Located in Herford, elementa:res specializes in vocational training related to print and digital media. All courses are conducted in-person at the school headquarters or on-site for corporate clients.
As an Adobe Authorized Training Partner, elementa:res maintains a catalogue of courses in web and UX design, photo and video editing, and vector and motion graphics. The school has been in operation in since 2003.
Elementa:res—or elementa:res für Medienkompetenz—was founded in 2003 by Detlef Stuke, after a long and successful career in the print industry working for companies of all sizes. His goal in opening elementa:res was to create a school that would provide continuing education to those involved in the graphics and printing fields, while simultaneously providing consulting services to companies involved in those same areas. The school is an Adobe Certified Training Center, and concentrates its curriculum on the products in Adobe Creative Cloud. Elementa:res is also an Adobe Gold Reseller, a Roland Authorized Dealer and an Epson Partner.
The school is located at 30 Engerstraße in Herford, a town of some 66,000 people founded by Charlemagne located in the state of Nordrhein-Westfalen. Herford is approximately an hour’s drive from Hanover and an hour and a half’s drive from Münster.
The school can arrange corporate training for clients, either at its Engerstraße premises or wherever in Germany the client might desire. The school does not, however, teach online classes.
The curriculum at elementa:res is devoted almost entirely to the three principal Adobe Creative Cloud programs, Photoshop, InDesign and Illustrator. The goal of all the school’s classes is to equip those working in graphic design and media production with tools they can utilize in the course of their professional lives. A small number of general classes in topics such as color theory is included in the course listing as well.
A comparison of elementa:res’ Adobe Creative Cloud classes with those of other schools can be effected by clicking the link and consulting Noble Desktop’s Classes Near Me tool. It will suggest alternative educational opportunities in the Nordrhein-Westfalen region as well as a number of online classes that are accessible from any point on the globe.
Most classes at elementa:res focus on specific problems in media and graphic design and the ways in which the Adobe Creative Cloud programs can be used to solve them. There is considerable variety and a great deal of specificity in the subject matter. The majority of the school’s classes are not designed for beginners, but, rather, for those who have experience with the software and are looking to increase their skill levels.
A typical offering from elementa:res is Optimizing Camera-Ready Copy for Packaging and Labels using the Adobe Creative Cloud. The course shows how to use specific features of InDesign and Illustrator such as transparent coatings, die-cut contours and embossing effects to create packaging and labels. The class lasts for two days and provides its fair share of tips and tricks for working more efficiently with the software. A follow-up advanced class is also available.
That is not to say that the school doesn’t offer any elementary classes. Indeed, a glance down the list of courses will turn up introductions to Photoshop, InDesign, PremierePro and Dreamweaver. These are predicated on getting students literally up to speed and to be able to work productively with the software in as little time as possible.
Other examples of elementa:res classes include a workshop in Creating Advertising Materials with the Adobe Creative Cloud, a mouthful of a class called Compact Prepress Three-Day Power User with the Adobe Creative Cloud and courses in Adobe Dimension 3D Visualizations for beginners and advanced users. Also available is a workshop in XML-Based Cross-Media Publishing with InDesign, a two-day class in creating complex interactive forms for the web, and something of an overview class designed to convey more the theoretical applications of the Adobe Creative Cloud for creating print materials (Creation of Print Data Power User with the Adobe Creative Cloud, two days.)
Above and beyond all the Adobe classes, the school also teaches a few beginner classes in Maxon Cinema 4D (for everything from 3D text to 3D animation.) As an alternative to that, the school also teaches a brief course in Luxion’s KeyShot for 3D rendering and animation.
Classes are taught live at the elementa:res school location in Herford. The school also creates in-house corporate training, which casts its net quite a bit wider than a small town in Nordrhein-Westfalen. Online classes are not available.
Classes are kept extremely small, sometimes limited to only two participants. Be apprised of the fact that the school’s facilities only allow for the teaching of one class at a time. As a result, the class listing is spread rather thinly across the calendar.
As a general rule, admissions are open. The proviso is that quite a few of the elementa:res classes presuppose a working knowledge of and some experience with the Adobe Creative Cloud programs. Students should thus read the course descriptions carefully before registering for one of the advanced seminars.
Prices for elements:res’ two-day classes are generally at or around €900 (that is to say approximately $920), while the one-day workshops price out at roughly €450 (approximately $460). Prices for the three-day classes are far more variable, and fluctuate between €1350 ($1380 approximately) and €1950 (roughly $,000).
