As Julie is away today taking a well-earned rest after a manic 50th issue, and I’m back from a little break myself (cheering on the mighty Spurs to their first win, good times, good times), I thought I’d update you guys on AP’s visit to the CreativePro Expo at the Olympia National Hall last Thursday.Needless to say, it was a hotbed of commercial and creative activity and well worth the trip. And, of course, I was there to sample the digital delights. Making some worthy contacts, we’re hoping here at the mag that these relationships will allow us to further provide readers with examples and opinions of some of the industry’s top hardware and software technologies. So keep an eye out for new developments over the coming issues.

Get your entries in for the latest Peer Pressure challenge, now up on the website! Pick one, two or three of the available images and do what you like with them in Photoshop, email them in to me and the top three will be selected to be printed in the magazine. The winner will also receive a great book from David & Charles and will be shown on the website under the Challenge Winners link. I can’t wait to see what you can come up with this month!

Well, after a month of hard slog, issue 50 has gone to press, to hit the shelves on 6 November. With over 100 artists featured throughout the various special features, tutorials and profiles, it’s a pretty ambitious issue – and a showcase of the very best digital art around. We’re now full steam ahead into getting issue 51 sorted, so there’s no rest for the wicked! I’ll update you more on issue 50 nearer the publication date and give you a sneak preview of the cover.

Hi all. I have had a couple of queries about the Peer Pressure online challenge. I am in the process of sorting this out now in-between working on our mammoth 50th issue. The new challenge will be online in the next couple of days, however, as well as showing off the winner from the last challenge. Keep your eyes peeled!

Well, after two amazing weeks in America (first Las Vegas and then Los Angeles), I am back in the AP offices catching up with about a million emails and taking my first look at how issue 50 has been progressing – it’s going to be special! I was pretty excited when I went into Borders on Sunset Blvd and saw AP 47 sitting there along with loads of other Imagine Publishing titles (Digital Photographer, Photoshop Creative, iCreate, Web Designer, Corel Painter…) – the security guard didn’t seem so impressed when I starting flicking through them all, though!I’m in a bit of a jet-lagged haze (I only got back last night, plus there’s the eight-hour time difference), but it’s actually quite nice to be back at work – I did keep an eye on the AP website and gallery while I was away. I can’t believe how much I have missed – the new website looks amazing, so thanks to the web team for a great job, and the Photoshop Face-Off is so addictive. I couldn’t stop using the one over at the Digital Photographer site, but it’s even better now that I can do it here! Honestly, give it a go – it’s a great way to see a random selection of images from the site, which you might otherwise miss, especially now that we have nearly 8,000 images on the gallery.Thanks also for all your entries into the latest Web Challenge – I’ll be picking a winner with the team tomorrow, as well as putting the new challenge online.I’m going to start browsing the gallery now to see what you’ve been up to over the last couple of weeks…

Hi gang, well, I hope you like the new place. I am, of course, talking about the official Advanced Photoshop gallery website’s latest interface. But why not let us know directly.Just log onto the forum at www.advancedphotoshop.co.uk/forum and visit Chat Lounge>Face Off Site Section and leave your comment, be it positive or negative, but always constructive. Let us know exactly what you think of the redesign.