It’s been a long way since Photoshop 4 – eighteen (18) years and we’re now in the Cloud. Could it be any punnier that it was built from the ground “up”?

This Internet Thing

’96 – I was in high school – clueless as to what the coolest nickname was for an e-mail address because what’s e-mail? We were only using the PeeCee to research on the Encarta CD. It was the same year I left alone the 20-volume encyclopedia and 17-volume macropedia to rot in the shelf.

One very late night, I was asleep in the living room, I awoke to this weird sound – it was a robotic android-y sound coming from the computer area. Brushing my eyes from the slumber, I saw my brother in the dark with his face lit by the 15-inch monitor. I asked him what’s that I heard.

“I’m surfing the internet,” he said it like he couldn’t be bothered.

“Surfing? Internet? Can I watch?” Thought it was a new game he’s got there. Then maybe, just maybe he switched windows to Yahoo! Directories from whatever he’s doing.

And that was the end of the Encarta CD.

Surfing Sounds So Cool

You see, surfing the ‘net is quite easy to learn – with all those underlined links and animated GIFs – pure fun in digital form. I waited for my turn every after midnight to connect to the internet with anticipation – that distinct sound of the 56k modem (which is now my ring tone) successfully taking you into another dimension – it’s my Pavlov’s bell.

And so I found another reason to use the computer – to collect pictures of my favorite band of all time, Oasis.

And Graphic Design!

I’ve exhausted my “research” and “data-gathering” on Oasis and it left me with buttloads of band pictures. Then, just like how curiosity killed the cat, I wondered if I could “extend” a cut picture of Liam Gallagher’s shirt.

Going past through Notepad, FreeCell, Solitaire, and Minesweeper, I found my way to this piece of software which I tried to tame at least once in my life. It’s called MS Paint. It was a pain to manually copy-and-paste similarly-looking pixels to form an extension of the shirt. But hey, this was no the Photoshop before I knew it existed but it did what I wanted – a pop-out Liam Gallagher.

“Enter” Adobe Photoshop 4

Adobe Photoshop, you were a mere proper noun and a software with the coolest splash image – congratulations you’ve already been verbalized. I’ve seen you in your Undo/Redo ability until your History capability.

It sounded funny – the word “Adobe” – while I pictured an orange-y block of stone. And that nearly hindered me from getting interested in launching the program. “Photoshop” – it was just a place where you go to develop and print photos. No big deal.

I wondered if it could take the pain MS Paint gave me. I launched the program and thought to replicate what I did in MS Paint – just click “File > Open…” and find whatever picture was lying on the Desktop. Or in the bowels of a 100-folder directory.

Long story short, I found my brother’s pr0n stash.

And that’s the beginning of the tale of a wide-eyed pimply teenager in front of a computer about to uncover life’s biggest secrets.

Photoshop and Boobies

I opened one file from the stash.

Why not the same picture of Oasis? You might ask. My reasons, my disposition at that time – I could not recall. But I remember I was happy, a determined person.

The picture made me forget about my original plan – to extend Liam’s clothes, remember? Ironically, there it was – a picture of a flawlessly naked woman in front of me. I was being challenged to erase some itsy-bitsy body parts.

And so I clone stamped it out.

Alt+click-release + click, alt+click-release + click, alt+click-release + click. And more alt+click-release + click.

Done. It’s not a work of art – but this accomplishment, like how the internet dawned on me, opened a new dimension – a world of possibilities what could be done to, say, a landscape picture or even a blank canvas!

And so they say, “curiosity killed the cat but satisfaction brought it back.” Only to get curious again.