Prices are netto, which is to say exclusive of MsWt at 19%.
Classes at ementa:res are eligible for federal and state subsidies such as the NRW Bildungsscheck.
Given the brevity and specialized nature of its courses, and the fact that they are targeted at the employed looking to acquire a specific skill, elementa:res does not offer career support services.
Elementa:res provides no information about the impact their classes have on their students. Nor did a search of the internet produce any information in that respect.
A search of German and international review sites both large and small produced no results as far as reviews of elementa:res was concerned. The school’s website even fails to reproduce any testimonials from past students. Given the small size of the school, the smaller size of its classes, and its location in a very small city, that is perhaps not entirely surprising.
Short Description of School (2 sentences summarizing the school): elementa:res is a small school in the small city of Herford that caters to those working in media and print. Their classes target highly specific uses of the Adobe Creative Cloud in those industries.
Long Description of School (2-4 sentences with more info about the school): Introductory classes are available as well, as are courses in non-Adobe software such as Maxon Cinema 4D. Onsite corporate training is also available from elementa:res.
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In March of 1998, INCAS (InterNetwork Consulting and Services) was trademarked. That summer, IP-SCHOOL opened its doors in Kempen, under the direction of Stephan Otten. Two years later, those entities were merged and began to operate under the triumvirate of Otten, Roland Janke and Stefan Pollok. A year later, the school moved its premises from Kempen to Krefeld. Since then, INCAS has hosted 3D Forums in Lindlar, helped pioneer touch technology in live broadcasting, and collaborated with the WDR (West German Broadcasting Company) in Köln on a multi-media social media project. Since 2013 the school has been again under the sole direction of Stephan Otten, who has recently become a member of EATO, the European Association for Training Organizations.
The school can lay claim to a truly impressive number of certifications from major software manufacturers: INCAS has been recognized as an official training partner by Adobe, Citrix, Ventuz, VMware, IBM, Corel, Wacom, Maxon, Unreal Engine and Autodesk. Since 2018, the school has also been a Microsoft Gold Partner. In 2020 the number of training seminars offered by the school surpassed the 1500 mark, making the school one of the very largest of its kind in Europe.
INCAS Training’s executive offices and main classrooms are located in Europark Fichtenhain, a high-tech industrial park about 12 minutes from downtown Krefeld, a city in the state of Nordrhein-Westfalen of some 225,000 residents with a history dating back to the twelfth century. Krefeld is about half an hour’s drive northwest of Düsseldorf. Since 2020, the school has been a member of the PC College network, which enables INCAS Training to bring several of their classes to every city in Germany, from Munich, Hamburg and Frankfurt to smaller locales such as Bad Homburg, Erfurt and Dortmund.
Nearly every class the school teaches is available live online. As a general rule, these live online classes coincide with the in-person seminars given at the school’s main Krefeld location.
INCAS Training’s website lays claim to 1711 different classes available through the school. If that sounds exhaustive, that’s because it is. Moreover, very few of those classes qualify as soft skills classes, meaning that most of those 1711 classes are devoted to IT subjects involving software and server and network administration, configuration and maintenance.
Students looking for classes in such usual topics as the Adobe Creative Cloud, Microsoft Office Suite and website development using HTML, CSS and JavaScript will find abundant offerings from INCAS Training. To give an example of the dimensions of that cornucopia, there are no fewer than 66 different Adobe classes available through the school.
Autodesk, Corel, SAP, Rhinoceros and Unreal Engine (for game development) are among the other software products that students can learn to use at INCAS Training. Programming is also taught: courses in Python, Ruby, Java and C++ and C# are available, as are classes in such related topics as machine learning and AI.
INCAS Training also teaches a veritable superabundance of classes in server-side subjects. Amazon Web Services, DataCore, IBM, Microsoft and Cisco are among the topics available for study in network administration, architecture and management. Cybersecurity is also covered in depth, with classes designed to prepare candidates for such EC-Council certification examinations as the Certified Ethical Hacker and Certified Threat Intelligence Analyst.
To compare INCAS Training classes in Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Cloud or Web Development with similar offerings in the Nordrhein Westfalen (NRW) region, please consult Noble Desktop’s Classes Near Me tool by clicking on one of the above links. They will bring up not only classes in the NRW area, but also a few online ventures that may be taken from anywhere. The tool will be equally as effective in bringing up class options in the cybersecurity field.
