Web Design

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  Bokardo

• Five User Experience Trends

  Josh

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:22 am

  Since my blog has been broken a lot recently I missed this excellent overview of Five User Experience trends by Gene Smith. I can’t help but agree with all of them: Services as Software – Gene is one of the first people in the UX industry to admit that good enough, fast and cheap tools like usertesting.com will have a real impact. While most people still feel the need to argue “User testing is important”…the market is moving past that. “How fast can you measure?” is as important as “Did we find everything?” User Experience Analytics…

• Google: Forms & Landing Pages are Key

  Josh

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:01 am

  A fascinating post by Googler Gavin Doolan: If you are considering making changes to your website design, take a moment to consider the potential revenue impact of your redesign. (This graph) shows a theoretical overview of the ROI impact of various parts of your website. I love that: “theoretical overview”. In other words, they really have no idea. But, if this is true, think about how it would rewire the way the design world works. Almost all money is pushed into technology and branding. Homepage, site redesigns, and custom CMSes are the cash cows of the design…

• Dreamers of Day

  Josh

  7 Feb 2010 | 8:25 am

  I recently posted this quote on the 52weeksofUX site, but I like it so much I’m going to post it here as well: “All men dream; but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds Awake to find that it was vanity; But the dreamers of day are dangerous men. That they may act their dreams with open eyes to make it possible.” T. E. Lawrence (aka Lawrence of Arabia)

• On the Origins of Avatars

  Josh

  8 Dec 2009 | 4:47 am

  Updated: Thanks to several commenters, I’ve updated the piece to cover some more early references to avatars. As I sit looking at Tweetdeck this morning, looking over 40 avatars of people I know and don’t know, I wonder how much of my interaction is influenced by what a particular avatar looks like. Am I more willing to converse with someone who has a realistic avatar? A smiling avatar? Does the offbeat, non-human, text-based avatar inspire better communication or worse? I have my hunches, and will write them up after I have done more research on the subject. In the meantime, here…

• The Most Important Feature of a Multi-Device Web: Syncing

  Josh

  19 Nov 2009 | 6:24 am

  As the ecosystem of devices proliferates, with the iPhone and Android platforms coming into their own (along with the ever-impending iTablet), we’re seeing a single feature become the most important and critical piece of new technology: syncing. If you sync seamlessly across devices, people will love you for it. It’s why I love the Apple ecosystem. I add a calendar event to my desktop, iPhone, or web app, and it automagically appears on the others. All of my mail is synced in all of these places so I never have to worry about missing email or knowing whether I replied or having to…

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  Smashing Magazine Feed

• Applying Mathematics To Web Design

  Adit Gupta

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:52 am

    “Mathematics is beautiful.” This may sound absurd to people who wince at numbers and equations. But some of the most beautiful things in nature and our universe exhibit mathematical properties, from the smallest seashell to the biggest whirlpool galaxies. In fact, one of the greatest ancient philosophers, Aristotle, said: “The mathematical sciences particularly exhibit order, symmetry and limitation; and these are the greatest forms of the beautiful.”Because of its beautiful nature, mathematics has been a part of art and architectural design for ages. But it has not been…

• Color Theory for Designer, Part 3: Creating Your Own Color Palettes

  Cameron Chapman

  8 Feb 2010 | 3:58 am

    In the previous two parts of this series on color theory, we talked mostly about the meanings behind colors and color terminology. While this information is important, I’m sure a lot of people were wondering when we were going to get into the nitty-gritty of actually creating some color schemes.Well, that’s where Part 3 comes in. Here we’ll be talking about methods for creating your own color schemes, from scratch. We’ll cover the traditional color scheme patterns (monochrome, analogous, complementary, etc.) as well as how to create custom schemes that…

• SimpleFolio: A Free Clean Portfolio WordPress Theme

  Elja Friedman

  7 Feb 2010 | 8:35 am

    Today we are glad to release a beautiful, simple and clean portfolio WordPress theme — SimpleFolio, designed by Omar E. Corrales and released for Smashing Magazine and its readers. SimpleFolio is a portfolio theme that includes a blog and a very extensive option page that allows you to exclude all your portfolio items from the blog page. It also includes a front page slider.It has 2 different widget areas and threaded comments, and also supports paged comments and has 2 different page templates for advanced usage. The control of images is done from the post page.Download the…

• Beautiful Motion Graphics Created With Programming: Showcase, Tools and Tutorials

  Vailancio Rodrigues

  6 Feb 2010 | 5:50 am

    When you hear the word “creative”, what type of profession comes to mind? Maybe a graphic designer, painter, sculptor, illustrator, or writer? It’s unlikely that you would consider a “programmer” when thinking of creative fields of work. But programmers have the potential to be creative and come up with ideas or concepts that will impact others in positive ways.We often turn to programmers to solve mathematical-related problems, but the concept of mathematics in programming is what powers programmers to innovate. When you think of mathematics you…

• 50 Free UI and Web Design Wireframing Kits, Resources and Source Files

  Paul Andrew

  5 Feb 2010 | 6:04 am

    Planning and communication are two key elements in the development of any successful website or application. And that is exactly what the wireframing process offers: a quick and simple method to plan the layout and a cost-effective, time-saving tool to easily communicate your ideas to others. A wireframe typically has the basic elements of a Web page: header, footer, sidebar, maybe even some generated content, which gives you, your clients and colleagues a simple visually oriented layout that illustrates what the structure of the website will be by the end of the project and that…

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  A List Apart

• Words that Zing

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:00 am

  When someone consults a website, there is a precious opportunity not only to provide useful information but also to influence their decision. To make the most of this opportune moment, we must ensure that the site says or does precisely the right thing at precisely the right time. Understanding the rhetorical concept of kairos can help us craft a context for the opportune moment and hit the mark with appropriately zingy text.

• The Problem with Passwords

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:00 am

  Abandoning password masking as Jakob Nielsen suggests could present serious problems, including undermining a user’s trust by failing to meet a basic expectation. But with design patterns gleaned from offline applications, plus a dash of JavaScript, we can provide feedback and reduce password errors without compromising the basic user experience or losing our visitors’ trust.

• Using SVG for Flexible, Scalable, and Fun Backgrounds, Part II

  26 Jan 2010 | 1:00 am

  In Part II, dig deeper into the technology behind using SVG for your site design. Explore how to incorporate SVG in a cross-browser friendly manner, including using SVGWeb to ensure that the SVG shows in Internet Explorer. And discover the unique characteristic that makes SVG ideal for page backgrounds: scalability.

• Using SVG For Flexible, Scalable, and Fun Backgrounds, Part I

  26 Jan 2010 | 1:00 am

  Many of us think of Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) as an also-ran: fine for charts and tables, but not much else. Yet SVG can actually enhance a site’s overall design, and can be made to work in even the most stubborn browser. In Part I of a two-part series, Shelley Powers covers important basics of working with SVG, including browser support and accessibility.

• The Survey, 2009

  15 Dec 2009 | 2:00 am

  For the third year in a row, good citizens of the web, we ask that you take a few minutes to tell us about your professional skills, educational background, career prospects, job benefits, and more.

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  Tutorial Blog

• Awesome Customizations: 10 websites based on the Yamidoo Magazine Theme

  Barbara Holbrook

  14 Jan 2010 | 1:18 pm

  Premium WordPress themes can be a designer’s best friend. But most websites worth visiting know better than to use a theme straight “out of the box.” Your site design is part of your branding and it’s the first impression visitors will have of your product. It only takes seconds for a new visitors to decide whether your site is “reputable.” And, like it or not, they will make that decision based on looks. That’s why when you’re deciding which premium theme to buy the most important question you can ask is, “Can I make this theme look…

• How to Use Google Maps with WordPress Blogs: 5 Plugins to Get You Started

  Barbara Holbrook

  15 Dec 2009 | 1:06 pm

  It wasn’t long ago that Mapquest was the only quality mapping tool online. Then, the rise of Google Maps, possibly the best and most sophisticated mapping tool available online. Google Maps inspired regular people to become cartographers — mapping our lives, mashing up old maps in new ways, and creating a new way to share our world. Even as the maps have become more sophisticated, the general tools have become simpler. In fact, if you’re using WordPress inserting a Google Map can be dead easy with the right plugin. A note of caution, inserting Google maps into a WordPress…

• Sync Your Life: Great Tools to Sync, Backup and Store your Files

  Derek Walter

  2 Dec 2009 | 10:00 am

  You probably remember that one time when you really needed a copy of that spreadsheet for the meeting; only to realize it was sitting on your hard drive at home. Or the time you wrote up that great list of ideas and forgot to e-mail it to yourself. If you use multiple devices for computing, the good news is these potential hazards can be avoided. There are now some great online tools to keep your files, notes, and other essential data synced between your desktop, laptop, and mobile phone. Here are some suggestions for Getting your Digital Life in Sync. (...)Read the rest of Sync Your Life:…

• Freelancers: Invoice your clients

  Oli

  23 Nov 2009 | 10:00 am

  Create invoices and manage account receivables online using one of these 9 web apps. You’ll save time and maybe even earn more money. The ability to successfully run a freelance design business, requires more than just graphic skills. You’ll need to know how to drum up business, manage competing demands and perhaps most importantly how to get paid. As a freelancer, choosing the right invoice software can make your job easier. These web apps can create invoices online, track payments, and more. Many offer a free trial, others are completely free. All you need now is determine…

• Target Your Marketing Campaign with Facebook Ads

  Barbara Holbrook

  4 Nov 2009 | 10:00 am

  Facebook ads are quickly becoming the top choice for targeted online ad campaigns. Whether your goal is lead generation, sales, or improving brand recognition, a targeted campaign will always have better results. Google Adwords used to be the king of online ad campaigns because they can target users based on their current search priorities. Facebook ads are the next generation of targeted text ads. Learn how to get started and why you should create a Facebook ad. (...)Read the rest of Target Your Marketing Campaign with Facebook Ads © Tutorial Blog, 2009. | Permalink

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  Psdtuts+

• How to Create a Somber Composition in Photoshop

  Constantin Potorac

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:08 am

  This one’s another collaboration with my good friend Toma Alin Gabriel. In this tutorial you will learn how to manipulate stock images and turn them into your puppets to express your desired feelings.Final Image PreviewTake a look at the final result first. Want access to the full PSD files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join PSDTUTS PLUS for just $9/month. You can view the final image preview below or view a larger version here.Tutorial Details Program: Photoshop CS4 Difficulty: Intermediate Estimated Completion Time: 7 hoursResourcesFirst of all I would…

• Best of the Web – January 2010

  Emil

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:07 am

  The first month of the new year has wrapped up and there was a ton of great content for all the Photoshop Fans. This month was bursting with tons of freebies that the readers could check out and download, for example this month we are featuring some great free font packs, as well as some great 2010 wallpaper packs. On top of that we have some great high quality tutorials that deal with some very interesting 3D techniques. So lets get into this wrap up of January 2010.Tutorial Wrap Creating a Surreal Desert SceneOur first tutorial of the new year is already an amazing photo manipulation…

• How to Create a Stone Giant Matte Painting – Psd Plus Tutorial

  Alex Beltechi

  4 Feb 2010 | 1:30 pm

  We have another Psd Plus tutorial exclusively available to Plus members today. If you want to take your matte painting skills to the next level, then we have an awesome tutorial for you. Learn more at the jump!This Plus Tutorial is Filled with Creative TipsThis tutorial is a collaboration between myself, Alex Beltechi, and college pal, Andrei Bacter. I’ve requested his help to bring you a bit of what we don’t do a lot on Psdtuts – Matte Painting. This technique combines photo scenery and tablet drawn details. As such, the tutorial is divided in two parts. The first one…

• How To Repair Scratches, Tears, and Spots on an Old Photograph

  Robert C. McLaughlin

  3 Feb 2010 | 7:46 am

  In this tutorial you will learn how to repair cracks, scratches, and spots so this photo of the Swedish Nightingale, Jenny Lind, looks just like new. We will purposely avoid using some of the quick fix tools such as the healing brush so that you can gain an understanding of the basics of photo restoration. Let’s get started!Final Image PreviewTake a look at the image we’ll be creating. Want access to the full PSD files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join Psd Plus for just $9/month. You can view the final image preview below.Tutorial DetailsProgram:…

• A Myriad of Vintage Grunge Patterns From Across the Web

  Callum Chapman

  2 Feb 2010 | 8:25 am

  Patterns can be used in almost any style of graphic and web design. They have many purposes, from being used as backgrounds to being used to touch up vector files that look just a little too clean. For that reason we have rounded-up and compiled a huge collection of over 450 free and premium patterns from various different websites for you to use in your personal and commercial projects.Free PatternsGrungy Green Tileable Photoshop Patterns (10)Grungy Natural Beige Photoshop Patterns (6)Grungy Natural Beige Photoshop Patterns (6)Grungy Hearts and Flowers Patterns (8)Seamless Grungy Burgundy…

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  Customized Marketing

• Favorite Tools for Web Design

  admin

  7 Feb 2010 | 6:25 pm

  I am frequently asked what tools I use for web design.  Many of the add-ons and plugins that I use are free and you might want to investigate for your own use if you don’t already use them. Hardware, etc.: Macbook Pro 3.06  8GB RAM(upgrading the RAM to 8GB makes all the difference in the world!), Dell 24″ LCD, Apple wireless keyboard and magic mouse Rain Design M stand – raises the MB Pro to right height to use  as 2nd monitor with the Dell,  cools the Mac, and gives me a little space underneath for stuff Harmon Kardon Speakers – you gotta have good sounds when…

• Free Income Blogging Guide

  admin

  18 Jan 2010 | 8:32 pm

  Well, my pal Joel, is at it again.  He has recently unveiled his new income blogging guide and you can get it for free here. If you want to discover: - The 2-step process you need to choose a proven money-making niche…get it wrong and you’ll never make any money - The 3 golden rules of keyword analysis…get one rule wrong and ALL your future efforts are wasted. - The exact step-by-step methods to find the best domain name for your blog …99% of bloggers miss this crucial “Search Engine Optimization” step - How to install WordPress in under 1 minute (as long…

• Grit and Glimmer

  admin

  3 Jan 2010 | 12:37 pm

  Heidi Swift’s new site.  Quite a transformation from her white site of last year.

• 7 Must Have Gadgets for Techies

  admin

  20 Dec 2009 | 9:37 pm

  Want to know 7 gift ideas for the Techie on your list? The Amazon Kindle allows you to get and read the latest book without leaving your chair. The Chill Pill RapCap is a tiny microphone for your iPod and comes in colors to suit every taste. Want a new digital camera with 12x zoom, and super fast shutter that also records movies in HD?  Check out the Panasonic Lumix ZS3. Livescribe makes a smartpen that is a great idea for designers or anyone who wants to record thoughts or information. Any size 3rd Generation  iPod Touch holds lots of music, videos (including TV and movies), your email,…

• Massive Collection of Over 1,300 Free Icon Sets

  admin

  19 Nov 2009 | 8:20 pm

  Okay, I admit it.  I am a compulsive collector of free icons (and some paid ones).  Just always have to have one more set for the arsenal, and I have been known to stockpile.  What you have here is a list of some beautiful icon sets and many posts that have collections of icons for social media, web functions and applications.  All told there are over 1300 sets of free icons for you to bookmark or download.  Some of the compilations repeat sets, but I didn’t eliminate them if they had some unique sets that were worth noting. Think of these sets as a good excuse to download a few…

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  Carsonified » Blog

• The Pipeline with Dan Benjamin

  Keir Whitaker

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:48 am

  Dan Benjamin recently blogged about his decision to venture into full time podcasting. We love to hear about anyone branching out and trying new things so we wish him all the best with his venture. Two of his new shows solo shows are The Pipeline and The Conversation: The Pipeline, an interview show talking with designers, developers, writers, and entrepreneurs. Episode one featured Jeffrey Zeldman and upcoming shows will include Kottke, Storey, Vaynerchuk, Coudal, Mann, Siracusa, and many more. The Conversation, a live-streamed talk show featuring topical discussions, reviews, special…

• Future of Web Design London 2010 is go

  Keir Whitaker

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:56 am

  We are delighted to announce that Future of Web Design will be returning to London for the 4th year running. Taking place from May 17th – 19th 2010 in the heart of London it will be packed full of great talks, workshops and networking opportunities. Grab the early bird discounts There are a number of early-bird offers available including £195 off a two day conference pass, they are limited in number so grab them whilst they’re hot. Amazing speakers Here’s just a few of the great speakers we have lined up for this year. Full details of their sessions are available on the new…

• Designing for donations

  Jaan Orvet & Andreas Carlsson

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:57 am

  Donating money to a charity should be as quick and easy online as it is to stuff a few coins in a collection pot on the high street. It should also be apparent what the money will be used for. With these two things in mind, it is surprising how often charities miss the mark when it comes to their online donation screens. Fiddly pull-downs, peculiar microcopy, trillions of steps, and minimal transparency. Here are some of our step-by-step notes and drafts from a concept exercise on behalf of a well-known charity. The goal was to create a screen that encourages more site visitors to give, and…

• Bulletproof backups for MySQL

  Chris Lea

  4 Feb 2010 | 5:27 am

  You have all your important data backed up, right? I mean, come on folks, it’s 2010. We may not have flying cars yet like we’re supposed to, but “having backups” is a problem that’s solved. And I’m sure you’ve solved it. I’m sure you sleep well at night knowing that if a comet hit the data center where your website lives, and everything was completely destroyed, you could get back up and running somewhere else quickly enough. Except that the chance this is actually true for you, statistically, is very small. If we look at the statistics, then…

• Future of Web Apps Miami: Are you coming?

  Keir Whitaker

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:09 am

  Save $50 off your pass by entering promo code THINKVITAMIN when booking your pass. Only 9 left! Buy your tickets now » Did you know Carsonified, the team behind Think Vitamin, also run a number of web industry events? In a couple of weeks we head off to Florida for the third Future of Web Apps Miami. It’s going to be a great three days (February 22nd – 24th) and will feature great speakers, in depth workshops and free University sessions all delivered by leading industry figures. Here’s a quick round up of what’s happening: Companies speaking at FOWA Miami 2010…

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  Web Designer Wall

• Free Vector Social Media Set

  Nick La

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 pm

  In case you’ve missed it, I recently released a free vector set of Social Media Icons at IconDock. It includes 50 icons of the most popular social media networks. The icons are available at 32px and 16px in EPS, PNG, and GIF format. Feel free to use it in your blogs or client’s projects. If you like it, don’t forget to spread the love by blogging or tweeting about it. (more…)

• 47 Amazing CSS3 Animation Demos

  Nick La

  3 Feb 2010 | 7:10 am

  Here is a compilation of 47 jaw-dropping CSS3 animation demos. They demonstrate the possibilities of the CSS3 transform and transition property. Some are very useful and can be used as Javascript alternatives. Most of them are simply to look cool. In order to veiw these effects, you need a webkit browser such as Safari and Chrome (sorry to the Internet Explorer users). Enjoy! (more…)

• What to Expect in 2010: UX/UI Design Simplicity

  Nick La

  1 Feb 2010 | 6:56 am

  Guest Post by Chuck Longanecker In January of each year, we flip over the hourglass and, once again, we have everything in front of us. The new year gives us a clean slate, a chance for change and encouragement to evolve the way we do things. In the past, we’ve yielded to client and user requests to pack our website designs full of unrelated features and countless pages of duplicate information. The change we have been waiting for has come - our users have matured. 2010 is the year of Design Simplicity.

• InMotion Web Hosting Giveaways

  Nick La

  28 Jan 2010 | 6:08 am

  Exciting contest: InMotion Hosting is giving away 3 Power accounts (one-year) to WDW’s readers. To enter this contest, simply post a comment in this post before Feb 12, 2010. I’ve moved my hosting to them for about 2 weeks and very pleased with their services, particularly their 24/7 tech support. If you are looking for web hosting, check them out. They have a wide range of hosting packages from $5.95/mth shared hosting to $199/mth dedicated servers. (more…)

• Design Trends (Predictions) in 2010

  Nick La

  21 Jan 2010 | 5:49 am

  As we are stepping in a new decade, I can foresee that web design in 2010 is going to be fun and filled with experimental works. With the new CSS3 and HTML5, designers and developers are trying to utilize the new features to create impressive designs. Sketchy and large background styles are fading out. Serif fonts and texturized background will be popular. Thanks to CSS3, we are going to see a lot of rounded corners, RGBA transparency, and drop shadows. With the rise of smart phones, mobile web design is going to pick up this year. (more…)

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  Vandelay Design Blog

• 25 Creative E-Commerce Website Designs

  Vandelay Website Design

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:19 pm

  E-Commerce sites are often considered to be boring and unattractive, however, that is not always the case. This post showcases 25 e-commerce sites that demonstrate creativity in the design. It may be the layout, graphics, design style or site structure, but all of them break the mould of the typical e-commerce site. For more inspiration from e-commerce sites, see our gallery CartFrenzy. Ride Four Ever Mom & Popcorn The Affair Hipstery Benestar Green Label Organics RedVelvetArt CellarThief Shirt Fight K2 Snowboarding Storenvy Edge of Urge ‘47 Levi’s McMenamins Giraffe…

• Showcase of Floral Typography

  Vandelay Website Design

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:20 pm

  If you frequently browse through sites like deviantART and the Behance Network you’ve no doubt come across a number of designs that use typography and floral effects. In this post we’ll showcase some excellent works of this kind from various designers. If you would like more inspiration from typography and text effects please see our gallery site TypeInspire. Butterfly Eco Environment Cyrella Wonder Dolce & Gabanna Kings of Leon Funkrush Narani Ecosystem Wallpaper Desire for Love Sell Your Body to the Night Wyatt Play Passion New Years Eve Party Flower Power Small is Beautiful…

• 40 Beautiful Corporate Websites

  Vandelay Website Design

  31 Jan 2010 | 2:55 pm

  In today’s marketplace, every company needs an effective website. Of course, the purposes and needs of each company’s site will be unique, but every company should have a site that presents a professional image to visitors. That image should also be an accurate representation of the company and should work with other branding efforts to present consistent messages to customers. In this post we’ll feature 40 well-designed corporate websites. Blackberry Logitech Navigant Consulting Team Excellence Cognigen Chapeltown Development Trust Capgemi Mission Bicycle Company Sophos…

• 15 Invoicing Tips for Designers and Freelancers

  Vandelay Website Design

  27 Jan 2010 | 12:10 pm

  Most designers don’t particularly enjoy the financial side of running a business, but handling it properly is a necessary part of being a freelancer or running a design agency. The financial side of the business includes invoicing clients, and in this article we’ll look at some tips and best practices for invoicing. 1. Decide on an Invoicing App or Software There are plenty of online invoicing apps available that have been created with designers and freelancers in mind. Additionally, there are some software options as well. Using either an online app or software to handle your…

• Design Instruct: A New Resource for the Design Community

  Vandelay Website Design

  26 Jan 2010 | 4:54 am

  Almost two years ago I got to know Jacob Gube of Six Revisions as both of us had relatively new blogs in the design community. Since then I’ve followed Six Revisions as it has grown to become one of the leading blogs on web design and development with over 40,000 subscribers. If you follow Six Revisions you know that Jacob is a very talented designer, developer, and writer. Today he and his brother Isaac have launched their latest project, Design Instruct, which will provide high quality content related to visual arts and communication. Design Instruct has launched today with a…

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  digg.com: Stories / Design / Popular

• How to make new stuff from your piles of obsolete tech

  8 Feb 2010 | 7:00 pm

  If you're like us, you have an attic, closet, or garage stuffed with unused, outdated tech junk. Oh, you think you'll recycle it -- but you don't, do you? Wouldn't you like to do something useful with them?

• Common Misconceptions about Web Designers

  7 Feb 2010 | 10:20 pm

  Here are some common misconceptions about being a web designer that just aren't true.

• Is Wearable Technology of the Future Just Hype or Hope?

  7 Feb 2010 | 5:40 pm

  The onus is on us: It is our choices, our demands from the market, that will bring about the necessary actions and changes in the fashion industry. Smart fabrics and wearable technology offer us an opportunity for a more sustainable future, but the promise will be bittersweet if the entire product life cycle isn’t taken into consideration.

• Best MIT PhD Homepage Created With MS Paint Ever

  3 Feb 2010 | 10:30 am

  All this effort (and creativity), I hope he got a great job from this.

• Richard Branson Makes Luxury Submarine For Rich People

  31 Jan 2010 | 7:50 am

  Sir Richard Branson has a new underwater toy to accommodate the rich and adventurous--the Necker Nymph submarine.

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  FreelanceSwitch

• 4 Ways to Kill Scope Creep

  FreelanceSwitch.com

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:30 am

  Some clients just keep asking for a little more: a four page website design can turn into a design plus copy or even a design plus copy plus marketing. It often happens just a little request at a time, as the scope of the project creeps ever larger. Scope creep isn’t always an entirely bad thing, of course. As long as your clients are willing to pay for the work that goes along with a bigger project, it can be beneficial. Depending on the situation, there are several responses you can offer to a client with a case of scope creep.1. Glad to help — here’s a new estimateIf you can…

• Freelance Freedom #142

  FreelanceSwitch.com

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:30 am

• From the Community: Advice for New Freelancers

  FreelanceSwitch.com

  5 Feb 2010 | 4:30 am

  Recently, the FreelanceSwitch community was asked what simple, one-line advice they would give newly minted freelancers. The result was a surprising and poignant mix of wisdom, humor, and insight on topics such as clients, money, marketing, and keeping one’s sanity. Read on for the best advice from the FreelanceSwitch community! It’s a not so well-kept secret that the FreelanceSwitch community forums are filled with experts and seasoned freelancers of every make and specialization. But everyone had to start somewhere! Being a new freelancer can be an exercise in hard lessons…

• Automate Your Bookkeeping

  FreelanceSwitch.com

  4 Feb 2010 | 4:30 am

  As a freelancer, it’s important to focus as much of your time as possible on the work you have or getting the work you need. And that means minimizing administrative tasks. Take bookkeeping, for example.Bookkeeping is critical for maximizing tax deductions and monitoring the overall health of your business, but it’s a royal pain. In this post I’ll show you how to automate bookkeeping tasks so you can stay focused on existing jobs while marketing your talents.Decide on a bookkeeping systemMany people still hand-write their income and expenses in a notebook or Excel…

• 7 Elements of a Successful Freelancer’s Website

  FreelanceSwitch.com

  3 Feb 2010 | 4:30 am

  “The shoemaker’s children go barefoot.”You’re not a shoemaker but the saying still fits. Between client projects, conferences, and social obligations (okay, okay, WOW clan meetings may count as social obligations), your site has been sorely neglected. A neglected website might not seem like a big deal if you’re flush with work. But what happens when, Zeus forbid, work slows? You’ll start pushing for new work, realize that your site is a mess, and spend time working on your site you should have spent landing new contracts.As a reminder for the veterans and a…

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  Noupe

• Mobile Web Design: Tips and Best Practices

  vitaly

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:13 am

  By Cameron ChapmanLast year, more than 63 million people in the United States accessed the Internet from a mobile device. It’s forecast that by 2013 there will be more than 1.7 billion mobile Internet users worldwide. With those kinds of numbers, it’s imperative that web designers and developers learn optimal development and design practices for mobile devices.For the most part you won’t need to learn any new technologies for mobile site design. But you will need to look at site design in a new way, one that is decidedly more restrictive than design for standard browsers. To…

• 60 Excellent Gadget Photoshop and Illustrator Tutorials

  vitaly

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:39 am

  Designing your own (or redesigning existing) gadgets such as MP3 Players, Game Consoles and Computers is an incredible way to improve your general skills in Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator (or any other design-related software package for that matter). You’re bound to pick up new skills every time, even if you’re considered an expert.The following round-up of tutorials consists of 60 great gadget tutorials. There is a selection of Photoshop and Illustrator tutorials so you can learn new tricks in two of the most used pieces of graphic software the world has ever seen.There are…

• 10 Things Clients Look For In a Design Portfolio

  vitaly

  6 Feb 2010 | 6:17 am

  By Thursday BramThere’s no formula for a perfect portfolio. There’s no format that’s guaranteed to land you clients, as long as you follow it. However, there are certain questions that a prospective client has in mind when he’s looking for a web designer. If your portfolio can supply the answers a client wants, you can improve your portfolio’s ability to convince a client and land a new project.Your portfolio may not be the only way that your clients find you, but it’s likely that most of your clients have at least seen it at some point. In many cases, your…

• Free Saint Valentine’s Day Icon Set

  vitaly

  6 Feb 2010 | 5:11 am

  Today we are glad to release Valentine’s Icon Set, a set with 10 free icons in resolutions 32×32px, 48×48px, 128×128px and 150×150px in formats .ico, .png and .icns. This set was designed by Iconsmaster and released especially for Noupe and its readers. The set was created from scratch using Adobe Fireworks — the .png-sources are available for free download as well.Download the icon set for free!You can use the set for all of your projects for free and without any restrictions. You can freely use it for both your private and commercial projects, including…

• 55 Conceptual Examples of Surreal Artworks

  vitaly

  5 Feb 2010 | 6:43 am

  By Aquil AkhterSurreal Art is getting so much attention because it lets an artist freely express his creativity, feelings and the way he thinks. It is the medium of art in which you can showcase your talent and creativity in the most meaningful and the most intangible way. This is the main reason why Surreal Art is getting so popular these days. We have compiled a list of some inspirational Surreal artwork for you. Hope you’ll like this collection. Just drop us a line here and tell us which one you like most.Photomanipulation Surreal ArtLost boatIdee FixeWhere Sunflowers Grow by…

• 
  SimpleBits

• Exploded Settings icon

  Dan Cederholm

  6 Feb 2010 | 5:50 am

  A wonderfully nerdy tee by Sebastiaan de With.

• The Days of Miracles and Wonder

  Dan Cederholm

  6 Feb 2010 | 5:48 am

  Greg Knauss role plays some excellent perspective.

• Events in 2010

  Dan Cederholm

  29 Jan 2010 | 8:55 am

  This year will be a busy one in terms of speaking events. I’m currently crafting a brand new talk titled, “The CSS3 Experience”. It’ll focus on enriching the experience layer with advanced CSS and CSS3. Everyone can easily add enhancements to to their designs when focusing on the interactions and events that happen on the page. And by targeting the user experience with these new and evolving standards, you can start using these flexible techniques now, on any site, with less worry. Well damn, that sounded rather pitchy, didn’t it? That’s partially because…

• FF Nuvo

  Dan Cederholm

  26 Jan 2010 | 10:33 am

  Celebrating Firefox 3.6’s support for WOFF (Web Open Font Format), FontFont is giving away the WOFF version of FF Nuvo for free.

• 300&65 Ampersands

  Dan Cederholm

  26 Jan 2010 | 10:27 am

  An ampersand a day keeps the… something away. This is my kind of calendar.

• 
  The Daily Report

• A List Apart 300

  Jeffrey Zeldman

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:29 am

  Issue 300 of A List Apart for people who make websites solves password-related usability problems with a dash of JavaScript, and employs content strategy to help your site do the right thing at the right time: The Problem with Passwords by LYLE MULLICAN Abandoning password masking as Jakob Nielsen suggests could present serious problems, undermining a user’s trust by failing to meet a basic expectation. But with design patterns gleaned from offline applications, plus a dash of JavaScript, we can provide feedback and reduce password errors without compromising the basic user experience or…

• Free advice: show up early

  Jeffrey Zeldman

  5 Feb 2010 | 7:31 am

  Delay happens. The train is late, the flight is cancelled, the traffic is murder. Travel is the leading edge of entropy, and entropy is the universe’s final comment on the meaning of it all. If the universe is expanding and there are snow delays on Route 1, it’s not your fault that you’re 15 minutes late to the meeting, right? Don’t be so quick to excuse yourself. If 80% of success is just showing up, 90% is showing up early. It’s hard for the client to sympathize with your lateness when she, who had farther to travel, managed to make the meeting on time. No…

• Ahem

  Jeffrey Zeldman

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:39 am

  The first part of my post of 1 February was not an attack on Flash. It described a way of working with Flash that also supports users who don’t have access to Flash. I’ve followed and advocated that approach for 10 years. It has nothing to do with Apple’s recent decisions and everything to do with making content available to people and search engines. It’s how our agency and others use Flash; we’ve published articles on the subject in our magazine, notably Semantic Flash: Slippery When Wet by Daniel Mall. We do the same thing with JavaScript—make sure the site…

• Free advice: buy a dongle

  Jeffrey Zeldman

  2 Feb 2010 | 7:20 am

  There is still no Wi-Fi on the northeast corridor Amtrak trains that carry hundreds of thousands of business travelers each day. So quit whining and get a USB 3G modem. It’s free with monthly service, which is tax-deductible. For the $60/month I pay Verizon, I can connect my laptop to the internet from any train, bus, boat, lounge, lobby, conference room, coffee shop, or just about any other environment to which modern business takes me.

• Laying Pipe

  Jeffrey Zeldman

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:22 am

  Dan Benjamin and yours truly discuss the secret history of blogging, transitioning from freelance to agency, the story behind the web standards movement, the launch of A Book Apart and its first title, HTML5 For Web Designers by Jeremy Keith, the trajectory of content management systems, managing the growth of a design business, and more in the inaugural episode of the Pipeline.

• 
  Subtraction.com

• D-Crit Now Accepting Applications for Fall 2010

  desk@subtraction.com

  6 Feb 2010 | 6:43 am

  The School of Visual Arts’ MFA in Design Criticism program, run by my friend Alice Twemlow, is gearing up for its second school year starting this autumn. There’s not another program in the country, to my knowledge, that gives students access to a wealth of critical design knowledge on this level: Create original segments in a radio and podcasting workshop with PRI’s “Studio 360” senior producer Leital Molad and host Kurt Andersen; voyage deep into 20th century design with design historian Russell Flinchum; learn investigative journalism techniques…

• Pulling Over and Asking for Directions

  desk@subtraction.com

  4 Feb 2010 | 6:34 pm

  All told, I think I did a pretty good job of ignoring “Lost” for years, in spite of all the raves and recommendations from friends. Mostly, it was out of self-interest; I couldn’t afford the time investment that another hugely complicated television series would require, especially one that seemed to inspire such obsessive fandom. But now, living with a “Lost” devotee as I do, I find I can no longer willfully ignore the persistent phenomenon that is J.J. Abrams’ labyrinthine television saga. I started watching a handful of episodes here and there last…

• We Love Patterns

  desk@subtraction.com

  3 Feb 2010 | 10:54 am

  Just clicking through this bevvy of gorgeous and incredibly fun pattern designs from the very talented, young, Argentinian illustrator Gastòn Caba (and others) is just plain joyful. I know everyone thinks I’m all about grids and minimalism and monochromatic palettes and being very serious (okay, guilty), but it doesn’t mean I don’t also find this stuff to be totally great, too.

• Notes on iPad

  desk@subtraction.com

  27 Jan 2010 | 6:26 pm

  It’s not as if I haven’t had a point of view on all of this tablet computing device stuff that’s been lighting up the Internets for the past several months, but for professional reasons, I’ve had to keep mum. Suffice it to say, I’m really excited about Apple’s iPad, announced today, and I’m even more excited about what can be done with it. However. I’m pretty sure that I’m in the camp that believes that this is not the salvation that most publishing companies have been looking for. Not that the device falls short in some way, but rather…

• The New York Rocker

  desk@subtraction.com

  26 Jan 2010 | 8:04 pm

  A small but excellent selection of covers from “the definitive music and culture publication in New York City in the early 1980s.” I’d never heard of it before, but then in the Eighties New York was just an idea and not a real place for me yet. These covers evoke that dreamland of my youth though: gritty, plausibly if not authentically punk, confrontational and exclusive (who the hell were Human Switchboard? Oh, that’s who).

• 
  Stuff and Nonsense

• Revised Font Stack

  Andy Clarke

  6 Feb 2010 | 1:09 pm

  Font-stacks created after considering the font-share percentage on both Mac and Windows platforms and then checked in browser for x-height and other issues (like: readability). Published in External links.

