Apple, Canon events confirmed for Digital Arts Expo

The seminar and workshop schedule for the first Malta International Digital Arts (MIDA) Expo 2008 continues to fill out with sessions dedicated to getting the most out of cutting edge digital technology.

The event, organised by ICA Ltd, will be held at the Hilton Conference Centre between July 3 and 6.

SG Solutions have confirmed a total of six workshops and two seminars so far, looking at the possibilities of two brands long associated with the best of digital creativity: Apple, creators of the Mac, the iPod and Adobe, publishers of leading creative packages like Photoshop, Insight and Illustrator and originators of the pdf format. One session will introduce Mac OSX Leopard, taking participants on an exciting tour of the powerful features of Apple's latest operating system.

It will demonstrate how Leopard can help empower users, freeing their time to concentrate on the creative aspect of their work by including tools like the 'Time Machine', which keeps the Mac fully and automatically backed up.

The second session maintains the Apple flavour, covering Final Cut Pro HD. Apple's professional film and video editing software allows users to log and capture digital media, set up a project, use the tools and palettes to put it all together effectively and add finishing touches, before exporting the movie to QuickTime, CD, DVD, DV tape, VHS and the web.

Turning to Adobe's solutions, the third session looks at the software powerhouse's 'Creative Suite', which brings together its leading creativity packages into one place. But professional photographers need a more powerful tool designed for their specific needs - different to those of the publishing industry.

SG will be holding a workshop on 'Aperture', a solution that fills that need providing a RAW-focused workflow, making the professional image format as easy to handle as jpegs. And for people looking to do audio post-production work more efficiently, the session on 'Logic Pro' should provide a valuable direction.

Canon will be holding two workshops on printing - one dealing with printing and the Mac, and the other on the ins and outs of large format printers.

The third Canon workshop looks at the other end of the process: not output but input. It will introduce the value of high speed document scanning, an effective solution for large scale document management.

Many of the businesses showing their solutions at the expo are going that step further, putting them through their paces for the Expo's visitors and demonstrating how to get the most from them - and both simplify and enhance creativity and productivity.

The range is comprehensive: among the other businesses holding workshops, for example, is St Martin's Institute of Information Technology, which will be holding a workshop.

For updates on the continuously growing calendar of events visit www.digitalartsexpo.com, where one can register for free entry to the Expo and book a place at any of the workshops.