Breaking down the 1700+ classes offered by INCAS Training is something of a Herculean labor. As Adobe comes first in the alphabet, it’s as good a place as any to start. For the key programs in Adobe Creative Cloud—Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator—the curriculum is organized around a three-day introductory class in each program, followed by a two-day advanced class. Additional classes cover more specific topics such as Photoshop for architects, 360º photo editing with Photoshop and Illustrator for fashion designers. With PremierePro and After Effects, the beginner classes are the ones that run for two days and the advanced ones run for three. (Acrobat’s introductory and advanced classes both are two days long.) There are additional courses as well, including print-ready copy with Acrobat, animated explicatory videos with After Effects, and using PremierePro to create 360º videos. Classes are also available in many of the lesser-known Creative Cloud programs, including Animate, Bridge, Captivate, ColdFusion, Connect, Dimension, Dreamweaver and FrameMaker.
The Microsoft classes divide into two groups: network administration/server-side operations and Office software. The former include classes in Windows 10, Windows Server (both the 2016 and 2019 versions), and no fewer than 32 classes in working with, administering and protecting Microsoft’s answer to the cloud with Azure. As for the software classes, they begin with a class in the basic operation of a computer for absolute beginners, as everyone has to start somewhere. Word is represented by a basic class, an advanced one, and a few others in such topics as managing long documents for publication. The Excel curriculum is also built around a beginner and an advanced class, and further includes seminars in VBA programming. Power BI classes, including a three-day Data Analyst class, are to be found as well, as are seminars in PowerPoint, Teams and, for those who want to go in for programming, app development using Xamarin,.NET and C#.
The Autodesk software classes go far beyond the usual pair of introductory and advanced classes in AutoCAD, although INCAS Training certainly has such classes on offer. Autodesk’s 3ds Max, Inventor, MAYA, and Revit are all represented as well, with such classes as MAYA Animation Workflow, 3ds Max for automation with Maxscript, and a VRED seminar that teaches students to incorporate the 3D-visualization software into their regular work routines.
The popular bookkeeping software DATEV is taught extensively by INCAS Training, with classes ranging from an introduction to the discipline of keeping books through to specialized seminars in such operations as creating electronic statements, dunning and payments, and office accounting. SAP’s Enterprise Resource Planning modular software solutions are covered in an even wider selection of classes, available either as public seminars or as private corporate training.
Those looking for instruction in programming will find that INCAS Training teaches classes in everything from C to SQL, with stops in between for such popular languages as Java, Python and PostgreSQL. The Java classes are designed for total beginners, for those with a programming background but no knowledge of object-oriented programming, and for those who are seeking to switch over to Java from a different language. The Python curriculum includes beginning and advanced classes, along with seminars that cover data science with Python and further classes that treat Python’s usefulness with machine learning and neural networks. As for the classes in PostgreSQL, those run the gamut from an introductory class through to one in advanced optimization and performance tuning.
INCAS Training presents quite a number of classes in web development. Those begin with the expected HTML, CSS and JavaScript classes, but delve into other software as well. There are PHP, Sketch and Angular classes, courses that go into content management systems such as WordPress and TYPO3, and even a class in creating VR applications for the web using A-Frame.
Also extensively covered by INCAS Training is the field of cybersecurity. The school teaches classes that prepare students for (ISC)2 (International Security System Certification Consortium) exams such as Certified Information System Security Professional (CISSP) or Certified Cloud Security Professional (CCSP). Those seeking certification through the EC-Council will find a similar listing of exam prep classes, this time for such titles as Certified Ethical Hacker, Certified Network Defender or Certified Security Analyst. The duration of all these exam prep classes is five days. There are also multiple classes available in Palo Alto software’s network defense and firewall software.
Other software that INCAS Training students can learn to use go as far afield as 3D graphics with Blender, CLO’s virtual fashion design program Marvelous Designer, and extensive classes in Epic Games’ Unreal Engine game-creation software. For the last, the school is an Unreal Engine Premier Authorized Training Center, which explains why there are 36 different classes in Epic Games’ software that range from creating mobile applications with Unreal Engine to using the software’s automotive configurator, to say nothing of the many stops in between.
While that’s a bit more than just the tip of the iceberg, quite a few of INCAS Training’s classes still remain beneath the metaphoric water’s surface. Neglected thus far have been all the classes dealing with server-side and network technology, classes that range from instruction in Amazon Web Services (network architecture, data analysis, DevOps and so forth), in many facets of IBM technology (cloud and data platform classes, Cognos analytics, DB2, etc.), and seminars in Microsoft’s behind-the-curtain technology. The school teaches well over 100 different classes in IBM technologies alone; INCAS Training thus has its students covered regardless of which aspect of the computer universe they wish to study.