• Life Below 600px

  Andy Clarke

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:50 am

  Some people would have you believe that you aren’t reading this because it’s not ‘above the fold’. — Sending this to my client from hell. Published in External links.

• ★ The CSS3 Online Conference

  Andy Clarke

  2 Feb 2010 | 4:06 am

  In other conference news, this time of the online kind, I will be broadcasting from my orbiting space-station for The CSS3 Online Conference,  organised by Carsonified on March 22nd. As this is an online event, there will no travel costs, no time out of your office and you can watch the event live (then as many times as you like) through your browser. Better still, ticket costs are only $150.00. The schedule runs like this, with some amazing presentations from some amazing presenters. CSS3 Transforms, Transitions and Animations with Ethan Marcotte Learn how to translate, scale and…

• ★ Web Directions @media is back in London in June

  Andy Clarke

  2 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  The conference that got it all started for me as a speaker comes back to London on June 10th and 11th for a sixth year, this time with a new face — Web Directions @media. If you're not familiar with Australia-based Web Directions, they have organised some of the best conferences in the web world in Sydney, Vancouver and Tokyo and I’ve had the great pleasure of working with them in all three venues. That the Web Directions organisers are taking over, keeping many @media traditions but bringing their own flair to the event can only be great news for the UK web industry. This…

• CSS3 AT-AT Walker

  Andy Clarke

  2 Feb 2010 | 1:57 am

  This is why CSS was invented. Read the tutorial. Published in External links.

• 
  You the Designer

• Various Alice in Wonderland Designs for Inspiration

  ronald

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:06 am

  Do you remember having bedtime stories read to you as you grew up? Remember your parents telling you tales about fairies, princes and princesses, knights, dragons and all those wonderful characters born of pure imagination? Several of these stories were even made into movies and cartoons that captured our young minds… These fictional characters have played a significant part in our childhood memories. Who could forget the classic stories of Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel and so many more?!!! Today, we pay a tribute to one of our all-time favorite stories. It’s about a young girl…

• 30 Free Adobe Photoshop Valentine Brush Sets

  ronald

  7 Feb 2010 | 3:23 pm

  As Valentine’s day approaches, more and more designers are searching for quality brushes to aid them in creating their Valentine designs. We put together 30 Free Adobe Photoshop Valentine Brush Sets to make sure our fellow designers have high quality brushes in time for Valentine’s Day…. This collection of brushes will help you create astounding designs for your loved ones to help celebrate a day of love. Check out this awesome heart brush collection and download the brushes you like best. Each set of photoshop heart brushes is unique, so make sure you don’t miss any…

• Increase Your Google Visibility in Under 5 Minutes

  Sam Nam

  1 Feb 2010 | 12:22 pm

  Google now holds a 70% market share of the search engine game and increasing your visibility in Google Search is key to gaining new clients. In addition, you may have noticed that Google now displays 7 local listings and a map when you search for a local business or service. Guess what? Graphic design is a service and a business. You can immediately increase your visibility to potential clients in your area by registering yourself in Google’s Local Business Center. Local SEO for Graphic Designers It takes about 5 minutes to sign up and fill out your info. At the end, they need to verify…

• 11 Creative Outdoor Advertisement Designs

  Girlie

  25 Jan 2010 | 3:00 pm

  Getting noticed in a busy street or crowded hallway isn’t easy, but the reward of reaching millions of consumers has possessed marketers to come up with some amazing and ridiculous outdoor advertisements.  Today’s post looks at 11 of the most creative outdoor ads around the world (according to us). Click on the image to see the original high-res images at adsoftheworld.com Creative Outdoor Advertisements If you’re looking to design outdoor advertising of your own, check out UPrinting.com’s large format printing products here.

• Job Posting – Freelance Tutorial Writer

  Sam Nam

  20 Jan 2010 | 11:47 am

  The team here at You the Designer is looking for a freelance tutorial writer to help bolster the variety of content offered to our readers. If you have experience writing design tutorials, please email us right now. How to Apply for Freelance Tutorial Writer Position Email the following information to writers@youthedesigner.com Cover Letter Resume / Portfolio Per Post Rate

• 
  Graphic Design News

• Children's museum honored for graphic design

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:56 am

  DuPage Children's Museum was recognized recently by Graphic Design USA, the premier graphic design magazine.

• [JOB] InContext Design is hiring Interaction Designers in Boston and Chicago

  8 Feb 2010 | 8:09 am

  Since 1992 InContext has used its Contextual Design methodology to design innovative solutions.

• Redlands Tea Party leader throwing herself into political fray

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:47 am

  A local Tea Party organizer is in the early stages of challenging the high-powered Rep.

• QuarkXPress 8 K-12 Site License Provides Design Software Solution for Schools

  6 Feb 2010 | 7:23 am

  QuarkXPress 8 desktop publishing and design software is one of the most widely used solutions for designers and artists alike.

• The Barn cements status as mainstay

  5 Feb 2010 | 7:02 am

  Sue Newton, owner of The Barn Gallery & Frame Shop LLC on Route 37 in New Fairfield, spends her days surrounded by beauty.

• 
  AIGA Home

• AIGA National Design Center holiday hours

  AIGA

  8 Feb 2010 | 3:27 pm

  AIGA’s offices and gallery will be closed Monday, February 15, in observance of Presidents Day. Normal gallery and business hours will resume on Tuesday, February 16.

• AIGA Design Archives 2.0 now live!

  AIGA

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:01 pm

  The AIGA Design Archives site has just been relaunched with a brand new interface by Second Story Interactive Studios—go take it for a spin!

• Enter the AIGA competitions by March 5

  AIGA

  4 Feb 2010 | 12:10 pm

  If selected, your work would be featured in the newly relaunched AIGA Design Archives and seen by countless future designers, students and clients. Just one month remains before the entry deadline.

• Register early for “Gain”

  AIGA

  4 Feb 2010 | 10:24 am

  “Gain,” AIGA’s biennial design and business conference, will take place in NYC this October. This event tends to sell out quickly—register early to reserve your spot!

• Case Study: AIGA Design Archives

  Michael Neault, Second Story

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:00 am

  Learn how Second Story gave the AIGA Design Archives website a new look, improved navigation and greater functionality.

• 
  The Everyday Web Expert!

• Free, Free, Free – A Facebook Fan Contest

  Kyle Reddoch - Owner

  9 Feb 2010 | 8:21 am

  As promised, we are having another contest. This time the stakes are higher, much HIGHER. Once you find out what the winner will receive, you will not be able to pass this one up! As most of you may already know, we have a fan page on Facebook that currently has 149 fans! Just a shout out to everyone that is already a fan, Thanks. We are having a contest to bring in more fans to our Facebook Page. Here is how the contest will play out. Contest Details Help us round up 500 fans on our Facebook page. The fan that suggests and brings in the most fans will be the winner. You can suggest…

• TEWE Superbowl Contest!!

  Kyle Reddoch - Owner

  5 Feb 2010 | 7:55 am

  We at The Everyday Web Expert are very much into football. Since it is Superbowl Weekend, we are having a tremendous contest! This contest will not be a drawing, instead it will test your prediction skills. How the Contest Works All you need to do is comment on this post with your prediction on who will win the big game, Colts or Saints. If you are correct in predicting who will win the game, you will win a coupon worth 50% off your website cost along with a FREE month of hosting. No drawings, No gimmicks, No fine print. Rules When entering for the contest, make sure you comment below. Please…

• Mister Doyce Tuxedos

  Webmaster

  2 Feb 2010 | 1:29 pm

  Mister Doyce has been serving Amarillo since 1964. Like many start-up businesses we had a lot of energy and not much capital. The only advertising we could afford was word of mouth, so we worked very hard to make every customer feel special. That approach is still the basis of our business philosophy. Our mission is to make sure you look and feel your best on your special day. We have grown considerably since 1964 and hope to continue to be your FIRST CHOICE! Thanks to the experts at The Everyday Web Expert, Mister Doyce Tuxedos has a fresh new look! Take a peek at it.

• Social Media and Religion

  Kyle Reddoch - Owner

  26 Jan 2010 | 10:09 am

  With recent news of Pope Benedict XVI commanding his priest’s to venture out to social media to bring the Gospel to the masses (especially younger ones), brings quite a message to the world of the power of Social Media. To get you caught up if you haven’t read about this yet, here is a excerpt of what the Pope said regarding this commandment: “The spread of multimedia communications and its rich ‘menu of options’ might make us think it sufficient simply to be present on the Web, or to see it only as a space to be filled. Yet priests can rightly be expected to be present in…

• New Blog Design and Features

  Kyle Reddoch - Owner

  26 Jan 2010 | 6:59 am

  First of, we want to thank our webmaster and web team for working hard yesterday on our new company blog! As you guys see, we now have a new, updated blog. There are a lot of new improvements that you will see. Please have a look around and get use to the new layout and design. As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to email our webmaster. We are still working on a few changes but the most of it is completed. You can still use the site as usual. One of our new features that we have available is advertising! We now allow people/businesses to advertise on our…

• 
  Experience Matters by Critical Mass

• Weekly Points of Interest

  Scott Weisbrod

  5 Feb 2010 | 1:30 pm

  Skittles re-designed its website when they realized that social media isn’t all rainbows. Adweek and Fast Company weigh in on Skittles’ experiment with social media. Business Week published a special report on the Value of Design this past week. A couple of choice articles to check out include The Role of Design in Business and Why Design Matters. Frontline recently aired a new documentary called Digital Nation that “explores what it means to be human in an entirely new world — a digital world”. They’ve created a companion web site containing tons of raw…

• The Digital Quarterback

  Scott Shamberg

  5 Feb 2010 | 11:22 am

  13 years old.  That is how old David Sills is.  He verbally committed to play quarterback at USC this week – in the year 2015.  Forget for a second that at 13 years old he is already six feet tall and obviously very athletic.  At that age, how can he have such a high level of understanding of the game?  If you watch this video you can hear the way the coach is talking to him about reading the safety and defensive coverage.  Really?  At 13? So as we prepare for the Super Bowl this weekend, a game that includes arguably the greatest thinking quarterback to ever play, I asked myself…

• Happy World Nutella Day to one and all!

  Critical Mass

  5 Feb 2010 | 9:27 am

  At Critical Mass, we are all celebrating World Nutella Day today. Just this week we announced our interactive agency of record status for Nutella Canada, so all of our offices are making of most of this delicious day! Bistro specials, Breakfast Bake-a-Thons and an office dressed all in Brown. We are all aflurry discussing our favorite hazelnut breakfast recipes and sharing them in our online Nutella community along with photos and fun. Want to get in on this? Vote below on your favorite way to enjoy this deliciously healthy breakfast spread. Or visit the community to chat up Ella Nutella and…

• 8 Best Practices for Mobile Site Design

  Critical Mass

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:00 pm

  According to ABI Research, people spent approximately $1.6 billion via m-commerce last year. Consumers are increasingly using their mobile phones for financial transactions and there is no question that the opportunity is huge. But what is the best way to go about it? If you’ve surfed the mobile web, you’ve undoubtedly encountered some pretty terrible experiences. So we set out to identify the best practices that make a mobile experience extraordinary. Why are sites such as m.espn, m.google, mobile.yelp, bbc.co.uk/mobile, mobile.nytimes, iphone.ebay, m.facebook so effective? What…

• My Take on the Apple iPad

  Scott Weisbrod

  28 Jan 2010 | 1:53 pm

  Originally posted at Experience Planner blog. At first glance, the new Apple iPad doesn’t appear to be a game changer. Honestly? What it is, is an upgraded, tricked-out iPod Touch and in typical Apple fashion, they’ve focused on basic functionality the first time out. There is no camera, no HDMI, no USB – not without an adapter, at least – and it lacks multi-tasking. Apple has created a low-risk product based on their existing technology. So unlike the Apple iPhone, there’s no new real technological or user experience innovation here (i.e., touchscreen tech and…

• 
  Graphic Design Links

• A Complete Guide On Starting A Webhosting Company On Your Own

  DIVINDS

  9 Feb 2010 | 8:25 am

  Multi-billion dollar industry of Internet is booming. IPv4 address is nearing its exhaustion, and this clearly implicates what is the growth rate of Internet in the present scenario.8 Vote(s)

• Weekly Web Design Inspiration #39

  atikusdesign

  8 Feb 2010 | 3:00 pm

  A showcase of the very best web designs from the last week7 Vote(s)

• Tsarfin Computing Ltd Declares Availability Of NetGong 7

  DIVINDS

  8 Feb 2010 | 3:46 am

  Tsarfin Computing Ltd declares the availability of NetGong 7, the flagship product of the company in the network monitoring software marketplace.8 Vote(s)

• BounceWeb Hosting Provider Goes Cent Percent Green

  DIVINDS

  6 Feb 2010 | 11:31 pm

  Web hosting provider BounceWeb announced that it's Web hosting services are now cent percent green.8 Vote(s)

• MAGIX Music Maker 16: Make Music As Easy As That

  DIVINDS

  6 Feb 2010 | 2:00 am

  Music Maker 16 is a product that let you make music like you always wanted9 Vote(s)

• 
  Just Creative Design

• How to sell the value of design: An email conversation

  Jacob Cass

  9 Feb 2010 | 9:46 am

  As a designer it’s not always easy to stand up for yourself… clients often have demanding requests, tight budgets and due to one reason or another, designers will succumb to taking on labour heavy jobs at heavily discounted rates. This does not have to be. In this article I will show you how I personally ’stand up’ for my rates and how I ’sell’ the value of my design services, which in the end, means a better result for the client and a much more pleasant overall experience for the designer. Below you will find the original transcripts of a conversation…

• Top 12 Logos of 2009 As Voted By You

  Jacob Cass

  1 Feb 2010 | 1:14 pm

  These are the top 12 logo designs of 2009 as voted by you (the awards that won Logo Of The Month) on my other site Logo Of The Day. What logo do you believe should win the 2009 Logo Of The Year? Cast your vote at the bottom of this post. Voting closes February 12th. And just so you know, we are now accepting new logo submissions, so go & suggest a logo for a chance to win a Logo Of The Day award. Michael Jackson Michael Jackson commemorative logo – from a  short video clip shown on MTV. Winner: Logo Of The Month September 2009 Credits: Agency; bbdo.de Executor; s-farm.de Lochness Loch…

• Back In Action

  Jacob Cass

  25 Jan 2010 | 6:22 am

  Some of you may have noticed this website and my other websites being down the past two weeks. Simply put, my old hosts did a runner on me… all of my websites and email stopped working and there was no one to contact for support, my hosts simply vanished. Luckily enough, I had a full back up from just before I left for my trip around the states which meant I had nearly all of articles and comments, bar from a few that I have now salvaged from Google’s cache. It wasn’t easy restoring the websites as the databases were quite large and had to be uploaded using some crazy back…

• Here’s To A New Year

  Jacob Cass

  4 Jan 2010 | 5:00 am

  It’s been a great break… I loved traveling across the USA, it truly is a remarkable country. I’ll be posting some photos when I get a chance to go through the 1400+ pics. Today (5th Jan) I will be flying out from Australia to begin my new life (story here) in New York, where I plan to stay for 1 to 3 years, while working for Carrot Creative. I will still be blogging & freelancing on the side. I’ve found a great spacious apartment to live in, with 4 other creatives (and a dog) who are currently attending Pratt Institute – we had a webcam meeting just yesterday and I consider…

• A Recession Guide For Designers

  Jacob Cass

  28 Nov 2009 | 5:00 am

  This is a guest article by Ana Paula Rodrigues*. In difficult times people get creative — and creative people must find new ways to use resources wisely. Whether you work as an in-house designer at a large company, own your own design firm, or work as a freelancer, the recession has no doubt affected you or someone you know. Thus, creating a need to think outside the box in order to make, and ultimately save, more money . Here are a variety of ideas to help you through this economic downturn. 1. Create a magazine club Magazines are a great source of information and inspiration, but they…

• 
  Logo Design Love

• The Philadelphia History Museum

  David Airey

  5 Feb 2010 | 10:02 am

  “Turns out, creating a logo that represents a city with nearly 350 years of history is difficult,” said Brendan Quinn of Philadelphia-based branding agency 160over90. “There are cliches to avoid (I’m looking at you, cheesesteaks, Rocky, and Liberty Bell), and just as many fascinating stories that are just too obscure to a general audience. “So we looked at the history, the people, and this place for inspiration. Digging through the museum’s artifacts, we found this map of William Penn’s original plan for the city. “It was a tight, orderly grid with…

• “Logos are dead.”

  David Airey

  2 Feb 2010 | 3:28 am

  Image from Flickr Simon Manchipp, one of three creative directors and partners at London-based studio SomeOne, said on Twitter yesterday: “Logos are dead. Yet we have been featured in the new book Logo Design Love as an example of how to do Logos. “They are a hangover from old-school thinking about branding. There is no desire by the public for a new logo. They are simply an old-fashioned approach to differentiating products or services.” Upon questioning, Manchipp explicitly meant, “…that symbols invented to accompany brand names are a waste of time, money and…

• Perez-Fox on the London identity

  David Airey

  29 Jan 2010 | 3:10 am

  And so it is decided, The Greater London Authority has confirmed that Saffron Brand Consultants has won the Brand for London tender to create a visual identity for the capital. Saffron principal Ian Stephens says that the London marque’s launch will not come ‘much later’ than the GLA’s original deadline of next month. Hot on the heels of the announcement, New York-based brand developer Prescott Perez-Fox published his own pitch. Perez-Fox said, “One of the main criticisms for the whole [tendering] effort was the fact that only a handful of design firms were allowed to bid in the…

• Slow news day

  David Airey

  26 Jan 2010 | 3:01 pm

  Apparently it’s harder than I thought to be original. “You gotta wonder — at least I did — if Apple was inspired by the creative doodlings of AOL in crafting their invitation to their press event on Jan. 27, where the highly anticipated tablet, or ‘iSlate’, device is expected to appear. “A similar artistic sentiment appears to be at work in both instances. You’ve got bursts of bright colors that encase the company’s logo (Apple) or name (Aol).” Slow news day at The Baltimore Sun. Published on Logo Design Love Related posts on Logo Design…

• Another free chapter: staying motivated

  David Airey

  22 Jan 2010 | 3:01 pm

  Graphics.com has offered you all the “staying motivated” chapter from Logo Design Love: A Guide to Creating Iconic Brand Identities. Guild of Food Writers logo, by 300million Here’s a quick excerpt. “Every designer has a level of insecurity that can only be abated by the creative peer group respect or commercial success of their work,” said Martin Lawless, creative director at London-based 300million. “Sadly, the warm, fuzzy, proud feeling of security doesn’t last long. Sometimes, it’s as short as the length of time it takes to make the winding walk back from the…

• 
  Dexigner Design Portal

• The Real Men and Women of Madison Avenue

  9 Feb 2010 | 8:28 am

  The Real Men and Women of Madison Avenue, an exhibit the celebrates the contributions made to American business and to popular culture by the real stars of Madison Avenue, is coming to San Francisco for its first public showing outside of New York City.

• SEAMLab 2010 Scholarship Competition

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:47 am

  SEAMLab's inaugural Scholarship Competition encourages students to thoughtfully consider contemporary challenges and opportunities that exist in material design, architecture, engineering, science, and the built and natural environments.

• Grant Funding by Design

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:38 am

  If you have ever wondered whether your design products and services might by eligible for a grant, you are not alone.

• SEE Bulletin: Issue 2

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:16 am

  Design Wales released the second issue of the SEE bulletin.

• RIBA President's Awards for Research 2010: Call for Entries

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:36 am

  The Royal Institute of British Architects is calling for entries for this year's RIBA President's Awards for Research.

• 
  Graphic Design Blog & Web Design Blog

• Rhys Owen Illustration and Digital Art

  Toon

  4 Feb 2010 | 5:22 am

  Character Designs on the Behance NetworkTechnorati Tags: Rhys Owen, Illustration, Digital Art, BehanceSubscribe to this feed

• Graphic Design & Web Design Jobs Jan 2010

  Toon

  20 Jan 2010 | 5:52 am

  This is a roundup of the latest graphic design and web design jobs from the Estetica Graphic Design Forum... CODER with good SEO needed --- SEO Job Graphic Design Job, Sheffield Junior Graphic Designer for Azendi - Yorkshire & Humberside LAMP ASP Developer Job Wordpress Theme Designer Needed GRAPHIC DESIGNER JOB (web, print, marketing) New York Paid Gig: Need Basic Progamming and Touch Up Graphic Design Job - Harrogate PHP coder needed - Web Design Job Need a logo will pay - Logo Design Job Requesting Logo For Band [Voluntary] Find more jobs at the Graphic Design Forum's Employment…

• Steven Bonner Illustrations

  Toon

  20 Jan 2010 | 4:37 am

  Home : Also Known As | Steven BonnerTechnorati Tags: Steven Bonner, IllustrationsSubscribe to this feed

• Maciej Leszczynski Photography

  Toon

  19 Jan 2010 | 5:42 am

  Black & White on the Behance NetworkTechnorati Tags: Maciej Leszczynski, PhotographySubscribe to this feed

• Type designs and experiments

  Toon

  9 Jan 2010 | 3:21 am

  TYPE EXPERIMENTS on the Behance Network Technorati Tags: Type design, experiments, Typography Subscribe to this feed

• 
  CSS-Tricks

• jQuery MagicLine Navigation

  Chris Coyier

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:58 am

  These “sliding” style navigation bars have been around a while, I just thought I’d take a crack at doing it myself as the opportunity came up recently. Turns out it’s really pretty darn easy. I put two examples together for it.The IdeaThe idea is to have a highlight of some kind (a background or an underline) follow you around as you mouse over the different links in the navigation. This will happen with jQuery and it’s animation abilities. As such, the “magic line” will only be appended via JavaScript. Once added to the list and styled, as you mouse…

• How nth-child Works

  Chris Coyier

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:24 am

  There is a CSS selector, really a pseudo-selector, called nth-child. Here is an example of using it:ul li:nth-child(3n+3) { color: #ccc; }What the above CSS does, is select every third list item inside unordered lists. That is, the 3rd, 6th, 9th, 12th, etc. But how does that work? And what other kinds of things can you do with nth-child? Let’s take a look.It boils down to what is in between those parentheses. nth-child accepts two keywords in that spot: even and odd. Those should be pretty obvious. “Even” selects even numbered elements, like the 2nd, 4th, 6th, etc.

• Threadsy Invites / Haiti Poster Project

  Chris Coyier

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:33 am

  Two things today.First, have you guys heard of Threadsy? I hadn’t, but apparently they got 2nd place at TechCrunch 50, which is pretty great. It’s a web application that combines several of your online “input streams” (e.g. Email, Twitter, and Facebook). I think that’s actually all they do right now, which I find kind of awesome, because those are the only ones I use anyway.I have 500 invites to give away for it. First come first serve as I understand it. Just click this to sign up.I really quite like it. The Threadsy team has done a killer job in creating an…

• Link Underlines Grow to Backgrounds on Hover

  Chris Coyier

  4 Feb 2010 | 7:10 am

  Reader Jaime Morrison emailed in:I’ve been mulling the idea of going with a link style in which a link’s underline “slides-up” to become a background highlight on hover.I started mulling over a few ideas on how to do this myself. Ultimately, I tried two different things but neither one of them is absolutely perfect.Take OneWe know we’re going to be using jQuery here (or some JavaScript library), because of the animation. My first though was to set relative positioning on the links, then use jQuery to append empty <span>’s to each link. The span would be…

• Free Template: DocTemplate

  Chris Coyier

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:42 am

  Little freebie template for ya’ll today. It was actually Doug Neiner’s idea, I ran with it, then he helped me out at the end tighten some stuff up.View Demo   Download FilesNoteIt’s PHP. So if you download it to check it out, throw it up on your web server to test it out (or somewhere you run PHP locally).NavigationThe navigation is all AJAX’d up using the jQuery .load() functionality. I just think it’s kinda fun. It supports “deep linking”, so if you were to link to this page with a hash-tag of a page (e.g. /DocTemplate/#parameters.php) , it…

• 
  DevWebPro

• iPhone App Developers Get Video Tool

  Mike Sachoff

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:15 am

  Video communications firm Global IP Solutions, announced today the availability of video chat technology for iPhone developers to incorporate video conferencing/video chat into their mobile applications. With GIPS VideoEngine Mobile, iPhone developers can integrate high quality real-time video chat or multi-point video conferencing into iPhone applications that resolves the issues related to IP networks such as delay, jitter and echo. “iPhone developers are at the forefront of cutting-edge mobile applications, and with such fierce competition, it’s incredibly important to offer…

• Apple Checks Developers’ Satisfaction

  Doug Caverly

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:02 am

  Developers who aren’t thrilled with the app submission, review, and update process established by Apple have received a chance to voice their displeasure. Apple’s started surveying developers, asking them to share their experiences, and it stands to reason that the company might make changes as a result. As noted by MG Siegler, the survey asks developers to rate their level of satisfaction with a number of things related to the App Store.  They’re also asked to answer the key question, “What one thing could Apple do to make the iPhone Developer Program better?”…

• Check out the Tandem Series from Otterbox

  admin

  9 Feb 2010 | 9:27 am

  Otterbox is widely known for its sturdy and sleek mobile cases. WebProNews got to check out the new Tandem Series of products from Otterbox at CES 2010. The new product line is a case protector for your mobile phone which comes in 2 parts – one for the front and back. These cases are built to provide powerful protection for your phone, from any type of damage. The first design is for the Palm Pre and should be available in the next few months. More cases for the Blackberry, iPhone, and other smartphones will be made available in the near future. Visit http://www.otterbox.com/ to check…

• Polaroid Returning To Instant Film

  admin

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:33 pm

  One of Polaroid’s trademark technologies throughout the years has always been instant film. Their instant film line ended back in 2008, but due to popular demand, has made a strong return at CES 2010. Polaroid’s Chief Marketing Officer, Jon Pollock spoke with WebProNew’s Abby Johnson about the reasons behind their return to instant film. The company received so much support for the format, specifically from artists and photographers, that they couldn’t ignore it. The PIC 1000 is the camera that Polaroid is hoping brings instant film into the 21st century. There have been…

• iPad Development Service Launches

  Mike Sachoff

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:26 pm

  Mobile development firm, ObjectDev, said today it is introducing an iPad app development service. For businesses and entrepreneurs who want to capitalize on Apple’s new tablet device and take advantage of this new platform for content distribution and custom apps, tapping into a team of experienced mobile app developers can be a key to success. ObjectDev developers are currently porting many of their existing apps to the iPad platform and because the company’s development team has been involved in mobile app development, they can offer specialized tools, methods and software development…

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  ScribeMedia.org

• Branding Nations Through Search Results

  Michael Cervieri

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:30 pm

  Digital reputation is something individuals and organizations face every time a search on their name is conducted. With split second perceptions, users will read through a page or two of results and decide whether the person or brand is good, bad or irrelevant. Managing reputation can be tricky. Take a colleague of mine. As far as I know — and I know him pretty well — he’s a capable, intelligent and amiable fellow. Oh, and law abiding too. Yes, law abiding. Why do I say that? Because if you search on the Google for him your second result will be for a convict with his exact…

• Beer’s Good For You and Other Super Bowl Stats

  Michael Cervieri

  8 Feb 2010 | 2:32 pm

  1000 beer labels create one Homer. Marty.FM via Creative Commons/Flickr. Good news for our New Orleans comrades who awoke today with a bit of the hangover: beer’s good for you. Or at least it could be. A study of a hundred beers shows that the suds are a source of dietary silicon. Dietary silicon, in turn, is important for bone health. Non-dietary silicon makes our computer chips. Now that that’s out of the way, here’s something surprising: a sizable portion of Super Bowl fans want more of Go Daddy’s faux lesbian kink. Akamai shows network traffic spikes after the…

• Making Online Videos Pay

  Chikodi Chima

  8 Feb 2010 | 11:53 am

  The digital content revolution will not be televised because it’s already being streamed, podcasted and downloaded. While online video may have reached near ubiquity, it’s high time someone started making money. Google bought YouTube in 2006, but the company is still bleeding $400 million a year at the top spot in user generated video. In spite of a hungry and growing audience, cashing in is not easy, even for the big guys. In his guest post, “How to Make Money in Online Video” TechCrunch contributor, Ashkan Karbasfrooshan, CEO and founder of Mojo Supreme, thinks he…

• Brick City – A New Media Marketing Case Study

  Peter Cervieri

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:40 am

  Watch all past Producers Guild of America New Media Council events here. The PGA East Diversity Committee; Documentary Committee and NMC East celebrate Black History Month with the team behind the groundbreaking Sundance Channel documentary BRICK CITY. Originally aired in September, 2009 as a five-part documentary series, it examines the city of Newark, New Jersey during a pivotal year in the renaissance mayoral administration of Cory A. Booker, whose 2006 election signaled a new chapter in the city’s fortunes. As the mayor and his allies fight to make the city safer and stronger, the lives…

• The Morning Distraction: Beatles Cartoons

  Michael Cervieri

  5 Feb 2010 | 8:29 am

  It’s amazing how sometimes you take a few minute break to watch a video and two hours later you re-emerge wondering where exactly you’ve been. Such was my morning. Not even sure how I ended up here but came across the above Beatles cartoon of Penny Lane. It’s part of a collection from 1965 – 1967 that saw 37 half-hour shows produced for British television. Each segment of the show was named after the song it featured. For old school animation fans it’s well worth the time spent. Supposedly, MTV ran the series in 1986-1987. Unfortunately, I grew up in the boonies…

• 
  Design Shack

• Code a Corporate Website From a Photoshop Design: PSD to HTML Tutorial

  9 Feb 2010 | 8:10 am

  Step-by-step tutorial on converting a PSD to a live page. View Post

• Mobile Web Design: Tips and Best Practices

  9 Feb 2010 | 8:08 am

  A thorough guide on designing for the mobile web. View Post

• Applying Mathematics to Web Design

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:54 am

  A unique article examining how to apply the Golden Ratio/Golden Rectangle, Fibonacci Sequence, and Kundli Design into web design. View Post

• 10 Signs You Need to Expand Your Team (and How to Do It)

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:47 am

  Recently we discussed how to find work as a designer, today we’re going to discuss what to do if that search is a little too successful. Whether you’re a freelancer or the owner of a small design firm, there are times when the workload is simply too much for you to handle. Rather than playing Russian Roulette with your client base to decide who you’re going to let go, you should consider expanding your team to take advantage of the increase in available work. Below you’ll find some signs to look for to help decide if it’s time for you to expand your team along…

• CSS Design: Project Bubble

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  View projectbubble.com at Design Shack

• 
  CSS Beauty News Feed

• Font-Face Browser Support & Tutorial

  Alex

  27 Jan 2010 | 1:23 pm

  Font-Face Browser Support & Tutorial. A good recap on the current state of browser support for @font-face and how to use it.

• FontFriend Bookmarklet

  Alex

  25 Jan 2010 | 8:08 pm

  FontFriend Bookmarklet. Enables for rapid checking of fonts and font styles directly in the browser without editing code and refreshing pages.

• Firefox 3.6 Released

  Alex

  21 Jan 2010 | 9:28 am

  Firefox 3.6 Released. New features include support for the latest HTML5 specs, Web Open Font Format (WOFF) and CSS gradients. Go get it now!

• Anaglyphic Text Effect with CSS

  Alex

  4 Jan 2010 | 12:16 pm

  Anaglyphic Text Effect with CSS. Learn how to create an anaglyphic text effect with some simple CSS.

• Optimizing HTML

  Alex

  4 Jan 2010 | 8:21 am

  Optimizing HTML. Reduce your HTML document size by getting rid of redundant structures and employing minification techniques.

• 
  CSS Drive News

• 8 Logo Design Ideas- Lightening up your creative minds!

  webmaster@REMOVETHIScssdrive.com

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:14 am

  Here are 8 simple but fruitful notions which if kept in mind, can give you bundles of successful logo design ideas.

• Use of Effective Typography in Logo Design

  webmaster@REMOVETHIScssdrive.com

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:30 am

  Some nice examples of logos with effective, fantastic typography.

• Most Interesting Design Trends Among Blogs: 2010

  webmaster@REMOVETHIScssdrive.com

  8 Feb 2010 | 11:01 pm

  A list of interesting trends to watch for in blogs for 2010, such as advanced typography.

• 15 Ways to Improve Freelance Creativity

  webmaster@REMOVETHIScssdrive.com

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:43 am

  Freelancers often find that staying in a creative mindset, day in day out, can be a real challenge. Here are 15 tips for improving creativity and staying creative for longer.

• Pure CSS3 Animated AT-AT Walker from Star Wars

  webmaster@REMOVETHIScssdrive.com

  7 Feb 2010 | 10:33 pm

  This article looks at creating animatiosn using CSS3, in this case, an AT-AT Walker from "The Empire Strikes Back".

• 
  Cssleak.com

• Aaron Kato

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:49 pm

• Jenaxin

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:47 pm

• The Solid Studios

  7 Feb 2010 | 6:05 pm

• Tanitoss.ca

  7 Feb 2010 | 6:00 pm

• lodjixmedia

  7 Feb 2010 | 5:59 pm

• 
  All Graphic Design & Graphics News

• 3D Photoshop Object Projects and Tutorials - Part II

  admin

  28 Jan 2010 | 3:20 am

  More 3D for Fun and Function In our last article we presented some nifty examples of what you can do with Photoshop in creating your own 3D objects. There are literally thousands of PS objects that you can download from the Internet, but the process of making your own Photoshop 3D items is not only fun [...]

• 3D Photoshop Object Projects and Tutorials - Part I

  admin

  26 Jan 2010 | 4:11 pm

  Practice Makes Perfect After a while, it seems that plain old 2D Photoshop images are lacking when it comes to creativity for some of your graphic design projects. Maybe you have thought about doing more 3D work but didn’t know where to start. The following Photoshop tutorials can help you create some nice objects. All that [...]

• The Do’s and Don’ts of a Successful Portfolio - Part II

  admin

  22 Jan 2010 | 9:10 am

  Presentation and Eye Appeal What would your reaction be if you were served a plate of food at a restaurant that had dust, lint, or smudges on the dish? Now let’s switch this scenario around and put this in the context of a job seeker presenting a portfolio that has dust, lint, and smudges on the [...]

• The Do’s and Don’ts of a Successful Portfolio - Part I

  admin

  21 Jan 2010 | 2:49 pm

  The Basics At long last you’ve landed a job interview at a design firm. You’re excited, nervous, and worried all at the same time. You realize that part of the interview process hinges on presenting a strong portfolio. But where do you begin? You’ve got lots of examples from projects while going to your graphic design college [...]

• What Employers Are Looking for in Graphic Designers - Part II

  admin

  15 Jan 2010 | 3:25 am

  It’s More than Just Talent When you are going after a graphic designer position, your prospective employer is not only seeking qualified talent but “soft” skills and abilities. The “hard” skills as described in our last article, What Employers Are Looking for in Graphic Designers - Part I, gave a list of the skill sets that graphic [...]

