content can make the issue worse for some, however. The Channel 5 website has a banner ad at the top of the page followed by navigation underneath and an image. When the page is not zoomed the only priority content you see is the navigation, which is not much. When zoomed 300% only a small portion of the banner ad is visible. This makes locating priority content particularly challenging if you are low vision or use zoom due to cognitive or learning impairments. Editorial for links, headings and paragraphs should also prioritise primary content at the start. Add value Nationwide Building Society supports Touch ID, which helps people who are blind, low vision or have cognitive or learning disabilities Consider the value of features and how they improve the experience for different users. Adding value is where you can get creative. This is less about the content and functionality of your product and more about utilising the brilliance of features available in the platform. Everyday tasks such as logging in and filling out forms can be a real struggle. Autocomplete is hugely beneficial if you have dexterity issues, struggle with a keyboard, or use an alternative input device such as voice. It also helps people with learning or cognitive disabilities as well as non-native English speakers. But why stop there? Consider adding support for voice search – this also supports the principle of providing choice. Inputting passwords is particularly difficult as they require text input but cannot be seen. James Williamson, a web design and development author who has Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) explains the problem he and many other users will face when trying to access certain data. “Whether I’m using voice dictation or a single finger on my keyboard, precise input is extremely difficult. This difficulty is increased when you introduce special characters and many of the requirements found in passwords. Not being able to see what I’ve input equates to a high degree of failure when entering passwords.” Including the ‘show password’ feature allows people to check their entry before continuing, therefore minimising mistakes that can take time to correct, adding a frustrating delay to what should be a straightforward process. Offering Touch ID as well as the ‘show password’ feature provides further choice and an alternative for those who have the dexterity to use it. We need to shift our thinking away from ‘making things accessible’ to enabling people by design. Integrating the Inclusive Design Principles early on in projects can help teams to better understand who will be using their products and how. Referencing the principles when writing personas, user stories, building prototypes and in user research will all help teams to build better features that will be able to properly support all disabled audiences. This article originally appeared in issue 297 of net, the magazine for professional web designers and developers – offering the latest new web trends, technologies and techniques. Buy net issue 297 here or subscribe to net here. Special Christmas offer: Save up to 47% on a subscription to net for you or a friend for Christmas. It's a limited offer, so move quickly... Related articles: Get started with web accessibility How accessible are your designs? Léonie Watson on making accessibility integral to web design process View the full article

A new ice cream shop in Montclair, New Jersey, has sparked a beef with local residents thanks to its sexualised cow logo. The controversial logo (above) features a coquettish cartoon cow with blonde braids and a saucy beret tucking into an ice-cream. However it's the cow's unmissable augmented ass that has caused offence among townspeople. This might seem like a moment of marketing madness, however the logo starts to make a lot more sense when you learn that the shop is called Dairy Air Ice Cream. Not that this justifies that design, but at least you can trace the shop's thought process – although it does make us wonder if the owners came up the pun first then tried to build an entire business plan around it. What's particularly disturbing about the logo is that the rear end appears to be humanised. While that old advertising adage of 'sex sells' probably isn't going anywhere any time soon, surely this raunchy reverse cow centaur has crossed a line? The internet certainly seems to think so. Fellow local business owner Amy Tingle took to Facebook to express her outrage in a now-private open letter to Dairy Air Ice Cream. “It is offensive and sickening," she writes. "A hyper-sexualized, obviously female cow with her ass upended and poking through a circle, tail raised up, waiting for what? I’m not sure, but I do know that I am repulsed and offended. This kind of marketing scheme is the reason we currently have an [alleged] sexual predator in the White House.” The shop's external logo doesn't feature the sexualised cow Strangely, the exterior of Dairy Air Ice Cream features a different logo that doesn't hint at the debauchery