Mike Chaney's Tech Corner

The first of many instructional videos have been made available on the Qimage Ultimate web page.  Just go to http://www.ddisoftware.com/qimage-u and click "Learning Videos" on the left.  We've just started so the list will be expanding but there are several vids of interest already available so feel free to check them out and post here if you have comments or ideas for future vids.

Regards,
Mike

Nice videos.Mike.

Maybe you could try one, or more, concerning borders, and text  - sort of required for greeting cards, etc. Seems to be causing some difficulty for some wrt print area and getting equal margins and positioning/rotating text.

Best wishes,

Ray

Great, they will be most helpful.  I get most of my info/instructions from Utube vids, and Fred, Terry and all on this forum.

Busy today on affairs auto, will give the vids a look later this week.

Jeff

I've looked at all 3 and I am ashamed to admit how much I learned and I've been using Qimage for something over 10 years!  Keep them rolling. No shortage of topics available but one that comes up here is setting your printer profile/let Qimage manage printing.  Another relates to quality - dpi readings in printers causing confusion.

Thanks Mike.

Sandy

Thanks.  I added two more today for a total of five.  Should be able to keep you busy.  :)

Mike

Just got round to giving the videos a run through.

I am impressed, they are very good.

Having just got may first photo printer the Precision Print Alignment video will be handy, I did not realize the features discussed existed, also there were things in the others I way unaware of.

Jeff

Hi Jeff,
For the benefit of others: assuming you have a good internet connection, I recommend the 720p "HD" version, it's much clearer.
Even I (supposedly an old hand  ::)) learned something new yesterday, in the Page Editor, Shift and arrow to move images 1mm or 0.25" on the page. I knew about CTRL arrow and arrow alone but not use of the Shift key. Nice  8)
Terry

Two more added today.  The two new ones (at the bottom) show how to handle print borders and how to make a photo card.

Mike

OK, one last video for today making 3 new ones.  This last one covers printer drivers, settings, etc. associated with using printer ICC profiles with your printer and paper.

Mike

Just one small thing regarding the "Print Drivers & ICC Profiles" video that made me wondering if I am doing something wrong.

I noticed that you in the Canon driver setup had selected "Auto" as the halftoning method. I have always used "Diffusion", so my question is: by using "Diffusion", is my setup suboptimal?

I am getting 'super-duper' (as you put it) prints, no problems there, but your video just made me wondering.

I've tried changing that option between "Auto" and "Diffusion" in the past and I've never seen a difference with photos.  It is my understanding that it will end up using "Diffusion" on photos anyway just due to the characteristics of the image you send to the printer.  Maybe if you print graphics (like screen shots), the "Auto" setting would actually work better because the dithering pattern would lean more toward solid coverage rather than fine random dots.  Simply put, I think you're fine either way.

Mike

When Q-U was first introduced, I was wondering if I needed to "upgrade".  I did upgrade, as I did when Q-Studio was introduced, as a way of thanking you for your fantastic program and support.  As you introduced the new Q-U features I was happy and enthusiastic about what was to come.  The video training is a great aid to learning more about Q.  I've had Q for a long, long time and follow the forums religiously. I'm happy to say the videos have taught me several things!

Thank You

Mike, Fred and Terry

Great videos for learning Qimage Ultimate!
Your covering the Beginner to the Pro.
The nice part: as your watching the video you ask yourself a question and it gets answered before the video is over.
Can't wait to see more!

Ya Me

Are you sure, what makes you thinks it's those 3?
Nice to see you back btw  :)
Terry

I Had A Dream ;)
It's Been So Long I Don't Remember How To Post An Image >:(
Check Your Mail

Ya Me

Thanks for the e-mail, well spotted  ;)
"Anonymous"

May I make one suggestion.
The videos are Great!
Not everyone knows how they can save the videos to their hard drive.
If you could have it so they could "Right Click .. Save Target As" and save the video to their hard drive.
I will understand if that won't be an option.

Thanks
Ya Me

Read my mind, I see they are all uTube videos and personally I would prefer to download them for local viewing or even keeping a copy on DVD???

There are ways and means of doing this but I don't want to share how without Mike's permission. :-X
Terry

I don't mind, but I don't recommend them.  If you have a reliable/safe site for downloading YouTube videos, I'd like to know it too!  I've used a number of them in the past but every one of them has turned to a steaming pile of you-know-what.  They used to be free and easy but now all of them that I'm aware of are slow, can't handle HD videos, and they are LOADED with malware and recursing pop up windows warning you that "your computer is infected", warning you that you have to pay, and such nonsense.  So if you have a good one, please post it.  YouTube intentionally makes it difficult to download their videos but they fit the bill for what I'm doing as I don't want the video bandwidth on my server.

