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A new report from Sonic Foundry and the Center for Digital Education shows instructor and student benefits from a video-driven flipped classroom approach to learning.

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(from press release)

"Wakefield, Mass. – Aug. 4, 2011 – The Consortium of Digital Forensic Specialists (CDFS), a global non-profit industry group that aims to improve the digital forensic profession through unity, advocacy and standardization, announced today that it is now accepting membership applications from interested organizations and individuals."

Visit the Consortium of Digital Forensic Specialists (CDFS) website for the complete press release.

The World Series can be quite a spectacle at times, and a single photo often can’t do justice to everything that’s going in the game. So will 360 hi-res photos compiled into a mammoth panorama do? Yes, please.

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If you weren't part of the beta program you may be interested to know that the CS5 free trial downloads are finally available.

Visit www.adobe.com to download your free trial version today.

Windows 8 will introduce a slew of interesting features, but will they benefit you?

Upgrades, system migration, support headaches -- IT folks are probably dreading the next major Windows rollout. Yet Windows 8, which is scheduled to move to the beta stage in late February and will likely launch in the fall, does offer several compelling new features for both IT and end users.

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Another Jem from the Photoshop Jedi Master Deke McClelland. Think a discussion on Photoshop's Image Size tool is too basic for you? Fear for you I do, for that is the mindset of someone leaning toward the dark side.

"The essential Image Size command lets you scale an image on screen or in print. In this week's Photoshop Top 40 Countdown episode, Deke explains resampling and resolution, both of which affect the core quality of digital photographs."

AMD has finally launched the long-anticipated followup to its Radeon HD 5970, its dual-GPU monster graphics card. Like its predecessor, the new Radeon HD 6990, code-named Antilles, combines two GPUs in a single package, and the result is the fastest graphics card you can buy.

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Atlantic Light Works and Reindeer Graphics announce the release of PercepTool 2.0.2 TM, a Photoshop add-on suite that performs High Dynamic Range (HDR), Tone Mapping and Perceptual Effect operations on digital photographs. Compatible with both Windows and Mac platforms in 32- and 64-bit processing, it operates in Photoshop CS4 and CS5 (Photoshop Extended required for 32-bits/channel). PercepTool 2.0.2TM works with both B&W and Color images in 8-bits, 16-bits and 32-bits.

Today Google launched Google Drive, a free-if-you-just-need-5GB-of-storage Dropbox-like service that lets you easily store and share files in the cloud.

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On March 11th, 2009 the mixed martial arts community, and quite frankly the world, lost a great man. Charles "Mask" Lewis was a pioneer, and probably the best example in recent history of why you can't judge someone by the way they look on the outside; it's what is inside that counts. I'm still struggling with this tragedy and although this isn't typically the forum where I'd share MMA or fighting related posts or issues, this is much more than that. Below is the post I left for Punkass and Skrape on 3/12, as well as a tribute video put together by the TapouT Live radio crew. RIP MASK - Always Believe.

You can download a free PDF, Color Correction and Enhancement in Adobe Photoshop CS6. This is 33 page excerpt from the new book, Understanding Adobe Photoshop CS6: The Essential Techniques for Imaging Professionals.

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One thing I really stress when training video evidence Technicians & Analysts is to stay in your lane. Don't go beyond your training & experience levels on any topic/tool/etc., no matter who is asking you to.

A related one is that an expert's job at trial is to leverage their expertise to make sure the Trier of Fact has accurate evidence & information, not to be an advocate for one party or the other.

I've had several students over the years tell me that my passionate articulation of one or the other has saved their case or even their career. Two rather recently.

Honored & proud, of course, but I always like to point out to them that they are the ones that did all the hard work and stood their ground.

Keep being great & doing great things my friends! 😎

As each day passes law enforcement and government agencies struggle with managing more sources of digital evidence and multimedia, like body worn cameras. The massive amounts of data storage required have led many to finally consider secure cloud-based storage solutions, but as some have found out, despite the minimal capital investment cloud storage costs can quickly exceed the LE & IT budgets of even the largest agencies. Let's break this down and talk specifically about digital evidence and archiving.

How are you archiving all of your digital evidence today? A tiered storage solution? Hybrid cloud solution? LTO tape? Hard drives? Optical discs (i.e. CD-R, DVD+/-R, BD-R)? Lots of questions and options, so lets talk specifically to the last group; those using optical discs.