UC Professor Trains Corporations on Design
Sheldon Nemoy, president of The Thornhill Group, one of the Los Angeles area's premiere computer-based design and training agencies, was instrumental in introducing desktop design technologies to Los Angeles' corporate publishing communities. He is a master designer with 30 years of experience -- a teacher at UCLA as well as a lifelong student of design and its relationship with technology. Throughout his career, Nemoy has enjoyed sharing his expertise with those around him. For example, he is co-author of the best seller, Looking Good with CorelDRAW, published by Ventana Press. "The objective of training at our center," says Nemoy, "is to use the new technology to its best advantage while maintaining quality of design and craftsmanship. If you lose elegance or readability, then the technology isn't working to your advantage." Training Facilities At Thornhill, classroom and one-on-one instruction are available for the corporate publication specialist, design/graphic arts professional and executive presenter. System resources, printers and CD-ROM drives are shared on a network. Individual training is conducted on a Dell Dimensions XPS P60 Pentium-powered multimedia workstation with a 21" high-resolution display. A mouse and Wacom tablet with a cordless pen are the available pointing and drawing devices. The Thornhill Group's publication experience began with the original Ventura Publisher from Xerox (now called Corel VENTURA Publisher, after acquistion and re-vamping by Corel). The design firm now includes all Corel applications as the majority of its educational offering. Thornhill's focus on training came about naturally. As a design firm, the problems and needs were understood from an insider's perspective. Companies that have made the transition to computers need project- or process-specific training to accomplish their goals, many times while they are in the midst of production. "I think the desktop publisher should be fluent in several programs," asserts Nemoy. "Corel-DRAW and CorelVENTURA go hand in hand -- CorelDRAW for easily creating typographic logos and illustrations, and CorelVENTURA for page layout with its automation features and precision. The full suite of Corel programs offers a total graphics capability." A Project Sampler Last January, the design staff of Cherokee Clothing needed high-level training in logo design with CorelDRAW. They came to Nemoy. After defining each designer's specific needs, one-on-one sessions began with a quick refresher and advanced to demonstrations of various design strategies to create the logos. By working with each student, answering questions and holding demonstrations, works and variations were created and saved. These designs became a series of labels for custom lines of clothing. Knightsbridge Publishing of New York and Los Angeles needed to develop a look that ech'ed the U.S. Constitution and a method to produce this in-house. CorelTRACE provided an electronic solution from a traditional title design that was hand-rendered in an elegant quill-pen-inspired calligraphy. After the titles, chapter numbers and calligraphic dingbats were created in ink, they were scanned in TIFF format. Each image was traced using CorelTRACE and imported into CorelDRAW for clean up. Care was taken to retain the hand-rendered effect. The CorelDRAW files were then exported as EPS files, loaded into CorelVENTURA, and placed on the page. The single hand-created element of this project eventually became a computer file, streamlining the publishing process. A final example is the Gemological Institute of Santa Monica, Calif., which had developed considerable expertise in computer-based document design and production. While foreign-language and spot-color publications were under control, full-color work needed a boost. A plan was developed to bring the publishing department's pre-press skills up to speed. A series of seminars and workshops were created to bring a higher level of productivity and quality control to GIA's staff. CorelPAINT provided the environment for scanning and image enhancement; CorelTRACE helped in reusing existing artwork. Working with CorelDRAW, color logos and illustrations were created and exported as EPS files for use in CorelVENTURA. A Promise Come True "It's true. Corel's complete line of software is an all-in-one solution for the publishing professional," maintains Nemoy. "This suite of programs offers power and ease of use with full feature sets and automation for aesthetics and productivity. The corporate publication community is delighted with these fully developed, artistic tools and is now seeking high-level professional training. Breathtaking publications and delivery of the highest quality prepress materials to their commercial printers is now a reality."
This article originally appeared in the 08/01/1994 issue of THE Journal.