• 
  Vandelay Design Blog

• 25 Creative E-Commerce Website Designs

  Vandelay Website Design

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:19 pm

  E-Commerce sites are often considered to be boring and unattractive, however, that is not always the case. This post showcases 25 e-commerce sites that demonstrate creativity in the design. It may be the layout, graphics, design style or site structure, but all of them break the mould of the typical e-commerce site. For more inspiration from e-commerce sites, see our gallery CartFrenzy. Ride Four Ever Mom & Popcorn The Affair Hipstery Benestar Green Label Organics RedVelvetArt CellarThief Shirt Fight K2 Snowboarding Storenvy Edge of Urge ‘47 Levi’s McMenamins Giraffe…

• Showcase of Floral Typography

  Vandelay Website Design

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:20 pm

  If you frequently browse through sites like deviantART and the Behance Network you’ve no doubt come across a number of designs that use typography and floral effects. In this post we’ll showcase some excellent works of this kind from various designers. If you would like more inspiration from typography and text effects please see our gallery site TypeInspire. Butterfly Eco Environment Cyrella Wonder Dolce & Gabanna Kings of Leon Funkrush Narani Ecosystem Wallpaper Desire for Love Sell Your Body to the Night Wyatt Play Passion New Years Eve Party Flower Power Small is Beautiful…

• 40 Beautiful Corporate Websites

  Vandelay Website Design

  31 Jan 2010 | 2:55 pm

  In today’s marketplace, every company needs an effective website. Of course, the purposes and needs of each company’s site will be unique, but every company should have a site that presents a professional image to visitors. That image should also be an accurate representation of the company and should work with other branding efforts to present consistent messages to customers. In this post we’ll feature 40 well-designed corporate websites. Blackberry Logitech Navigant Consulting Team Excellence Cognigen Chapeltown Development Trust Capgemi Mission Bicycle Company Sophos…

• 15 Invoicing Tips for Designers and Freelancers

  Vandelay Website Design

  27 Jan 2010 | 12:10 pm

  Most designers don’t particularly enjoy the financial side of running a business, but handling it properly is a necessary part of being a freelancer or running a design agency. The financial side of the business includes invoicing clients, and in this article we’ll look at some tips and best practices for invoicing. 1. Decide on an Invoicing App or Software There are plenty of online invoicing apps available that have been created with designers and freelancers in mind. Additionally, there are some software options as well. Using either an online app or software to handle your…

• Design Instruct: A New Resource for the Design Community

  Vandelay Website Design

  26 Jan 2010 | 4:54 am

  Almost two years ago I got to know Jacob Gube of Six Revisions as both of us had relatively new blogs in the design community. Since then I’ve followed Six Revisions as it has grown to become one of the leading blogs on web design and development with over 40,000 subscribers. If you follow Six Revisions you know that Jacob is a very talented designer, developer, and writer. Today he and his brother Isaac have launched their latest project, Design Instruct, which will provide high quality content related to visual arts and communication. Design Instruct has launched today with a…

• 
  Fuel Your Creativity

• Brandstack gets a new sibling. Introducing: Upstack

  Chad Engle

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:58 pm

  Brandstack, the creative marketplace for logos has an unveiled another way to market logo designs to the masses. Upstack. Upstack is a unique route for a person needing a logo, website, web design, advertisement or other creative service. Unlike the predecessor Brandstack, Upstack lets anyone build a team of hand-picked designers that are ready to burn the midnight oil to work on your project. Upstack manages all the processes by taking the client from the brief to the final design. This wastes no design time and spares no quality. They also do this without spec work which makes it something…

• Need Inspiration? Get Out!

  Jennifer Moline

  7 Feb 2010 | 8:34 pm

  There’s been much back-and-forth about telecommuting vs. working in a cubicle. One of the arguments often cited by people who work from home is that they’re free of distractions at the office; they are able to focus more and produce faster. So “they” say. I know that when I’ve worked from home full time, I’ve experienced creativity block. I think that often has to do with the lack of interaction among co-workers. But there are other ways to be inspired, and they involve stepping away from your home office. Outdoors The best inspiration is often free. How much better do you feel…

• Web Banner Templates: Photoshop & Illustrator

  Chad Engle

  4 Feb 2010 | 9:40 pm

  We know starting a project can be a real pain no matter how easy the task may be. We’ve put together the IAB standard size ad templates for you in one little packaged up file. They come in two flavors, Photoshop and Illustrator. We’ve also put together some nice resources and other downloads below that you may find helpful in starting a project. If there is anything you’d like to see us give away in the future, let us know in the comments. Sizes: 88×31 120×60 120×90 120×240 120×600 125×125 160×600 180×150 234×60 240×400…

• Modern Bicycle Concepts That Will Blow Your Mind

  Chad Engle

  2 Feb 2010 | 10:38 pm

  Transportation Designers have always tried to push the envelope when it comes to speed, style and grace. The world of streamlined bicycles is driven by all of these same principles. However, several concept bikes have begun to look like they are screaming around corners even when they are sitting still. Here are some super sleek & stylish modern concepts that are beautiful and intriguing. Pulse This vehicle is part fitness membership, part fashion statement, and part Kyoto-pact contribution. Designer: Teague Chris Boardman – Olympic Cyclist, Concept Future Bike A very light and…

• Unforgettable Textiles Created to Inspire

  Chad Engle

  31 Jan 2010 | 9:02 pm

  Minä Perhonen is a fashion brand that produces clothing lines which do not lose their allure over the years. This group of talented textile designers hail from Japan and aspire to develop new materials and techniques with various production houses over the globe. They showcase patterns beautifully with a very linear and graphic quality that parallels graphic design & traditional art. They have a wonderful style that can be minimal or very intrinsic but always has a clean and simple outcome. Bird Flags Carnival Forest Paradise Fujisans Herringbone Tambourine Yuki-no-hi Sponsored by…

• 
  Boagworld

• The Ultimate Website Prelaunch Checklist

  Andy Wickes

  8 Feb 2010 | 8:01 am

  We’ve all been there. After months of development, meetings, conference calls, protracted arguments over typography, photography, colour ways and copy. All of a sudden the site is approved and the client wants it live. Do you think to yourself, ‘I know every pixel on this site inside out’ and put it live? Hopefully not. You’ll have a printed checklist which you complete before you go public. By no means is this an exhaustive list. Neither is it presented in any particular order. Your own checklist will be very much tailored towards your own individual clients and the type…

• 199. Time to generalise

  Paul Boag

  5 Feb 2010 | 12:30 am

  Download this show. Launch our podcast player Having trouble listening to 199? Housekeeping Next week is our 200th show! Hard to believe isn’t it. To celebrate this momentous achievement we are going to do a 12 hour live podcast marathon. The show starts at 10AM on Friday the 12th February and finishes at 10PM that evening (times are UK based). We have too many guests to mention, but lets just say you will not be disappointed! To listen to the live show go to boagworld.com/live/. Obviously we will not be recording the whole show but hopefully will release edited highlights over the…

• Designing for the next generation of devices – don’t get left behind

  Leigh Howells

  4 Feb 2010 | 1:00 am

  As far as I have experienced there is little or no current use being made of the accelerometer on web sites when viewed on an iPhone. The accelerometer when triggered in the iPhone’s Safari browser at the moment does little for our general browsing experience beyond giving us a little more horizontal space when in landscape mode. But I believe we live in a world where the hand-held web device equipped with accelerometer is going to become more and more prevalent, and quickly. Current Acceptance We accept a limited browsing experience on our mobiles as merely providing a useful, mobile…

• I was on net@night

  Paul Boag

  3 Feb 2010 | 10:47 am

  I love net@night. It’s a great show. It’s laid back, informal and talks about all the web stuff that warms my heart. You can therefore imagine how excited I was to be on the show this week. Both Leo and Amber have been a huge influence on my podcasting and so it was great to talk to them both. We chatted about web design trends, the boagworld podcast and the website owners manual. It was loads of fun and I hope I get the chance to talk to the guys again in the future. Similar Posts: Website Owners Manual is out on friday! Free Consultancy Clinic to celebrate Christmas needs you!

• Content is King

  Colin James Firth

  2 Feb 2010 | 2:00 am

  Just because content is king doesn’t mean, however, that the designer’s job is any less important. How seriously would people take the King if his suit was poorly made? It has to look good. An unhealthy obsession with aesthetics I’ve been a designer for 15 years and I started out with a very unhealthy obsession for aesthetics. It was always about how good, or trendy, or innovative a design was. Making it readable was just an irritating request from the copywriters. Thankfully, I soon realised just how important content is and began to change the way I worked to suit. And…

• 
  CSS Newbie

• The Simple Secret to Good Dropdown Navigation

  Rob Glazebrook

  3 Feb 2010 | 1:26 pm

  Almost every example of good dropdown navigation on the web today relies on a single, simple HTML structure: the nested unordered list. Without this structure, dropdown menus would be much more complex to build than they already are.Of course, that means that knowing how to build a good nested unordered list is critical to this entire process. I’ve seen many examples of people trying to build a dropdown menu on their own, running into problems they didn’t understand, and throwing their hands up in frustration… only to discover their problem wasn’t some obscure CSS problem, but an…

• How To Emulate a Foreach Loop in JavaScript

  Rob Glazebrook

  21 Jan 2010 | 11:53 am

  JavaScript does many things well, but one area I’ve always had trouble with is the array and array-manipulation department. For example, this weekend I was working on a project that required me to iterate through a JavaScript array and peform a set of functions on the values within. In PHP, that would have looked something like this:$myArray = array("item 1", "item 2", item 3"); foreach($myArray as $item) { $item = "Do Something Here"; }Nice and simple, right? All we’re doing is iterating through the array with the foreach() construct and…

• Improve Usability and CTR: Make an Entire List Item Clickable

  Rob Glazebrook

  12 Jan 2010 | 2:31 pm

  I was recently working on the navigation for a new Wordpress site (to be announced later) and I encountered a bit of a conundrum when it came to my category navigation.I had developed some snazzy PHP/WordPress scripting to output my category information into a list containing both the category name as well as the category description. It was a nice way to show people what categories the site had, as well as offering some insight into what the category might contain. The code looked something like this: <ul id="categories"> <li id="cat-1"> <h2><a…

• The Best CSS Newbie Articles of 2009

  Rob Glazebrook

  5 Jan 2010 | 10:55 am

  Happy 2010, readers of CSS Newbie! It’s a bitterly cold day here in Des Moines, Iowa — the sort that causes me to question the wisdom of throwing off the blankets in the morning. However, today I get to reflect on the last year of CSS Newbie, and that’s enough to warm my heart, if not my toes.I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: CSS Newbie is nothing without you awesome readers out there. This year, more than a quarter million people stopped by, visiting more than half a million pages. For that, I am very, very grateful. It also makes me excited to see what…

• Build a Bare-Bones WordPress 2.8+ Widget

  Rob Glazebrook

  21 Dec 2009 | 1:22 pm

  This tutorial is going to be a little more advanced than some of the fare around here, but in the end you’ll have all the information you need to know to create your very own WordPress widget! And that’s worth the effort, I think. However, you will need to understand a little bit of PHP for this to make much sense.Widgets — essentially fancy drag-and-drop plugins, commonly used in sidebars — have existed in WordPress for quite some time, but with the release of WordPress 2.8, developers have a brand new widget API that makes creating widgets for WordPress a little bit…

• 
  Dzine Blog

• 20 Cool jQuery Tricks for Web Developers

  Deep

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:43 am

  For those of you that don’t know, jQuery is a rich JavaScript library that makes it possible for web developers to produce quite remarkable effects with just a few lines of code. It makes writing lengthy JavaScript code bearable, by turning long, repetitive tasks into shorter, more understandable ones. It’s simple to use, saving you time and effort. jQuery is massively popular, for obvious reasons, and everybody’s using it. To make sure you stand out, it’s vital you incorporate some of the more quirky capabilities of jQuery into your web sites. That’s where this list comes in! We…

• 30 Useful Free Dingbat Fonts

  Deep

  2 Feb 2010 | 6:44 am

  A dingbat is an ornament, character or spacer used in typesetting, sometimes more formally known as a “printer’s ornament” or “printer’s character”. The simple shapes and pictures found in Dingbat fonts are awesome for making your own unique digital scrapbooking papers, embellishments, trims, borders , frames and so many other uses. Your imagination is the limit!!! Here i’ve collected a list of 30 beautiful free dingbats for you resource collection, hope you find this collection usefu Enjoy! 1. )Dj Horses 1 2. )Sexyrexy Smitten 3. )Damask Dings1 4.

• Very Cute Jacket+Bookmarks by Igor “Rogix”

  yugu

  29 Jan 2010 | 8:26 am

  This is new concept, created by Igor “Rogix” Udushlivy, I wonder that it would be great if we can use dust jackets and bookmarks together to create a unique image of a paper book. you can cover your books with a dust jacket that has a matching bookmark that goes along with it. The coordinating jacket and bookmark make the book even more fun and can help to expand book’s space Hope you like this cool idea 10 Creative Designers of the Month November - [ Random inspiration ] 10 Creative Designer Portfolios of The Month June Outstanding Artworks of Josh Keyes Art on a Board: Creative…

• 6 Goals to Reach For When Designing Your Next Website

  yugu

  27 Jan 2010 | 9:32 am

  Goals are important to have in life. They are especially important for website design, because without any goals, you have nothing to shoot for in the end and nothing to measure your success by. Goals help designers focus on the important things and not lose sight of what you want in the end; goals are what help designers deliver outstanding sites every time. The results at the end of the site design process are usually pretty much the same with every project; I end up with a site design and I hand it off to the client. In the beginning, I have an idea of what I want to do and what the client…

• 36 Best Photoshop Web Layout Design Tutorials Part 4

  yugu

  20 Jan 2010 | 9:14 am

  When it comes to designing a website Photoshop is an excellent tool for it, No design Software gives you quite so much control as Adobe Photoshop in designing a website. For beginner web designers - design tutorials really help to understand the basic knowledge about web design , Designing a website is not an easier process, Here is a collection of 30 layout design tutorials that will help you with designing a decent looking website. They are all different types of websites and styles of design represented here that will sure help you to create a decent looking website 1. )How to Create a…

• 
  Woork Up

• Anatomy of The Perfect Sidebar

  Antonio Lupetti

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:49 am

  The sidebar is an important element of every blog. In a standard two-columns layout it’s placed to the right of the main section and includes information and links related to the content of blog posts. A well organized sidebar should include some important items, such as subscription options, advertisements, recent and popular posts, and help blog readers find contextual information related to the article they are reading or, in general, about the blog they are browsing. Many blogs also add on their sidebar optional items such as external widgets (Facebook Fan Page or Google Friend…

• Is Google Wave a Flop?

  Antonio Lupetti

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:48 am

  Lars Rasmussen at the Google I/O Conference (May 2009) In may 2009, at the Google I/O Conference, Lars Rasmussen presented a new Google application called “Google Wave” that should have revolutionized the way to communicate and collaborate on-line. The new Google product immediately took many positive comments and was defined as one of the most promising tools of 2010. But the initial enthusiasm was short lived. Google Wave is an application that merges instant messaging, e-mail, document editor, wiki tool and much more, but it seems none of this. The lack of clarity in what the…

• 3 Books To Understand Social Media Even If They Don’t Talk About Social Media

  Stefano Mizzella

  5 Feb 2010 | 9:01 am

  More than once I heard someone say that to really understand social media is enough to have a profile on Facebook, on Twitter, YouTube, and so on. Nothing more wrong. Social media are changing culture, society and knowledge sharing. In this change, technology is certainly something important but not decisive. So, understanding social media means go deep in some books that marked the origin and development of cyber-culture. In this post I would like to mention three books written before the rise of Web 2.0 and social media. In these books, written in different years by different authors, you…

• The Best Websites to Watch Streaming TV Shows, TV Series and Movies

  Antonio Lupetti

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:27 pm

  Here is a round-up with the best services online that allow you to watch the best TV series, TV shows and movies for free. HULU Hulu – Launched in private beta in August 2007 with a joint venture of NBC Universal, News Corp., The Walt Disney Company and Providence Equity Partners, Hulu is one of the most popular website that offers high-quality streaming video of TV shows, TV series and movies. You can choose from a huge archive of primetime TV hits (such as Lost, Dr. House, The Simpson), movies, documentaries and TV shows, all available for unlimited streaming, with some commercial…

• Woork Up: Something is Changing

  Antonio Lupetti

  3 Feb 2010 | 2:06 pm

  Dear friends, something is changing on Woork Up. As you know, since its birth in October 2007, this blog has been mainly addressed to web designers and developers becoming a popular and appreciated website in that area. Now, due to a big increase in popularity of Woork Up, I believe it’s the right moment to make a choice in a new direction. In the last months I thought about how to expand the audience of Woork Up, and I decided to start adding new contents by covering four main categories: web design, social media, digital inspiration and tech news. I’m also creating a little editorial…

• 
  Popular Wallpapers on Desktop Nexus

• Greek mask

  3 Feb 2010 | 4:29 pm

  Greek maskA new wallpaper has been posted to the Entertainment gallery on Desktop Nexus.Uploaded By: Mrs.GreggCategory: TheaterDate Uploaded: 02/03/10Native Resolution: 1024x819Points: +4Download Count: 38View This Wallpaper Now

• fabulous digital art

  20 Jul 2009 | 12:07 am

  fabulous digital artA new wallpaper has been posted to the Abstract gallery on Desktop Nexus.Uploaded By: ramyadevimsCategory: 3D and CGDate Uploaded: 07/20/09Native Resolution: 1024x768Points: +9Download Count: 135View This Wallpaper Now

• SYDNEY CELEBRATION

  18 Jul 2009 | 4:07 pm

  SYDNEY CELEBRATIONA new wallpaper has been posted to the Abstract gallery on Desktop Nexus.Uploaded By: NickyboyCategory: 3D and CGDate Uploaded: 07/18/09Native Resolution: 1920x1200Points: +12Download Count: 244View This Wallpaper Now

• 3d deep water for fishes

  17 Jul 2009 | 9:21 am

  3d deep water for fishesA new wallpaper has been posted to the Abstract gallery on Desktop Nexus.Uploaded By: djEyeCategory: 3D and CGDate Uploaded: 07/17/09Native Resolution: 1024x768Points: +18Download Count: 271View This Wallpaper Now - View Wallpaper Comments (1)

• spogne bob faces

  17 Jul 2009 | 6:18 am

  spogne bob facesA new wallpaper has been posted to the Entertainment gallery on Desktop Nexus.Uploaded By: BeautifuldisasterCategory: TV SeriesDate Uploaded: 07/17/09Native Resolution: 1024x768Points: +125Download Count: 2,672View This Wallpaper Now - View Wallpaper Comments (10)

• 
  Pro Blog Design

• How to Install Wordpress on your PC

  sogeking

  8 Feb 2010 | 8:00 am

  Wordpress is arguably the most popular and the best blogging platform out there. You might have installed Wordpress on your site, but you might be scared to experiment with Wordpress worrying that you could break your site and Wordpress.Experimenting is one of the best way to learn new things and if you break your site, you probably might not want your visitors to see the fault as it might leave a bad impression. So, it is necessary to have the ability to learn WordPress and try new themes, plugins and other items without putting it online where people can see.So, the best solution is to…

• Design Review: Free Pixels

  Michael Martin

  4 Feb 2010 | 9:00 am

  In this review, we’re going to work through a website (FreePixels.com) as a case study, looking at its design and seeing what we can learn from it and what we could improve on.So to start off, let’s take a look at Free Pixels. They offer almost 4000 extremely high quality images, for free. All you have to do is leave the small watermark in the corner, or create your own link back.That makes it a very handy site for bloggers! Now load up the site in a new tab, and let’s start our case study!The very first thing I look for is the logo and slogan. The logo is right where you’d expect it,…

• The iPad – Help Me Decide?

  Michael Martin

  1 Feb 2010 | 9:00 am

  I don’t know what to do.The iPad came out last week and, well, I want one. But that’s a standard side-effect of a Steve Jobs keynote; you always end up wanting one.There’s been a lot of talk about shortcomings of the device, and a lot of the points have merit. Enough merit to stop me from getting it though?In this article, I’ll be working through all of the pros and all of the cons I can see so far. Hopefully by the end, I’ll know what to do.(PS – Just for the record; I’m a Windows 7 user on a HP desktop. I also have a Toshiba laptop that will be getting Ubuntu 9.10 installed on…

• 25 Color Combination Tools For Designers

  Lee Ka Hoong

  25 Jan 2010 | 8:00 am

  Color is difficult to get right. There’s a near infinite number of combinations out there, but only a few that will actually look right for your project. Because it’s so important to a design’s success, it’s worth taking a little time to work out your palette.There are a lot of online tools to help out with this. They all vary slightly to suit designers with different preferences on how they work. We’ve collected together 25 of the best here, with a quick overview on each to help you decide which to try.Website Color Match Color Match is a website tool that shows…

• How To Make a WordPress Events List

  Michael Martin

  18 Jan 2010 | 9:00 am

  An events list is just what you would expect; a list of upcoming events, ordered by the date they are taking place on (Not the date they were written on!).In this post, we are going to create our own events list that will let us add events simply by writing posts and assigning them to an “Events” category. It can’t get much easier than that!This is exactly what we set up for a recent client of ours, American Majority. You can see their full events listing here, or solely the events in one state here (And on both pages, you’ll see the corresponding list in the sidebar as well).There…

• 
  About.com Web Design / HTML

• Are legal pages critical to websites?

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:58 am

  I received the following question from a reader: I have made a community based website... I often see the "accept terms" that you have to check mark to register to a forum. Will it be necessary for my forum? And while many people put up forums and other websites with no terms or disclaimers or other legal information, this may not be the best way to protect yourself and your business. There are many legal pages you can have on a website. Not all sites need all of them, but many sites could benefit from one or two. Which ones do you use? More Help with Legal Pages Legal Pages for Websites What…

• Why Are Web Pages So Ugly?

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:53 am

  I was thinking about the Reader's Choice Awards and specifically the Best Web Designs participants when one of my friends was complaining that some of the nominees were (in his words) "downright ugly". He wondered why, when there were so many good looking sites on the Web, ugly ones seem to get more prominence. So I asked him who he nominated for each of my design categories. And he laughed and said "well, I couldn't think of any for all of them." And I began to wonder, are beautiful Web pages more or less common on the Web than their ugly brethren? So I devised this completely unscientific…

• Web Design Software Pick of the Week: Stock.Xchng

  7 Feb 2010 | 5:38 am

  Stock.Xchng, while not really software, is a tool I use for my Web design work all the time. It's a stock photography and images site, and the best thing about most of the images? They are free. You can find standard stock photo iconic images like the ubiquitous handshake signifying a business deal and abstract photos like these lightbulbs and many other types of photos. It's my favorite stock photo site. CSS Tool: Stock.Xchng Where do you get your Web photos? How to Find Photos for Web Pages Get Scanned Photos onto a Web Page Protect Your Digital Photos Online Taking Great Pictures for Web…

• JavaScript Menus Don't Have to be Hard

  4 Feb 2010 | 6:49 am

  If you've ever tried to build a JavaScript drop-down menu from scratch, then you know how hard it can be. They can get very complicated very quickly, and unless you are building menus all day, everyday mistakes will creep in that can be challenging to find and fix. One solution is to use a tool like FlexiMenusJS to design and build your menus. More About DHTML and DHTML Menus FlexiMenuJS Standards Based DHTML Menus How Do You Build Dynamic Menus? DHTML Menu Scripts and Programs Show and Hide Blocks of Text (or Images) with CSS and JS JavaScript Menus Don't Have to be Hard originally appeared…

• Poll: With the coming of the iPad, are you going to focus more on HTML5 than Flash?

  4 Feb 2010 | 12:34 am

  There is a lot of hoopla going around the announcement of the Apple iPad. I admit that I've been hooked as well, and the complaints that it's nothing more than a "giant iPod touch" suit me just fine. That's not a complaint in my book, that's a benefit. But all swooning aside, I am wondering how the iPad will affect my work as a designer. If you had asked me last December what I thought was going to change in 2010, I would have said that Flash was going to get a lot bigger as more sites started using it for games and features. But then the iPad came out and Apple is beginning to make it fairly…

• 
  lewro's blog

• WP Webhost is great hosting company not only for Wordpress bloggers

  lewro

  7 Feb 2010 | 11:43 am

  It has been more then year since my blog has been elected 11th coolest Wordpress blog in competition which has been run by WP Webhost. Since then lot of things have changed. I was offered free life-time web hosting, my blog has also been redesigned and I am not running one Wordpress blog but 3. The company provides reliable hosting mainly for Wordpress blogs but I have also been running my PHP application (Read Plus) on this server without any difficulties. They provide standard C-Panel where I can manage sub-domains, mysql stuff and so on. So I guess the question is – Would I recommend…

• 45royale giving advices how to make read plus better

  lewro

  3 Feb 2010 | 11:54 am

  Couple of months ago I have sent two of my sites URL to .Net magazine. They have a section there where they are giving advices how to make your site better. The magazine has picked my application Read Plus. One of the best web agencies – 45royale are the one who were giving advices to me how I could improve my RSS Reader. First of all I want to thank guys from 45royale for their advices and great ideas. After reading all their comments I can only fully agree with everything they said in the article. They are saying that it is not very clear from the copy on the home page what is the…

• Code & Config – Sharing the smart bits

  lewro

  29 Jan 2010 | 12:58 am

  I have been thinking for quite some time what would be the best way to store useful coding information. I have tried Google documents some mac applications but It wasn’t really working for me. I wanted to have these snippets available anytime, categorized by programming language. I was even thinking I could write simple application for this but at the end I have decided to use Wordpress. I have made decision based on the fact that I have been working with Wordpress engines for couple of years and specially because there are plugins which will make this simple to implement. I was…

• 2010 New Year’s Resolutions

  lewro

  26 Jan 2010 | 1:59 pm

  As every year even this year I am going to set some goals so I have some targets in front of me. Last year has been very successful and pushed me miles ahead and I am very great-full for this. And let’s be clear, I am not talking about money here. Money is not my priority. The priorities are personal growth, quality time, new experiences, good health (not in this order obviously). I have not managed to achieve all goals I setup up last year but I am feeling pretty good about all the stuff I managed to achieve. Here is the list for this year. Build a Ruby on Rails web application Write…

• Lewro 4.0 up and running

  lewro

  24 Jan 2010 | 11:33 am

  The theme is up and I am sure you have noticed that the whole structure of the site has changed as well. It is not even called blog anymore. Let me tell you why. Design I am not in the state where I am able to produce site in a 911 Porsche quality which means that my designs still gets kinda old after some time. Why the comparison with 911? Because designer of that quality can produce product which looks excellent after years and years in production. The other aspect is that we all learn. We learn how to use Photoshop better, how to code our CSS, HTML, PHP cleaner and mainly we learn that…

• 
  Bridgeline Software Blog

• Writing for the Web Part 2: The Meta Data

  Becki Dilworth

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:54 am

  http://www.flickr.com/photos/matsiltala/ In the world of SEO, meta tags likely get more time on the debate stand than any other. You’ll hear from one SEO expert that Meta Data is critical to help the search engines in understanding what your page is about. You’ll hear from another that none of the engines pay attention to this anymore – it’s an archaic tag and shouldn’t be an area of focus. This debate will undoubtedly continue, but in this post we’re hoping to clarify how best to use Meta Data on your site. What is Meta Data Wikipedia defines Meta Data as…

• What Content Management Has In Store for 2010

  Tony Pietrocola

  5 Feb 2010 | 6:38 am

  Since 2010 is off and running, I thought I would post some thoughts on what the Content Management industry would have in store in terms of WCM improvements and features in 2010. Social support: social marketing continues to be a hot topic and proven to be a successful medium. You will see more support and integration features from WCM vendors. Integration with CRM: effective web sites should drive qualified traffic. If this is so integration with a company’s CRM is key to keeping sales cycles moving along swiftly. WCM systems will be integrating with Salesforce.com out of the box to…

• Implementing an eCommerce System – Ask Critical Questions

  Marcel Moreau

  11 Jan 2010 | 12:39 pm

  The boom of eCommerce is certainly changing the way companies conduct business. Online eCommerce sales are growing from $335 billion in 2006 to $711 billion in 2010. According to IDC Research, more than a billion consumers will spend $1.2 trillion shopping online in 2012. And B2B eCommerce will be ten times larger, totaling $12.4 trillion worldwide in 2012. Either Get On Board or Get Left Behind Gartner’s Hype Cycle for Commerce reports: “Organizations no longer view eCommerce as a risky investment; instead, it is considered a strategic customer growth-and-retention competence and…

• SEO Strategy and Your CMS; Are They Working Together?

  Marcel Moreau

  18 Dec 2009 | 6:55 am

  If you weren’t able to attend our recent webinar on CMS (Content Management Systems) and their relation with SEO (Search Engine Optimization), you missed an informative session on a hot topic. Hosted by Becki Dilworth and Brian Bolton, we spent an hour drilling into the important issues. For years now, businesses have understood the importance of search engines and how SEO can drive prospects to their websites. But with websites having a shelf life of one to two years, businesses often perform redesigns. Along with redesigns come new web development vendors and new Content Management…

• Don’t Look Now But You’re Being Watched

  Greg Bellan

  9 Dec 2009 | 10:52 pm

  I got an email the other day that shocked me.  In retrospect it shouldn’t have but when I first read the subject line I was a little taken aback: “Have we lost your interest?” That in and of itself isn’t all that unnerving, but the first line of copy in the body was: “We have noticed that you have not opened any of our email offers in the past 3 months and were wondering what we can do to keep you interested in our offerings.” I don’t say this to alarm you but I’d like to remind you of one simple fact.  No matter how good you are at hiding…

• 
  DivitoDesign

• Smart File Management with Dropbox

  Stefan Vervoort

  5 Feb 2010 | 3:40 am

  This week, I had to work with a team for a study project. We had to build the promotional campaign of our study and the end results have turned out absolutely amazing. Usually, I work on my projects as a one-man team. However, working in a group or team is an other situation and works completely different. I enjoyed working with this large group, but it also caused some management problems. A lot of files were needed by everyone working on the project, and that wasn’t easy to organize with 16 people in one team. Until I remembered Dropbox. Dropbox works like this: Download the Dropbox…

• How to Choose Web Hosting for Designers

  Stefan Vervoort

  3 Feb 2010 | 2:56 am

  This is a guestpost from Joanna from Webhosting Search. When you are a web designer and you are really devoted to your profession, you live on the Web. This is quite normal – pros are like that. If you want your life on the Net to be comfortable, you need to find a nice place for you – i.e. a good web site hosting offer where to host your and your clients’ sites. With tons of offers for business website hosting and for web site hosting in general, there is no reason to complain about not having alternatives to choose between. However, when there are so many options to choose from,…

• 9 Examples of Creative Use of Grids in Web Design

  Stefan Vervoort

  11 Jan 2010 | 7:54 am

  Grids are used in newspapers and book design, but also on the web. On the web however, grids are used differently. Web designers have a lot of possibilities to use the grid for ordering information and content. For this reason, I have gathered 9 websites with grids used out-of-the-box to show you what is possible and what works best. Enjoy these websites! 1. Form+Logic is an identity studio whose website uses a nice grid to display their latest clients. By using enough space between the different projects, the layout appeals quiet and relaxing. 2. Max Voltar – the personal blog of Tim…

• Book Review: Thinking with Type

  Stefan Vervoort

  6 Jan 2010 | 2:00 am

  My Communication & Multimedia Design study brings me in contact with a lot of design-related books. Numerous books are ugly, uninteresting and just plain boring. A few however, are interesting enough to tell you about. Thinking with Type is such book. This book is a critical guide for designers, writers, editors and students who would like something about typography. Thinking with Type This book is written by Ellen Lupton, a typography teacher on the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore. She wanted handbook explaining typography for her students. That is exactly what this book…

• Poll: What’s Your Main Area of Skill?

  Stefan Vervoort

  4 Jan 2010 | 6:07 am

  Just recently, I start picking up posting and writing for DivitoDesign again. The blog has still a large number of unique visitors each day coming from Google, but I am not sure what they are looking for now. Back in the day, that was mainly HTML/CSS related people, but I have the feeling that audience has changed a little. For this reason, I added a new poll to the sidebar. This poll is about your skillset, mainly because I am interested to see what the visitors of DivitoDesign are looking for on the blog. If you are browsing the blog, please take the time to vote on the poll. For the RSS…

• 
  AndySowards.com

• #WDNDL For 2/9/2010 – Photoshop & Illustrator Tuts, JS/jQuery/CSS Awesomeness, & Inspirations!

  Andy Sowards

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:01 pm

  Designers *First* Designs… | The Design O'Blog Nice flash back to awesome Designers humble beginnings! Web Banner Templates: Photoshop & Illustrator | Fuel Your Creativity Awesome Photoshop and Illustrator Resources! The Power (and ease) of Patterns in Illustrator | BittBox Great read on Patterns (tags: bittbox help pattern illustrator blog design webdesign howto graphics inspiration) 50+ Logos Created With Brilliant Logic | metamags.com Technology Blog | Push The Limits of Technology Awesome LOGOS!! (tags: brand design webdesign inspiration logo creative branding logos) 10…

• FlashMoto CMS Review – Easiest way to make and manage Flash sites, Ever.

  Andy Sowards

  7 Feb 2010 | 12:10 am

  So recently I had the opportunity to give FlashMoto CMS a test-drive from the kind folks at FlashMoto.com – And I have to tell you that it was probably the least frustrating flash related thing I have ever done. Unless you are working with flash sites and building them from scratch day in and day out, working with flash, exporting the swf, uploading it to the server, testing it, and repeating every-time you change any little thing is very time consuming and frustrating at times. If you are like me, you really like how flash portfolio sites look. They are a beautiful and sleek way of…

• #WDNDL For 2/8/2010 – Navigation, UX/UI, jQuery, CSS3, AJAX, Javascript, & Freelancer Tips/Tutorials!

  Andy Sowards

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:03 pm

  How to Use Any Font on the Web | The Interactive Wall Great font tips! (tags: webdesign web webdev css tools fonts typography) Free Saint Valentine’s Day Icon Set – Noupe Awesome Icon Sets! (tags: free icons icon) Top 10 Tips and Tools for Freelancers – Freelancing – Lifehacker Great freelance tips 20 Very Useful CSS3 Tutorials – Speckyboy Design Magazine Nice CSS3 Tutorials! (tags: design webdesign inspiration web resources tutorials tutorial resource list programming reference howto css tips smashingmagazine guide twitchboard css3 style temp sheet speckyboy 20 web2…

• #WDNDL For 2/5/2010 – Inspirational Interviews, Apple iPad, Typography, & Tech News!

  Andy Sowards

  4 Feb 2010 | 5:01 pm

  Twitter Finally Fixes Mobile OAuth [PICS] Bout time! Become a Gmail Master Redux – Gmail – Lifehacker Great Gmail-Fu Info (tags: gmail productivity howto shortcuts ninja lifehacker email google tips) Man Resigns On Twitter In Haiku. Happens To Be Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz. This is kind of funny (tags: sun twitter haiku tweetmarks) Apple Now Lets You Preview iPhone Apps In Your Browser Wow, this is kinda cool (tags: apple iphone applications software itunes web ipod ipod,) Linchpin – An interview with Seth Godin on creativity and resistance | Fuel Your Creativity Great interview!

• #WDNDL For 2/4/2010 – Freebies, Blogging Tips, Design Inspirations & Nerd News!

  Andy Sowards

  3 Feb 2010 | 5:01 pm

  You Got Design Right – Now ‘Write’ Design! | Inspired Magazine Very nice article – blogging tips – writing process (tags: writing design inspiration tips copy smashing blogging marketing article blog inspiracion process magazine comparison leer) 10 Tips to Avoid a Creative Block | Inspired Magazine This is really helpful! (tags: design design_process muziek ideas freelancing tips photoshop business) 47 Amazing CSS3 Animation Demos I Don't care who you are – these rock. (tags: design javascript inspiration development lata animation reference webdesign css3 j *****…

• 
  webtoolkit4me

• XY-field: 2-dimensional slider for MooTools

  Gerasimos

  17 Jan 2010 | 11:48 pm

  “XY-Field Widget is a MooTools class that allows you to create a “field”-widget. This field can be seen as a two-dimensional slider. It allows users to work with data in a more compact and intuitive way.” Related posts:Moogenda: a calendar mootools agendajQuery content slider: Moving BoxesRiding carousels with jQuery, Mootools, YUI and Prototype

• TipTip jQuery Plugin

  Gerasimos

  13 Jan 2010 | 1:45 am

  TipTip, as the name almost suggests, is a jQuery plugin for creating tooltips. What makes this one a bit different from other tooltip plugins is the fact that it will generate one set of popup elements total, rather then generating one set of popup elements for each element with TipTip applied to it. Related posts:Horinaja : Slideshow for jquery and scriptaculousQuickFlip 2: a jQuery pluginjQuery Plugin imgPreview

• 5 excellent calligraphic fonts

  Gerasimos

  11 Jan 2010 | 9:37 am

  Here’s a small collection of really nice calligrapic fonts i’ve found over at dafont.com Jellyka – Gare de Chambord Download Scriptina Download Jane Austen Download Windsong Download Fely Download Background texture: old Paper Texture by chefranden Related posts:8 fonts for developers you’ve probably never heard before

• 1000 Free “Farm-Fresh Web Icons”

  Gerasimos

  11 Jan 2010 | 12:42 am

  1000 free icons is what fatcow.com is giving away for free. Icons come in 2 resolutions (16×16 & 32×32) in PNG format and they are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Related posts:15 Free High Resolution IconsFree Ecological Vector Design Elements20 Free Vector Icons from Web Designer Depot

• Free twitter icon set

  Gerasimos

  9 Jan 2010 | 2:39 am

  Brand new set of free twitter icons now available over at PinkMoustache.net. Icons are available in EPS format and PNG in 2 resolutions. 80 x 80 & 128 x 128. Free for any use as usual. Related posts:Icon set: Free glossy social icons100 free icons – Weby Icon Set1000 Free “Farm-Fresh Web Icons”

• 
  Web Design Ledger

• 13 Useful JavaScript Solutions for Charts and Graphs

  Henry

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:29 pm

  Graphs and charts are used to simplify complex data and make it easy to read and understand. So it really wouldn’t make sense if it was difficult to integrate a graph into a website. Thanks to Javascript and a bunch of talented developers, we have at our disposal solutions for easily adding graphs and charts to our web projects. Here are 13 of these, including some written for jQuery and MooTools, that you will find very useful. Highcharts Highcharts is a charting library written in pure JavaScript, offering an easy way of adding interactive charts to your web site or web application.