within. Instead it opts for a tasteful and entirely un-suggestive ice cream sandwich. Ice cream shops are traditionally family-friendly establishments, so to lure customers in with what looks like an ordinary logo only to turn around and surprise them with curvaceous cattle once they're through the door only serves to compound the issue. This isn't the only instance of logo designers sexualising cows. Nestlé's range of low fat ice creams, Skinny Cow, uses a logo of a slender cow draped over the brand name and wrapped in a tape measure. Complete with eyelashes and lipstick applied – with amazing precision, considering she has hooves instead of hands – the Skinny Cow mascot looks like she's about to ask you to draw her like one of your French girls. Where to begin? The seduction continues when you get to the Skinny Cow product overview: "Creamy deliciousness comes in a host of Skinny forms, from luscious sandwiches and cones to decadent ice cream candy bars and truffle bars. You’ll find happiness in every bite." Blimey. We dread to think what the Dairy Air Ice Cream mission statement promises. At the prudish end of the flirtatious cow logo spectrum is Bel's Laughing Cow. This bubbly bovine features only the mildest of feminine eyelashes, although she does wear earrings of creamy cheese so there's probably more going on with this one than meets the eye. And the less said about her provocative red colour scheme the better. As for Dairy Air Ice Cream, it's gone the way of other brands that have been publicly shamed in that it's shut down its social media platforms and issued an apology. The shop's manager, Natalie DeRose, said in a statement issued on Facebook: "We have heard the complaints. We take them very seriously and we are acting to change the cow to be more fun and less sexy. Our goal was always fun and not sexy.” Dairy Air Ice Cream will also be open for community meetings for residents who want to discuss the logo further. Related articles: Eurovision reveals new nautical logos The top 10 big-brand logos Formula 1 ditches its negative space logo View the full article

Christmas is getting alarmingly close now, so if you've still not started that festive project, you'd better get a move on. To help you out with your festive projects we've scoured the web for some free design resources – namely, Xmas vector shapes. These designs are perfect for creating seasonal patterns, backgrounds and much more (although if you'd like to create your own designs then check out our collection of vector art tutorials). 01. Cartoon snow caps Make anything instantly festive by sticking some snow on top of it If you want a simple way to make absolutely any image look incredibly Christmassy, all you need to do is cover everything in snow. And with this useful download of ready-made snow caps, you don't even need to draw it yourself; just pick out what you need and paste it in. 02. Retro Christmas backgrounds This retro set is ideal for a more traditional Christmas For more traditional festive creations, this pack of 21 retro Christmas backgrounds should sort you right out. It's a treasure trove of seasonal goodies, complete with Santa, Christmas trees, snowmen, gifts and festive lettering. 03. Wooden toys These festive toys are full of rustic charmThese delightfully crafty and folksy templates by Russian designer Anastasya Mutovina are designed for printing out and hanging from your Christmas tree, but their simple rustic charm makes them just as suitable for incorporating into your own festive designs. They come in both PDF and EPS format; check out Anastasya's Behance page for more festive vectors. 04. Christmas pine needle vector All the fun of pine needles without having to vacuum them up If you're after a background image for your Christmas card, this design by Nouri Atchabao ticks all the boxes: pine needles, sparkling snow and a glorious bokeh backdrop to finish it all off; all you need now is to find some suitably festive free fonts with which to add your Yuletide felicitations. 05. Cute characters Download Chris Spooner's cute Christmas characters to use in your festive designsDesigner Chris Spooner created these cute Christmas characters and has generously decided to share them with the world. Made of simple shapes, the pack includes Santa, a reindeer, polar bear, penguin, and a robin. Simply download the pack and use the characters in your Christmas design work. The pack contains Adobe Illustrator and EPS file formats. 06. Merry Christmas pack These free vectors by graphic designer Clarice Gomes are perfect for any greeting card or Christmas designThis Merry Christmas vector pack was created by graphic designer Clarice Gomes and hosted by Free Vector. Vector images include a present box, mistletoe, pines, snow, and ornaments, perfect for any greeting card or Christmas design. The pack contains Adobe Illustrator and EPS file formats. 