My Music is BACK!
My music collection has been restored.
All 376 Gigs of music I have collected and curated throughout the years in high-quality digital.
It has been almost 4 years since I last had this collection online and accessible. Due to the collection size, I have struggled to keep it on a machine through the years. But now, with this new huge SSD, it isn’t an issue. I had the collection on a local network shared server and used Plex for a long time, but that soon got unwieldy on my network connection.
So I just turned it off. Life went on, and here we are.
I have recently switched to using a PC more, which has opened up many possibilities for listening to music.
I don’t want a tool that chews up the precious metadata on my collection. I have been fastidious in keeping up with the proper song and album names, and the original album art in a decent resolution looks good but doesn’t weigh down the files themselves.
So now that I am on Windows, VLC player is giving me all that I need. Even fun visualizations.
Good Times.
Relaxing More is Good
I am starting to relax more.
I should give myself more grace every once in a while.
I have been sleeping better lately, and that has had a positive effect.
This is the first time I have been without the Adobe Suite in a while, and I am researching alternative tools to do instructional work. Also, I love learning new things.
I am looking for replacements for
Illustrator - I do most of my graphic design work in Illustrator because I love the clean look of smooth curves. Its replacement needs to work with, at minimum, both SVG and EPS file formats.
After Effects - I use After Effects to do most of my video editing these days, along with all of the motion graphics I create.
Photoshop - I am not a photographer, but I do a lot of photo editing and correction work. Well-designed selection tools are necessary for anything more complicated than basic cropping and color correction tools.
Indesign - I use a page layout tool for anything that will end up as a PDF or printed on paper.
Premiere - I do much of my video editing straight in After Effects. Still, sometimes you need the fine control of a straight-up video editor.
I have found some good replacements.
Illustrator Replacement Possibilities
What led me to this initially is that I have it on my iPad. I first got it because of the killer feature of seamless transitions between working with vectors and raster. The desktop version is the “best of the rest” when dealing with vector art. The tools are easy to understand, and since I had the iPad license, I got a price break on the suite.
A tool that can do many, many things if you know how to do them. My issue is the learning curve at this point. I want something I can use now.
After Effects Replacement Possibilities
I am honestly blown away that this is open-source software. It is mainly for motion graphics, so I will have to also find a proper video editor.
Photoshop Replacement Possibilities
Think of Photoshop without all the new fancy Ai tools. All the raster graphic tools I need are here and easy to find and understand. Nice.
This tool has pulled me out of many binds when I found myself without the financial resources to get any graphics program. Gimp is always a go-to, but I can’t say much about using it. It has come a long way from all the endless menus and right clicks of the past, but it still has a long way to go until I call it easy to use.
Indesign Replacement Possibilities
I learned this faster than I learned inDesign. I may use this as the replacement because it has much the same functionality but not the same bulkiness as inDesign. I may like this better.
Google Docs
Ugh, You know what I mean. You can do some rudimentary page layout in Google docs, but it is nowhere near what I need.
Premier Replacement Possibilities
They have free and paid tiers, but I have never had to use the paid version. Just wanted to mention that this program was developed by the famous camera builders BlackMagic Studios. So you might want to check it out regardless.
This is what I used before I found SnagIt. It is entirely open source free software.
My Final Choices
I ended up with the Affinity Suite of tools, along with Synfig Studio for motion graphics and Davinci for Video Editing.
Sitting in This Feeling
I am uncomfortable. I can’t seem to fully relax. I know this feeling is caused by the fact that I got laid off from my job, and in these times of economic uncertainty, this is not the best timing.
In my mind, I know that events such as these can cause irrational anxiety and fear around all the things that I have no control over. Knowing all this doesn’t stop it from happening, nor does it improve my feelings regarding the fact that I no longer have a paycheck.
I am not a fan of totally positive thinking. Thinking positively has its place, but it can mask certain emotional energies that one can and should take advantage of. I am harnessing this uncomfortable energy to land a new job.
Getting Hired Again
I finally have my resume where I want it in terms of words; now I have to improve the layout and insert that improved copy to my LinkedIn profile.