• 50 Inspiring iPhone Application Websites

  gmuller

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:20 am

  One thing that many of the iPhone application websites have ‘in common’ is their beautiful and inspiring design. They simply look amazing. The colors are great, the typography is classy, the photos, spaces and reflections are astonishing. The websites are so visual appealing that it is very good to browse around to get inspired and also to find a cool app for you (in case you have an iPhone). And as I’m always looking around for inspiring sites, I found that making a selection of iPhone app sites would give us a great list! So here we are… with 50 samples of beautiful,…

• A Showcase of Website Navigations with Serious Click Appeal

  Henry

  4 Feb 2010 | 9:37 pm

  A couple of months ago we posted an article showcasing great website navigations. Consider this the sequel. The navigation of a website is meant to be clicked. It doesn’t need to blend in or be hard to find. It’s important that it stands out from the rest of the elements on the page, but yet still matches the overall style of the design. Here is a showcase of websites that achieve this in a very stylish way. These navs look amazing, have serious click appeal, and are guaranteed to inspire you. Clicking on the images will take you to each site. Vegas Uncork’s SYNTHVIEW Help…

• WDL Premium: Stains Vector Pack from Go Media

  Henry

  4 Feb 2010 | 8:00 am

  Today we’re releasing another amazing vector pack for our WDL Premium Members from the talented people at Go Media. Stains is a grimy set of vector coffee stains, brush strokes, and ink splatters. These vector shapes are incredibly detailed, scanned at a very high resolution and vectorized. Warning, slow machines might have trouble with this because the splatters in this pack include all the tiny specs that spray out. It’s insane, there is a huge level of detail here. Also, there are some vector brush strokes applied to rough paper for a really dirty and gritty feel. Be sure to…

• The Principle of Contrast in Web Design

  Henry

  3 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  A web design is made of many different elements, each having varying levels of importance and some demanding prominence over others. Some elements share a relationship, while others are not related at all. The tricky part is being able to communicate this visually and effectively. This is where the principle of contrast comes into play. Contrast is the difference between two or more elements. With contrast, a designer can create visual interest and direct the attention of the user. But imagine if all of the elements on a web page were the same in style and appearance. There would be no…

• 
  Unmatched Style

• LiveResto

  Gene Crawford

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:07 am

  Submitted by Steve Verlinden, @verlinden. Developer. LiveResto is an online platform allowing the creation and the management of restaurants websites. I like the big image area with the three images of sample websites .The navigation design is pretty good too, with a big green image as the on state it’s hard to miss what page you’re on. I’m not digging the chef illustration all too much, but it does break up the clean design well. This design is thorough and complete with the rounded corners on the form elements.

• Fuel Brand Inc.

  Gene Crawford

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:15 am

  Submitted by Adelle Charles, @adellecharles. We really like the Fuel Brand inc. website. Jay and I did a screen-cast review of it. It’s a pretty memorable experience, it’s more than your standard javascript interaction styled website. The interactions are very well done, they’re almost minimal and I think that’s what makes it work so well. The color change between section is a nice touch. The other things like the over states on the profiles and the news section are great. What’s really nice and something we missed while doing the screen-cast is that they have…

• vanillaforums.com

  Gene Crawford

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:12 am

  Really very simple page for this software website. I like the non complexity of the design and limited color palette. It really works well with the name “vanilla”. What I like most isn’t shown in the above screenshot but the ‘8 Reasons Why You’ll Love Vanilla’ grid design is wonderful. It’s engaging on it’s own and leaves me wondering why the entire site doesn’t play this particular design portion up more.

• uptrending.com (redesign)

  Gene Crawford

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:01 pm

  Submitted by Andy Brewer, @andybrewer. Designer & Developer. We’ve featured uptrending.com before, and as always the designs are good. I think this is one of the best so far, I love the simplification of the content displayed on the home page. Keeping it clear and easy to digest, that’s the trick right? I also like that the design resists making elements animated for no real reason, it’s largely static but it’s still very nice. Proving you don’t always need to make something wiggle or fade to be a well designed site.

• dizzytree.com

  Gene Crawford

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:15 am

  Submitted by Brad Madigan, @bmadigan. Designer & Developer. I love personal/professional websites like this one. Places where web professionals put up work samples and blog posts side by side. Often they are projects that are worked on just for fun, it normally shows in a good way. There’s some interesting design things going on with this design, the half face half computer imagery at the top of the site is a nice little visual thought. I think the typography could stand to be simplified a bit on the overall layout, there feels like there may be too much going on. Overall though,…

• 
  Design Snack

• Hugo Mendes

  3 Feb 2010 | 1:00 pm

  Hugo Mendes (http://www.hugomendes.com)

• Rick Monroe

  2 Feb 2010 | 3:46 am

  Rick Monroe (http://rickmonroe.net)

• Lofts at 136 - Downtown Student Living

  2 Feb 2010 | 3:46 am

  Lofts at 136 - Downtown Student Living (http://www.136lofts.com)

• Pinxai - Graphic and Web Design.

  1 Feb 2010 | 9:00 pm

  Pinxai - Graphic and Web Design. (http://www.pinxai.com)

• Cullpa solutions

  30 Jan 2010 | 9:00 pm

  Cullpa solutions (http://www.cullpa.com)

• 
  sweet faerie designs

• Blog Design Giveaway

  26 Jan 2010 | 4:46 am

     My friend Kristi over at Pink and Polka Dot is hosting a giveaway for a FREE blog makeover, hurry and enter before midnight 1/27/2010. [Closed - Congratulations Emily at Notions on Nesting!] Blog Prize Package includes: 2-3 column template (Blogger platform) Header (Blogger and/or graphic only) Sidebar titles (Blogger and/or graphic only) Blog button promoting your site (Blogger and/or graphic only) See all the details over at her blog.

• Pink and Polka Dot

  23 Jan 2010 | 11:17 am

  Before: After: Oh, there's nothing I love more than a blog re-design and a challenge! Kristi from Pink and Polka Dot contacted me to redesign her blog (originally designed in February 2009.) She wanted to simplify the look and clean up the clutter.  We downsized from the 3 column blog back to a 2 column blog without losing any space, also we added advertising boxes, social media icons, and Blogger's new pages to help streamline Kristi's new look.  We also went in a different direction with backgrounds and headers. I'll also be updating Kristi's Twitter and Etsy store... to be…

• Where the Green Grass Grows

  8 Jul 2009 | 11:40 am

  I always get excited with a new design and forget to snag a before shot and this client was no different. She had a lovely blog to begin with, but she wanted a departure from the scrapbook genre, something more grown up.

• That Girl Blogs

  10 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pm

  sweet!I love this design.

• Mandatory Blog Here

  9 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pm

  Just some minor tweaking here and there for this blog. My client really liked her colors and header so I played up on those and added a few extras.

• 
  Desizntech

• Free High Res Grungy, Rusty Metal and Dirty Textures

  Kawsar Ali | DT Admin

  5 Feb 2010 | 1:18 pm

  Grungy rusty metal textures can be very useful when designing posters or web layouts. You can add dirty, old and grungy quality to your projects. Today we present to you 10 free high res (3008 x200) rusty, grungy metal and dirty textures. Most of these textures are From Bangladesh. Recently, I was lucky to go [...] Massive Freebies Password: d08YkM1

• 25 Creative and Amazing Surreal Self Portraits

  Kawsar Ali | DT Admin

  2 Feb 2010 | 6:38 am

  Portrait is a wonderful technique to engage viewer with the subject of the photograph. Surreal Portraits add bizarre or unrealistic elements in the photograph to make it more interesting, appealing and captivating. In this post we have gathered some original, creative and unique self portraits. The surrealistic elements in the photographs are added by adding [...] Massive Freebies Password: d08YkM1

• Must Have High Quality Free Vectors for Designers

  Kawsar Ali | DT Admin

  27 Jan 2010 | 4:57 pm

  Vectors are really useful for design projects and web applications. One of the best thing about vector is the scalability without losing quality. No matter how you size the vector, still looks same. In this post, we have collected some high quality useful vectors that will be useful if designing a website or application. Shopping Vector [...] Massive Freebies Password: d08YkM1

• Happy Birthday Desizn Tech! Massive Freebies and Giveaway

  Kawsar Ali | DT Admin

  27 Dec 2009 | 12:18 am

  Happy Birthday to Desizn Tech ! Yes Desizn Tech is 1 years old and to celebrate this occasion we are giving away free icons, templates, vectors, wordpress theme and many more items. Download You can see preview of some icons here here To all download this item click on the above link and you should be directed [...] Massive Freebies Password: d08YkM1

• Desizn Tech’s Birthday Freebies and Giveaways Preview

  Kawsar Ali | DT Admin

  24 Dec 2009 | 7:01 pm

  Update: Download Link also added in end of the post. Hello, Desizn Tech readers. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays. In this post we are just informing you about the MASSIVE number of freebies and giveaways that is coming up on December 27. The freebie pack will contain all the following items and lot more. The download pack [...] Massive Freebies Password: d08YkM1

• 
  Web Design

• Prepping for Internet Retailer Web Design & Usability 2010 Conference in Orlando. Getting away from Canadian cold and some warm weather.

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:56 am

  Prepping for Internet Retailer Web Design & Usability 2010 Conference in Orlando. Getting away from Canadian cold and some warm weather.[Filtrs in article: "web design" ][FiltrRank: 4][Source: twitter.com/ezrasilverton]

• we are exhibiting at the Internet Retailer 2010 Web Design & Usability conference in Orlando. If you're coming,... http://bit.ly/ddWshz

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:50 am

  we are exhibiting at the Internet Retailer 2010 Web Design & Usability conference in Orlando. If you're coming,... http://bit.ly/ddWshz[Filtrs in article: "web design" ][FiltrRank: 4][Source: twitter.com/webhostingbuzz]

• The Usability Mindset:What You Need to Know Before Implementing User-Centered Web Design http://cli.gs/WLVus

  9 Feb 2010 | 9:05 am

  The Usability Mindset:What You Need to Know Before Implementing User-Centered Web Design http://cli.gs/WLVus[Filtrs in article: "web design" ][FiltrRank: 4][Source: twitter.com/4legs]

• Key trends for the next 12mnths in web design http://tinyurl.com/ya6wurv "...be content-aware, and user-, & usability-,focused."

  9 Feb 2010 | 9:03 am

  Key trends for the next 12mnths in web design http://tinyurl.com/ya6wurv "...be content-aware, and user-, & usability-,focused."[Filtrs in article: "web design" ][FiltrRank: 4][Source: twitter.com/EmmsieLu]

• RT @webdesignerjobs Web Design Jobs New Subdomain Design & Usability Improvement - oDesk: We have a new subsite with reviews and hardw...

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:51 am

  RT @webdesignerjobs Web Design Jobs New Subdomain Design & Usability Improvement - oDesk: We have a new subsite with reviews and hardw...[Filtrs in article: "web design" ][FiltrRank: 4][Source: twitter.com/Shishev]

• 
  milo

• Rury Vizcarra

  miloIIIIVII

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:40 am

  Industrial Designer Rury Vizcarra strives not only to offer desire and fearless innovation, but also to create memorable experiences and impacts on people’s lives. Extraordinary aQuatica Faucet has been inspired by sea creatures.

• Stefan Chinof

  miloIIIIVII

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:35 am

  Stefan Chinof and his design with very powerful colors and extravagant typography styling. Aged 28 currently residing in Plovdiv, Bulgaria.

• Andrés Remy Architects

  miloIIIIVII

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:43 am

  Andrés Remy architecture and their Black House design has an almost provocative sobriety, where the pure white in the inside does imply a provocation an emotive contrast with the absolute black in the outside, reminding the bite of an apple. A strong characteristic that names the house.

• Mount Fuji Architects

  miloIIIIVII

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:38 am

  Mount Fuji architecture was realized by crossing two rectangular parallelepipeds at very right angles. The lower one contains private rooms and bathroom, and sticks half of the body out to existing narrow level ground. The upper one incorporates salon and kitchen, and lies astride the lower one and the mountain ridge. It almost seems like an off-centered cross pinned carefully on natural terrain.

• Christy Turlington & Linda Evangelista

  miloIIIIVII

  3 Feb 2010 | 9:24 am

  In 2007, she signed a multiple-year exclusive contract with the cosmetics company L’Oreal Paris. It was announced in early 2008 that she would be featured in the Prada Fall 2008 campaign seen in magazines internationally. She is signed to DNA Model Management in New York City, and Models 1 in London.

• 
  BlueWave Media

• Links for 2010-02-04 [del.icio.us]

  Kimberly Beaven

  5 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  100 Great Google Docs Tips for Students & Educators | AccreditedOnlineColleges.org For students and teachers, the Google Docs collection provides a streamlined, collaborative solution to writing papers, organizing presentations and putting together spreadsheets and reports. But besides the basic features, there are lots of little tricks and hacks you can use to make your Google Docs experience even more productive. Here are 100 great tips for using the documents, presentations and spreadsheets in Google Docs. Pranav Mistry: The thrilling potential of SixthSense technology | Video on…

• Links for 2010-02-03 [del.icio.us]

  Kimberly Beaven

  4 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  Nibirutech-twitbirds TwitBird Pro is a fast, flexible, rich featured twitter client for iPhone and iPod touch.It has a lot of cool features that you see in other twitter apps but rarely together. It offers everything you'd expect for a good twitter client, from your timeline to map search. It is such a powerful twitter client with simple user interface, people will find no difficulties to use all the features. iPhone OS 3.1.3 Out Now Apple has just released iPhone OS 3.1.3. But don’t get too excited; there aren’t new features, just some bug fixes.

• Links for 2010-02-01 [del.icio.us]

  Kimberly Beaven

  2 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  13 Useful WordPress SQL Queries You Wish You Knew Earlier | Onextrapixel - Showcasing Web Treats Without Hitch WordPress is driven by a MySQL database. This is something active WordPress users would know. However, if you only just read about it here from us, here’s what you should know. MySQL is a free relational database management system available in most web hosting services. All of the WordPress data like the posts, comments, categories, and settings are stored within the MySQL database. If you wish to read up more about MySQL, you can take a look at WordPress’s Database Schema. First…

• Links for 2010-01-19 [del.icio.us]

  Kimberly Beaven

  20 Jan 2010 | 12:00 am

  GOOD Home Page - GOOD GOOD is a collaboration of individuals, businesses, and nonprofits pushing the world forward. Get involved.

• Links for 2010-01-13 [del.icio.us]

  Kimberly Beaven

  14 Jan 2010 | 12:00 am

  Inklet turns your trackpad into a Wacom-style tablet Now here's a fascinating app -- Inklet is a new Mac app by Ten One Design that purports to turn your Macbook's trackpad into a tablet-style input. The program uses the multitouch trackpad interface to sense where and when you're touching the pad, and then translates that into "drawing" marks just like a Wacom pen tablet. Unfortunately, the trackpad doesn't have sensitivity built-in (it can only tell when you're touching, not how hard you're pushing), but with Ten One's Pogo Sketch stylus, which I…

• 
  Cheese and Beans

• 4 Year Old Brain = Work in Progress

  Jonathan

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:02 am

  Our youngest daughter developed an unexpected speech impediment several weeks ago; she became unable to say her sister’s name without stuttering on the first latter. Without wanting to dwell too much on it and make her aware – or to let the others realise and tease her about it – we occasionally tested her out – asking about similar sounding words. They were all fine. It was just her sister’s name. When asked who had done something she would stumble over the first letter, and smile. You could break the name down, and ask for each syllable. She could do that.

• Oh, the cleverness of me

  Jonathan

  8 Feb 2010 | 3:13 pm

  Mario had been thinking for some time about reading a big book… Please forgive me for this momentary lapse in lucidity. I’ve not been well. Honest.

• Little Children and the Human Condition

  Jonathan

  8 Feb 2010 | 7:12 am

  I’m off work with a cold. I can’t quite figure out how it crept up on me – yesterday evening I was fine; this morning I felt like my brain had been put in backwards. Putting words together in any kind of sensible, lucid manner is proving difficult – hence the decision early this morning that attempting to instruct a computer to do anything similarly planned or constructive might be a bad idea. I think this may be the second “real” day off sick since the girls arrived in February 2008. I say “real”, because I invariably end up working if I am at…

• Dinner With Friends

  Jonathan

  7 Feb 2010 | 10:15 am

  This weekend has served to remind me about the value of friendship, and of having a life. It’s easy to let work consume your life – in my case so much that I approached this weekend with a creeping dread that the time we were investing in social activities were taking away from time I might otherwise have spent working. On Saturday morning, shortly before leaving for my inlaws, I wrote on twitter “Saturday morning, and the beginning of a slightly mad non-weekend. Freelance work, dinner with friends, and dinner with more friends to come”. Notice the italics. A part of…

• The School Reunion

  Jonathan

  4 Feb 2010 | 12:20 pm

  A few of the people from my year at school are arranging a reunion this year. Quite why it has to be this year, I’m not sure – we’ll all be hitting 37 – surely 40 would have been a better number ? Last year would have been 20 years since we left. It really makes no sense at all. As fun as it has been to get hear voices from the past on Facebook making encouraging noises about the prospect of seeing one another again, my gut reaction is to stay the hell away from any sort of reunion. I have a couple of misgivings; one entirely pragmatic, and the other less so. When the…

• 
  CSS Globe | Web Standards Magazine

• 10 Brilliant CSS3 and jQuery Examples

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:17 am

  This post is all about CSS3 and Javascript. With all the new features that come with CSS3, there are whole lot of animation possibilities that can't be achieve before. So, Check this out and get inspired.

• Expandable Drop Down Ticker

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:37 pm

  A one of a kind jQuery ticker script that can be viewed both sequentially and simultaneously, via drop down menu. The ticker's contents can be defined either inline on the page, or inside an external file on the same server and fetched via Ajax.

• Choosing The Best CSS Framework: A Complete Guide

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:04 am

  There are plenty of reasons to use a CSS Framework to build your websites. They can speed up development, make your sites more aesthetically pleasing, and they can help eliminate all those nasty cross-browser compatibility issues.

• JavaScript WYSIWYG Editor � TinyEditor

  7 Feb 2010 | 11:19 pm

  TinyEditor is a simple JavaScript WYSIWYG editor that is both lightweight (8KB) and standalone. It can easily be customized to integrate with any website through CSS and the multitude of parameters.

• Anatomy of The Perfect Sidebar

  7 Feb 2010 | 8:10 am

  A well organized sidebar should include some important items, such as subscription options, advertisements, recent and popular posts, and help blog readers find contextual information related to the article they are reading...

• 
  Six Revisions

• The Three Golden Rules of Site Redesigns

  Jacob Gube

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:25 am

  Last month I made a New Year’s resolution to schedule myself as a client and rebuild my website. Basically, the design and code had become entirely embarrassing to me. Additionally, the chaos caused by three years of feature-creep and band-aids was extremely frustrating. Rebuilding a site is a great feeling; it means out with the old and in with a new. A clean slate. But there are also a number of critical questions to ask when you’re thinking about redesigning your website: The redesign might appeal to a new audience, but will it alienate loyal readers? How will restructuring…

• A Quick Look at Mobile Web Designs

  Jacob Gube

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:22 am

  If there’s anything web designers learned from the past year, it’s that mobile web usage will continue to soar. Thanks to smartphones and social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook that promote on-the-go interaction with web applications, the amount of people using mobile devices to access the web has grown exponentially. There are over 4.5 billion mobile phones in usage today and it’s estimated that by the end of this year, over 1 billion users will be accessing the web via a mobile device. While these numbers are overwhelming, the mobile web experience is yet to…

• Common Misconceptions about Web Designers

  Jacob Gube

  7 Feb 2010 | 6:42 am

  As a web designer, I’m proud to be a part of an Apple-loving, forward thinking, technologically advanced group of people that devour tutorials and web design blogs, hoping to create a stellar design that that gets posted in every CSS gallery out there. Yep, we’re a group of people that works hard, plays hard and strives to meet our deadlines, while learning something new along the way. We’re also a misunderstood group of people, viewed as gothic creatures that shun the daylight because we’re just tragic artists. Well, I’m here to set things straight. Here are…

• 15 Fantastic Finds on the Google Code Repository

  Jacob Gube

  6 Feb 2010 | 5:57 am

  Google Code Repository is a section of Google that, just like SourceForge, allows developers to upload their code for others to use under license. The repository was launched in 2006 and after searching through its archives, I found a number of interesting scripts and other goodies that would be an asset in any website owner/website builder’s arsenal. All the code examples below are free to download and use. They’re released under a GPL, BSD, MIT or Creative Commons license. 1. Twotiny This is a great series of tiny icons created by Paul Jarvis at twothirty.  There’s a…

• CSS3 Techniques You Should Know

  Jacob Gube

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:47 am

  Many of you have probably heard all the buzz around CSS3, but exactly which techniques can we use today? In this article I’ll show you some different CSS3 techniques that work great in some of the leading browsers (i.e. Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera ), and how they will degrade well in the non-supported browsers (i.e. Internet Explorer). Using browser specific extensions, many of the proposed CSS3 styles can be used today! If you aren’t aware of the browser extensions, these are CSS styles with a vendor specific prefix. Since CSS3 is not fully supported yet, we must use these…

• 
  Chris Wallace // Designer&Developer

• Win a Copy of Things for Mac

  Chris

  29 Jan 2010 | 9:24 am

  After launching the AllDevJobs.com Blog, I decided it would be a heck of a lot more fun to give away a copy of Things for Mac to 5 lucky email subscribers. To read the details and enter the contest, please visit the new AllDevJobs.com Blog.

• Vaynerchuk Meets Wallace

  Chris

  20 Dec 2009 | 6:36 pm

  Last week, I had the opportunity to meet Gary Vaynerchuk at a book signing/networking event at World Market in St. Louis. Now, to be perfectly honest, I haven’t seen many of his videos and have never purchased a bottle of wine in my life, so I certainly can’t claim to be his biggest fan. However, after meeting him, I can safely say that this is one guy that really knows what he’s talking about, especially when it comes to knowing where the web is going. On top of that, he’s super nice. After standing in line for about 20 minutes to get a signed copy of…

• Fix Custom Post Template Plugin for WordPress 2.9

  Chris

  20 Dec 2009 | 12:11 pm

  Odds are if you were using the Custom Post Template plugin and upgraded to WordPress 2.9, it broke. Luckily, there is a very simple fix while you wait for an official update. Navigate to your plugins directory, pop open the file named ‘custom-post-templates.php’ and find line 126. Replace the whole line with the following: $template_data = implode( '', file( $template ) ); That should take care of it. Enjoy!

• 8bit Network

  Chris

  16 Dec 2009 | 8:21 pm

  I just wanted to share the new logo for one of the projects I am currently working on. Odds are if you’re in the WordPress world, you know John Saddington. He operates under @human3rror on twitter and has released a number of WordPress themes on his website. He is a great guy and I am very excited to be working with him on a very fun project. I just recently completed the logo for this super-secret project and asked John if I could share this with you all to get some feedback on it. Basically, the concept behind the logo is the idea of being recharged or refueled. I’d love to know…

• Domain Inspiration

  Chris

  11 Dec 2009 | 8:22 am

  I was in the process of transferring MashedJobs.com to its new owner (recently sold on Flippa) and while I was working in my GoDaddy account, I thought it would be fun to go through the list of domain names I own and list them all here with an explanation of why I own them. After participating in the latest meme-craze URL ABC from TVD, I thought this would be a fun way to share my ideas and domain purchase mistakes with all my friends. So here you go: 9creatives.com – I had an idea to put together a small network of designers that posted just ridiculously awesome content and aggregating…

• 
  Arbenting Freebies

• Arbenting Asks Aloud — How Important is Design Theory?

  Robert Bowen

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:08 am

  During our stint over at Fuel Your Creativity, one of our favorite parts was interacting with the community in the discussions we would have. We always valued those opportunities to connect and the insights that were shared, so we wanted to bring those discussions back to the forefront of what we are doing, as we also felt they were great ways to enrich the community through open and honest discussions about design and the creative process. Enter our new series, Arbenting Asks Aloud. Because overall, as most do, we have questions. And instead of keeping them and the answers to ourselves, we…

• Beautifully Colorful Photo Manipulations

  Angie Bowen

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:02 am

  Well the second of February has come and gone, and just in case you missed it, the graphic designer did see a shadow the other day so we are in for six more weeks of inspiration! To go ahead and help feed this imaginatively stimulating forecast we dove into an area of digital artistry that is not only a favorite of ours, but has also proven to be a favorite of our readers as well. Photo Manipulations, when done with skill and precision, can prove to be a masterful expression of artistic creativity. Add to that a vibrant collection of color and the transformation goes beyond the boundaries of…

• A Month Full of Found Freebies: A January Roundup

  Angie Bowen

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:45 am

  2010 is showing no signs of starting slow, and January has already run its way free from the calendar as if to prove this point. With the month rushing passed the way it has, you may have missed some of the freebies that the design community was kind enough to create and offer to the masses. Never fear, Arbenting is here with our monthly roundup from the corners of the web, to showcase some of the skilled designers who have given so freely of their time and talent. Hope you enjoy. Free Furry Cushions Social Icons Set Today we are glad to release Furry Cushions Social Icons, a set with 6…

• February 2010 Wallpaper: Love Letters

  Angie Bowen

  31 Jan 2010 | 9:21 pm

  February is upon us, and as we move into the new month, Arbenting has some new wallpaper goodies for our readers. Not only do we have a monthly calendar wallpaper for you entitled Love Letters, but we also have an alternate wallpaper where we took the same idea, Love Letters, and simplified it. Like, extremely simplified. So this months wallpaper contributions are a little different. Angie created our calendar wallpaper, and a version without the calendar to give it that timeless feel. That is the first one we come to below. Going with a more traditional, romantic take on the month. For Your…

• 6 Free High-Res Grungy Paper Textures

  Angie Bowen

  26 Jan 2010 | 1:29 am

  It’s freebie time again, so you must be at Arbenting! Or you know, one of the other sites that might be offering freebies today. Statistically speaking we can’t be the only blog giving something away today. Though, technically speaking that could be heavily dependent on what day you have come to the site, I mean we are publishing on a Tuesday, but given how hectic your week has been, for you it could be Friday. If even this week…what were we talking about again? That’s right, freebies! Speaking of freebies, we hadn’t given away any textures in a while, so Angie decided it was time.

• 
  Line25

• Tips for Designing Unique and Attractive Blog Posts

  Chris Spooner

  7 Feb 2010 | 11:00 pm

  Designers have began to inject increasing levels of creativity into their blog posts and articles, throwing out the traditional and generic style of blog posts in favour of a much more attractive layout that’s themed specifically to the content. Let’s take a look at some of the best examples, and see what makes them work so well. In his fantastic article ‘The Death of the Boring Blog Post‘, Paddy Donnelly sums up this method of fusing together a blog post with the style and design of a traditional magazine article and coins the name, ‘Blogazine’. Be sure to…

• Line25 Sites of the Week for February 5th 2010

  Chris Spooner

  4 Feb 2010 | 11:00 pm

  Line25 Sites of the Week is a weekly roundup of the most outstanding website designs. In this week’s collection, we have designs from Upstruct Belin, Charma Inc, Eighty8Four, Demotive and Jay Hollywood. Upstruct Berlin View the website Charma Inc View the website Eighty8Four View the website Demotive View the website Jay Hollywood View the website Similar Posts Line25 Sites of the Week for January 29th 2010 Line25 Sites of the Week for January 22nd 2010 Line25 Sites of the Week for January 15th 2010Line25 Sites of the Week for January 8th 2010

• Free Apple iPad Icon Set for Your Website Designs

  Chris Spooner

  31 Jan 2010 | 11:00 pm

  Just like the iPhone and other Apple products, there’s no doubt the new iPad will begin to appear in a range of website designs in the near future. I’ve been busy working on an iPad style icon pack for you to download for free use in your upcoming website or application designs, or to simply save in in your resources folder until the opportunity comes around! The pack includes the full size graphic, as well as 256px, 128px and 64px icons sizes. The icon pack includes four sizes of the iPad graphic, in PSD, PNG and Mac ICNS formats. Be sure to also check out the handy Creative…

• Line25 Sites of the Week for January 29th 2010

  Chris Spooner

  28 Jan 2010 | 11:00 pm

  Line25 Sites of the Week is a weekly roundup of the most outstanding website designs. In this week’s collection, we have designs from Sushi & Robots, Pixelbot, Paravel, Matt and Giraffe. Sushi & Robots View the website Pixelbot View the website Paravel View the website Matt View the website Giraffe View the website Similar Posts Line25 Sites of the Week for February 5th 2010 Line25 Sites of the Week for January 22nd 2010 Line25 Sites of the Week for January 15th 2010Line25 Sites of the Week for January 8th 2010

• An Interview with Designer & Blogger Jon Phillips

  Chris Spooner

  24 Jan 2010 | 11:00 pm

  Jon Phillips is a freelance web designer and is a well known figure in the online community as the guy behind top design related sites Spyre Studios, Freelance Folder and Design Newz. I’ve had the pleasure of working with Jon on a couple of his personal and client related projects in the past, so I invited him to chat about his background, share some of his experiences of running multiple blogs and give some insights into his upcoming projects. Hi Jon, let’s start with an introduction. What is your background and what do you do? Hey everyone! Thanks a lot Chris for having me.

• 
  Marcofolio.net

• Alice in Wonderland Fan Art

  8 Feb 2010 | 11:34 am

  Although the success of 3d movie "Avatar" seems unstoppable, another movie in 3d is coming to the cinemas soon. With the tagline You've got a very important date, the latest version of "Alice in Wonderland" will be released in theaters in one of the upcoming weeks. Since the story about Alice is one most people will know from their childhood, loads of fan art is created around it. Because of the upcoming movie, this post is a inspirational roundup with Fan Art about Alice in Wonderland. Main source for this inspirational was DeviantART, a great resource to look for…

• Nostalgia: Dragging the Windows XP error dialog

  31 Jan 2010 | 9:12 pm

  Remember the "good old days" when you were still using Windows XP? If so, I'm pretty sure you remember the loads of error dialogs that would pop up at a totally random time. Although these dialogs always show up at a bad time, you could do something pretty neat with them. Drag the window around and it would duplicate itself over and over! Sadly, I haven't seen this effect alive in Windows 7, so to keep those memories alive for XP, I re-created the effect using HTML/CSS with jQuery and jQuery UI. Simply check out the demo to see if you can remember how it would look like. Be creative…

• New CSS3 properties added to Firefox 3.6

  24 Jan 2010 | 10:27 pm

  A couple of days ago, Mozilla released their newest version of their ever popular browser: Firefox. It was in beta before, but now version 3.6 can be officially downloaded. This version of the browser brings us a couple of improvements on several aspects, like using Personas (themes), improved (JavaScript) performance and an extended version of the CSS engine compared to the 3.5 release. Today, we're going to look at a couple of the new CSS3 properties that are added to Firefox 3.6. In this article, we'll be looking at the following properties that are now supported by Firefox 3.6:…

• jQuery 1.3 and PHP: Book review and Giveaway

  17 Jan 2010 | 10:13 pm

  Combining both jQuery and PHP can be very powerful. One of my very popular articles called A fancy Apple.com-style search suggestion is combining these two techniques too, to achieve the desired effect. There are loads of tutorials on the net that also use both techniques, but Kae Verens wrote a complete book about it. The book is called jQuery 1.3 with PHP (by Packt Publishing) and shares great information on how you can combine jQuery and PHP for use on your own website. I've read the book and wrote a review about it. Now, you have a chance to win this book and read it yourself! What you'll…

• Best of the Best: 2009

  18 Dec 2009 | 4:54 am

  A little bit of sad news; This will be the last post on Marcofolio on 2009. I'm going to Austria for two weeks and enjoy a winter sport vacation. But don't worry, I'm planning on finishing this year with another great article. Just like last year, I contacted several (web)design bloggers and asked them the following question: Could you provide me with the URL of what you think is the best article that you wrote in the past year (2009)? If you do, please add a short description why you found that article the best one. As you can imagine, this post is a round up with the actual best posts from…

• 
  Plaveb.com

• Web Application Advantages in Present Scenario

  Mark Spenser

  31 Dec 1969 | 4:00 pm

  Web application development services have been launched  for making applications usage easier and safer for the consumer. There are many advantages of going online to utilize applications as opposed to using desktop applications are rising  progressively. With many web applications development companies’ cropping up and providing best services, the assortment and miscellany of we...

• Website Using Opt-In List for Internet Marketing Triumph

  Mark Spenser

  31 Dec 1969 | 4:00 pm

  Internet Marketing, as a notion, is a need for any business or service supplier, these days. If a business is in set up mode, then it would not be encouraging to spend a lot of money on hiring professionals. In such a case, do it yourself – internet marketing business plots are best to start with. But, in the case of sensible to big businesses, the most reasonable idea would be to hire a firm that could h...

• Small Business Ecommerce is Truly Borderless

  Mark Spenser

  31 Dec 1969 | 4:00 pm

  The small business ecommerce is truly borderless. People can really make money from any part of the world as long as they have a laptop and an Internet connection. They can sell almost to anyone, anywhere in the world. Using the Internet as a platform for displaying products and services doesn't cost a lot. Internet is a good means to sell because lot of consumers look for products and services online. All types of  online payment services have further made e...

• Mobile Web Development is a Boon for Sellers

  Mark Spenser

  31 Dec 1969 | 4:00 pm

  The Mobile Web access Internet using a mobile device linked to a wireless network. Mobile Web access still endures from usability problems. This is due to the incongruity of the format of much of the information accessible on the Internet with mobile devices and partly due to the small size of the screens of mobile devices. Most of websites are compatible with desktop based web browsers, when such websites are accessed from mobile phones it does not display inform...

• Web development gives life to designed website

  Mark Spenser

  31 Dec 1969 | 4:00 pm

  Web Design Development Company presents web development services to different companies across the world. Every business should have a decent website which explains all the features of business and attracts the visitors. Website design and content should be clear and informative so that visitor returns again and again. To promote business online - web design development companies plays an important role. When business is done t...