07. Classic Christmas shapes Download this free pack of Christmas vector shapes from Photoshop blog psd-dude.com Photoshop blog psd-dude is offering this pack of free Christmas vector shapes to help with your Christmas designs. You can find all sort of winter season shapes like baubles, a Christmas tree, gifts, stockings, candles, stars, candy cane, snowman shape, mistletoe, and many more. Gathered together in one CSH file, the images are free for personal, non-commercial use. Note: registration to this site is required in order to download. 08. Xmas baubles Add some balls to your design, quite literally, with these Xmas baublesNeed some baubles this Christmas? Then look no further than these classic Xmas bauble designs brought to you by 123FreeVectors. This free vector is in AI format and can be used for both personal and commercial Christmas-related projects. 09. Gift wrap Add some beautiful typography to this classic gift wrap design maybe?A simple but classic design, grab hold of this Christmas gift wrap vector from Vector Stock. The majority of images require paid-for credits to download, but there's also a great freebie section and this is just one of many Christmas designs you can help yourself to. This vector image is perfect for creating festive tags, wallpapers and much more. File types included are EPS, AI, PDF and a high resolution JPG. Note: registration to this site is required to download this file. 10. Origami Xmas tree vector We love this Christmas tree design with an origami twistThere are thousands of vector Christmas tree images to choose from online. But we really liked this origami-inspired concept from freelance designer Ian Barnard. The generous creative regularly shares useful resources, such as this free vector image. Barnard also has two other free festive vector images; wallpaper and an illustration depicting the reason for the Christian festival. The files are available to download in EPS format. 11. Santa's sleigh Send Santa flying high with this cool sleigh designDesigned Santa but need his sleigh? Then download this freebie, which is another from Vector Stock. The sleigh comes complete with gifts, isolated on a white background, perfect for incorporating into any Christmas designs. File types included are EPS, AI, PDF and a high resolution JPG. Note: registration to this site is required to download this file. 12. Christmas snowflakes These vintage snowflake designs are something a bit different These vintage-style snowflakes are just one of a number of nicely designed vectors from WebDesignHot. Head over to the site to grab loads more similarly-styled festive vectors, including baubles, bells and other traditional Christmas symbols. Related articles: 100 amazing Adobe Illustrator tutorials 30 graphic designers to follow on Behance 56 best free fonts for designers View the full article

Creatives in all fields rely on the apps of the Adobe Creative Cloud Suite. These powerful tools are counted on by amateur and professional creators alike. Learn your way around them with the Adobe CC Lifetime Mastery Bundle – and you can pay what you want for it. If you're an aspiring creator, you're going to need to learn the Adobe Creative Cloud suite. It's the most powerful set of design tools around and can take your work to the next level. The Adobe CC Lifetime Mastery Bundle will help you to make the most of it. You'll get more than 40 hours of actionable courses that will make you a master of Adobe's powerful artistic tools – from Photoshop and Illustrator to Dreamweaver and InDesign, plus you'll learn how to make use of motion graphics in After Effects and more. The Adobe CC Lifetime Mastery Bundle is valued at over $384, but you can get it now for a price that you pick. Beat the average to unlock it all, get on the leaderboard, or just pay what you want. You can't go wrong, so grab this course bundle today. About Creative Bloq deals This great deal comes courtesy of the Creative Bloq Deals store – a creative marketplace that's dedicated to ensuring you save money on the items that improve your design life. We all like a special offer or two, particularly with creative tools and design assets often being eye-wateringly expensive. That's why the Creative Bloq Deals store is committed to bringing you useful deals, freebies and giveaways on design assets (logos, templates, icons, fonts, vectors and more), tutorials, e-learning, inspirational items, hardware and more. Every day of the working week we feature a new offer, freebie or contest – if you miss one, you can easily find past deals posts on the Deals Staff author page or Offer tag page. Plus, you can get in touch with any feedback at: deals@creativebloq.com. Related articles: 95 top Photoshop tutorials How to illustrate for an event 5 best laptops for Photoshop View the full article

