From alchemyreply0991 at mindworkshop.com Sat Dec 23 11:22:57 2017 From: alchemyreply0991 at mindworkshop.com (Alchemy Mindworks) Date: Sat, 23 Dec 2017 11:22:57 -0500 Subject: [Newsletter] Announcements from Alchemy Mindworks Message-ID: <3.0.5.32.20171223112257.0324fe70@localhost> _______________________________________________________________________ THIS IS AN AUTOMATIC POSTING FROM THE ALCHEMY MINDWORKS UPDATE MAILING LIST UNSUBSCRIBE: http://mindworkshop.com/mailman/options/newsletter _______________________________________________________________________ Contents: 1. GIF Construction Set Professional 8 Revision 3 2. Announcing Voice Manager 8 3. Announcing Font Wrangler 8 (Second Notification) 4. 10 Monumental Tweets about Graphic Workshop Professional 8 5. Are You Running Graphic Workshop 6, GIF Construction Set 6, e-Paint 6 or The Ultimate Screen Clock 6? 6. Replying to this Message and List Removal _______________________________________________________________________ We'd like to wish all the users of our software, the readers of Steven William Rimmer's books and the many peripatetic visitors to our web page who've subscribed to this list just because a joyous and wantonly indulgent holiday season. ...and as in years past, here's hoping you don't get any more socks. _______________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________ 1. GIF Construction Set Professional 8 Revision 3 _______________________________________________________________________ GIF Construction Set Professional 8 has been updated. This release: - Improves the solid color selection buttons throughout the application with a quick palette selection window - just hold down the Shift key on your keyboard when you click to select a color to see it. There's a complete discussion of this window and how it interacts with the primary Colors window in the section of the Reference document that deals with Color Selection. The enhanced color selection features will also apply to the color buttons in any animation plugins hosted by GIF Construction Set. - Implements a number of performance improvements in Animation Wizard. - Fixes a bug in the PNG transparency reader. - Addresses a number of GDI and performance issues that software developers never really stop meddling with. - Updates the documentation. You can download GIF Construction Set Professional 8 from: http://www.mindworkshop.com/gifcon.html#download ........................................................................ UPGRADES If you registered or upgraded a registration for GIF Construction Set Professional 7 , you can upgrade to GIF Construction Set Professional 8 for half the cost of a new single-user license. Please visit: http://www.mindworkshop.com/upgrade.html to upgrade. _______________________________________________________________________ 2. Announcing Voice Manager 8 _______________________________________________________________________ Voice Manager 8 has been released. We've refined the internal architecture of Voice Manager to make it faster, more memory-efficient and better able to take advantage of the functionality of Windows 7, 8 and 10. While most of the seriously cool changes embodied in Voice Manager 8 are "under the hood," users of the latest release will notice that it's noticeably quicker, especially for functions that call for significant system resources. The updated architecture will also allow us to add new features to Voice Manager that were impractical or genuinely impossible under version 7. ........................................................................ The Yamaha reface DX synthesizer is amazingly cool... among other things because its voices can be reprogrammed to make it sound like pretty much anything you can imagine. In the event that you're not feeling very imaginative, there's also a voice-sharing community from which to download buckets of fresh sounds for it. Alchemy Mindworks' Voice Manager will keep track of banks of synthesizer voices, allowing them to be saved as permanent disk files. It also embodies an intuitive voice editor, and numerous other tools to make this instrument totally rock. If you play keyboards, we invite you to check out Voice Manager. ........................................................................ WHAT'S NEW The changes in version 8 include: - Hardens the library interface underlying Voice Manager to make it more resistant to tampering. Sadly, the tampering in question appears to originate with some third-party security applications... which our lawyers would really prefer we didn't name. - Updates a number of user-interface issues throughout the application. - Addresses a number of GDI and performance issues that software developers never really stop meddling with. You can download Voice Manager 8 from: http://www.mindworkshop.com/voxman.html#download _______________________________________________________________________ 3. Announcing Font Wrangler 8 (Second Notification) _______________________________________________________________________ Font Wrangler 8 has been released. We've refined the internal architecture of Font Wrangler 8 to make it faster, more memory-efficient and better able to take advantage of the functionality of Windows 7, 8 and 10. While most of the seriously cool changes embodied in Font Wrangler 8 are "under the hood," users of the latest release will notice that it's noticeably quicker, especially for functions that call for significant system resources, such as managing large libraries of fonts. The updated architecture will also allow us to add new features to Font Wrangler 8 that were impractical or genuinely impossible under version 7. ........................................................................ WHAT'S NEW The changes in version 8 include: - Improves the solid color selection buttons throughout the application with a quick palette selection window - just hold down the Shift key on your keyboard when you click to select a color to see it. There's a complete discussion of this window and how it interacts with the primary Colors window in the section of the Reference document that deals with Color Selection. - Font Wrangler 8 will optionally import most of the configuration items of an existing Font Wrangler 7 installation, if there's one on your system, eliminating the need to restore your preferences by hand. It will also remove your earlier software for you if you like. - Hardens the library interface underlying Font Wrangler 8 to make it more resistant to tampering. Sadly, the tampering in question appears to originate with some third-party security applications... which our lawyers would really prefer we didn't name. - Addresses a number of GDI and performance issues that software developers never really stop meddling with. - Updates the documentation. We'd like to take this opportunity to express our sincere regrets for the minor bump in the price of Font Wrangler 8. In our defense, it's been about a decade and a half since it last changed. Bookkeepers may not be the most irresistible force in the universe, but they are the most relentless. You can download Font Wrangler 8 from: http://www.mindworkshop.com/fontrang.html#download ........................................................................ UPGRADES If you registered or upgraded a registration for Font Wrangler 7 on or after April 1, 2017, you?re welcome to a free upgrade to Font Wrangler 8. If you registered or upgraded a registration for Font Wrangler 7 prior to April 1, 2017, you can upgrade to Font Wrangler 8 for half the cost of a new single-user license. When you first run Font Wrangler 8, it will check to see if you have a registration for Font Wrangler 7 on your system. If it finds one, it will display a window to tell you which of the foregoing upgrade options is applicable. Click on the Upgrade button to visit our web page and request or order an upgrade. The upgrade window can subsequently be accessed through the Help > Upgrade Manager > Upgrade from Previous Version item of Screen Saver Construction Set 8's menu bar. You can also visit the no-cost upgrade page directly at: http://www.mindworkshop.com/fntkey.html and the upgrade order page at: http://www.mindworkshop.com/upgrade.html _______________________________________________________________________ 4. 10 Monumental Tweets about Graphic Workshop Professional 8 _______________________________________________________________________ If you're among the tens of thousands of Graphic Workshop users who don't follow us on Twitter - we're in no way offended by this - you'll likely have missed the ongoing tweets that deal with often-overlooked features of the known universe's most popular image management software. Graphic Workshop Professional 7's ability to do practically everything that can be done to pictures makes it relatively easy to use it every day for years and still miss a few of its better tricks. Here are ten more of the finest features you never knew it had, fresh from the Alchemy Mindworks Twitter account: - The Black Threshold filter - turn anyone into a vampire in under ten clicks. - Create the smallest possible JPEGs with the MOZ plugin. - The Canvas Downpour filter - be the rain. - e-Paint UltraLight - complete digital darkroom, learning curve of a potted plant. - The Scrapbook - a Windows clipboard that never forgets. - Weary of this world? Create one of your own with Fractals and Textures. - The Adjust window - refine your photos effortlessly, never leave the sofa. - The Sepia and Vignette filters - olde-tyme photos in ten clicks or less. - Light up anything with the Neon filter. - Convert pretty much anything to a JPEG file. You can download a copy of Graphic Workshop Professional 8 from: http://www.mindworkshop.com/gwspro.html#download ........................................................................ If you're still using Graphic Workshop 7, we invite you to enjoy all the new functionality, enhanced performance and cool things to click on - for half the new-user registration price. Please see: http://www.mindworkshop.com/alchemy/upgrade.html ........................................................................ See http://www.twitter.com/alchemymindwork to follow us on Twitter. _______________________________________________________________________ 5. Are You Running Graphic Workshop 6, GIF Construction Set 6, e-Paint 6 or The Ultimate Screen Clock 6? _______________________________________________________________________ The half-price upgrade path from version 6 Alchemy Mindworks software will be closing in just over a week. At present, you can still upgrade your version 6 applications to their vastly cooler version 8 progeny for half price. Among other things, you'll enjoy: - Graphic Workshop's enhanced Filter window and Archive Manager. - e-Paint's equally enhanced Filter window. - GIF Construction Set's batch processor. - The Ultimate Screen Clock's amazing animated Tubes and Flip styles. Please visit: http://www.mindworkshop.com/upgrade.html to upgrade to version 8 and save some cash. _______________________________________________________________________ 6. Replying to this Message and List Removal _______________________________________________________________________ This message has been sent from an unmonitored address - please do not reply to it. To remove your address from this mailing list or to change your address, please visit our web page at: http://www.mindworkshop.com/update-list.html Removal requests will be processed instantly. ....................................................................... If you have questions about this list or any Alchemy Mindworks products, please contact us at: http://www.mindworkshop.com/email-alchemy.html You can contact us by telephone at (705) 789-5238, and by snail-mail at Alchemy Mindworks, L10 C8 Brunel, Huntsville, ON P1H 2J3, CANADA. **************************************************************************** Copyright (c) 1998 - 2017 Alchemy Mindworks. All rights reserved. Use no hooks.