Most of the software links below are Open-source software and are available free of charge and are legal to download and use.

Software Links:

• Open Office: http://www.openoffice.org/  This software is an excellent replacement for Microsoft Office.
   
• Blender: http://www.blender.org/  This is a great starting point for 3D modelling.
   
• CutePDF: http://www.cutepdf.com/  This will convert your Word - Excel or any other document to a PDF file.
   
• Avast: http://www.avast.com/eng/download-avast-home.html  A completely free anti-virus application that is updated regularly.
   
• 3DPlus: http://www.freeserifsoftware.com/software/3dPlus/default.asp?SP=G400_UK&kwd=3d_software&gclid=CL6wl6K3lIkCFTYNQgodrxBemw another 3D application.
   
• Firefox: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/  One of the best web browsers around.
   
• ThunderBird: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/thunderbird/  This email client is the perfect replacement for Outlook.
   
• Gimp: http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html  Not a complete replacement for Photoshop but it is good.
   
• DivX: http://www.divx.com/  A great movie codec compressor, make your movies a lot smaller without loosing quality.
   
• Winamp: http://www.winamp.com/  One of the best free music and movie players.
   
• Filezilla client: http://filezilla-project.org/   You will need this for FTPing your site to portfolioshowcase.co.uk or you can use Adobe Dreamweaver.
   
• VideoLan: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/  This application can play just about any file format.

Useful Sites:

•  The adobe design centre http://www.adobe.com/designcenter/video_workshop/   CS3 video tutorials.
   
• A collection of incredible web sites for your inspiration http://www.beautifully-webdesign.net/beautifully_0_1.htm
    
• 30Gb of free online storage that can be accessed from any PC http://humyo.com/  (some Colleges may block) it stores 25Gb of music-images-video and 5Gb of docs
   
• Adobe Lads  Kuler http://kuler.adobe.com/   This site is free to use and is the only colour coordination application you will ever need, it will export colour swatches to Photoshop  CS3.