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  Webdesigner Depot

• Free Speech and Freedom of Information: Advice for Bloggers

  Walter

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:05 am

  The information bloggers choose to put out there often has a huge impact on how they’re perceived and what others online think about them. And what many bloggers don’t realize is that information they put on their blogs can have a direct legal impact. Even if what you’re posting to your blog isn’t breaking any laws, it may be considered unethical by others, which can often be just as damaging. Here’s a guide to free speech and freedom of information specifically for bloggers. Legal issues, ethical issues, and other things to consider are all covered. If you have…

• A Collection of Free iPad Icons, Tutorials and PSDs

  Walter

  8 Feb 2010 | 9:24 am

  Since its controversial release, the iPad has been both criticized and admired by the design community. In this post we have compiled a list of great resources, that teach you how to create your own iPad icons, as well as a collection of ready made icons and PSDs. To download the files, please click on the preview image to go to the source site and remember to check theterms of use before using them in your projects. If you know of any other great iPad freebies, please add them in the comments section below and we’ll include them in this post when appropriate. Enjoy… iPad…

• Our Favorite Tweets of the Week Jan 31-Feb 6, 2010

  Walter

  6 Feb 2010 | 11:08 pm

  Every week we tweet a lot of interesting stuff highlighting great content that we find on the web that can be of interest to web designers. The best way to keep track of our tweets is simply to follow us on Twitter, however, in case you missed some here’s a quick and useful compilation of the best tweets that we sent out this past week. Note that this is only a very small selection of the links that we tweeted about, so don’t miss out. To keep up to date with all the cool links, simply follow us @DesignerDepot Interesting Design Trends Among Popular Blogs: http://bit.ly/dfPvgz HTML5…

• Comics of the Week #11

  Walter

  5 Feb 2010 | 10:08 pm

  Every week we feature a set of comics created exclusively for WDD. The content revolves around web design, blogging and funny situations that we encounter in our daily lives as designers. These great cartoons are created by Jerry King, an award-winning cartoonist who’s one of the most published, prolific and versatile cartoonists in the world today. So for a few moments, take a break from your daily routine, have a laugh and enjoy these funny cartoons. Feel free to leave your comments and suggestions below as well as any related stories of your own… A Mother/Daughter Thing The Lonely…

• How to Plan for the Absence of JavaScript

  Walter

  5 Feb 2010 | 9:48 am

  Though the methods used to gather website traffic statistics call into question the validity of the stats themselves, the fact is that some of your website’s visitors will have JavaScript disabled. You could divide your traffic sources into four broad categories: Search engines, mobile visitors, visitors using screen readers and visitors who have JavaScript turned off. When planning your information architecture and design, you must figure out how to deal with these special groups. I have assembled a few recent real-world scenarios to find clarity on the issue. When you want to hide…

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  Redswish - a web design blog

• Redesigning Yourself

  Nathan

  2 Feb 2010 | 2:43 am

  This guest post has been kindly contributed by Barbara Williams, who writes on the topic of Computer Technician Programs. You can get in touch with her here. Working in the digital industry requires constant attention to the incredibly fast paced developments going on around us. For those, like myself, that are still relatively new to this line of work; learning the ropes becomes a tough challenge when even the veterans are gasping, trying to keep up. There’s plenty you can do to try and keep on top; a while ago I wrote an article on how to improve yourself as a designer. In…

• Don’t believe the hype

  Nathan

  28 Jan 2010 | 7:44 am

  My 2 cents. I can see why there’s been some dissapointment about the iPad; especially after all the hype. Rumours have circled the web in a misty torrent of completely unprecedented speculation for months, only to be crushed by what initially seemed as a rather overhyped, mediocre product. No multitasking! No 3G except the most expensive model! What a silly name! It’s just a glorified iPhone! I believe the iPad’s simplicity is it’s beauty. It’s not overloaded with fancy features and crap you’ll probably never use. The lack of multitasking at least means it…

• The Periodic Table of Typefaces

  Nathan

  18 Jan 2010 | 7:17 am

  Unfortunately I’m not sure where this appeared from originally, I’d love to credit to the creator if I knew who they were. It’s geeky, it’s possibly useful and is most definitely the work of someone with too much time on their hands. But I’m a sucker for this ‘type’ of stuff. Found here.

• Tweets that make a difference

  Nathan

  13 Jan 2010 | 9:16 am

  I’ll keep this short and sweet. A couple of days ago I popped out the back door for a smoke, only to realise I’d left my Zippo lighter in my other jeans, which I’d just put in the wash. Panic striken, I ran to the washing machine and gazed mournfully at the soaked denim spinning around. It was gone, game over. As is the case with anything slightly more remarkable than staring at a wall, I tweeted my anguish for all to ignore. Because that’s what you do. Redswish: Nooo! Just realised I’ve left my zippo in my jeans in the wash! You can practically hear my cries of…

• On creativity

  Nathan

  7 Jan 2010 | 5:51 am

  An interesting, and rather long-winded question posed to Dave Trott on creativity caught my attention today. Dave, likely flabbergasted by such an exhausting query, posted it on his blog and allowed the world to share their views instead. Amongst the ramble, several tricky and often avoided questions emerged: Can you train your mind to be more creative and have better ideas? Are there any exercises to develop creative thought processes? Is creativity really ‘99% perspiration and 1% inspiration’? Is creativity a teachable/learn-able skill of coming up with good ideas consistently…

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  Inspired Magazine

• How iPad Affects the Way we Design Websites?

  Tuhin

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:37 am

  The iPad has received mixed reviews. While the geeks (people like you and me) have looked at it with disdain for being “just” what we expected, the media publishing industry (read print media) has seen it as the salvation they had been waiting for. Whether the iPad is able to change the world or not, is not the issue of this article. But the fact of the matter is that it is here and sooner or later we need to learn to design the web keeping it in our minds. So what are the things we need to consider? Fluid Width Design The iPad has no RIGHT way of viewing websites. That means you can view…

• How to Fail at Your Design Business

  Jeff Archibald

  7 Feb 2010 | 12:25 pm

  Today’s guest post is a special piece from Jeff Archibald – a graphic designer hailing from the Great White North – Canada. When he’s not building igloos, fighting polar bears or writing tongue-in-cheek articles about failing at design, he runs a modestly popular design blog over at Paper Leaf Design. This is it. You’ve worked many long, hard hours developing your Pen tool skills in Illustrator to the point you could probably add “Pen Tool Ninja” to your business card. You’ve learned so much about graphic design that your head is bigger than Rush Limbaugh’s…

• 10 Essentials Posts of the Week for the Inspired Community

  Catalin Zorzini

  7 Feb 2010 | 5:45 am

  Our sister site – Inspired News – is feeding us with more than 30 design / development & social media related articles per day, meaning that we could miss quite a few! So here is the complete list of essential reads, as clicked & retweeted by the Inspired Community. To be the first one to know when these kind of stories are published, be sure to Check out Inspired News and folow us on Twitter. 40 Creative and Funny Advertisements Using Animals 100 Years of Movie Title Stills Avoid Design Burn-out by Limiting Client Revisions 50 Free UI and Web Design Wireframing Kits,…

• Freebie Friday – Download the Social Eyesores Icon Pack

  Catalin Zorzini

  4 Feb 2010 | 4:14 pm

  We’re starting the 2010 series of Freebie Friday giveaways with the most creative social icon pack you’ll ever come across on the Interwebs! The author is Xavier Gallego Moya, the Barcelona based artist who created the Eyesores world! And while you’re at it, check out the first Inspired Release – The Social Bird Icon Set The Icon Pack RSS, Twitter, Facebook, LastFM, YouTube, LinkedIn, MySpace – we’ve got them all! Click here to download the icon pack with 7 different icons (both 32×32 pixels and 100×100 pixels versions). So feel free to show off…

• Coolectables – Ten of the Most Unique and Limited Edition iPhone Apps

  Catalin Zorzini

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:28 pm

  We’re trying to keep you inspired on all levels, so here’s this week post with 10 creative iPhone & iPod Touch apps. This time we’re featuring some collectable and limited edition apps. As your at it be sure to check out The Coolest iPhone Games You Should Own No Matter What & 8 Amazing Musical iPhone Apps You Should Definitely Touch Parra Plays | Details | Download Boost 3D | Details | Download Dot | Details | Download Satromizer | Details | Download ..™ | Details | Download Sound Shaker | Details | Download Itotooshi | Details | Download JellyDrift | Details |…

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  Mindsmack

• MindSmack.com ranked top web design agency in the USA for February 2010.

  admin

  1 Feb 2010 | 7:07 am

  MindSmack.com specializes in the highest level of interactive web design, flash, animation, 3d, ad design, video, post production, iphone application development, facebook applications, facebook games, twitter applications, post production and web development in the world. In business since 1996, we have won 100’s of recognized awards including: 1st Annual DesignFirms.org Award 2nd Annual DesignFirms.org Award 5 FWA Awards Cool [...]

• Apple iPhone app FastMall is now 100% FREE for all shopping mall maps + 15 other new features.

  admin

  30 Jan 2010 | 8:41 am

  FastMall is the first and only iPhone app that lets you shake your iPhone to find, then be taken to the nearest bathroom. It also provides turn-by-turn directions for finding your way inside shopping malls and around shopping districts in the USA, Canada and UK. Have a stroller? In a wheelchair? Trouble with stairs? FastMall provides [...]

• MindSmack.com ranked top web design agency in the USA for January 2010.

  admin

  6 Jan 2010 | 6:05 pm

  MindSmack.com specializes in the highest level of interactive web design, flash, animation, 3d, ad design, video, post production, iphone application development, facebook applications, facebook games, twitter applications, post production and web development in the world. In business since 1996, we have won 100’s of recognized awards including: 1st Annual DesignFirms.org Award 2nd Annual DesignFirms.org Award 5 FWA Awards Cool [...]

• MindSmack launches landmark iPhone app called FastMall. Shake your iPhone for the closest restroom anyone? Turn by turn navigation inside shopping malls? Yep.

  admin

  24 Dec 2009 | 6:25 am

  We are truly excited to release this iPhone app for shoppers, mall goers, parents, money savers, geeks and all others. We have basically recreated Google maps but with very high end designed interactive virtual maps for internal structures starting with malls, rodeo drive (soon universities, hospitals, theme parks and the world…) See below for tons of [...]

• Facebook vanity web address directory launches. FacebookVanity.com

  admin

  18 Nov 2009 | 2:04 pm

  This is an interesting idea for a site that we had that has not been done before that we know of. Basically everyone has a Facebook page. Most businesses do not have any 1 niche specific site to advertise their Facebook page except through Facebook search and their own site. This is a pay only [...]

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  Inspect Element

• Tools and Resources to Improve your Typography on the Web

  Tom Kenny

  4 Feb 2010 | 6:50 am

  Typography on the web has previously been confined to a set of web-safe fonts due to their dependance of being on every computer but now that has changed. It’s one of the most satisfying and rewarding aspects of web design when you get it right but can also be one of the most difficult to do so. Here are some tools, resources and free fonts to help you on your quest for quality typography. Font Embedding Font embedding has become the saviour of typography on the web. Without it, we would still be stuck using the usual array of ‘web-safe’ fonts such as Arial, Georgia and…

• Code a Backwards Compatible, One Page Portfolio with HTML5 and CSS3

  Tom Kenny

  25 Jan 2010 | 1:12 pm

  HTML5 is the future of web development but believe it or not you can start using it today. HTML5 is much more considerate to semantics and accessibility as we don’t have to throw meaningless div’s everywhere. It introduces meaningful tags for common elements such as navigations and footers which makes much more sense and are more natural. This is a run through of the basics of HTML5 and CSS3 while still paying attention to older browsers. Before we start, make note of the answer to this question. Do websites need to look exactly the same in every browser? View Demo | Download…

• 15 Stunning and Fresh Premium WordPress Portfolio Themes

  Tom Kenny

  18 Jan 2010 | 3:35 pm

  A benefit of building a portfolio using WordPress is you have the ability to use the powerful blog features alongside your portfolio. A blog discussing your work or more about your processes and inspiration will add to the personality and allow potential clients to get to know you more increasing the attractiveness of you as a web designer. WordPress can also act as a more than adequate CMS for displaying your portfolio work. Previously we’ve looked at Fantastic Presentation Styles of Web Designers’ Portfolios so taking what has been learnt from there, let’s look at WordPress…

• Call to Arms for Web Designers: Make Simplicity the Trend for 2010

  Tom Kenny

  15 Jan 2010 | 11:05 am

  When designers talk about web design trends, more often than not, they’re referring to a visual design style such as letterpress or gradients but a trend doesn’t have to be something you see. So this doesn’t mean you have to resort to using a minimalistic design to achieve simplicity in web design. Far from it. Applying simplicity to your websites or designs can be as simple as removing unnecessary elements or by reducing the steps it takes to complete a specific task. We live in a world where technology is becoming more and more advanced but the way we interact with it is…

• How to Create a Theme Development Environment for a Live WordPress Site

  Tom Kenny

  11 Jan 2010 | 1:44 am

  Any good website owner knows that they need to be constantly looking at ways to improve their site even through small little tweaks. If you’re using Wordpress you’ll notice that it isn’t easy to create a development version without creating a separate installation. Of course, you can make changes directly on a live WordPress site but that isn’t recommended for anything other than minor tweaks. With the help of an excellent plugin for WordPress called Theme switch and preview, this tutorial will allow you to easily switch between the live site and development versions…

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  Posh CSS

• We’re Ready for CSS3, but are we Ready for CSS3?

  Pat Dryburgh

  8 Feb 2010 | 9:37 am

  We’re all smitten with CSS3. It’s reinvigorated that sense of newness that CSS and Web Standards brought our way just a few years ago. We’re able to more easily replicate the set of design standards that has become nearly universal much faster than before with just a few CSS declarations. There are a number of CSS3 rules I’d be writing for every project, but I’m just not sure it’s as ready for prime time as many designers are making it out to be. Read more at mondaybynoon.com →

• Multiple Backgrounds and CSS Gradients

  Pat Dryburgh

  1 Feb 2010 | 6:24 am

  CSS3 features are making their way into the various browsers and while many are holding off on implementing them, there are those who are venturing ahead and likely running into a world of interesting quirks across the various platforms. Two such features that I have been having the pleasure of enjoying are the use of multiple backgrounds and CSS gradients. I’m covering both features because multiple backgrounds by itself is simple enough, as are CSS gradients, but combining the two is where things get interesting. Read more at snook.ca →

• iPhone CSS—tips for building iPhone websites

  Sam Brown

  1 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  With the rapid rise in mobile browsers, it has probably never been more important to ensure your sites can be handled on these platforms. By far one of the most popular such browsers is Mobile Safari on the iPhone—this is one of the easiest browsers to develop for: it runs on Webkit (meaning a lot of rich CSS3 support) and it’s only ever on one resolution and on one OS. Read more at csswizardry.com →

• How To Provide a Flexible Base for Text

  Kevin Holesh

  29 Jan 2010 | 7:15 am

  Dan Cederholm talks about the potential problems with sizing your text in absolute units (pixels) versus relative units (ems and %). Read more at www.youtube.com →

• A reconsideration in defence of and

  Sam Brown

  28 Jan 2010 | 6:04 am

  An article covering the usage of the <b> and <i> elements in web development today. Read more at csswizardry.com →

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  Onextrapixel

• Effective Visual Communication Using Infographics: 40+ Attractive Examples

  Charlotte

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:31 am

  Everyone, at some point in their lives would have had to, at the very least, create a quick map or a simple data pie chart of some sort. Welcome to the fascinating world of infographics!Visuals that are used to represent, instruct, or to disseminate information, data, and knowledge are called information graphics, or simply, infographics. Infographics have been around since the early ages, seen in the form of cave drawings and maps. Used everywhere, perhaps it is just that we don’t realise how often and common infographics are. In this modern information age, there are various types of…

• Using Philosophy to Better Understand The Methodology of Design

  Josh

  7 Feb 2010 | 11:25 pm

  As creative professionals, we are on the perpetual quest for ways and means to further enhance our understanding of the design industry. A domain which demands a quick turnaround of fresh ideas that is practical, original and impressionistic. More often than not, we pay exclusive attention to the traditional specificities within the field of design, such as aesthetic principals/trends, typographic elements and various other technical functionalities. While these facets of the design process are undeniably crucial, it is high time designers took a step back to fully understand and absorb the…

• How to Build a jQuery Brush Stroke Navigation

  Marko

  5 Feb 2010 | 2:26 am

  Today we are building an animated navigation for a watercolor-styled website which will have links that appear to be painted when it is hovered on. The watercolor graphics were created in Photoshop and we’ll be using the popular jQuery JavaScript framework for the animation. Tutorial DemoBefore we go into the steps of building the jQuery Brush Stroke Navigation, you can check out the final tutorial demo below.Demo DownloadThe Graphics – PhotoshopThe background canvas is a pattern that comes with Photoshop (I’m using CS4 but I’m pretty sure that it was available in previous versions)…

• A Complete Guide to Writing Guest Articles

  Shay

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:33 am

  Guest articles (articles written for a website other than your own) are popping up all over the place. Web design websites are rapidly growing at a rate that would not be possible without the help of guest articles. Many websites are delivering quality articles on a daily basis. It is hard to imagine one person, or even a couple of people, in charge or producing all of this quality content daily. Chances are they are not the only ones and have the help of guest authors. Who are these guest authors? They are any knowledgeable person with passion for web design and development, you included.

• 40 Creative and Funny Advertisements Using Animals

  Aidan

  2 Feb 2010 | 2:38 am

  Animal lovers, you’re in for a treat! Today’s collection of advertisements uses animals or creatures to attract the attention of viewers. Animals are all creatures belonging to the kingdom of Animalia, like birds, reptiles, fish, and other larger mammals. Many animals are often perceived as cute, cuddly and friendly. Image from: DHL - Chicken or EggTheir innocence and helplessness reach out to our inner child and our empathy. But even if you aren’t an animal lover, you are still able to objectively look at the advertisement and appreciate its humour and the creativity that went into its…

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  The Designed

• 20 Cool T-Shirt Websites For Inspirations and Goods

  The Designed

  8 Feb 2010 | 8:34 pm

  This is just another ‘cool t-shirt’ post. For what it’s worth, here are 20 cool t-shirt websites where you’ll find inspirations, goods, and even a chance to make some money with your mad design skills. You probably have heard of some of these, hopefully we’ve introduced you to a few new ones to brainlessly look at really neat and funny t-shirts. ATshirtBlog OMG Tees! uneetee Scribtee TypoTees Shirt Fight iloveyourshirt Rumplo Teecycle T-shirt Guru Tee Junction Color Overload Pop Culture Tees Taddict Threadless Design by Humans teextile shirt.woot 10tees…

• 24 Delicious Chocolate Website Designs

  The Designed

  7 Feb 2010 | 11:04 pm

  Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. To help you get in the mood, here are 24 delicious chocolate website designs. Go ahead and pick your favorite and then send your love something chocolaty. Godiva The Truffle Kit Bedre Fine Chocolate BVBA Chocolate Divine Chocolate Dagoba Organic Chocolate New England Chocolate Company Dove Chocolate The Little Chocolate Company El Rey Éclat Chocolate Oh! Chocolate taza chocolate Askinosie Simply Seattle Chocolate Box All Chocolate Astor Chocolate Recchiuti The Chocolate Smith Chocolate Potpourri Tumbador Chocolate Kee’s Chocolates…

• Link Collection #5

  The Designed

  5 Feb 2010 | 8:46 am

  Links this week include web design mistakes, inspirational websites, tips for better design, tools, and more great development resources. How to make full-time money as a part-time writer – DoughRoller February 2010 Desktop Wallpaper – Smashing Mag 40 Breathtaking Examples of Serene Sunrise Photography – The Photo Argus 50 Inspiring Portfolio Designs – WDL 20 Years of Adobe Photoshop – WebDesignerDepot Custom Letters 2009 – LetterCult 20 Ways to Streamline your web business – AEXT.NET 12 Cool Garage Door Stickers – Toxel 25 Cool Inspirational…

• 15 Excellent Splatter Typography Examples

  The Designed

  4 Feb 2010 | 3:41 pm

  There are designers out there who really love working with typography. It’s become so popular that for some, that’s all they do. Like anything in design, there can be endless ways to present something in a unique and beautiful way. Here are 15 excellent examples of typography with splatters. Each piece links to the artist with more great design. Related posts:Link Collection #4 Designing a Children's Web UI: 25 Examples Link Collection #1

• Today's 7 Most Recognizable Private Jet Schnozes

  Denver Wilkinson

  1 Feb 2010 | 9:46 pm

  Many people suggest that all of today’s private jet aircraft look the same, that aircraft designers emulate the designs of competing companies. There’s an element of truth to that. However, most designers keep one part of the airplane same design after design – the nose. It’s arguably the most distinguishable and recognizable part of an airplane. For example, compare the nose of Learjet’s very first commercial business jet, the Learjet 23, to their current designs today and you’ll see they’re virtually identical. Take a look at today’s most…

• 
  Inside the Webb

• Chill to your Music Library anywhere with Grooveshark

  Jake

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:45 am

  Ever since I found out about Grooveshark a few months ago, it’s revolutionized the way I listen to music. No longer am I stuck with my iTunes playlists and limitions on songs – nor do I even need to store the songs on my computer!. Grooveshark allows you to upload any and all mp3 files you [...]

• Why Digg.com is heading for a Major Pitfall

  Jake

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:55 pm

  I remember a time when Digg used to roam wild in the Social News kingdom. It was the force to be reckoned with when it came to internet marketing – everybody needed to hit the front page to gain some traffic to their site. I’m sure tons of blogs have built their popularity off of [...]

• Facebook Introduces a Brand New, Sleek Home Design

  Jake

  6 Feb 2010 | 12:56 pm

  A few days ago Facebook released their newest design. Nothing has changed on personal profile pages, but when you log into your account you should see some major changes to how everything is layed out. This came as a shock to me when I logged in to check my status for the first time earlier [...]

• Interview with Yahoo! Answers Q&A Competitor Blurtit

  Jake

  4 Feb 2010 | 1:14 pm

  Yahoo! Answers has to be the most well-known and popular Question & Community on the web. However there is always room for improvement on apps like these, and Blurtit takes the cake. Building more of a community around the idea of the “Ask Any Question” niche, Blurtit allows users to connect like never before, searching [...]

• Behind the Scenes at Vibrant and Inspiring Design Blog ilovecolors

  Jake

  28 Jan 2010 | 8:27 am

  Most graphic design blogs today can serve as a source of inspiration and creativity. I’ve recently run into a fantastic design blog covering everything from Photoshop to Typography. ilovecolors is a fantastic blog run by Elio Rivero, and I was lucky enough to get a behind-the-scenes interview. Just by glancing at the site’s theme you can [...]

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  Useful Tools

• Give Your Press Releases a Facelift

  Alison K

  9 Feb 2010 | 9:24 am

  Press releases are an important tool to help you get publicity for your business. However, they also tend to be kind of boring…just a plain page of snooze-inducing black and white text, followed by some boilerplate about your company at the bottom. Presslift is a service that lets you give your press releases a much-needed facelift by including multimedia like pictures, videos, audio files and documents, plus links to your company’s social networking profiles. Presslift is easy to use-basically, you just write a standard text press release, upload it to the site, and then attach…

• Find People Who Share Your Passions

  Alison K

  5 Feb 2010 | 1:42 pm

  Gravity, still in private beta at the moment, is a website that connects you with other people who have similar interests.  Basically, it’s a lot like a collection of forums, with the main difference being that you  can join conversations about a variety of different topics from the same website. The Gravity website is divided up into general topics, called worlds. For example, there’s a world for foodies, a world for music, a world for gadgets, and much more. Even Jersey Shore has it’s own world, if you want in on that train wreck. More worlds will be added in time, and…

• Show Off Your Skills

  Alison K

  3 Feb 2010 | 11:39 am

  These days, maintaining a presence on social networking sites is an essential part of building your career. Linked-in is the most popular career-oriented social networking site, but its value is largely based on who is in your network, not what skills you have. Skills Log is a social networking site for professionals that is based on skills instead of contacts.  Your profile is like an interactive resume, listing your skills, your skill levels, your education and your experience. If you’re looking for someone with a specific skill, it’s easy to find them by simply clicking on the…

• Discover Relevant Content While You Browse

  Alison K

  30 Jan 2010 | 3:45 pm

  When you’re researching a topic online, it’s nice to be able to discover related content quickly. Glydo is a browser extension for Firefox that makes it easy to find additional relevant content without getting in your way. All you have to do is download and install Glydo, then browse as usual.  Glydo sits at the bottom of your browser window, ready to feed you tidbits of related content, including news stories, web pages, videos from YouTube, Wikipedia entries and tweets. There’s also a space that just shows the latest news headlines, so you can check to see what’s…

• A Better OS for Netbooks

  Alison K

  28 Jan 2010 | 9:33 am

  I use my desktop computer most of the time, but I also have a little Acer Aspire One netbook so that I can work outside when the weather is nice, take my work with me when I’m traveling and move to another corner of the house when my husband is driving me crazy. However, over the holidays, my netbook went on a permanent acid trip, booting up to a screen full of mesmerizing colors and patterns, but utterly devoid of functionality. Since the Acer runs on Linux,  neither my husband nor I had any idea how to fix it, and to make matters worse, I couldn’t find the recovery CD. Even if…

• 
  Slodive

• Funny Caricatures by Anthony Geoffroy – I.D. 15

  SloDive Admin

  7 Feb 2010 | 12:55 am

  Older Related Articles: Caricature Art by Gary Locke Traditional Expression Painting by Ruben Belloso Adorna Jaw Dropping Digital Paintings By Alex Garner Inspirational Work 01 Inspirational Work 02 Inspirational Work 03 Inspirational Work 04 Inspirational Work 05 Inspirational Work 06 Inspirational Work 07 Inspirational Work 08 Inspirational Work 09 Inspirational Work 10 Inspirational Work 11 Inspirational Work 12 Inspirational Work 13 Inspirational Work 14 Inspirational Work 15 Inspirational Work 16 Inspirational Work 17 Inspirational Work 18 Link To His Portfolios Portfolio Related…

• 12 Creative Color Schemes

  SloDive Admin

  4 Feb 2010 | 6:39 pm

  Older Related Articles: 10 Websites Where Big & Bold Rule! 13 Creative and Beautiful Blog Designs 12 Unique 404 Error Page Designs IndoFolio Irvine Acosta Bornintents Vegas Uncork’d Delibar Notorious Design Information Highwayman Cooper Graphic Design Giraffe Tennessee Vacation Fresh..not canned Five years of Firefox Related posts:13 Creative and Beautiful Blog Designs We love sites that break away from the norm and...A Roundup of 22 Cutting Edge PSD to HTML Tutorials Designing a web layout in Photoshop or Fireworks is only...12 Unique 404 Error Page Designs Fortunately I don't end…

• Caricature Art by Gary Locke – I.D 14

  SloDive Admin

  2 Feb 2010 | 8:03 pm

  Older Related Articles: Awesome Chalk Illustrations by Julian Beever and Kurt Wenner Marvellous Cardboard Creations by Bernie Burns’ Realistic Character Design Illustrations Inspirational Work 01 Full View Inspirational Work 02 Full View Inspirational Work 03 Full View Inspirational Work 04 Full View Inspirational Work 05 Full View Inspirational Work 06 Full View Inspirational Work 07 Full View Inspirational Work 08 Full View Inspirational Work 09 Full View Inspirational Work 10 Full View Inspirational Work 11 Full View Inspirational Work 12 Full View Inspirational Work 13 Full View…

• 32 Digital Paintings / Wallpapers To Spice Up Your Desktop by Marta Dahlig

  SloDive Admin

  1 Feb 2010 | 5:00 am

  Older Related Articles: 16 HQ Painted Wallpapers – Animal Edition Conceptual Digital Artwork by Thomas Tibitanzl 15 Awesome Chalk Illustrations by Julian Beever and Kurt Wenner CG Wallpaper 01 Download CG Wallpaper 02 Download CG Wallpaper 03 Download CG Wallpaper 04 Download CG Wallpaper 05 Download CG Wallpaper 06 Download CG Wallpaper 07 Download CG Wallpaper 08 Download CG Wallpaper 09 Download CG Wallpaper 10 Download CG Wallpaper 11 Download CG Wallpaper 12 Download CG Wallpaper 13 Download CG Wallpaper 14 Download CG Wallpaper 15 Download CG Wallpaper 16 Download CG Wallpaper 17…

• Traditional Expression Painting by Ruben Belloso Adorna – I.D. 13

  SloDive Admin

  30 Jan 2010 | 9:56 am

  Older Related Articles: Awesome Conceptual Art by Daniel Dociu Marvellous Cardboard Creations by Bernie Burns’ Body Painting by Guido Daniele Inspirational Work 01 Full View Inspirational Work 02 Full View Inspirational Work 03 Full View Inspirational Work 04 Full View Inspirational Work 05 Full View Inspirational Work 06 Full View Inspirational Work 07 Full View Inspirational Work 08 Full View Inspirational Work 09 Full View Inspirational Work 10 Full View Inspirational Work 11 Full View Inspirational Work 12 Full View Inspirational Work 13 Full View Inspirational Work 14 Full View…

• 
  Creativity Den

• #23 Creative Logos of the Week!

  Type08

  5 Feb 2010 | 11:59 am

  The FILM STRIP inspirationTrendy or not, there is a lot of film strip inspired logos at the moment. Since graphic designers are very visual people and love to communicate and experience the world around them that way, I bet you that you can’t find a designer that doesn’t like watching movies or browsing through some nice photos in magazines or online. And that’s how we get inspired every day because movies and photos became parts of our everyday life. The media that brings it all to life inspire designers to bring interesting logos to life. There is something magical about…

• The hidden power of border-radius

  Liam McCabe

  3 Feb 2010 | 1:39 pm

  Circles and Curvy Shapes with CSS3So hopefully after reading – Understanding CSS – Padding, Positioning and CSS3 – you understand the basics of CSS and have been experimenting with other properties. It is important to remember that some properties will allow you to achieve effects that aren’t necessarily stated. In this post we will explore the property border-radius and how it can be used to create circles, semi-cricles and quarter-circles. It also has the potential to produce some terrific designs using just CSS – no images.The property .round { border-radius: 5px;…

• Understanding CSS – Padding, Positioning and CSS3

  KayRoseDesign

  31 Jan 2010 | 8:32 am

  Using CSS3 In Your Daily Coding!As my first CreativityDen post I’ve decided to show you all, (mainly beginners to CSS), how to use it effectively in you designs. One of the most frustrating things when coding a website can be not having the skills to bring your .PSD file to life, it happens to most of us, (unless your like me and you learnt to code first), but it doesn’t have to be that way anymore.These methods are trial and error, not every effect works in every design, which is why not every well done site has drop shadow and rounded corners everywhere, so be careful when and…

• #22 Creative Logos of the Week!

  Type08

  29 Jan 2010 | 9:42 am

  Solo designer as a SPORT TEAM memberOne of the hardest fields of logo design overall is definitely sport teams logos. It takes a lot of creativity, imagination and execution skills to show the messages of power, agility and dynamics. The base of it lays in the team name and different sports treat those names in different ways: some use weather terms, some animals, some use founder’s name and some just a name of the town they hale from. One way or the other, only original and nicely detailed solution will get recognition amongst the fans but also provide an extra feeling of loyalty and…

• Web designs with exceptional forms of navigation

  Liam McCabe

  28 Jan 2010 | 9:03 am

  Beautiful browsing.There are a number of showcases demonstrating creative navigation throughout the design community. Despite this, the majority of them just showcase nicely designed horizontal and and vertical menus. Of course, they were probably creative at some stage. However, some web designers test the laws of usability and like to experiment with design. Today, I have showcased over twenty stunning forms of navigation in website design. I hope these websites inspire you to forget all forms of current navigation and to design new, better and improved ways of navigating websites.65…

• 
  Inspect Element

• Tools and Resources to Improve your Typography on the Web

  Tom Kenny

  4 Feb 2010 | 6:50 am

  Typography on the web has previously been confined to a set of web-safe fonts due to their dependance of being on every computer but now that has changed. It’s one of the most satisfying and rewarding aspects of web design when you get it right but can also be one of the most difficult to do so. Here are some tools, resources and free fonts to help you on your quest for quality typography. Font Embedding Font embedding has become the saviour of typography on the web. Without it, we would still be stuck using the usual array of ‘web-safe’ fonts such as Arial, Georgia and…

• Code a Backwards Compatible, One Page Portfolio with HTML5 and CSS3

  Tom Kenny

  25 Jan 2010 | 1:12 pm

  HTML5 is the future of web development but believe it or not you can start using it today. HTML5 is much more considerate to semantics and accessibility as we don’t have to throw meaningless div’s everywhere. It introduces meaningful tags for common elements such as navigations and footers which makes much more sense and are more natural. This is a run through of the basics of HTML5 and CSS3 while still paying attention to older browsers. Before we start, make note of the answer to this question. Do websites need to look exactly the same in every browser? View Demo | Download…

• 15 Stunning and Fresh Premium WordPress Portfolio Themes

  Tom Kenny

  18 Jan 2010 | 3:35 pm

  A benefit of building a portfolio using WordPress is you have the ability to use the powerful blog features alongside your portfolio. A blog discussing your work or more about your processes and inspiration will add to the personality and allow potential clients to get to know you more increasing the attractiveness of you as a web designer. WordPress can also act as a more than adequate CMS for displaying your portfolio work. Previously we’ve looked at Fantastic Presentation Styles of Web Designers’ Portfolios so taking what has been learnt from there, let’s look at WordPress…

• Call to Arms for Web Designers: Make Simplicity the Trend for 2010

  Tom Kenny

  15 Jan 2010 | 11:05 am

  When designers talk about web design trends, more often than not, they’re referring to a visual design style such as letterpress or gradients but a trend doesn’t have to be something you see. So this doesn’t mean you have to resort to using a minimalistic design to achieve simplicity in web design. Far from it. Applying simplicity to your websites or designs can be as simple as removing unnecessary elements or by reducing the steps it takes to complete a specific task. We live in a world where technology is becoming more and more advanced but the way we interact with it is…

• How to Create a Theme Development Environment for a Live WordPress Site

  Tom Kenny

  11 Jan 2010 | 1:44 am

  Any good website owner knows that they need to be constantly looking at ways to improve their site even through small little tweaks. If you’re using Wordpress you’ll notice that it isn’t easy to create a development version without creating a separate installation. Of course, you can make changes directly on a live WordPress site but that isn’t recommended for anything other than minor tweaks. With the help of an excellent plugin for WordPress called Theme switch and preview, this tutorial will allow you to easily switch between the live site and development versions…

• 
  Miralize

• Daily Links – 2nd Feb 2009

  miralize

  2 Feb 2010 | 4:49 am

  This is what I’ve been reading for the past few days 10 ways to make Internet Explorer act like a modern browserFebruary 1, 201020 Fonts Ideal for Big and Powerful Headings | FreebiesFebruary 1, 2010Admit It, Microsoft: You Suck at the Web – GigaOMJanuary 31, 2010How to Design the Apple iPad in Photoshop | Circlebox BlogJanuary 31, 2010 Videos What an epic performance!