I don't mind people downloading them though, so that's not the issue.  In fact, we may offer them in "shippable" DVD format for those who don't care to (or can't) fool with YouTube.  The idea is to just charge a reasonable S/H fee so if we do it, it won't cost much!  That's down the road a bit though...

Mike

Hi Mike

Point taken about bandwidth 'issues' and also from a user point of view about questionable methods of downloading, I have my share of Malware AV from seemingly innocuous links :( :(

Would the likes of file download services such "Sendit" work for this purpose, forgive my ignorance but I thought these services were free for both provider & recipient of the file(s).

Having said that if each video was charged out at very modest fee perhaps $1 would that cover a server and bandwidth on the basis of the numbers downloading???

Michael R over at LL has video downloads tutorials for LightRoom that he sells.............just thinking out loud???

In the meantime I suppose I will have to stick with uTube !

Hello All

Another video recorder - Freecorder from http://goo.gl/jLrNA

Appears to work ok.

Here my effort created with the help of Making Photo Cards. 

Created the image (hours) saved to file.  inserted 4 times on an A4, created some general text for the reverse side with Scribus DTP

Very pleased with result.

jeff(http://JeffMilan.zenfolio.com/img/s1/v21/p38724112-4.jpg)

Wow, Jeff, I see more videos have been added.
Are any of them 'up' for an Academy Award?

Fred

[/quote]

Wow, Jeff, I see more videos have been added.
Are any of them 'up' for an Academy Award?

Fred
[/quote]

They should be, they are the best instruction free videos I have seen.

Jeff

Thanks a lot, the video tutorials are great! 

I see there is a new video about using the Selective Colour feature in the editor. This is a powerful tool but needs practice to get used to it.
As is shown in the video, I have used it to liven up a dull UK sky but it does need to have a reasonable amount of blue in it in the first place to get a good result.
I regularly use some of the pre-set Sel Col filters for monochrome, I guess not many users know they are there, just click the folder icon and have a look. There's Back & White, red, green or blue separation and sepia. It's worth checking the effect of the the different separation filters as can help to get the right tone variation and contrast for a particular image.

Mike's example (in the video) of changing red to yellow using  1,0,0 in the green of the red row is something I'm still getting my head around and a little more explanation would be helpful. There is a section in the Help but my ability with matrix transformations was never very good  ::)

Below is an example attached where I have used the Selective Colour filter to help reduce the effect of a distracting bright yellow-green background. The small change in the red row blue channel was to compensate an effect on the flesh tones created by the changes in the yellow row. To help get things like that right, I make a copy of the original image for comparison purposes.
Terry

Since Mike gave his permission for us to download the videos from Utube, I thought I would share how I do it.  First go to the internet site that has the videos:
http://www.ddisoftware.com/qimage-u/learn.htm
Then select the video you want by going to the "Video Large" column and right clicking on the "720P video".  Then select copy shortcut.

Go to http://keepvid.com/ and paste what you copied into the url space at the top.  Then click download.  You will then be presented with a quality screen.  I click "High Definition - 1280x720" and then click save and tell the program where you want to save the file.

Repeat for each video you want to keep on your PC.

I forgot to mention that keepvid.com does requre Java.  Also, to get the highest quality picture when playing these saved videos, I use use VLC media player which can be downloaded for free.

Thank you,
Works slick and I must agree on that VLC player. Been using it for a long time, and it is wonderful.

Fred

Hi guys and gals,
I just had a very interesting experience yesterday afternoon.

A new Qimage Ultimate user heard through a mutual friend that I lived nearby, and I was asked if I would go to the newbie's house with the mutual friend.
I was expecting to spend a good number of hours going over the basics .... e.g.   Thumbs/ menus, Raw options, White Balance, emailing etc.
The newbie's name is really Joe. My friend is Peter.
Joe told me that he was "good" with everything except SEL CLR, which he understood, but the numbers to type in to replace the 1.0 eluded him.
The other thing he needed was the Tone Targeted Sharpening drop down menu, and which tool to use.... e.g.   Equalize, Target the Selected Tone, Target Selected RGB and reversing them with Soften or Sharpen non targeted areas... the whole menu, when and why!!!

Mind you, he has Qimage Ultimate for only 2 months!