INCAS Training offers a choice of formats for its classes. The school can create corporate training sessions, which can be conducted at the client’s place of business or at one of the school’s locations throughout Germany. It also teaches open classes, the more popular of which are available in multiple cities, but the more esoteric of which are conducted only at the Krefeld location. The Krefeld classes are fairly systematically offered online as well, thus opening them up to anyone in Germany, or, assuming they’re German-speaking, to anyone in the world.
The school is also a Pearson VUE Testcenter, and (by arrangement) can set up the certification examinations for which the school prepares students.
The Krefeld classes include lunch at a restaurant adjacent to the school.
Although there are no admission examinations for the open classes, the different levels at which subjects are taught may be confusing to some students trying to hit upon the right INCAS Training class for their level of knowledge. The school will assist prospective students with placement upon request.
With over 1700 different classes, INCAS Training’s rate card is downright byzantine in its complexity. While each class doesn’t have a unique price, one can begin to get that impression as one glances down the list. Examples will therefore have to suffice. Thus the Adobe Photoshop, InDesign and Illustrator introductory classes cost €940 (approximately $960) for three days and the advanced follow-ups cost €740 (approximately $755) for two days. Meanwhile, the one-day class in 360º image editing with Photoshop lists at €590 (roughly $600).
The Excel two-day introduction, on the other hand, is priced at €540 (approximately $550), and the advanced two-day follow-up is €590. Microsoft Azure Fundamentals (2 days) is priced at €1450 (approximately $1480), while the three-day Power BI Data Analyst course carries a price tag of €1990 (that is to say about $2035).
Among the Autodesk courses, the basic AutoCAD class is priced at €1320 (approximately $1350), and the continuing class is €1110 (or about $1135). These prices hold for the introduction and advanced Revit classes. On the other hand, all the Inventor classes are priced at €1320 each.
Beginning HTML will cost the student €980 (approximately $,000), while basic Python is €1390 (approximately $1420) and basic C# is €1730 (approximately $1765). Certified Ethical Hacker exam preparation is priced at €3950 (or about $4035). The basics of Unreal Engine are €1470 (roughly $1500), and finally, to choose one class from the many server-side courses on offer from the school, IBM Information Analyzer Essentials (a four-day venture into the subject) carries a price tag of €3200 (approximately $3265).
None of these prices includes Germany’s 19% MwSt (value added tax.)
Given the fact that 1700 classes have seemingly 1700 different prices, the prospective student is referred to the individual class pages on the INCAS Training website for exact pricing.
Many of the continuing education classes at INCAS Training are eligible for government subsidy. That would include the NRW Bildungsscheck and the Bildungsgutschein from that Federal Employment Agency.
With the brevity of its classes and its largely business clientele, INCAS Training does not offer career support services. Moreover, they offer only a very few soft skills classes, although, to choose an example, the workshop in The Art of Making an Entrance would be of interest to those seeking to further their careers.
Although it doesn’t offer figures on student success following its classes and seminars, INCAS Training has amassed quite a number of accolades for student satisfaction over the years in which it has been in existence. Most recently (2022), the school obtained a five-star rating from Performnet AG, a Swiss firm that specializes in performance analysis and classification.
The school offers a number of guarantees relating to its classes, be they in-person or online. Foremost among those is a money-back satisfaction guarantee that is available during the first quarter of a course’s duration. Online students who are dissatisfied with the teaching modality may also take their classes again live in Krefeld.
Although third-party review sites with critiques of INCAS Training are seemingly impossible to find on the internet, there are reviews posted on the school’s Facebook page, admittedly not always the most unbiased source for such things. One former student of the school wrote: “pleasant atmosphere, helpful answers to questions, the trainer spoke very clearly…and had a great body of knowledge.” The poster added that she would gladly return to INCAS for a further class.
“I learned so much from the class, ” wrote another student. “For me, it could have lasted another three days. The teacher was very competent and pleasant. I would come back anytime.”
Meanwhile, among the reviews that the school quotes on its own website, former students have written: “Finally an understandable and hands-on course in SQL. Super teacher. The incidentals were all TOP!” There is no shortage of praise for teachers in the other quotes as well. And, finally, another student said: “I can’t imagine a better introduction to video editing using Adobe. The class was a big help to me.”
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