• Helvetica – The Quintessential Typeface

  miralize

  1 Feb 2010 | 11:41 am

  Since I’ve been designing, “Helvetica”, has probably been my favourite typeface. And I know I’m not alone with my opinion. “Helvetica” has been a staple in advertising, design, and street signage for the past 50 years. And after watching the documentary “Helvetica”, directed by Gary Hustwit, it has enlightened me on how significant this typeface actually is. Created in 1957, by Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann, Helvetica was first called Neue Hass Grotesk. The idea behind the name came from the word “Helvetia”, which is Latin for…

• Daily Links – 29th Jan 2009

  miralize

  29 Jan 2010 | 10:05 am

  Busy week both for me and the tech world. iPad introduced, multiple companies trying to block competitors from importing goods into the US and of course the most important, miralize v10 was introduced! Here’s what I’ve been reading recently The iPad DilemmaJanuary 28, 201020 Easy-to-Learn jQuery Animation TutorialsJanuary 26, 201020 Color Combination Tools for DesignersJanuary 23, 2010The Best Icon Sets for Minimal Style Web DesignJanuary 21, 2010Kids Spend Every Waking Minute in Front of a Screen [STUDY]January 20, 2010In Depth: 7 technologies to thank the 1970s forJanuary 8,…

• Redesigning is a drug and I’m an Addict.

  miralize

  28 Jan 2010 | 11:41 am

  I just cannot seem to keep a version of my site online longer than a few months at most. This one, Miralize Design v10, came from me absolutely hating the last design, which only lasted a month (a record I think). Its also the fastest from conception and design to final release, a mere 14 hours of work. I’m actually quite happy with it, as I now have the portfolio launched too. The blog template now looks more like a blog, rather than a gimmicky excuse for one. One of the most important things about any website is the fact that “Content is key”, and I think I forgot that…

• The iPad Dilemma

  miralize

  27 Jan 2010 | 8:17 pm

  As I start writing this, its 3am and in the 9 hours since Apple introduced the iPad, and I’ve been trying to figure out why I feel let down. Everything about the event was perfect. Steve Jobs, as usual, put on an excellent show. He could sell you a used mattress and you’d be leaving happy. The device however was an utter disappointment, and the reason Apple gave for selling it is even worse. They say they are trying to bridge the gap between the smartphone and the portable computer, that it has to excel in key things like: Browsing, Email, Movies, Music,  eBooks. But Apple has…

• 
  Inspiredology

• 5 Ways to Make User Interface Design Work for Everyone

  Bill

  8 Feb 2010 | 7:02 am

  It’s a user interface tug o’ war… When it comes to UI, there is inherently a balance that needs to be struck between the needs of the user and the needs of the client. Sometimes these needs are the same and you have an ideal situation on your hands – congratulations! More often than not, the creation of the user interface becomes a careful balance of what the user wants to see on the page and what needs to be displayed on the page in order to drive business objectives. Here are a few tips and guidelines to help keep things in perspective and allow you to blend the two…

• Friday Fix Feb. 1 – 5

  Andrew

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:29 am

  The Friday Fix is a weekly recap of all things inspiring. We look at new followers, web articles, awesome new websites and anything else design related. Winners from the Birthday Bash Giveaway Here is our contest post http://inspiredology.com/birthday-bash-giveaway/ Thanks to everyone who entered the contest! And don’t worry if you didn’t win, there will be more great giveaways coming up! First Prize – Jeff Jeff says… Happy Birthday!!!!!! I listen to House Music…usually a set recorded live from a DJ. One track about 70-80 minutes long. Without being able to forward…

• 22 Awesome Free Grunge Fonts

  Peter Olexa

  3 Feb 2010 | 4:46 am

  Grunge fonts are currently one of the most favorite fonts being used by almost any designer out there. It’s the current trend wherever you look. We selected a collection of hi-quality free grunge fonts which shouldn’t be missed in your font library. Enjoy! Resource: http://www.fonts2u.com @Fonts2u Fonts2u on Facebook Share this on del.icio.us Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Digg this! Bump this on DesignBump Moo this on DesignMoo! Submit this to DesignFloat Share this on Facebook Share this on Reddit Subscribe to the comments for this post? Blend this!

• Inspiredology turns 2

  Chad

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:21 am

  As you already have heard, this week we celebrate Inspiredology’s second birthday, today I would like to recap our past years success, downfalls and talk about the future of Inspiredology. The Sophomore Season Looking back on last years birthday post, I wanted to compare the stats and see how much Inspiredology has grown. We didn’t reach some of the goals we wanted to but we surpassed the majority of them. This year Inspiredology has expanded in followers, daily visitors and new niche groups. Bringing Andrew on board this year has really helped me in organizing the blog better and…

• HUGE $4800 Birthday Bash Giveaway

  Chad

  1 Feb 2010 | 6:11 am

  Today we celebrate Inspiredology’s 2nd Birthday, we are so happy to be turning 2. Of course it wouldn’t be a good Birthday without presents so without further ado we give you our 2nd annual Birthday Bash Giveaway. Again we have collected some great prizes for you to sink your teeth into this year, we would like to send a huge thank you to our generous supporters and sponsors. How to Win: Just simply post a comment telling us your favourite music to listen to when working. It could be your fav band, album or even those peaceful soothing sounds of the rain-forest (if that’s your thing).

• 
  hongkiat

• Giveaway: Music Organizing Application – TidySongs

  hongkiat

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:22 am

  If you are using iTunes to organize your music, here’s something you may find interesting. Earlier last month I was introduced to this app called TidySongs by Jennifer of Cloudbrain. TidySongs has a pretty self-descriptive name. It an application with one sole purpose - organizes your iTunes songs. Here’s what TidySongs do: Remove duplicated songs Fix miss-spelled song names Fill up the missing data – artists, years and genres (Something perfectionist collectors will love), and The function I like most – Add missing album-art so they look cool in your cover flow.

• 30+ Artist Interpretations of Mario and Luigi

  hongkiat

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:30 am

  By Shane Ward. Shane Ward is a contributing editor of the art/lifestyles sites: Freshbump, Collect3d, and Format Magazine He’s short and pudgy with a thing for Peaches. He’s an Italian plumber from the Mushroom Kingdom. He is Nintendo’s mascot, and probably the most popular video game character ever. You know him as Mario. Mario has appeared in over 200 video games, mostly bearing his name, mostly as the iconic smiling plumber with blue overalls and a mustache. But his persona is open to interpretation. These artists have re-interpreted Mario (and his famous sidekick Luigi)…

• 11 Common Web Design Mistakes (Blunders)

  hongkiat

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:00 am

  By: Brujo Owoh There are tons of website on the Internet, and hundreds or probably thousands are created by day. Here’s a very interesting thing to ponder – What are the elements of a good website? Image Credit: tveskov Building a website can be daunting but the real challenge lies in making it usable. The problem is most web designers forget that the website wasn’t created for themselves but to solve the users’ needs. They give creativity priority over practicality and usability. In this article, we would like to highlight 11 web design blunders that web developers and…

• Winners for Flash Content Management System (Flash CMS)

  com

  3 Feb 2010 | 6:25 am

  We’ve got winners! If you’ve participated in the FlashMoto CMS contest earlier last week, here’s an entry you should not miss. Continue reading to find out who the winners are :) Thanks to FlashMoto, the following winners are getting a Flash CMS that worth $199 for free. Piscesboy01 Srikanth, and Sun Pietro Congratulations to the winners and thank you all for participating. If you are interested in getting free stock photos, you should know that we have a Stock Photo Accounts (Loaded With Credits) contest on progress too. Get notified on the next giveaway: Subscribe to RSS…

• 28 Excellent Examples Of Typography Portraits

  hongkiat

  3 Feb 2010 | 5:43 am

  I’m sure most of us heard of these memorable saying that goes like "A good sketch is better than a long speech" or "A picture is worth a thousand words". Sometimes, even the most complicated issue and matter can be simplified and expressed over a single image. That’s just how incredible images are; but today I want to show you something different, a hybrid of both. Here’s a showcase of a very unique approach to portrait illustrations. These images below are mixtures of both images and typography, where the latter is used to shape the portraits while the…

• 
  ziipa.com

• Uptime Robot

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• meetordie.com

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• instantjury.com

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• capsulecrm.com

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• theymakeapps.com

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• 
  Brian Cray's Blog

• The more I know, the less I need: Thoughts on web design

  Brian Cray

  3 Feb 2010 | 8:36 am

  You may have noticed that I’ve been going through design changes like crazy over the past month or so. That’s because I’m tracking almost everything my readers do into web analytics. With the right web analytics tools, you can gain real-time empirical data on your website visitors’ habits in massive quantities. What I’m learning may shock some of you, and it may confirm ideas for others. It’s not far from what I’ve blogged about in the past: Supplemental navigation is, in most cases, visual junk. Breakdown of link clicks by area Interpreting the chart…

• How to promote innovation from your web team

  Brian Cray

  28 Jan 2010 | 9:27 am

  “Analytics, analytics, analytics, blah, blah, blah.” “Code, code, code, blah, blah, blah.” Two people, one a web analytics professional, the other a web developer, awkwardly sip coffee across from each other at a small cafe table that feels like a vast expanse. Their professional focuses seem not to hit any harmonious tones. Then it happens. The internet marketer asks the question: “Do you know what an API is by any chance?” “Yea, sure. Why?” “I was reading about new stuff in Google Analytics, things like being able to track things other…

• UX Case Study: Designing a user-focused web app

  Brian Cray

  26 Jan 2010 | 11:48 am

  I wrote this article to give you insight into the complete design process for the redesign of Nearby Tweets. Web app developers and entrepreneurs will hopefully gain some ideas or reinforce their own processes. Users may find it interesting to see what goes into the design of a complex UI. I’d love your ideas, feedback, and thoughts at the end of this article! Enjoy. Start at the beginning In the beginning there was the first iteration of Nearby Tweets, a simple way to connect with local people and businesses on Twitter. But in product development there is no such thing as perfection,…

• Display popular posts based on social media engagement with PostRank Top Posts API

  Brian Cray

  4 Jan 2010 | 8:19 am

  According to PostRank, “Over 80% of the engagement with your content doesn’t happen on your blog.” That’s a big deal on many levels. In the context of this post, it confirms that number of comments alone doesn’t constitute the popularity of your blog posts. Lucky for us though, PostRank—a company that monitors and collects social engagement data in real-time across the web—provides powerful Data Services that give developers API access to that social engagement data. Today I’ll show you how to use PHP5 to fetch and display your blog’s most…

• Diving deep into user behavior with Google Analytics, Event Tracking, and jQuery

  Brian Cray

  29 Dec 2009 | 12:20 pm

  In a default Google Analytics setup, the information you have about your users’ navigation behaviors and preferences is limited to which pages they viewed and where they came from. But what does that really tell you about how your users behave inside your web pages? Not much, and that’s where all the juicy behavioral insight comes from. I dare you to answer the following questions with your current Google Analytics setup Are your users using the main menu to navigate or do they use different means to find content? Do your users scroll through your content and click links in the…

• 
  WebAppers

• jQuery PhotoShoot Plugin Simulates Camera-like Effect

  Ray Cheung

  8 Feb 2010 | 11:01 pm

  The jQuery PhotoShoot Plugin gives you the ability to convert any div on your web page into a photo shooting stage simulating a camera-like feel. Using this plug-in, we give visitors the ability to take shots of the background image.Each time you click the area, a new shot is added to the slide div with a negative margin to the right. After this an animation starts, which slides it in view and pushes the other shots to the left, hiding the leftmost one. You can freely use the techniques and build upon the code. There are many possible uses especially in navigation systems and promotional…

• Flickr-Style Photo Tagging Using jQuery

  Ray Cheung

  7 Feb 2010 | 11:01 pm

  A few days ago, Ben Nadel programmed a little proof-of-concept for Flickr-style photo tagging using jQuery. He did it as an exploration in mouse-based event binding. He took a step further and packaged the jQuery code up into a jQuery plugin (phototagger.jquery.js), build a light-weight ColdFusion persistence layer (drop-and-run, no database required), and turned it into an official project: jQuery Photo Tagger.jQuery Photo Tagger comes in at about 1,000 lines of code. As such, you can either check out the project page or try the online demo for yourself. Please note that you have to hold…

• How to Create Bulletproof Backups for MySQL

  Ray Cheung

  6 Feb 2010 | 1:19 am

  You have all your important data backed up, right? I mean, come on folks, it’s 2010. We may not have flying cars yet like we’re supposed to, but “having backups” is a problem that’s solved. And I’m sure you’ve solved it. I’m sure you sleep well at night knowing that if a comet hit the data center where your website lives, and everything was completely destroyed, you could get back up and running somewhere else quickly enough.If, however, you are one of the many many people who doesn’t have a good backup strategy in place, this article…

• Plupload – Making Multiple Uploading Easier than Ever

  Ray Cheung

  4 Feb 2010 | 11:01 pm

  Plupload allows you to upload files using HTML5 Gears, Silverlight, Flash, BrowserPlus or normal forms, providing some unique features such as upload progress, image resizing and chunked uploads.Plupload is currently separated into a Core API and a jQuery upload queue widget this enables you to either use it out of the box or write your own custom implementation. Drag/drop support of files is currently only available in Firefox 3.5+. Image resizing is only possible on Firefox 3.5+ and only at a fixed quality.Requirements: jQuery Framework Demo: http://www.plupload.com/example_queuewidget.php…

• Apple iPad GUI in PSD Format using Vectors

  Ray Cheung

  3 Feb 2010 | 11:01 pm

  Now that Apple has officially released the iPad we want to start designing for it. While Apple’s interface builder is great, it doesn’t really allow us to create custom UI elements on the fly. That’s why Geoff Teehan created iPad GUI PSD for us.The PSD was constructed using vectors, so it’s fully editable and scalable. You’ll notice there are a few new UI elements as compared to the iPhone interface. The workable screen design is formatted to 768×1024 so anything you design in the Photoshop file can easily be brought over to the SDK.Source:…

• 
  Woork

• Anatomy of The Perfect Sidebar

  Antonio Lupetti

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:49 am

  The sidebar is an important element of every blog. In a standard two-columns layout it’s placed to the right of the main section and includes information and links related to the content of blog posts. A well organized sidebar should include some important items, such as subscription options, advertisements, recent and popular posts, and help blog readers find contextual information related to the article they are reading or, in general, about the blog they are browsing. Many blogs also add on their sidebar optional items such as external widgets (Facebook Fan Page or Google Friend…

• Is Google Wave a Flop?

  Antonio Lupetti

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:48 am

  Lars Rasmussen at the Google I/O Conference (May 2009) In may 2009, at the Google I/O Conference, Lars Rasmussen presented a new Google application called “Google Wave” that should have revolutionized the way to communicate and collaborate on-line. The new Google product immediately took many positive comments and was defined as one of the most promising tools of 2010. But the initial enthusiasm was short lived. Google Wave is an application that merges instant messaging, e-mail, document editor, wiki tool and much more, but it seems none of this. The lack of clarity in what the…

• 3 Books To Understand Social Media Even If They Don’t Talk About Social Media

  Stefano Mizzella

  5 Feb 2010 | 9:01 am

  More than once I heard someone say that to really understand social media is enough to have a profile on Facebook, on Twitter, YouTube, and so on. Nothing more wrong. Social media are changing culture, society and knowledge sharing. In this change, technology is certainly something important but not decisive. So, understanding social media means go deep in some books that marked the origin and development of cyber-culture. In this post I would like to mention three books written before the rise of Web 2.0 and social media. In these books, written in different years by different authors, you…

• The Best Websites to Watch Streaming TV Shows, TV Series and Movies

  Antonio Lupetti

  4 Feb 2010 | 2:27 pm

  Here is a round-up with the best services online that allow you to watch the best TV series, TV shows and movies for free. HULU Hulu – Launched in private beta in August 2007 with a joint venture of NBC Universal, News Corp., The Walt Disney Company and Providence Equity Partners, Hulu is one of the most popular website that offers high-quality streaming video of TV shows, TV series and movies. You can choose from a huge archive of primetime TV hits (such as Lost, Dr. House, The Simpson), movies, documentaries and TV shows, all available for unlimited streaming, with some commercial…

• Woork Up: Something is Changing

  Antonio Lupetti

  3 Feb 2010 | 2:06 pm

  Dear friends, something is changing on Woork Up. As you know, since its birth in October 2007, this blog has been mainly addressed to web designers and developers becoming a popular and appreciated website in that area. Now, due to a big increase in popularity of Woork Up, I believe it’s the right moment to make a choice in a new direction. In the last months I thought about how to expand the audience of Woork Up, and I decided to start adding new contents by covering four main categories: web design, social media, digital inspiration and tech news. I’m also creating a little editorial…

• 
  ComBridges

• TV Industry News, Talkin’ New Media, part 2

  Jon

  26 Jan 2010 | 12:44 pm

  I’m continuing to have fun as a video contributor and New Media / New Marketing expert on TheTVNews.tv. Today was the “world premiere” of what will now be a weekly appearance every Tuesday and more. I wrote a press release for the occasion, “New Media / New Marketing Consultant Joins the TV industry’s Only Daily News Show with Weekly Segment.” This press release also introduces the “Super Bowl Commercial Rating Party” which will be offered via Twitter and Facebook during the big game. FYI, we’re still looking for peeps with TV industry…

• Am I Your Go-To Guy? (a self-awakening)

  admin

  18 Jan 2010 | 2:20 pm

  One advantage of having a coach who is also a client is that her testimonials not only flatter me, they make me think. Here’s what Christy Strauch, author of Passion, Plan, Profit: Twelve Simple Steps to Convert Your Passion into a Solid Business, said about me and my work: I think Jon knows better than anyone how to help businesses use the Internet as a powerful marketing tool. Wherever you are in the process of developing your Internet presence, Jon can tell you exactly what you should do next. He will enable you to take advantage of the latest (sometimes bewildering) array of tools,…

• Talking to the TV… Industry

  admin

  15 Jan 2010 | 8:55 am

  I am very pleased to announce that I have joined the team at TheTVNews.tv as their New Media/New Marketing expert. The guest appearance in the show embedded below was handled via Skype, but I’ll be recording my weekly reports, starting Tuesday 1/26, with my new camera. These new media/new marketing reports will appear each and every Tuesday. And, because they will be stand-alone segments (not like this one), I’ll be able to post them directly to this blog. The lead-in to my segment in this show begins at 3:19 with statistics on the explosive growth of online video consumption via…

• My Top 5 List of Top Whatever Lists: Happy New Tech New Year 2010

  Jon

  4 Jan 2010 | 3:26 pm

  Tis the season of lists. Too many lists? Maybe or maybe not, depending on whether or not you are looking for some perspective, or maybe some bottom line insights about trends and/or tips on how you or your organization’s tech, social media or just plain ole marketing priorities should be focused for the coming year. My high hopes are that the following list of lists (and grand perspectives) will help you make 2010 the best yet: 5. Super Geek David Pogue’s Pogie Awards My favorite NYTimes tech writer’s picks for gadgets, apps & such include the killer Firefox extension…

• Taking a Deliciously Dangerous Risk: New Video Holiday Greeting

  Jon

  27 Dec 2009 | 10:20 pm

  I had started gearing up to do a new series of on-camera videos before I read what I now consider to be a Silicon Valley classic business book, Randy Komisar’s The Monk and the Riddle: The Art of Creating a Life While Making a Living. I’ll review this book in more detail later, but the bottom line is that personal risks are far more important than financial risks. Randy illustrates through his own considerable life and business experiences that the real failures in business and in life result from doing things for the wrong reasons and not following your heart and your true…

• 
  User Interface Trends

• The Horizontal Way

  Kate Vander Ploeg

  5 Feb 2010 | 8:22 am

  Trend: Horizontal Scrolling Most people try fitting their design to the width of a standard window size to avoid horizontal scrolling. Nielsen even claims that “users hate horizontal scrolling” , and names reasons to stray away from horizontal scrolling. But then, there are those–I dare say most of them are designers–who do it anyway. So are these guys designing without regard to the usability of their sites, do they just not give a fudge about usability, or are they designing for a situation they feel warrants horizontal scrolling? Click this link for a showcase of horizontal…

• UItrends Giveaway – Free Dreamweaver Training DVD!

  Jeff Noble

  21 Jan 2010 | 6:47 am

  The boss has gone crazy!!! Well not really but, the fine folks at Class On Demand have provided us a copy of “Dreamweaver For Designers” training DVD. Usually these cost $199.95 but we are giving it away for free to one lucky winner. Zero, Nada. Gratis. All you need to do to win this DVD is leave a comment about why you love the UItrends website by February 20th, 2010. Bonus points if you include some areas we can improve, double bonus points to anyone that can spur Sarah Selser to post another big buttons article or tell us what has happened to Chris Farmer.  Sorry but you do…

• Form Design Inspiration

  Jeff Noble

  19 Jan 2010 | 6:50 am

  According to my admittedly flawed calculations there are approximately  the same number of articles on website form behaviors as the number of McDonald’s customers served each day.  Speaking of McDonald’s, rather than throwing up a lot of the same info, putting together yet another lame attempt at a top whatever number list, or you wasting your time going through all of these articles, I figured it might just be better to list out some of the best resources I found.  Why? Cause I have nothing better to do and hopefully some of these are helpful or at least inspirational to…

• Suggestions…Add as a Friend

  David Mortellaro

  15 Jan 2010 | 1:12 pm

  Trend: Customized Sites for You I thought about this the other day. Amazon. Facebook. LinkedIn. Like me, I am sure many of you use these websites often. They are only a few of many, many websites that are excellent and accurate with recommendations, whether it is merchandise or people. For example, I logged into Amazon recently to do some Christmas shopping. Upon logging in, Amazon had recommendations for me based on my previous purchases. Facebook and LinkedIn have very similar capabilities. Facebook actually scares me sometimes by the timing of its friend recommendations to me. I dreamt one…

• Review: Wireframing tool Cacoo

  Ron Norman

  14 Jan 2010 | 12:39 pm

  It’s the year 2010.  Weren’t we supposed to have jetpacks and flying cars by now? I mean come on, no hoverboards?  No teleportation?? Well, at least UI design is slowly catching up.  The demand for a user interface that delivers a rewarding experience and is aesthetically pleasing has never been higher.  Fortunately, the tools and methods for building a well rounded UI are now very numerous. Wireframes and Mockups have become a standard in the design process, and tools keep popping up specifically for wireframing.  I recently tried out Cacoo, a new web-based wireframing…

• 
  Noupe

• Mobile Web Design: Tips and Best Practices

  vitaly

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:13 am

  By Cameron ChapmanLast year, more than 63 million people in the United States accessed the Internet from a mobile device. It’s forecast that by 2013 there will be more than 1.7 billion mobile Internet users worldwide. With those kinds of numbers, it’s imperative that web designers and developers learn optimal development and design practices for mobile devices.For the most part you won’t need to learn any new technologies for mobile site design. But you will need to look at site design in a new way, one that is decidedly more restrictive than design for standard browsers. To…

• 60 Excellent Gadget Photoshop and Illustrator Tutorials

  vitaly

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:39 am

  Designing your own (or redesigning existing) gadgets such as MP3 Players, Game Consoles and Computers is an incredible way to improve your general skills in Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator (or any other design-related software package for that matter). You’re bound to pick up new skills every time, even if you’re considered an expert.The following round-up of tutorials consists of 60 great gadget tutorials. There is a selection of Photoshop and Illustrator tutorials so you can learn new tricks in two of the most used pieces of graphic software the world has ever seen.There are…

• 10 Things Clients Look For In a Design Portfolio

  vitaly

  6 Feb 2010 | 6:17 am

  By Thursday BramThere’s no formula for a perfect portfolio. There’s no format that’s guaranteed to land you clients, as long as you follow it. However, there are certain questions that a prospective client has in mind when he’s looking for a web designer. If your portfolio can supply the answers a client wants, you can improve your portfolio’s ability to convince a client and land a new project.Your portfolio may not be the only way that your clients find you, but it’s likely that most of your clients have at least seen it at some point. In many cases, your…

• Free Saint Valentine’s Day Icon Set

  vitaly

  6 Feb 2010 | 5:11 am

  Today we are glad to release Valentine’s Icon Set, a set with 10 free icons in resolutions 32×32px, 48×48px, 128×128px and 150×150px in formats .ico, .png and .icns. This set was designed by Iconsmaster and released especially for Noupe and its readers. The set was created from scratch using Adobe Fireworks — the .png-sources are available for free download as well.Download the icon set for free!You can use the set for all of your projects for free and without any restrictions. You can freely use it for both your private and commercial projects, including…

• 55 Conceptual Examples of Surreal Artworks

  vitaly

  5 Feb 2010 | 6:43 am

  By Aquil AkhterSurreal Art is getting so much attention because it lets an artist freely express his creativity, feelings and the way he thinks. It is the medium of art in which you can showcase your talent and creativity in the most meaningful and the most intangible way. This is the main reason why Surreal Art is getting so popular these days. We have compiled a list of some inspirational Surreal artwork for you. Hope you’ll like this collection. Just drop us a line here and tell us which one you like most.Photomanipulation Surreal ArtLost boatIdee FixeWhere Sunflowers Grow by…

• 
  Build Internet!

• Fundamentals for a Kick-Ass Creative Company

  Zach Dunn

  7 Feb 2010 | 9:40 pm

  This post has a little background to its inspiration.At the start of Summer 2009, we started Officeal as a way to showcase the offices of companies that “get” creative culture. The numbers are slowly increasing, but it’s ended up serving a more important role. We’ve seen the kinds of things that make companies more than just a place to work. These are the types of companies that create lifestyles you want to be a part of.As some of you may know already, Sam and I also run a web and creative company called One Mighty Roar. (Build Internet was originally developed as a…

• Designing for E-Commerce Personalities

  Damon Bauer

  3 Feb 2010 | 6:40 am

  Conversion, return on investment, loyalty, referrals; all of these site metrics are incredibly important to any successful website, and a site that sells product(s) is no exception. In a world (wide web) that’s muddled and overrun with sub-par, poorly designed shopping websites, it’s hard to break away from the mold.The key is to be informed — not only about designing a better shopping experience, but making that shopping experience more informative and enjoyable for the most important person, a potential customer! In my experience, I’ve noticed five main types of…

• How to Win Clients When You’re the Underdog

  Chandler Quintin

  27 Jan 2010 | 7:40 pm

  A management professor once told me that in business, the only thing you need to know is one special shape. This meant absolutely nothing to me until he began to show me how every fundamental business practice boils down to a basic geometric shape.Here I am paying $50k a year and we’re going to learn about one shape – a classic equilateral triangle. You know, that guy with 3 sides, 60 degrees each angle, and 180 degrees to go around. Yup, the simple, classy, equilateral triangle. 3 sides, no frills, all business. A Harvard MBA teaching other MBA’s about triangles?I’m skeptical…

• How to Make a CSS Sprite Powered Menu

  Zach Dunn

  25 Jan 2010 | 9:27 pm

  We haven’t gone back to basics in a while.Today’s tutorial will bring you through the process of building a slick menu using a single CSS sprite image. It’s a simple, but elegant solution for most websites. This was one of the design strategies that first helped me to start using smarter markup. For those of you just getting introduced to this technique today, hopefully you’ll have some similar results.The end goal is to create a navigation menu that loads quickly, and does not require any dated JavaScript for hover effects. If you’re still using individual…

• Five Minute Upgrade – Make Your Workstation (More) Ergonomic

  Sam Dunn

  21 Jan 2010 | 4:41 pm

  I’m going to be bold for just a moment and assume that you spend a fair amount of time at the computer.If you pile on hour after hour in front of a screen, maybe you should take the time to make sure you’re as comfortable as you could possibly be – which is where ergonomics comes in.Ergonomics is the science of designing the job, equipment, and workplace to fit the worker. There are two reasons to have an ergonomic setup – health and productivity.With that said, why not see what you can do to tweak your work environment and consequently live a longer and more…

• 
  Bwired Weblogs

• Optimising Your Mobile Website

  4 Feb 2010 | 11:22 am

  So you're taking the plunge. You know that mobile is here to stay, and you want to make sure you get it right first time around. Here are some key considerations that are an absolute must: Easy Access: Automatically direct mobile users to the mobile version of your website. They may not have the patience to trawl your full website for the "mobile website" link - particularly after they've waited for seconds on end for it to load, and the competition will be waiting readily with open arms. Linear Layouts: Minimize left/right navigation (which is difficult on mobile devices) and instead arrange…

• 2010 Economic Outlook in Layman's Terms

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:54 pm

  I've never been one to seek interest in the economy, infact I failed economics at University. Twice. Until late last year when wondering if I were in a position to purchase a house, the thought of financial planning and forecasting was limited to whether I was maintaining steady savings. Upon returning to the desk this year I thought then about businesses and business owners, and the financial mindset they must face before investing capital to grow their business. And then along came Alan Oster, NAB Group Chief Economist, who spoke at the Franchise Council of Australia's first Breakfast…

• Tags now helping you stay LinkedIn

  27 Jan 2010 | 11:49 am

  LinkedIn is currently one of bwired's favourite social media sites. With our company profile and company network you can easily find us all connected via the service. So, naturally when LinkedIn announced a nifty new contact browsing interface we couldn't help but get a little bit excited. The update allows users to browser their contacts by companies, industries and locations all via a new panel. You can also now use a system of user defined tags to help you sort through your contacts. The new interface also includes a powerful search tool to help you find contacts based on their profile…

• How to maximize Social Media in 2010

  25 Jan 2010 | 5:13 pm

  2009 saw an evolution in social media take up by businesses and individuals alike. We saw a cross over from personalized social voyeurism to SME's and corporate giants alike fall in love with social media and its offerings such as Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, YouTube and so on. So with such a strong following behind a fairly new and untraveled realm of cheap (in the monetary sense) self promotion comes a new set of netiquette (etiquette on the net). With this in mind I start 2010 with some simple tips and tricks when using social media tools to promote your business online. Measure your…

• Youtube - more than 15 mins of fame

  30 Dec 2009 | 9:04 am

  Being on TV is no big deal. Fifteen milliseconds of fame in the crowd at the MCG, maybe seen by a couple of your mates - good for a laugh but not much else. Being on Youtube on the other hand - that's got potential. The videos named in Youtube's recent announcement of 2009's most watched videos, the first time a list has been released, have created genuine fame - popular recognition and cash! Just look at Susan Boyle. Not a fan myself, but you can't help but love the story. She didn't win the TV show competition, she went one better. Almost overnight she became a youtube hit - loved, hated,…

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  siteInspire

• Designschneider

  hello@siteinspire.net

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• Aperto

  hello@siteinspire.net

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• Bianca Elmer

  hello@siteinspire.net

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• Hauser Lacour

  hello@siteinspire.net

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• Chevychase

  hello@siteinspire.net

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

• 
  Benzing Technologies

• Aries Resources Group

  Rusty

  5 Feb 2010 | 1:16 pm

  Aries interim executive management consultants are substantially different than your typical business consultant who identify problems and then leave a “white paper” for you to implement. Aries business consultants not only measure, analyze, and develop a plan to solve your business problems, they remain on board to provide the leadership to implement the changes, innovations, and solutions.

• Your Menu Maker

  Rusty

  25 Jan 2010 | 7:26 am

  Suncoast Identification Solutions choose us to design a landing page for their menu line. We immediately had some fun ideas running around our heads. We decided on a warm color scheme with a background that defines wow. Adding some rotating galleries for dynamics and our search engine optimization package and they are ready to sell. Your Menu Maker prints washable restaurant or bar menus. They can be laminated, covered, folded, or spiral bound.

• 10 Essential WordPress SEO Plugins

  Rusty

  19 Jan 2010 | 12:53 pm

  When it comes to web design management and blogging systems, WordPress wins my heart. In my last WordPress SEO post I noted the 12 Best SEO Plugins. Now I want to identify the 10 essential plugins you can’t be without if your running a WordPress Blog. We have done ton’s of research in finding these plugins and hope you find them as useful as we do every day. 1. Nofollow Case by Case – Nofollow Case by Case is a follow plugin for WordPress but allows you to selectively apply rel=”nofollow” to comment links and comment author links. Download: Here 2. Ping Crawl…

• American Advertising Federation SWFL

  Rusty

  15 Jan 2010 | 1:53 pm

  AAF-SWFL came to us with a previous website that needed a major overhaul. They were looking for something that would catch existing and potential members eyes and ears. We decided to play off the logo colors and build a bold experience.

• 5 Successful Link Building Techniques

  Rusty

  28 Dec 2009 | 7:56 am

  One of the most difficult, or rather tedious jobs when running a website is getting reciprocal links. It really matters to search engines…a lot. Link building is getting your website address, be it any link from your site, placed on a remote website. Now there are probably several more ways to build links I am not discussing in this post because I have found these five to be the most successful. So lets go over a few of my link building strategies. 1. Submitting to Design Gallery Websites If you have a beautiful website why not express how you feel to the design community by submitting…

• 
  Helloewy: A blog from Loewy Design

• Oops Marketing

  David Loewy

  27 Jan 2010 | 8:13 am

  There seems to be another scammy trend brewing in email marketing. Recently I’ve been receiving email promotions from brands with subject lines apologizing for a mistake or retracting a misstatement. I like to forgive and forget as much as the next guy, but when the apology requested is nothing more than a trick to get me to open an email, I’m opting out. Okay, I admit it, I’ve fallen for the trick a few times. Most such emails are from smaller companies hurting for revenue, but some are from brands that are well established and trusted. Just recently I received an email apology from…

• What’s your web grade?

  Donald May

  5 Jan 2010 | 11:18 am

  Just before the holiday we received my oldest son’s current school progress report. (Thankfully he is a good student and always does well.) This reminded me of a useful tool I’ve found to help measure websites with regard to best practices for search engine optimization (SEO) and web marketing. The tool is the Website Grader. This tool essentially scans your site for common HTML related to best SEO practices. It combines that data with other data from around the web, such as the web ranking in Google, the number of inbound links on your site, and where your site stands in relation to…

• I want my “open” Web TV

  David Loewy

  14 Dec 2009 | 7:30 am

  When I was a creative director at HomePC magazine back in the early ’90s, there were lots of articles making predictions about the convergence of PCs, TV, and telecom. Along came WebTV in ’96, a big box with a wired keyboard that made your TV into a monitor for accessing the Internet. Microsoft bought WebTV, but it never took off; it was very clumsy, with a bad browser among other shortcomings (not surprising). Now here we are in 2010, and you can plug your ethernet cable or wi-fi into your TV. Presto, you’re on the Web—sort of. I don’t claim to be an expert on the…

• Cyber monday everyday

  Marc Acosta

  1 Dec 2009 | 12:28 pm

  Black Friday & Cyber Monday may have come and gone but the spending season has just begun and if you have an iPhone, as nightmarish as it may seem, every minute of every day can be Cyber WhateverDay. Like the DVR did away with having to clear your schedule to make it home to watch your favorite show at 9PM, dedicated shopping apps can let you shop whenever you feel like it without having to rush home to your laptop or even worse – the store. Amazon Mobile With about a year on the competition, Amazon Mobile has had some time to refine what was an already great app last holiday season.

• Thanks

  Donald May

  25 Nov 2009 | 10:25 am

  I truly love this time of year. Getting together with family and friends. Sharing a fantastic meal (my wife is a wiz in the kitchen). Even the hustle and bustle of shopping doesn’t get me down. I don’t think we have Thanksgiving often enough. We should have it every few months so that we realize there is so much to be thankful for—even with the economy, and the wars still going on. Our lives in general are easy. We grumble if our lattés are too cold and lament the typical workday. Our ancestors would laugh at how easy our lives are. In honor of this holiday, the folks here at Loewy…

• 
  Little Box Of Ideas

• Project 365 Vector Characters – Daisy For Day 37

  Sneh Roy

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:39 am

  Day 37 – Daisy Daisy is a very confused little dude. He doesn’t remember where he is from or what he used to be. He remembers drinking the milky liquid flowing behind Pennechi‘ shop in Pastra. Next thing he knows, he has sprouted black wings. A few days later he has the pinkest udders ever seen. But he can’t stop drinking. He is addicted to it! Time Taken : 30 minutes Softwares : Illustrator CS 4 & Photoshop CS 4 Font for Daisy : AylaCSscript   In 2010, I have challenged myself to create 365 vector characters, one for each day of the year. Please Subscribe To…

• Project 365 Vector Characters – Pennechi For Day 36

  Sneh Roy

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:29 am

  Day 36 – Pennechi I am hungry when I sit down to create a character today and definitely cheery. My mood is sunny and so a yellow palette feels apt. This one takes a course of its own as I start doodling in Illustrator. It is no wonder, I am having pasta for dinner now! Pennechi lives in Pastra. He is the best sauce roller Pastra has ever seen. He can glide on it and roll in it with some really cool moves. The sauce that results from all the rolling is the most delicious concoction ever and wins Pastra the coveted Bruncheon Trophy every year. This week, Pennechi is rolling stringy…

• 40 Most Amazing Vector Landscapes

  tomwalker

  7 Feb 2010 | 3:34 pm

  We’ve searched high and low for the most powerful, technically distinguished and absolutely amazing vector landscapes available anywhere online. You’ll be astounded by the level of artistic expertise on show. “But what’s a vector landscape?!”, I hear you cry. Good question! Well … it’s a work of art made up of lines and blocks of color as opposed to a raster image, which is arranged as individual pixels. Below you’ll find rural landscapes, cityscapes and fantastical, imagined vistas. Immerse yourself in a vector world! 1. Nature in Technicolor…

• Project 365 Vector Characters – Rover For Day 35

  Sneh Roy

  7 Feb 2010 | 1:12 am

  Day 35 – Rover Rover is a shy monster dog who is scared to be under Pinka’s bed, very scared. So he hides in her closet and hopes he doesn’t get assigned duty under her bed every night! I am exhausted today. I have been up virtually all night after heavy rains caused flash flooding and caused sparks in our roof almost starting an electrical fire. We were very lucky nothing happened and switched off our electricity for the next 12 hours till someone came and fixed the fault. But we came very close to losing our home and that has me shaken up a bit. So today’s character…

• Project 365 Vector Characters – ISpye For Day 34

  Sneh Roy

  6 Feb 2010 | 1:26 am

  Day 34 – ISpye The ispye-bot is the Seeki child’s favorite companion. It is a crazy little toy bot with 6 eyes that play the “I Spy” game with phenomenal speed, constantly challenging the Seekian child’s brilliant mind who are already in training the minute they are born. The ispye comes with little yellow energy pods to last longer! Time Taken : 30 minutes Softwares : Illustrator CS 4 & Photoshop CS 4 Font for Ispye : Autobahn   In 2010, I have challenged myself to create 365 vector characters, one for each day of the year. Please Subscribe To My Feed…

• 
  WebM.ag

• A Few More Wordpress Security Plugins

  McBonio

  8 Feb 2010 | 11:26 pm

  We covered Wordpress security a few months ago here at WebM.ag and the article proved to be well received, so much so we have had a few requests to cover a few more top security plugins. So here we are, here are 10 more Wordpress plugins to keep your blog safe, below each is a brief [...]