Peter asked Joe, with an astonished expression, "How did you get to learn everything so fast"?
I watched the videos, sometimes over and over, practiced until I got the hang of it!

He was new to digital photos, and now has a nice Olympus camera and shoots in Raw mode. He loves the filter saving system.
He was not given to preconceived notions that he needed layers, and therefore there was no steep learning curve for him.

He just took Qimage Ultimate and ran with it.

Just thought it was a good story to share, and the fact it is true, happened yesterday, made it more interesting that I share it.

Oh, Joe is not an engineer, or digital expert. Joe manages a restaurant in Sarasota, Fl.

Fred

It's a shame he knew so much; you obviously could not do enough to warrant an offer of a free meal at his restaurant  ;D
Terry

That restaurant is too pricey for me to go often.
I have eaten there and it is a pleasure.
Fred

I just want to thank you for the videos and videos submitted by others on YouTube. Been watching quite a few and was able to solve an issue I was having.

we should thank you, Mr. Phillips, for mentioning that you got some useful information from the videos.
Sometimes, we think no one views them.
Fred

I've actually saved a ton of the videos to my hard disk, to watch & re-watch, and pause as I look at QU.  No way I would be using QU without them.  But that's not to say that the textual information isn't important, and it is definitely appreciated as well.

Less than two months ago I actually looked at a couple of the Challenges, esp. the videos, and added many of those to my collection.

I don't understand why they aren't better advertised.  When I first looked at them, at the beginning of the year, I didn't think they would be useful as a learning tool.  Obviously, I discovered I was wrong.

There should be a link to the Challenges in this thread, something like this: 

  More Video Tutorials and Help available in the Challenges section:  http://ddisoftware.com/tech/qimage-ultimate-challenges/ (http://ddisoftware.com/tech/qimage-ultimate-challenges/)

Or maybe convert it to a pinned thread?

And since the last video was posted in Aug 2017, maybe the title should be updated.  I think the 2013 date and the reference to fun originally threw me off.

There's really a lot of good stuff there, and I think it should be given more prominence.

So, thank you, Fred, for all the time and effort you've put in, not just the video tutorials here but the Challenges as well; also to Mike and Terry-M.

--George

Hi George,
Have you noticed a little red circle with a White V at various places on the QU user interface? They are links to videos relevant to that section of the UI.
See screen shots below for examples.
Terry

Thanks George.
It started as a challenge in the sense that I would show how I could make a calendar, and challenged you to make one too.
I remember that I made the calendar (not accurately to match the month, but generically.) I made the physical calendar, added Sun. >>>>Sat., and stuck SEPTEMBER at the top. Since it was for me sort of generic, I had 31 days in my calendar.

It probably took 15 seconds and Dennis, one of our long term good guys,   "FRED. September only has 30 days.

It just evolved and as I saw the questions posted, and the private emails I got, I realized, I could still call them challenges, but lean back toward showing how to do stuff, normal stuff, easily and quickly, and I didn't have to resort to creating....like a calendar.
Many questions... many people just hate to ask a question on the forum as they believe people will think less of them. Not so, of course, but they feel exposed.
Besides emails, I also get phone calls... I invite the calls, but people think they are imposing! Again, not so.  I am so old that "dirt" wants me to tell it a bedtime story.

Mike showed me how to do the videos and upload to youtube.
I try to pick topics that are relevant, and which were asked about. It would be extremely helpful if people would ask to see the best way to do something, and present their task.
Please email me   wathree.ssz@verizon.net    or phone if you wish.... 941 359 1933

Right now, I am scratching my head looking for a September topic (I know, Dennis. 30 days)
Thanks again.

Fred

Thank you Terry for pointing out the red V and what do to with it.
There are many so many options that I don't take advantage of.

Vlady

Vern, Hi this is Fred.
I have the R800 driver and it i working perfectly. It is overriding your draft setting because it is programmed to make the best prints possible using your choice of paper and profile. That's what it is doing. It has set the quality to lower than the best because of your paper choice. But still the best it can be with that paper.
Now you just change the paper selection from your Photo Quality Inkjet Paper  to Premium Glossy Photo paper and Qimage AI changes the quality to the best quality which is Photo RPM.
What I suggest is that you click on the gear wheel and when the box opens, remove the 4 checks from the bottom of that screen. Now you are in manual mode and Qimage will allow you to use Draft and whatever else you prefer for whatever reason you prefer. Essentially, you have shut off the AI feature.
Perhaps it's exerting influence when you are really drafting.
Hope this helps.
Fred