I have always found that one of the toughest parts about working in Photoshop is selecting parts of an image for deletion or enhancement. When I first started using Photoshop many years ago, I thought the only way to accurately make complicated selections, ones that aren’t simple rectangles or ovals, was to use the polygonal [...]

If you’re new to Photoshop, as everyone is at some point, then you may not be familiar with the idea of layers. Thus, we parepared a Photoshop layers tutorial for you. Most modern image editing software uses layers to allow you to make changes on top of what’s already there in a non-destructive way. This [...]

So you think you’re a hot photographer?  Here’s your chance to prove it to the world. MakeUseOf has set up a Flickr group to which you can submit your stunning photos.  We’ll use the best and most relevant images for our articles.  Not all MakeUseOf articles have photos of course, some just use screenshots (which [...]

No, don’t get excited, Google hasn’t released the Mac and Linux versions of its new browser just yet, but here’s the next best thing. The good folks over at Code Weavers have come out with a way to run the Windows version of Google’s Chrome on non-Windows computers. They’ve used Wine to make it run [...]

If you’ve got an iPod Touch or iPhone, you’ve got to give this neat little app a try. Its called “Writing Pad” and it’s free. It may look like your average textpad or notepad, but it’s far from it. You can type the old fashioned way by tapping on individual keys, or you can type [...]

There’s a free ‘if-found-please-return-to’ app in Apple’s app store that creates an image you’re supposed to set as your default wallpaper. It’s called If Found and was one of the first things I downloaded when the app store opened for business. It struck me as a great idea, but the simplicity of the thing got [...]

Virtualization seems to be one of the great buzzwords these days. Everyone wants to be running an operating system other than their own. My first experience with this sort of thing was trying to run Linux alongside Windows XP using VMware. My second was with Parallels, running XP on my Mac. The big problem with [...]

If you know what Twitter is all about, then you’ll feel right at home in Seesmic. That is, if you don’t mind people actually seeing your face and hearing your voice. Seesmic is essentially Twitter with video. With Seesmic though, you see not only what people think (or what they want you to believe they [...]

There’s a test version of the new Google customizable homepage (startpage), iGoogle, available to play with. When you start it up, the first thing you’ll notice are the pretty rounded corners on all your gadgets. The second thing you’ll notice are the tabs along the left side of the page, rather than across the top. [...]

I’ve had a Twitter account since the early days, but I haven’t really used it all that much. I’ve tweeted occasionally and I’ve even set up several of my feeds to automatically tweet for me, but I never really got twittering. That is, until I got myself an iPod Touch. Now I can’t stop Twittering [...]

Welcome one and all to the debut of the Make Use Of audio podcast! Every Sunday, I will be presenting a short show where I will be going over recently published posts on the site and also one of the Make Use Of writers will appear to be interviewed. This week, it’s the creator and [...]

Well, my two week descent into unusability and lack of functionality that is Safari, is finally over. About two weeks ago I undertook to stick to Safari all the time, 24 hours a day/7 days a week, while at home. Thank goodness I had an oasis of sanity every weekday when I went in to [...]

I’ve been a Firefox user for a few years now, since it came out really, and I love it. It’s a great browser and the extensions can turn it into anything you want it to be, from an FTP client to a multiplayer pong game. I’ve been using a Mac for a little over a [...]

When you talk for a living, it’s usually a good idea to know the proper pronunciation of the words you’re using. As a radio newscaster, I come across the occasional word that baffles me, either because I’ve never seen it before, or because I’ve seen it written, but have never heard it pronounced. Case in [...]

I got my first (and only) Mac about a year ago and discovered I hated one of the major features that makes OS X different from Windows. I resented having to move my mouse so high, just to get at the file or edit menu way up there in the menu bar. I’ve since come [...]