• A Bumper Set Of Valentine’s Day Resources

  McBonio

  7 Feb 2010 | 11:33 pm

  Valentines day is drawing near, have you booked your table and flowers for your special someone? Now is probably a good time! Talking about a special someone, doesn’t your beloved creation that you put hours and hours into deserve some love? Here is a bumper set of Valentine’s day resources, we have a great collection of Vectors, [...]

• A Selection Of PHP Frameworks

  McBonio

  6 Feb 2010 | 11:46 pm

  PHP can be extremely useful when you are working on web applications or web services, they quickly allow them to be built and keep the app relatively lightweight. Whether your fluent in PHP or not, PHP frameworks can be huge timesavers for anyone creating apps or softwares and they have a pretty gentle learning curve. Below are [...]

• Exclusive WebMag Social Media Icon Pack 2

  McBonio

  5 Feb 2010 | 11:57 pm

  As promised we are releasing our second pack of handdrawn social media icons. Like pack one, the icons have 64×64 and 128×128 sizes, and they cover the following: Bebo, Blog Engage, Design Moo, Ember, Melative, Netvibes, OpenId, Orkut, Share This, Skype, Xing and You Tube. Download *The icons are free to use in personal or commercial projects, but [...]

• How To Display Your Feedburner Count And Twitter Followers Without Chicklets

  McBonio

  5 Feb 2010 | 1:19 am

  Feedburner offers a great chicklet which allows you to add your subscriber count to your site, and for Twitter you can use a chicklet to display your followers from a service such as twittercounter.com. What I’m going to show you today is a method of displaying these counts without actually using a chicklet which will allow [...]

• 
  Web Design Booth

• 75 Beautiful Valentine Wallpapers

  Dicky

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:53 am

  14th February is a holiday celebrated by lovers throughout the world. There are a lot of ways where you can express your loves to the beloved people. But I am sure at least you will change your desktop backgrounds to match this Valentine day, am I right? As promised, we are going to share wallpapers for seasonal holiday. Our previous seasonal wallpapers include Halloween Wallpapers and Christmas Wallpaper. In this article, we bring you 75 Beautiful Valentine Wallpapers to spice up this Heart Season. Some of the wallpapers are pretty cool, and we hope that they can spice up your desktops, show…

• 70+ Examples Of Beautiful Night Photography

  Dicky

  3 Feb 2010 | 7:38 am

  Night Photography often got its own attraction and capturing a good night photography requires your skills and also whether your camera is capable of night photography. You may need a camera which able to keep its shuttle open for a longer time. Today, we are going to look into 70+ really beautiful night photography of various Cities, Buildings, Landscapes, Fireworks, Light Trails, Northern Lights and Aurora. If you are enjoying looking at these photography, why not read our previous post about Natural Landscape Wallpapers? Cities Night in Haneda Airport Dubai City Three towers London night…

• 30 Websites To Download Free Stock Photos

  Dicky

  1 Feb 2010 | 6:15 am

  Using stock photos in the design can save us a lot of time. Instead of hiring a photographer, you can instantly access high quality of stock photography by browsing through the stock photo websites. There are a lot of websites offering stock photos. Some of them are free, while most of them aren’t. So, if you are going to use stock photos in your design, you have to be aware of the license and agreement that may be involved. Today, we are going to share 30 websites where you can download free stock photos. If you found any free stock photo website that isn’t in the list, feel free…

• 18 Useful Wordpress Contact Form Plugins

  Dicky

  27 Jan 2010 | 6:43 am

  Contact Form is one of the most important page for all websites. If you are running an e-commerce website, you need a contact form so that your potential buyers can reach you to get more information. Even if you run a personal blog, you will also need a contact form so that bloggers from same niche or advertisers can contact you easily. There are some great online form providers such as Wufoo and FormSpring. These services allow you to create contact forms, survey forms and registrations form easily without knowing much about web programming languages. If you are using Wordpress, then you can…

• 5 Alternative And Tiny CSS Grid Systems

  Dicky

  25 Jan 2010 | 6:06 am

  CSS grid system is one tool that facilitates the work of web designers and web developers to develop a website. Advantage of using CSS grid system is you can reduce development time. Grids also provide uniformity and consistency in the placement of HTML elements. Do you want to know more about CSS Frameworks and grid system? If yes, then you may want to read our previous article that talk about useful CSS Frameworks. Today, we are going to look into 5 more CSS Grid Systems that are tiny but worth a look. 1. CSS Boiler Plate Grid As one of the original authors of Blueprint CSS I’ve…

• 
  hongkiat.com

• Giveaway: Music Organizing Application – TidySongs

  hongkiat

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:22 am

  If you are using iTunes to organize your music, here’s something you may find interesting. Earlier last month I was introduced to this app called TidySongs by Jennifer of Cloudbrain. TidySongs has a pretty self-descriptive name. It an application with one sole purpose - organizes your iTunes songs. Here’s what TidySongs do: Remove duplicated songs Fix miss-spelled song names Fill up the missing data – artists, years and genres (Something perfectionist collectors will love), and The function I like most – Add missing album-art so they look cool in your cover flow.

• 30+ Artist Interpretations of Mario and Luigi

  hongkiat

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:30 am

  By Shane Ward. Shane Ward is a contributing editor of the art/lifestyles sites: Freshbump, Collect3d, and Format Magazine He’s short and pudgy with a thing for Peaches. He’s an Italian plumber from the Mushroom Kingdom. He is Nintendo’s mascot, and probably the most popular video game character ever. You know him as Mario. Mario has appeared in over 200 video games, mostly bearing his name, mostly as the iconic smiling plumber with blue overalls and a mustache. But his persona is open to interpretation. These artists have re-interpreted Mario (and his famous sidekick Luigi)…

• 11 Common Web Design Mistakes (Blunders)

  hongkiat

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:00 am

  By: Brujo Owoh There are tons of website on the Internet, and hundreds or probably thousands are created by day. Here’s a very interesting thing to ponder – What are the elements of a good website? Image Credit: tveskov Building a website can be daunting but the real challenge lies in making it usable. The problem is most web designers forget that the website wasn’t created for themselves but to solve the users’ needs. They give creativity priority over practicality and usability. In this article, we would like to highlight 11 web design blunders that web developers and…

• Winners for Flash Content Management System (Flash CMS)

  com

  3 Feb 2010 | 6:25 am

  We’ve got winners! If you’ve participated in the FlashMoto CMS contest earlier last week, here’s an entry you should not miss. Continue reading to find out who the winners are :) Thanks to FlashMoto, the following winners are getting a Flash CMS that worth $199 for free. Piscesboy01 Srikanth, and Sun Pietro Congratulations to the winners and thank you all for participating. If you are interested in getting free stock photos, you should know that we have a Stock Photo Accounts (Loaded With Credits) contest on progress too. Get notified on the next giveaway: Subscribe to RSS…

• 28 Excellent Examples Of Typography Portraits

  hongkiat

  3 Feb 2010 | 5:43 am

  I’m sure most of us heard of these memorable saying that goes like "A good sketch is better than a long speech" or "A picture is worth a thousand words". Sometimes, even the most complicated issue and matter can be simplified and expressed over a single image. That’s just how incredible images are; but today I want to show you something different, a hybrid of both. Here’s a showcase of a very unique approach to portrait illustrations. These images below are mixtures of both images and typography, where the latter is used to shape the portraits while the…

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  Snappy Sentences

• Turning a negative into a positive

  Snappy Sentences

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:41 am

  Some products (or services) are easy to sell. There are obvious benefits to talk about, clear points of difference to focus on, and a strong desire from the customer to have/buy/hire. Unfortunately, you may not have this luxury. Your product or service may be mundane, embarrassing to talk about, even ugly. You may be in a market that’s saturated, or even regulated – so it’s hard to stand out from the crowd. How on earth can you come up with some unique selling points when you really can’t think of anything positive to say? Here’s a tip: Think of all the reasons…

• DIY proof reading

  Snappy Sentences

  6 Feb 2010 | 3:09 am

  Need some quick and easy proof reading tips? I’ve just written a post on DIY proof reading for SNOBs.com.au. Check it out here. Share with your network:

• Content workshops – a new service from Snappy Sentences

  Snappy Sentences

  25 Jan 2010 | 2:45 am

  As part of my initial quoting process, I ask all clients to complete my client brief. Some do this with ease, others find it more difficult as some of the questions in the brief include: What are your unique selling points? Who is your target audience? What do you want you call to action to be? What is the personality of your business? What is the objective of the copy? Most of the time after a telephone call these questions can be answered. After one such phone call, a client said to me: Hey, you should offer this as a service! What a great idea. So now I have added content workshops to the…

• Simple style guides

  Snappy Sentences

  17 Jan 2010 | 5:45 pm

  A simple style guide is a must for any business – no matter how big or small. Head over to www.snobs.com.au for my new post on developing a style guide for your business. Share with your network:

• Review of Practical SEO Copywriting e-book

  Snappy Sentences

  28 Nov 2009 | 2:20 am

  Glenn Murray is a SEO copywriter who I admire. He’s always got good things to say on Twitter, his blog posts are really informative, and his SEO e-book rocks. So when he said that he was busy writing a new SEO copywriting e-book, my ears pricked up. I got my hands on a copy as soon as it was out, and it’s good…really good. Practical SEO copywriting tips The main thing I like about Glenn’s books is that they are very usable. He practically holds your hand as he takes you through his tried and tested techniques. He doesn’t hold back…he shares his secrets in a…

• 
  Psdtuts+

• How to Create a Somber Composition in Photoshop

  Constantin Potorac

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:08 am

  This one’s another collaboration with my good friend Toma Alin Gabriel. In this tutorial you will learn how to manipulate stock images and turn them into your puppets to express your desired feelings.Final Image PreviewTake a look at the final result first. Want access to the full PSD files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join PSDTUTS PLUS for just $9/month. You can view the final image preview below or view a larger version here.Tutorial Details Program: Photoshop CS4 Difficulty: Intermediate Estimated Completion Time: 7 hoursResourcesFirst of all I would…

• Best of the Web – January 2010

  Emil

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:07 am

  The first month of the new year has wrapped up and there was a ton of great content for all the Photoshop Fans. This month was bursting with tons of freebies that the readers could check out and download, for example this month we are featuring some great free font packs, as well as some great 2010 wallpaper packs. On top of that we have some great high quality tutorials that deal with some very interesting 3D techniques. So lets get into this wrap up of January 2010.Tutorial Wrap Creating a Surreal Desert SceneOur first tutorial of the new year is already an amazing photo manipulation…

• How to Create a Stone Giant Matte Painting – Psd Plus Tutorial

  Alex Beltechi

  4 Feb 2010 | 1:30 pm

  We have another Psd Plus tutorial exclusively available to Plus members today. If you want to take your matte painting skills to the next level, then we have an awesome tutorial for you. Learn more at the jump!This Plus Tutorial is Filled with Creative TipsThis tutorial is a collaboration between myself, Alex Beltechi, and college pal, Andrei Bacter. I’ve requested his help to bring you a bit of what we don’t do a lot on Psdtuts – Matte Painting. This technique combines photo scenery and tablet drawn details. As such, the tutorial is divided in two parts. The first one…

• How To Repair Scratches, Tears, and Spots on an Old Photograph

  Robert C. McLaughlin

  3 Feb 2010 | 7:46 am

  In this tutorial you will learn how to repair cracks, scratches, and spots so this photo of the Swedish Nightingale, Jenny Lind, looks just like new. We will purposely avoid using some of the quick fix tools such as the healing brush so that you can gain an understanding of the basics of photo restoration. Let’s get started!Final Image PreviewTake a look at the image we’ll be creating. Want access to the full PSD files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join Psd Plus for just $9/month. You can view the final image preview below.Tutorial DetailsProgram:…

• A Myriad of Vintage Grunge Patterns From Across the Web

  Callum Chapman

  2 Feb 2010 | 8:25 am

  Patterns can be used in almost any style of graphic and web design. They have many purposes, from being used as backgrounds to being used to touch up vector files that look just a little too clean. For that reason we have rounded-up and compiled a huge collection of over 450 free and premium patterns from various different websites for you to use in your personal and commercial projects.Free PatternsGrungy Green Tileable Photoshop Patterns (10)Grungy Natural Beige Photoshop Patterns (6)Grungy Natural Beige Photoshop Patterns (6)Grungy Hearts and Flowers Patterns (8)Seamless Grungy Burgundy…

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  Inspired Magazine

• How iPad Affects the Way we Design Websites?

  Tuhin

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:37 am

  The iPad has received mixed reviews. While the geeks (people like you and me) have looked at it with disdain for being “just” what we expected, the media publishing industry (read print media) has seen it as the salvation they had been waiting for. Whether the iPad is able to change the world or not, is not the issue of this article. But the fact of the matter is that it is here and sooner or later we need to learn to design the web keeping it in our minds. So what are the things we need to consider? Fluid Width Design The iPad has no RIGHT way of viewing websites. That means you can view…

• How to Fail at Your Design Business

  Jeff Archibald

  7 Feb 2010 | 12:25 pm

  Today’s guest post is a special piece from Jeff Archibald – a graphic designer hailing from the Great White North – Canada. When he’s not building igloos, fighting polar bears or writing tongue-in-cheek articles about failing at design, he runs a modestly popular design blog over at Paper Leaf Design. This is it. You’ve worked many long, hard hours developing your Pen tool skills in Illustrator to the point you could probably add “Pen Tool Ninja” to your business card. You’ve learned so much about graphic design that your head is bigger than Rush Limbaugh’s…

• 10 Essentials Posts of the Week for the Inspired Community

  Catalin Zorzini

  7 Feb 2010 | 5:45 am

  Our sister site – Inspired News – is feeding us with more than 30 design / development & social media related articles per day, meaning that we could miss quite a few! So here is the complete list of essential reads, as clicked & retweeted by the Inspired Community. To be the first one to know when these kind of stories are published, be sure to Check out Inspired News and folow us on Twitter. 40 Creative and Funny Advertisements Using Animals 100 Years of Movie Title Stills Avoid Design Burn-out by Limiting Client Revisions 50 Free UI and Web Design Wireframing Kits,…

• Freebie Friday – Download the Social Eyesores Icon Pack

  Catalin Zorzini

  4 Feb 2010 | 4:14 pm

  We’re starting the 2010 series of Freebie Friday giveaways with the most creative social icon pack you’ll ever come across on the Interwebs! The author is Xavier Gallego Moya, the Barcelona based artist who created the Eyesores world! And while you’re at it, check out the first Inspired Release – The Social Bird Icon Set The Icon Pack RSS, Twitter, Facebook, LastFM, YouTube, LinkedIn, MySpace – we’ve got them all! Click here to download the icon pack with 7 different icons (both 32×32 pixels and 100×100 pixels versions). So feel free to show off…

• Coolectables – Ten of the Most Unique and Limited Edition iPhone Apps

  Catalin Zorzini

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:28 pm

  We’re trying to keep you inspired on all levels, so here’s this week post with 10 creative iPhone & iPod Touch apps. This time we’re featuring some collectable and limited edition apps. As your at it be sure to check out The Coolest iPhone Games You Should Own No Matter What & 8 Amazing Musical iPhone Apps You Should Definitely Touch Parra Plays | Details | Download Boost 3D | Details | Download Dot | Details | Download Satromizer | Details | Download ..™ | Details | Download Sound Shaker | Details | Download Itotooshi | Details | Download JellyDrift | Details |…

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  Web Designer Wall - Design Trends and Tutorials

• Free Vector Social Media Set

  Nick La

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 pm

  In case you’ve missed it, I recently released a free vector set of Social Media Icons at IconDock. It includes 50 icons of the most popular social media networks. The icons are available at 32px and 16px in EPS, PNG, and GIF format. Feel free to use it in your blogs or client’s projects. If you like it, don’t forget to spread the love by blogging or tweeting about it. (more…)

• 47 Amazing CSS3 Animation Demos

  Nick La

  3 Feb 2010 | 7:10 am

  Here is a compilation of 47 jaw-dropping CSS3 animation demos. They demonstrate the possibilities of the CSS3 transform and transition property. Some are very useful and can be used as Javascript alternatives. Most of them are simply to look cool. In order to veiw these effects, you need a webkit browser such as Safari and Chrome (sorry to the Internet Explorer users). Enjoy! (more…)

• What to Expect in 2010: UX/UI Design Simplicity

  Nick La

  1 Feb 2010 | 6:56 am

  Guest Post by Chuck Longanecker In January of each year, we flip over the hourglass and, once again, we have everything in front of us. The new year gives us a clean slate, a chance for change and encouragement to evolve the way we do things. In the past, we’ve yielded to client and user requests to pack our website designs full of unrelated features and countless pages of duplicate information. The change we have been waiting for has come - our users have matured. 2010 is the year of Design Simplicity.

• InMotion Web Hosting Giveaways

  Nick La

  28 Jan 2010 | 6:08 am

  Exciting contest: InMotion Hosting is giving away 3 Power accounts (one-year) to WDW’s readers. To enter this contest, simply post a comment in this post before Feb 12, 2010. I’ve moved my hosting to them for about 2 weeks and very pleased with their services, particularly their 24/7 tech support. If you are looking for web hosting, check them out. They have a wide range of hosting packages from $5.95/mth shared hosting to $199/mth dedicated servers. (more…)

• Design Trends (Predictions) in 2010

  Nick La

  21 Jan 2010 | 5:49 am

  As we are stepping in a new decade, I can foresee that web design in 2010 is going to be fun and filled with experimental works. With the new CSS3 and HTML5, designers and developers are trying to utilize the new features to create impressive designs. Sketchy and large background styles are fading out. Serif fonts and texturized background will be popular. Thanks to CSS3, we are going to see a lot of rounded corners, RGBA transparency, and drop shadows. With the rise of smart phones, mobile web design is going to pick up this year. (more…)

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  CSS-Tricks

• jQuery MagicLine Navigation

  Chris Coyier

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:58 am

  These “sliding” style navigation bars have been around a while, I just thought I’d take a crack at doing it myself as the opportunity came up recently. Turns out it’s really pretty darn easy. I put two examples together for it.The IdeaThe idea is to have a highlight of some kind (a background or an underline) follow you around as you mouse over the different links in the navigation. This will happen with jQuery and it’s animation abilities. As such, the “magic line” will only be appended via JavaScript. Once added to the list and styled, as you mouse…

• How nth-child Works

  Chris Coyier

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:24 am

  There is a CSS selector, really a pseudo-selector, called nth-child. Here is an example of using it:ul li:nth-child(3n+3) { color: #ccc; }What the above CSS does, is select every third list item inside unordered lists. That is, the 3rd, 6th, 9th, 12th, etc. But how does that work? And what other kinds of things can you do with nth-child? Let’s take a look.It boils down to what is in between those parentheses. nth-child accepts two keywords in that spot: even and odd. Those should be pretty obvious. “Even” selects even numbered elements, like the 2nd, 4th, 6th, etc.

• Threadsy Invites / Haiti Poster Project

  Chris Coyier

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:33 am

  Two things today.First, have you guys heard of Threadsy? I hadn’t, but apparently they got 2nd place at TechCrunch 50, which is pretty great. It’s a web application that combines several of your online “input streams” (e.g. Email, Twitter, and Facebook). I think that’s actually all they do right now, which I find kind of awesome, because those are the only ones I use anyway.I have 500 invites to give away for it. First come first serve as I understand it. Just click this to sign up.I really quite like it. The Threadsy team has done a killer job in creating an…

• Link Underlines Grow to Backgrounds on Hover

  Chris Coyier

  4 Feb 2010 | 7:10 am

  Reader Jaime Morrison emailed in:I’ve been mulling the idea of going with a link style in which a link’s underline “slides-up” to become a background highlight on hover.I started mulling over a few ideas on how to do this myself. Ultimately, I tried two different things but neither one of them is absolutely perfect.Take OneWe know we’re going to be using jQuery here (or some JavaScript library), because of the animation. My first though was to set relative positioning on the links, then use jQuery to append empty <span>’s to each link. The span would be…

• Free Template: DocTemplate

  Chris Coyier

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:42 am

  Little freebie template for ya’ll today. It was actually Doug Neiner’s idea, I ran with it, then he helped me out at the end tighten some stuff up.View Demo   Download FilesNoteIt’s PHP. So if you download it to check it out, throw it up on your web server to test it out (or somewhere you run PHP locally).NavigationThe navigation is all AJAX’d up using the jQuery .load() functionality. I just think it’s kinda fun. It supports “deep linking”, so if you were to link to this page with a hash-tag of a page (e.g. /DocTemplate/#parameters.php) , it…

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  Blog.SpoonGraphics

• 35 Inspiring Examples of Transparency in Logo Design

  Chris Spooner

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  Transparency effects in logo design help bring to life a digital mark, adding that extra level of depth and color. This showcase of examples provides some great design inspiration and shows how designers have creatively used transparency and overlaying effects to build unique logo designs. Goosebumps – Jared Milam Meca – Andre Oliveira Andy Fiord – sbDesign Nethik – Aurelie Ronflard Boss Hog Studio – Mathieu Schatzier Paranaiv – Are Sundnes Munich 2018 Museum of London – Corey Porter Bell Saol – Stefan Romanu Zipliner – David Pache Lexpro…

• This Week’s Favourites – February 5th 2010

  Chris Spooner

  5 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  In this week’s roundup of creative goodness, we have a selection of handy website wireframing templates; an article highlighting some interesting factors that boost the ‘wow factor’ in web designs; an interesting discussion about the risk of being unique; a fabulous vibrant Photoshop illustration tutorial; and a showcase of stationery and print design inspiration. GeekChix This great collection of resources from GeekChix pulls together some really useful templates that can be used to plan out your website design or application in sketch format. The roundup includes grids,…

• Nebulae Grunge Texture Pack for Premium Members

  Chris Spooner

  3 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  This second high resolution texture pack from Caleb Kimbrough of design resource blogs Lost and Taken and BuenoBrushes features a range of heavy grunge textures. Access All Areas members can get their hands on these high quality resources for free as part of their ongoing membership. These heavy grunge textures are ... This content is for Access All Areas members only Access All Areas members have the ability to view exclusive design tutorials and giveaways, discounts on a range of awesome design related products and more! Sound good?! Find out more about becoming a member.

• How To Create a Detailed Apple iPad Icon in Photoshop

  Chris Spooner

  1 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  The Internet world exploded with the news of the Apple tablet launch last week. Named the iPad, it’s set to bring yet another revolution to the way people access and browse the web. An iPad icon would be a sensible addition to any web designer’s resources toolbox, so let’s fire up Photoshop and create our very own detailed iPad icon graphic. The icon we’ll be creating features the typical front view of the iPad. Using the Apple website for reference, let’s get started. Create a new document, and use the Rounded Rectangle Tool to draw a portrait shape onto a new…

• Hand Drawn Skulls Vector Pack for Premium Members

  Chris Spooner

  29 Jan 2010 | 12:00 am

  Skulls are one of the most sought after vector resources, and are a particularly popular theme in the apparel industry. Who better to create a hand-drawn skulls vector pack than the talented folks from Go Media. This premium pack comes straight from their arsenal range of resources, and is free ... This content is for Access All Areas members only Access All Areas members have the ability to view exclusive design tutorials and giveaways, discounts on a range of awesome design related products and more! Sound good?! Find out more about becoming a member.

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  GoMediaZine

• Weapons of Mass Creation Interview: Fuel Brand Inc.

  Adam Wagner

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:38 pm

  Welcome to the fourth interview of the Weapons of Mass Creation video interview series. Not sure what this is all about? Read the kick-off article to get caught up! We sat down with Adelle Charles & Joshua Smibert of Fuel Brand, Inc and chatted about their background, goals, and views on the design industry. You’ll find both the video interview & the typed transcript below. Enjoy. Adelle Charles: Alright, I’m Adelle Charles from Fuel branding, and I’m the CCO. Joshua Smibert: Joshua Smibert, same. I guess most designers would know us through the site Fuel Your Creativity.

• iPad: Illustrators & Designers

  George Coghill

  3 Feb 2010 | 10:30 am

  Whether you’re an Apple user or not, it’s been pretty tough to avoid hearing about the iPad. The question here at Go Media Zine: what does it mean for illustrators and designers? It may be limited as far as content creation, but it also may hold huge potential for a new wave of users who want kick-ass visual content — and that means more opportunities for visual artists. Of course none of us mere mortals have one of these devices in-hand, so much of what I am about to discuss is pure speculation. However as an iPhone owner I think there are some things easily extracted from…

• Weapons of Mass Creation interview: Mark Weaver

  Adam Wagner

  27 Jan 2010 | 2:06 pm

  Here’s the third installation of the Weapons of Mass Creation video interview series featuring designer & illustrator Mark Weaver. Not sure what this is all about? Read the kick-off article to get caught up! You’ll find both the video interview & the transcript (to make up for poor audio quality) below. Enjoy! GoMediazine: How would people know you? Mark Weaver: I’m a graphic designer & illustrator. And basically, I started doing this project called “Make something Cool Every Day”, which was started by Olly Moss who is kind of a famous graphic…

• Interview: Film Poster Art with Tyler Stout

  Jeff Finley

  15 Jan 2010 | 8:38 am

  GoMediaZine: So who are you and how would people know you? Tyler Stout: My name is Tyler Stout. And I would guess people know me by seeing my stuff somewhere, or personally meeting me at some point in my life. GoMediaZine: Those posters you’ve done for the Alamo Drafthouse are everywhere. Can you explain your relationship with Alamo and how you got started working for them? Do you get paid to do these insane posters? Tyler Stout: I started working with them due to my friend Rob Jones, who is very involved with the Alamo as well as being a big-time poster artist himself. He was putting…

• Go Media featured in Advanced Creation: Illustrator

  Adam Wagner

  13 Jan 2010 | 7:33 am

  Near the end of 2009 we were contacted by Stéphanie Guillaume & her team at the French outpost of Advanced Creation about re-releasing a couple tutorials from The GoMediaZine. We said “sure!”, and sure enough, the hefty 150 page special issue arrived in Cleveland just this week. Typically the French division of Advanced Creation focuses on Adobe Photoshop, but like I said, this issue is special! It’s packed full of content, including 20 full-blown Adobe Illustrator tutorials! Among those twenty are two from right here on The GoMediaZine. Bill Beachy’s awesome…

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  BittBox

• Free Stuff: Brush Pilot Giveaway – Comment to Win

  Jay Hilgert

  8 Feb 2010 | 11:04 am

  Last week I released a new version of Brush Pilot (1.0.4), so I decided to have another giveaway to start of this week. I’ve got another 3 copies of Brush Pilot to give away to 3 lucky commenters. Brush Pilot is a fast, easy to use Photoshop Brush previewer for Mac OS X. Read the rules after the jump and good luck! Visit BrushPilotApp.com to download a demo and read more details. Contest Rules: All you have to do to enter is leave a comment. (tweeting is appreciated) Only comment once. 3 winners will be randomly chosen from the comments. You must leave an email address in order to win.

• Free Texture Tuesday: Grunge Frames

  Caleb Kimbrough

  2 Feb 2010 | 1:34 pm

  After browsing Flickr for some texture ideas, I ran across a cool “grunge frame” image and thought I would give it a whirl myself. Each of these textures are 4-5 images stacked on top of one another layers with various blending modes. I then just erased the center of certain layers, which gives the frame effect. I hope you find a good use for them, they were a blast to make. Enjoy! Preview About The Author: Caleb Kimbrough is the man behind LostAndTaken.com, a blog solely focused on giving away free high-res textures. a

• Photoshop 101: Editing Indexed Color Images from the Web

  Jay Hilgert

  1 Feb 2010 | 12:29 pm

  Have you ever plucked an image from the web and tried to edit it in Photoshop only to find annoying problems? It’s probably a .gif in Indexed color mode. For this quick example I’m using the MediaTemple ad in my sidebar, which happes to be an indexed .gif. When trying to edit an indexed color image in Photoshop, certain adjustments are disabled, as you can see below. The quickest way to tell what you’re dealing with is to glance at the Layers palette. You’ll see right away if it’s an indexed color image. All you need to do in order to edit your image is simply…

• Free Texture Tuesday: Grab Bag 2

  Caleb Kimbrough

  26 Jan 2010 | 2:09 pm

  Today marks the 300th texture we’ve given away here on Texture Tuesday, here’s to the next 300! I thought I’d do another grab bag set today, you can check out the first one here. Like before, these are just some textures I’ve had sitting around that deserved to be shared and used in your design projects. I need to give a shout out to Callum Chapman from Circlebox Blog for a couple of these, make sure to go tell him thanks. Enjoy! Preview About The Author: Caleb Kimbrough is the man behind LostAndTaken.com, a blog solely focused on giving away free high-res textures. a

• Brush Pilot 1.0.4 Now Available

  Jay Hilgert

  25 Jan 2010 | 1:51 pm

  I released Brush Pilot 1.0.4 yesterday, and I recommend everyone upgrade if you haven’t already. In 1.0.4 we’ve added the Sparkle framework for automatic updates. From now on when a new version is released Brush Pilot will automatically give you the option to download an install the new version. This way you don’t have to keep track of new versions, it does it for you. Also in 1.0.4 is a bug fix that prevents BP from crashing in Snow Leopard with no Photoshop installed. This is a free upgrade for all licensed users. The new version can be downloaded from the Brush Pilot…

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  W3Avenue

• Expandable Drop Down Ticker

  W3Avenue Team

  8 Feb 2010 | 2:55 pm

  Expandable Drop Down Ticker is a jQuery plugin you can use to create a ticker that can be viewed both sequentially and simultaneously. A drop down menu is automatically generated out of snippets of the ticker contents to let the user navigate the ticker on demand. Contents of your Drop Down Ticker can be defined either inline on the page, or inside an external file on the same server. External file is fetched using AJAX and the plugin supports re-fetching of this external file periodically, enabling you to push new content by updating the external file. Features Automatically generates a drop…

• jQuery Form Wizard Plugin

  W3Avenue Team

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:50 pm

  The jQuery Form Wizard Plugin will convert your regular forms into step-by-step form wizard without having to reload the page when moving from one step to another. The plugin is unobtrusive and gives you the ability to set up flow of the different steps, by creating specific routes based on user input. Implementation of jQuery Form Wizard Plugin is pretty simple. All you need to do is create a form on your page and divide this form into different steps using span or div elements. The only other requirement is that each of these elements must have class ”step” and unique id. Features…

• Support Multiple Methods For File Upload With Plupload

  W3Avenue Team

  7 Feb 2010 | 4:22 pm

  Plupload is an advanced open source JavaScript component for file uploads. It has the unique feature of supporting multiple upload methods including: HTML5 Gears, Silverlight, Flash, BrowserPlus and normal forms. Other features include: upload progress, image resizing, multiple file uploads,  and chunked uploads. Plupload unique features makes it highly usable upload handler for Content Management Systems or similar solutions. It is currently separated into a Core API  and a jQuery upload queue widget this enables you to either use it out of the box or write your own custom implementation.

• Technical Support For Your WordPress Customers

  W3Avenue Team

  7 Feb 2010 | 11:30 am

  Technical Support is a new WordPresss plugin that will enable your customers to easily ask for help, directly from their WordPress dashboard. Regardless of whether you have developed a custom theme for your customer or are just providing integration / consultancy services – this simple plugin will make a noticeable difference in your overall support efforts. Setting up Technical Support plugin is very easy – all you need to do is install the plugin and configure settings with your email address, logo, website URL, and list of support related topics. The plugin will automatically add a…

• Embed Custom Google Maps With gMap jQuery Plugin

  W3Avenue Team

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:40 pm

  gMap is a lightweight (only 2 KB in size) jQuery plugin that helps you easily embed Google maps in your web pages. gMap is very flexible, and you can customize it in many different ways by passing a JSON object (containing various custom properties) to the GMap() function. You can specify location of your gMap object using longitude and latitude.  Additional features include ability to specify which controls you want, enable or disable zooming with mouse scroll-wheel , custom marker image, multiple markers, custom viewport position, and zoom. Developed by Cedric Kastner; gMap jQuery Plugin…

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  Templates Block

• Going Global

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:34 am

  Going Global is a professional Blogger template for business blogs. This template is also suited to corporates who may have some small blog. Based on Wordpress by Linkprestige.com and created for Blogger by me. DownloadView DemoEssential Tips

• On The Highway

  7 Feb 2010 | 4:05 pm

  Something you`re looking for blog about your journeys on highways and long drives. Well, most of us have interesting stories along the highway. On The Highway Blogger template is perfect match for that! It`s also good for photography blogs too :) Based on Wordpress by WpThemesFree.com and created for Blogger by me. DownloadView DemoEssential Tips

• Glossy Heart

  6 Feb 2010 | 10:55 pm

  Glossy heart is a beautiful Blogger template with heart shaped header. Perfect for Valentines day special blogs. Based on Wordpress by Tipografo.org and created for Blogger by me. DownloadView DemoEssential Tips

• Sysyphus

  6 Feb 2010 | 7:46 pm

  Sysyphus is a clean and exceptionally decent looking Blogger template. The template has nice aquish dark layout with some cool dynamic drop down link lists. The template is best viewed in the resolution of 1024X768 or above. Based on Wordpress by Tipografo.org and created for Blogger by me. DownloadView DemoEssential Tips

• Cute Bubbles

  6 Feb 2010 | 1:21 am

  Cute Bubbles is a nice looking and colorful yet dark Blogger template. It has nice bubbles that makes it look a bit jolly. Although it doesn`t have the usual link lists but they can be put. The template features 2 columns, fixed, adapted from Wordpress, right sidebar and search box. Based on Wordpress by Point47.com and created for Blogger by me. DownloadView DemoEssential Tips

• 
  Good Dog Creative

• Doggie Do 365: day 40

  Eric

  9 Feb 2010 | 9:06 am

  A wallpaper created by loosely following a tutorial from abduzeedo.com. Share this on del.icio.us Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Submit this to DesignFloat Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Subscribe to the comments for this post? Moo this on DesignMoo! Bump this on DesignBump Blend this!

• Doggie Do 365: day 39

  Eric

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:08 pm

  Day 39 of the Daily Design Challenge is a logo for some random words that I put together. Kind of a fun little exercise. Monkeygrass. Share this on del.icio.us Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Submit this to DesignFloat Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Subscribe to the comments for this post? Moo this on DesignMoo! Bump this on DesignBump Blend this!