It seems CLO3D, maker of Marvelous Designer, is starting to listen to user feedback on price, as this latest version of its 3D tool, Marvelous Designer 7, is considerably cheaper. The $50 monthly fee is still a bit steep, but it's cheaper than it was. The prices on perpetual or annual licenses have also come down considerably, to $490 and $300 respectively – choose the option that suits you best from the Marvelous Designer store, here. It seems the last few years' increase in users and funding has also brought with it the time and money to develop some new features. One is the new, somewhat misnamed Flatten tool, as flatten is just a part of what it does. It lets you draw a spline onto your model, kind of like retopo work. Once you've blocked in the shape of a garment on your model, you add it into the 2D Pattern Editor for further work. Needless to say, this takes a lot of the hassle out of a measure-tweak-simulate workflow. In addition, you can generate splines based on your model's grouping. This is super handy for more finicky garment generation, like gloves. Taking a leaf out of the PatternMaker PRO playbook, Marvelous Designer 7 now offers libraries of clothing blocks, and new tools to tweak them It's not without flaws though, the most irritating being that it seems to work best with flat-chested figures. Try it with a female figure from MakeHuman or DAZ, and the spline tends to get lost in the curvier areas of the figure. It can be a hassle to find it again to continue drawing, especially when your UI is set to Max controls. Some tweaks and polish in the future will probably take care of that, but right now, it was simply annoying. The other standout is the fact that kitbashing is now also a feature for digital garments. It works exactly like it does in 3ds Max, Maya or any other 3D application: You have blocks of items, like collars, tops and sleeves, which you pick, tweak and assemble on your figure, and voilá – new garment. It's easy to use, too. You add components ranging from buckles, to garments to stitches, add them to a template shape, and save the garment into your library. In effect, this means no more mucking about with loading entire garments or project files to use part of a garment in another – now you can just generate and grab what you need from the library, and adjust it to the avatar you're using. In addition to many little UI tweaks, Marvelous Designer 7 has other touches to make garment creation easier. You can finally add darts to outside edges, making it so much easier to make superfluous cloth wrap and drape correctly. You can now offset internal lines along curves – something anyone who's created gambesons or other line-intensive garments should be very happy about, as it means an end to the 'create line, copy, paste, tweak, copy both, paste, tweak' and so on in the workflow. You now use a UI to define lines and offsets, again, saving time. The new flatten tool does more than just flatten, it allows you to draw the garment right on the figure In addition, Marvelous Designer 7 sports its first real attempt at automation in this release, by providing a basic Python interface and command set. All this new functionality comes at a price, of course. Our biggest grievance was a slowdown in UI responsiveness on a 64GB system with a 4GhZ GPU and two 1080s on a 4K LED screen – the screen actually went black during refreshes, no matter how much we tweaked my drivers or screen settings. While the new stitching functionality is pretty good, this could have been solved less geometry-heavy by handling it via Normals. In addition, it still has some lacking export tools, meaning the Marvelous Designer to ZBrush workflow is in this release too. These are trifles compared to the current functionality, though. Having reviewed and used Marvelous Designer since version 2, this is our absolute favourite release thus far, and if you haven't jumped on board the Marvelous train yet, this is the point where you should. This article was originally published in issue 228 of 3D World, the world's best-selling magazine for CG artists – packed with expert tutorials, inspiration and reviews. Buy issue 228 here or subscribe to 3D World here. To learn more 3D skills and hear from expert speakers, check out our new 3D event, Vertex. Related articles: How to model a complex 3D city scene in Blender 12 mighty Maya tutorials to try today 30 inspiring examples of 3D art View the full article

The truth about digital humans is that they make most people uncomfortable. There’s a biological reason for this. Since birth, you have been bred to look for threats. When something looks slightly off, alarms go off in your body, activating adrenal functions and big emotions like fear, anger and sometimes, disgust. This is supposed to help you survive. But appearances can be deceiving, and our brains can be tricked. Digital humans are one such example. When they look just slightly off, they can trigger the same sensations in us, and right now, most things still feel wrong. The world of computer graphics has spent the last few decades trying to overcome this challenge, which is known as the Uncanny Valley. And we’ve made progress, a lot of progress. With better technology and better trained artists in the mix, getting a digital human out of the Valley is much more achievable. As such, the demand for digital humans has gone up. We are also starting to investigate the role that they will play in our everyday lives. And because of this, a whole new set of problems have emerged, including questions of ethics, and the safety of our own well-being. Back from the dead The question of ethics really came into play when the entertainment industry started to bring celebrities back from the dead. You might remember hologram 2Pac; or hologram Michael Jackson (who some say is being prepped for a tour); or even Paul Walker’s last scene in Furious 7, which like the others was a product of digital restoration after his death. No matter what you think about these projects, they all raise serious questions. Including, first and foremost, who owns your likeness after you die? And what should they be allowed to do with it? If the thought of bringing dead actors back from the dead makes you upset, recent research may actually terrify you. The concept of fake news and doctored information has been one of 2017’s top stories. But in the last few years, several papers have emerged that demonstrate how digital humans can be used to distort the truth through video manipulation. 2016’s main example was face2face. This was a paper from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Max-Planck-Institute for Informatics, and Stanford University that showed how webcams could be used to digitally puppeteer subjects from pre-existing video. So, if you were to grimace next to a video version of Donald Trump, for example, digital Donald would grimace too, in the exact same way. A second paper called Synthesizing Obama: Learning Lip Sync from Audio came out of Washington University in 2017 and depicted a similar technology, with one key difference. Instead of using a live person as their modifier, this project seamlessly superimposed audio and lip movements from one video to another. It’s so good, it’s spooky. Copyright Meet Mike, Epic Games When you see things like this, it’s easy to come back to fear. Fear of digital humans. Fear of technology. Fear of what could go wrong. But if you stop there, you’ll miss out on all the benefits. I like to equate it to the internet. There are a ton of evil things you can do on the internet, but is the internet all bad? Of course not. It’s a revolutionary tool that changed the world - in many ways for the better. The same will be said for digital humans. The process of achieving realism is already teaching us so much about human needs, desires, and biological responses, you have to wonder what we’ll learn when we achieve full photorealism. Or when digital assistants break out of their current box. In time, they’ll meet us where we live. Looking us in the eyes with faces that feel complete. And with the help of AI, they’ll be able to recognise our emotions and then respond appropriately. Suddenly, the same biological mechanisms that used to set off warning bells around weird humans, will help you feel soothed by ones that accurately mimic our characteristics - facial and otherwise. This can be seen in the recent research by Autodesk called AVA, which helps us remember that at our core, humans are social animals. We want to be a part of a greater whole, with like-people, who get us. The rise of digital humans will be one avenue to this feeling. Copyright Meet Mike, Epic Games Another will be digital avatars. If VR takes off, as many of us believe it will, we’re heading for a worldwide MetaVerse that will allow users to spend countless hours interacting with virtual versions of ourselves. At first, these will be low-poly versions, far from the types that cause discomfort in the Valley. But over time, people will want these avatars to reflect their attributes (whether those are real or fantasy-driven), meaning we’ll either have to confront the Valley over and over again during our travels, or finally cross it. Mike Seymour, who works with me at the Wikihuman project, is especially invested in this subject and is making progress every day. You might have seen his #MEETMIKE exhibition at SIGGRAPH, which allowed him to conduct interviews using the most realistic digital avatar ever produced, in real-time, with people in a digital space. It was exciting to watch. And if you are like me, that’s the biggest takeaway. We are living in an exciting time. Yes, there are things to be cautious of. And just like the internet, there are things we have to self regulate. But ultimately, the technological leaps we are making are going to completely change the world. It won’t happen for years, but it’s coming. And it’s on all of us to make sure we do it right. I believe we can. Get your ticket to Vertex 2018 now For more insight into the future of CG, don't miss Chris Nichols' keynote presentation at Vertex, our debut event for the CG community. Book your ticket now at vertexconf.com, where you can find out more about the other amazing speakers, workshops, recruitment fair, networking event, expo and more. Related articles: The mocap magic behind Justice League’s Steppenwolf 12 mighty Maya tutorials to try today 37 brilliant Blender tutorials View the full article