• Doggie Do 365: day 36

  Eric

  5 Feb 2010 | 11:36 am

  Share this on del.icio.us Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Submit this to DesignFloat Share this on Facebook Tweet This! Subscribe to the comments for this post? Moo this on DesignMoo! Bump this on DesignBump Blend this!

• Doggie Do 365: day 35

  Eric

  4 Feb 2010 | 12:29 pm

  It’s been a hectic week and, just like I knew would happen, I’ve missed a couple of days for the daily design challenge but I’m getting back into it so here’s day 35. “Artificial Intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.” Share this on del.icio.us Stumble upon something good? Share it on StumbleUpon Submit this to DesignFloat Share this on [...]

• Don’t Be A Website Pack Rat: Sell! Sell! Sell!

  Eric

  3 Feb 2010 | 11:47 am

  I’ve found that, as web professionals, it’s almost a requirement for us to collect domains and create pet projects so, what do we do when have these things that we can’t really use any longer but don’t want to just let the registrations expire? Make some quick cash, that’s what. I have a few domain names [...]

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  Rebuilding The Web

• How should Web browsers render alternative text?

  Rebuilding The Web

  1 Feb 2010 | 2:00 pm

  Recently, Steve Faulkner performed a detailed comparison of how the leading Web browsers render alternative text that revealed non-uniform behaviour across browsers. Steve called for the HTML5 team to document a recommended behaviour. This article adds to Steve's work and makes a case for what I believe to be the correct way to render alternative text.

• Is Web accessibility a human right?

  Rebuilding The Web

  25 Jan 2010 | 11:30 am

  The Web is now so tightly integrated into our society that it's second nature to obtain employment, access education, do commerce, get information, get entertainment and even build social relationships online. If the Web is now a permanent and integral part of our society, then is denying a group of people access to much of the Web a form of discrimination and a denial of a human right?

• Is it irresponsible to advocate using HTML5 before it is ready?

  Rebuilding The Web

  18 Jan 2010 | 12:50 pm

  A number of renowned HTML5 supporters are advocating the use of HTML5 to the general public while the spec is still in development, unproven, and subject to change. Is this in the best interest of Web site creators or simply irresponsible behaviour?

• An open invitation to the HTML5 team

  Rebuilding The Web

  4 Jan 2010 | 7:00 pm

  HTML5 was conceived and continues to be developed within a group of likeminded people. There has not been any in-depth debate about the design principles of HTML5, the direction in which HTML5 is heading, nor the process in which HTML5 is developed. As a result, HTML5 may not be meeting the needs of many stakeholders in Web technology and may be insufficient to significantly evolve the Web. I invite the HTML5 team to a series of debates, with myself and others, on HTML5 and the future of Web technology.

• Will HTML5 make the Web even more invalid?

  Rebuilding The Web

  21 Dec 2009 | 12:00 pm

  Currently, each Web browser silently auto-corrects invalid HTML in a different way. HTML5 will harmonize the auto-correction of invalid HTML, so that all browsers will fix errors in the same way. Uniform auto-correction of invalid HTML behaviour across all browsers can only lead to good things - right? Or will this create even more invalid HTML on the Web?

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  Blog Perfume

• Plugin: Project and Task Management on WordPress

  Blog Perfume

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:01 am

  CollabPress WordPress Plugin adds project and task management functionality to your WordPress blog. You can easily create projects and tasks for each project from now on. The main features includes 1) Unlimited project and task creation, 2) Email notifications when new tasks are created, 3) Assign due dates to tasks and 4) Uses built-in WordPress user accounts. It works with WordPress and WordPress MU 2.9.1. Pricing: Free Requirements: WordPress 2.9+ Source: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/collabpress/ SponsorsPSD2HTML.com - You Design - We XHTML / CSS. PSD to XHTML Service

• Theme: Free Premium Modern Minimalist Design

  Blog Perfume

  27 Jan 2010 | 12:01 am

  The Structure Theme is a free premium WordPress theme with a modern minimalist design. There are 4 themes included with the Structure Theme download; a white theme, black theme, two column blog and a single column blog design. The theme was created with a simple and clean aesthetic meant to easily adopt the style of the content added to the site. The Structure Theme is also designed with customization in mind. Meaning, with a little work, the theme can be completely personalized to suit your brand. Pricing: FREE Requirements: - Source: http://structuretheme.com/ SponsorsPSD2HTML.com - You…

• Theme: Beautiful Designed Web 2.0 Templates

  Blog Perfume

  25 Jan 2010 | 12:01 am

  Tehana Studios is a beautiful designed themes for your client’s website and blog. These web 2.0 templates come in 4 flavours, Ocean Theme, Dark Matter Theme, Snow Theme and Pond Theme. It has everything you need for a portfolio website and blog: Homepage, About Us, Portfolio, Contact, Blog, Blog article page, Custom graphics and icons. The template is highly customizable, the layers are named and put into folders accordingly. Pricing: $12 Requirements: - Source: http://themeforest.net/item/tehana-studios/82423 SponsorsPSD2HTML.com - You Design - We XHTML / CSS. PSD to XHTML Service

• The Benefits of Guest Blogging

  Blog Perfume

  20 Jan 2010 | 12:01 am

  Have you heard of guest blogging? If not, let me explain what guest blogging is all about, and then I’ll give you a bunch of reasons why it’s such a great idea. If you want to increase the number of visitors that your Wordpress blog receives, you will be interested in guest blogging. What is guest blogging? In short, guest blogging is where you write a great quality and interesting article for another blog owner. In return, you have a couple of links at the bottom of the article, which go back to your website. These links help increase the number of visitors to your website, in…

• Importance of a Good Web Design for Websites

  Blog Perfume

  18 Jan 2010 | 12:01 am

  Websites are similar to homes. Just as homes of an individual represent the outlook of the person living in, his style, his attitude along with way of living similarly websites are regarded as the outlook of a company. They represent the status and position of the respective company in the current market. There is constant race of out doing each other. The main reason to this is the exponential increase in the volume of traffic that is directed to websites. These days’ websites are referred as online service providers for a particular query. Websites are available in numerous numbers and…

• 
  Cre8pc Usability & Holistic SEO

• Kim Krause Berg Article Wins a SEMMY

  cre8pc

  2 Feb 2010 | 12:43 pm

  Tribal drum roll please…the article I wrote for Website Magazine last year won the SEMMY in Design and Usability, And I’m not anywhere near as gorgeous at Beyonce. The Runners Up should not go ignored. Competition is fierce. I honor Dr. Pete and Daniel Ritzenthaler: Runners-Up The top two runners-up in public voting were: 1. 25-point Website Usability Checklist Dr. Peter J. Meyers, User Effect | 2/10/09 2. Taking the Guesswork Out of Design Daniel Ritzenthaler, A List Apart | 5/5/09 Everyday Usability – 14-Point Checklist for Success is the winning piece. To all who voted,…

• Developing Requirements Documentation for Your Web Site

  cre8pc

  29 Jan 2010 | 1:08 pm

  When I brought up the topic of requirements gathering and documentation during a talk at SMX East last year, I was stunned at the positive response that followed. Clearly, not enough attention on web site planning is discussed or taught. Segments are, such as the navigation or content. User interface is debated. Goals are tossed about but sometimes not written down or adhered to. A serious chunk of preparation is ignored because managers, from any size business, don’t know what to include. They need someone who does. Because I was trained to be the worry wart on behalf of a web design…

• The Secret Wisdom of Search Engine Algorithm Chasers

  cre8pc

  29 Jan 2010 | 9:29 am

  I wanted to describe how the combination of organic search engine optimization, combined with captology (emotional web design) work together for findability on the Web. You can read The Algorithm Chasers at Search Engine Land’s Just Behave column, that was published online today. The incentive behind algorithm chasers is to drive traffic to revenue generating web pages and to know that, search engines seek out what’s relevant to users and what motivates them to click, read or link. Economy blues? It's not too late to increase your web site conversions with Kim's affordable usability…

• Usability 14-Point Checklist for Success is SEMMY Finalist

  cre8pc

  25 Jan 2010 | 3:10 pm

  The article I wrote last year for Website Magazine made the SEMMY Finals in the Design and Usability category. It’s time now for readers to vote on the 4 articles chosen by judges. The article is Everyday Usability – 14-Point Checklist for Success User behaviors change and evolve and it’s up to website owners to adapt. Constant attention must be given to how users and search engines interact with your site to ensure that you not only attract visitors, but give them reasons to come back. Because as every Web professional knows, the more users interact with your site, the better the…

• User Experience Supports Findabilty and Usability

  cre8pc

  21 Jan 2010 | 2:03 pm

  I’m always asked how to explain web site usability and why a site owner should bother investing in user experience design. What would make an impact on users? Understanding, in-depth, who web site visitors are is a good place to start. When we use the Web, we agree to an Internet, computer based experience. We may spend so much time with the journey itself that we never reach our destination. User experience design aids and supports findabilty and usability. Consider what happened when manufacturing replaced people with machines. In doing so, we lost the unseen energy, care and detailed…

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  DesignM.ag

• Code a Corporate Website from a Photoshop Design: PSD to HTML Tutorial

  Steven Snell

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:27 am

  Last week we published a tutorial for designing a basic corporate website layout in Photoshop, and in this tutorial we will walk through the process of coding that design in HTML and CSS. Here is a look at the design that we will be coding (click the image to see it in full-size). In order to work though this tutorial you will need the PSD file from the first tutorial which can be downloaded here. I’d also recommend saving a backup copy of the PSD in case something that we do messes up the file that you are working with. Step 1: The Files and Folders The sample site that we will be…

• 100+ Resources for WordPress Theme Developers

  Steven Snell

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:25 am

  One of the great things about working with WordPress and developing your own themes is the community and all of the resources that are available. If you’re not sure how to do something or looking to see what solutions other theme designers and developers are using, you can find plenty of infomation and tutorials to help. In this post we’ll feature a wide selection of resources that are extremely useful for theme designers and developers. If you work on custom themes for clients, themes for your own use, distribute free themes or sell premium themes, these resources may prove to be…

• Freebie: Media Icons from IconShock

  Steven Snell

  4 Feb 2010 | 4:53 pm

  Our friends at IconShock have designed a new set of icons for DesignM.ag readers. This set includes five media icons, with the usual high quality that we’ve come to expect from IconShock. The icons are available as PNG files and as Adobe Illustrator files. They can be used for personal or commercial projects but cannot be redistributed or sold. If you’re looking for more icon sets, take a look at what IconShock has to offer. Download the PNG files Download the Adobe Illustrator files Previous Icon Sets from IconShock: Blogging Icons E-Commerce Icons

• Interview with Ryan Putnam of Rype Arts

  Steven Snell

  3 Feb 2010 | 2:58 pm

  Ryan Putnam is an amazingly talented designer and illustrator. Many of you are probably familiar with his popular Illustrator tutorials at Vectortuts and his own blog, Vectips. Ryan also provides services to clients through Rype Arts, and I recently had the opportunity to ask him some questions about design and business. 1. Can you tell us a little bit about your background and what you do? I have been drawing and doodling my whole life. When I was a kid, I loved drawing comic books, cartoons, and re-creating magazine advertisements. I continued drawing and explored fine art in high school…

• Financial Management Tips for Freelancers

  Steven Snell

  2 Feb 2010 | 7:31 am

  Most freelance designers are experienced and talented with their trade, but not so much when it comes to financial issues. In this post I’d like to share some things that I have learned through my own experience of being self employed that I think will be able to help others. I am in no way a financial professional and you should always seek the advice of someone qualified on the specifics of your own situation, but these are some general things that have helped me along the way. 1. Have Emergency Savings If you haven’t started full-time freelancing yet, the best thing you can do…

• 
  Pro Blog Design

• How to Install Wordpress on your PC

  sogeking

  8 Feb 2010 | 8:00 am

  Wordpress is arguably the most popular and the best blogging platform out there. You might have installed Wordpress on your site, but you might be scared to experiment with Wordpress worrying that you could break your site and Wordpress.Experimenting is one of the best way to learn new things and if you break your site, you probably might not want your visitors to see the fault as it might leave a bad impression. So, it is necessary to have the ability to learn WordPress and try new themes, plugins and other items without putting it online where people can see.So, the best solution is to…

• Design Review: Free Pixels

  Michael Martin

  4 Feb 2010 | 9:00 am

  In this review, we’re going to work through a website (FreePixels.com) as a case study, looking at its design and seeing what we can learn from it and what we could improve on.So to start off, let’s take a look at Free Pixels. They offer almost 4000 extremely high quality images, for free. All you have to do is leave the small watermark in the corner, or create your own link back.That makes it a very handy site for bloggers! Now load up the site in a new tab, and let’s start our case study!The very first thing I look for is the logo and slogan. The logo is right where you’d expect it,…

• The iPad – Help Me Decide?

  Michael Martin

  1 Feb 2010 | 9:00 am

  I don’t know what to do.The iPad came out last week and, well, I want one. But that’s a standard side-effect of a Steve Jobs keynote; you always end up wanting one.There’s been a lot of talk about shortcomings of the device, and a lot of the points have merit. Enough merit to stop me from getting it though?In this article, I’ll be working through all of the pros and all of the cons I can see so far. Hopefully by the end, I’ll know what to do.(PS – Just for the record; I’m a Windows 7 user on a HP desktop. I also have a Toshiba laptop that will be getting Ubuntu 9.10 installed on…

• 25 Color Combination Tools For Designers

  Lee Ka Hoong

  25 Jan 2010 | 8:00 am

  Color is difficult to get right. There’s a near infinite number of combinations out there, but only a few that will actually look right for your project. Because it’s so important to a design’s success, it’s worth taking a little time to work out your palette.There are a lot of online tools to help out with this. They all vary slightly to suit designers with different preferences on how they work. We’ve collected together 25 of the best here, with a quick overview on each to help you decide which to try.Website Color Match Color Match is a website tool that shows…

• How To Make a WordPress Events List

  Michael Martin

  18 Jan 2010 | 9:00 am

  An events list is just what you would expect; a list of upcoming events, ordered by the date they are taking place on (Not the date they were written on!).In this post, we are going to create our own events list that will let us add events simply by writing posts and assigning them to an “Events” category. It can’t get much easier than that!This is exactly what we set up for a recent client of ours, American Majority. You can see their full events listing here, or solely the events in one state here (And on both pages, you’ll see the corresponding list in the sidebar as well).There…

• 
  Webdesigner Depot

• Free Speech and Freedom of Information: Advice for Bloggers

  Walter

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:05 am

  The information bloggers choose to put out there often has a huge impact on how they’re perceived and what others online think about them. And what many bloggers don’t realize is that information they put on their blogs can have a direct legal impact. Even if what you’re posting to your blog isn’t breaking any laws, it may be considered unethical by others, which can often be just as damaging. Here’s a guide to free speech and freedom of information specifically for bloggers. Legal issues, ethical issues, and other things to consider are all covered. If you have…

• A Collection of Free iPad Icons, Tutorials and PSDs

  Walter

  8 Feb 2010 | 9:24 am

  Since its controversial release, the iPad has been both criticized and admired by the design community. In this post we have compiled a list of great resources, that teach you how to create your own iPad icons, as well as a collection of ready made icons and PSDs. To download the files, please click on the preview image to go to the source site and remember to check theterms of use before using them in your projects. If you know of any other great iPad freebies, please add them in the comments section below and we’ll include them in this post when appropriate. Enjoy… iPad…

• Our Favorite Tweets of the Week Jan 31-Feb 6, 2010

  Walter

  6 Feb 2010 | 11:08 pm

  Every week we tweet a lot of interesting stuff highlighting great content that we find on the web that can be of interest to web designers. The best way to keep track of our tweets is simply to follow us on Twitter, however, in case you missed some here’s a quick and useful compilation of the best tweets that we sent out this past week. Note that this is only a very small selection of the links that we tweeted about, so don’t miss out. To keep up to date with all the cool links, simply follow us @DesignerDepot Interesting Design Trends Among Popular Blogs: http://bit.ly/dfPvgz HTML5…

• Comics of the Week #11

  Walter

  5 Feb 2010 | 10:08 pm

  Every week we feature a set of comics created exclusively for WDD. The content revolves around web design, blogging and funny situations that we encounter in our daily lives as designers. These great cartoons are created by Jerry King, an award-winning cartoonist who’s one of the most published, prolific and versatile cartoonists in the world today. So for a few moments, take a break from your daily routine, have a laugh and enjoy these funny cartoons. Feel free to leave your comments and suggestions below as well as any related stories of your own… A Mother/Daughter Thing The Lonely…

• How to Plan for the Absence of JavaScript

  Walter

  5 Feb 2010 | 9:48 am

  Though the methods used to gather website traffic statistics call into question the validity of the stats themselves, the fact is that some of your website’s visitors will have JavaScript disabled. You could divide your traffic sources into four broad categories: Search engines, mobile visitors, visitors using screen readers and visitors who have JavaScript turned off. When planning your information architecture and design, you must figure out how to deal with these special groups. I have assembled a few recent real-world scenarios to find clarity on the issue. When you want to hide…

• 
  Yoast» - Yoast - Tweaking Websites

• Unleashing Quix

  Joost de Valk

  13 Jan 2010 | 6:15 am

  I've been working on a secret (side) project for 3-4 months now, way longer than I ever intended to work on it, but it's now ready for release. I'm ready to show you Quix, a tool I think is very cool, which I've shared with quite a few of my friends already who all like it as well.Quix is an extensible bookmarklet, that allows you to easily access all your bookmarks and bookmarklets, across all your browsers, while maintaining them in only one spot. All you have to do is remember the shortcut for the bookmarklet, so, basically, it’s like a command line for your browser.Check out the…

• Checking Blog Privacy Settings

  Joost de Valk

  31 Dec 2009 | 2:10 am

  As a result of last nights post, I dove in and added a check to my Robots Meta plugin that checks whether you're allowing search engines to spider your site.If not, it'll throw an ugly warning on each and every page until you fix it:The code for it is easy, and as I'd like other plugins to start using it as well, let me give it to you here:function blog_public_warning() { if ( '0' get_option('blog_public') ) { echo "<div id='message' class='error'><p>" echo "<strong>Robots Meta Issue: You're blocking access to…

• Web Designer Mag should fix its SEO

  Joost de Valk

  30 Dec 2009 | 12:06 pm

  Ok I just had to post this, as it's too funny. I got a Google Alert this afternoon for this post, which mentioned one of my plugins as being listed by Web Designer Magazine. So, I Googled them, as the post didn't link to them, and got this result:Notice something? I know I did: there's no description there. So I clicked on and checked the page to see what could cause that, finding it was easy:<meta name='robots' content='noindex,nofollow' />It was listed right above the EditURI line that WordPress puts in by default, telling me they forgot to uncheck a box (that get's checked by default…

• WordPress Hosting

  Joost de Valk

  22 Dec 2009 | 8:06 am

  You can find my WordPress hosting article here, because of an experiment the comments for that article are here, while the article itself is "on it's own".WordPress Hosting is a post from Joost de Valk's Yoast - Tweaking Websites.A good WordPress blog needs good hosting, you don't want your blog to be slow, or, even worse, down, do you? Check out my thoughts on WordPress hosting!

• Preventing your site from being indexed, the right way

  Joost de Valk

  17 Dec 2009 | 6:41 am

  It keeps amazing me that I keep seeing people use robots.txt files to prevent sites from being indexed and thus showing up in the search engines. You know why it keeps amazing me? Because robots.txt doesn't actually do the latter, even though it does prevent your site from being indexed.Let's go through some terms here:Indexed / Indexing The process of downloading a site or a page's content to the server of the search engine, thereby adding it to it's "index".Ranking / Listing / Showing Showing a site in the search result pages (aka SERPs).So, while the most common process goes from Indexing…

• 
  A List Apart

• Words that Zing

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:00 am

  When someone consults a website, there is a precious opportunity not only to provide useful information but also to influence their decision. To make the most of this opportune moment, we must ensure that the site says or does precisely the right thing at precisely the right time. Understanding the rhetorical concept of kairos can help us craft a context for the opportune moment and hit the mark with appropriately zingy text.

• The Problem with Passwords

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:00 am

  Abandoning password masking as Jakob Nielsen suggests could present serious problems, including undermining a user’s trust by failing to meet a basic expectation. But with design patterns gleaned from offline applications, plus a dash of JavaScript, we can provide feedback and reduce password errors without compromising the basic user experience or losing our visitors’ trust.

• Using SVG for Flexible, Scalable, and Fun Backgrounds, Part II

  26 Jan 2010 | 1:00 am

  In Part II, dig deeper into the technology behind using SVG for your site design. Explore how to incorporate SVG in a cross-browser friendly manner, including using SVGWeb to ensure that the SVG shows in Internet Explorer. And discover the unique characteristic that makes SVG ideal for page backgrounds: scalability.

• Using SVG For Flexible, Scalable, and Fun Backgrounds, Part I

  26 Jan 2010 | 1:00 am

  Many of us think of Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) as an also-ran: fine for charts and tables, but not much else. Yet SVG can actually enhance a site’s overall design, and can be made to work in even the most stubborn browser. In Part I of a two-part series, Shelley Powers covers important basics of working with SVG, including browser support and accessibility.

• The Survey, 2009

  15 Dec 2009 | 2:00 am

  For the third year in a row, good citizens of the web, we ask that you take a few minutes to tell us about your professional skills, educational background, career prospects, job benefits, and more.

• 
  ITHands

• Why Publishing eBooks is a Smart Idea

  Jessica

  13 Jan 2010 | 6:23 pm

  Did you know there are over 4000- 5000 eBook downloads every day? And that number is increasing rapidly. Everyone is getting on the bandwagon and ebooks are being offered through several mediums including Amazon, Google, Ebooks.com, Barnes & Noble, Project Gutenberg, and many others. Are eBooks Taking Over? Many feared that ebooks would be the end of paper books, but we’ve actually seen the opposite. Did you know that ebooks are actually helping the sales of paper books? Many publishers are reporting an increase in paper book sales rather than what they originally thought. “Ebook…

• Website Budgeting Made Simple

  Jeff

  15 Dec 2009 | 12:36 am

  Did you know that budgeting for a website is a lot like buying airplane tickets? Often I get the question, “How much does a website cost?”  And usually my answer is something along the lines of, “Well, that depends…”  The point being that the cost of website creation has a lot of different factors that may influence the actual investment.  Yeah, but how much does a website cost? We like to ask the question, “What do you want your website to do?  Asking this question will hep us understand what our client is thinking about their website investment.  …

• Ebook Conversion: Good News for Publishers

  Jeff

  3 Dec 2009 | 11:41 pm

  Good news for publishers, print companies and writers! In what might be the best thing to come to the industry since the softcover book there is now a new and exciting medium to distribute published content.  With the rise of Ebooks and the Ebook readers there are new channels for revenue available and savvy publishers are making sure they have a piece of the action.  More and more are proactively converting their published works to electronic book formats such as: HTML OTML Mobi XML Amazon Kindle AZW Microsoft .LIT Adobe .pdf IDPF .epub Libretto Digital Library System Warning: No Free…

• Websites: Give Me Progress Over Perfection Any Day

  Jeff

  2 Dec 2009 | 11:16 pm

  How do you think about your website? Here’s one way, a website is an online investment which should deliver an acceptable return on investment (ROI)?  We like to stress the investment component because, like you, we are bottom line folks who wants to make sound business decisions based on facts and not fads. The facts are when we create a website for a client we try to use the best project management practices like SCRUM methodology to deliver a project experience and website that meets or exceeds our clients expectations.  But after all this hard work and communication will the…

• The 3 Most Common Website Mistakes

  Jessica

  1 Dec 2009 | 11:48 am

  We’ve all seen them–bad websites. Everything from the ones where the color scheme reminds you of your Aunt Mildred’s retro mismatched living room to chaotic navigation which makes you feel like you’re playing a game of Frogger rather than searching for a page on a website. If we admit it, we know that some bad websites happen to best of us. This brings us to the classic question of struggle “Why do bad websites happen to good people?” Reason #1 Failure to see website as an investment A website is like a vehicle (except a website actually makes money for you). A website…

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  CSSJockey.com

• An easy way to create login panel with jQuery and CSS

  CSSJockey

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:01 am

  Creating Login Panel with jQuery and CSS Among many studies conducted to find out just what influences people’s perception of a website’s credibility, one interesting finding is that users really do judge a book by its cover… or rather, a website by its design. Rapid changes in design trends are driving focus towards its usability. More and more features are being zipped into a plain and simple design for users to get bountiful results without spending more than a jiffy. The back-end coding is the key device to achieve this simplicity in design. Keeping this mind, I’ve designed a…

• Stop Using IE 6 or Google Will Abandon You

  CSSJockey

  29 Jan 2010 | 5:52 pm

  Stop Using IE6 or Google will Abandon you!! Minutes ago, I received an email from Google which made jump in my chair with joy. As a developer, no other news could make me happier (especially at this time, when I was on the verge of pulling my hair, trying to get a client’s site work properly on this beastly browser). We all know about the age old fight of web developers, site owners, designers and web service providers with the timeworn Internet Explorer 6 users. Interestingly, this fight has been supported by many communities across the globe and Microsoft gave its share by taking away all…

• CSSJockey – Climbing for Clean Water with Summit on Summit

  CSSJockey

  12 Jan 2010 | 11:01 am

  Foot sponsored by CSSJockey.com You got it right! I’m very much climbing each step with these extraordinary people, who are making a tremendous effort to bring not mere clean running water, but the true sense of humanity to the people deprived of it. What this is about is all about? More than ONE BILLION people worldwide do not have access to clean, safe drinking water. The astonishing reality is, every 15 seconds a child dies from a waterborne disease. KENNA, the founder of this expedition, joined by a group of Global Influencers will climb Mt. Kilimanjaro 19340 foot in lieu of bringing…

• PowerGallery Contest Winners!!

  CSSJockey

  9 Jan 2010 | 7:44 pm

  Congratulations Power Gallery Contest Winners The Year 2010 started a bit silently for the readers for CSSJockey. Well, no I’ve not been hiding under rock. Had a bundle of new things to work on, for your up-coming surprises and yes, looking for many great designs online which have been flaunted on CSSTreat, do check them out! For the news everybody has been waiting for eagerly! Yes, you guessed it right, The CJ Santa’s Lucky Winners of the Christmas Contest. Ho-Ho-Ho! I greatly appreciate everybody who took time off their holidays to participate and keep an eye for the contest.

• CSSJockey Now Featured in Alltop.com

  CSSJockey

  26 Dec 2009 | 4:50 am

  CSSJockey Featured on Alltop.com Isn’t that so cool? Hell yeah!! And I’m so excited about it. Have been closely following Guy Kawasaki for around 2 years now and finally being featured on one of his project Alltop.com makes me feel on cloud 9!! I have always loved his ideology and followed his videos, posts, tweets. It always gave me something to learn from. For this reason I think Alltop.com is a great platform to be associated with as it gives a varied exposure to online businesses and personals while providing them a space to pool all resources they need.   So, here I’m people,…

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  Web Design and Developer Jobs

• Freelance Web and/or Flash Designer

  6 Feb 2010 | 10:46 am

  Looking to partner with independent/freelance Chicago-area web graphic and Flash designers. I operate Anacys Consulting, a small website development firm in Chicago's northwest suburbs and am looking to partner/network with independent/freelance w

• Front End Web Developer/Implementation Engineer

  2 Feb 2010 | 12:14 pm

  Front End Web Developers are the primary owners of the technical components of an implementation project. They are responsible for bridging the gap between business owners of a project and the technology team responsible for implementing it. We are l

• Senior Drupal Developer

  27 Jan 2010 | 2:51 pm

  Digital Pulp, an independently-owned web development company in NYC, is seeking a developer that has excellent programming skills in PHP and Ruby. Also know Python? Great! Java or C#? Well, we don't use those, but as long as you can sling around some

• Marketing Consultant

  27 Jan 2010 | 2:00 pm

  Adelie Design is looking for a marketing consultant to work with clients on an as-needed basis. You will meet with clients to determine their needs and develop marketing plans. You will work with our lead designer to develop creative marketing campai

• User Experience Expert

  27 Jan 2010 | 11:13 am

  We are seeking a team member with passion for great user-centered products to help design the best experience possible for our customers! Position Summary: The User Experience Expert will lead interaction design and research for new Eventbrite fe

• 
  Young & Freelancing - Bryan Connor

• Interview with Josh Brill of the Lumadessa Art & Design Label

  Bryan

  25 Jan 2010 | 10:08 pm

  I don’t pretend to know a great deal about the illustration or print making world but when an artist presents us with a strong new aesthetic and a brilliant concept people take notice. This seems to be the case for the very striking style of the prints of Josh Brill, founder of the now quite popular Lumadessa label. As a Maine College of Art graduate with a degree in New Media Design, Josh was in the position of many young freelancers ; fresh out of school and full of creativity. Since that time Josh has set up a successful art and design label under which he can produce work that he…

• Free for a Reason? Type Design Quality and the Web Part 2

  Bryan

  11 Jan 2010 | 9:20 am

  I asked 6 type designers and type foundries: Does free mean ugly and unconsidered? Is any font worth a lot of money better than one that is offered for free? This is part 2 of their responses. Previously we had answers from Ray Larabie, Eric Olson and Bas Jacobs, three well respected type designers. Today we have the exciting conclusion featuring Peter Bilak, Ross Mills, and Ken Barber. Peter Bilak – Typotheque Visit the Typotheque Site or read about Peter Bilak I do think that fonts represent a certain value, and it is very complicated to offer a quality typeface for free. The longest…

• Free for a Reason? Type Design Quality and the Web Part 1

  Bryan

  23 Dec 2009 | 10:25 pm

  Does free mean ugly and unconsidered? Is any font worth a lot of money better than one that is offered for free? I asked 6 type designers and type foundries these same questions and here are their responses. In this post we have Ray Larabie, Eric Olson and Bas Jacobs, three well respected type designers answering. Tune in next time for the exciting conclusion featuring Peter Bilak, Ross Mills, and Ken Barber. Ray Larabie – TypodermicVisit the Typodermic Site or read about Ray LarabieThe reason I started offering free fonts on the web is that they really weren’t very good. When I was…

• User-test Your Website or App for Free

  Bryan

  2 Nov 2009 | 9:34 am

  In the world of interactivity, the importance of user testing is drastically underestimated. Designers love to think that users will use their site the way they designed it without any hesitation and that everything is obvious. It’s nearly impossible to find a major flaw in something you’ve designed from the ground up. A single user test can change all that very quickly as it has for me time and time again. The misconception of user testing is that it’s expensive and ultimately not worth it. There are many services that will gather “qualified participants” to…

• Zook Tutoring Launched – Web Design & Branding

  Bryan

  26 Oct 2009 | 8:53 am

  Just launched last night, Zook Tutoring is my latest web creation for Rebecca Zook a wonderful client who tutors math online. The site runs on wordpress and features a lovely (if i do say so my self) three column flexible layout. Description Rebecca was looking to take her tutoring business to the next level using innovative online tools and effective online teaching methods and she needed a website to match. This site now serves as home base for all of her students with FAQS, demo videos, and resources for online learning. Rebecca works one on one with each of her students using online…

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  The Niche Store Builder

• Google Buzz – Should Twitter and Facebook be Concerned?

  Mark Hansen

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:41 am

  You know… I was going to write a witty post about Google and this new Google Buzz product they are releasing today. I just don’t have the energy. I am anti-google right now. What ever happened to them being a search engine? Instead, it seems they are indexing everything, including my underwear size, and showing it on their own site instead of referring visitors to the actual websites where the content is! Isn’t that justa  big scraper? Anyhow… Read Write Web is live blogging it… If you like twitter and you like Facebook – people say you just HAVE to get on…

• Reminder that We Need to Secure Our Websites!

  Mark Hansen

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:17 am

  Not sure how many of you follow Ben Johnson over at his blog – but he recently had to repair the damages left behind from an attack of a few of his Wordpress Sites. Never fun… I went through it myself back in 2007… and had to spend 2-3 days getting everything back in order! Anyhow – Ben wrote a GREAT post with a few common sense Tips to Secure your WordPress System. 10 minutes today – could save you several days of rebuilding work in the future! Reminder that We Need to Secure Our Websites! posted from the Niche Store Builder website. Related posts:Niche…

• Back to Basics – How to Add a Video to Your WordPress Post or Page

  Mark Hansen

  4 Feb 2010 | 12:25 pm

  Many of you said you liked the last Back to Basics post on What is an RSS Reader, so I thought I would dip back into that pool of things that some of you may not know about and shy away from, because you think its too hard to do. I mean, even though it comes easy to some, it may not be so easy for others. No use debating the fact that video is AWESOME for your review sites and readers LOVE them! So lets add one! How to Add a Youtube Video to a WordPress post or Page First, the easiest way to add a Youtube Clip to your WordPress site is with a plugin. You will find several Youtube plugins at…

• A Basic Build Sheet for Team Niche Site Building

  Mark Hansen

  4 Feb 2010 | 8:11 am

  A week or two ago, I tossed out the idea of putting together a small group of people to test the idea of  Group Building a Niche Niche. At the time of writing that post, I had already tossed the idea back and forth with a few of my contacts and we had already set a plan for doing the exact thing. With this post, I wanted to share exactly how we are doing it, so you can see if it fits into what you might have in store for 2010. I should also mention that I DO have a plan on paper on how to scale this into something that allows many people come in and join – but will not do anything…

• Everything You Wanted to Know About BANS

  Mark Hansen

  30 Jan 2010 | 12:37 pm

  There are going to be some pretty big changes coming to Build a Niche Store Users over the next few weeks and months, so I thought I would start a “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about BANS aka Build a Niche Store” page. This page is going to be a long work in progress… and will include quite a bit of stuff that goes back to my early BANS days in 2007, up to the most current changes, which may leave Build a Niche Store Owners with no choice, but to upgrade to something else! Last Admin Update: 01/30/2010 Current Status of BANS As of the latest update, BANS sites should…

• 
  Seth Goldstein Online

• My theories on Social Media and how to use it for marketing and brand knowledge

  Seth

  4 Feb 2010 | 1:46 pm

  Having been involved with social media for more than 5 years I’ve notices trends and ideas popping up. Through out this time I’ve developed a number of theories about social media and how a company or their social media representative can better utilize the avenues given to them by these social networks. Here are some of the basic tenants 6. Social media takes time – If you don’t have the time and don’t want to hire someone to do social media for you then don’t bother getting into it. You won’t get anything out of it 5. Social media isn’t about…

• Browser’s should adopt standards, not fight them

  Seth

  15 Jan 2010 | 2:12 pm

  Most of us remember the days of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 5 and IE 6. To many those were simpler times. Most people were using the Seattle software giant’s browser exclusively and because of that most people knew nothing else. Come in the new era of browsers. First the classic Mozilla browser, rising from the ashes of the destroyed and defeated Netscape. Later Firefox would take over as the dominant product coming from the Mozilla Foundation. Apple builds Safari and Google builds Chrome. Oh, and yes, let’s not forget about the little engine that would not die, Opera.

• With sadness comes the need to cope. How you cope is different for everyone

  Seth

  11 Jan 2010 | 3:49 pm

  So as many of you know my Grandma (Sylvia Goldstein) died this morning at 7:20 am. I found out around 10 am as I was finishing my morning walk. Grandma was 95 years old. She had recently fallen into the grips of Alzheimers and for over a year she had her good days, her bad days and her horrible days. My grandma was a very independent,  strong and loving woman. She was without a doubt one of the most important women in my life. Since I was little, we always and a very strong bond. She knew how to relate to me. She would come visit from the Bronx to my then house in Yardley (Pennsylvania) and…

• Happy New Year!

  Seth

  31 Dec 2009 | 8:00 pm

  Happy New Year! May 2010 be even better than 2009.

• What has 2009 meant to me

  Seth

  31 Dec 2009 | 2:03 pm

  As the hours go closer and closer to the annual celebrate we know as New Years, I can’t help but look back at 2009 with a grin on my face and a proud sense of accomplishment. In 2009, I’ve had my best year so far for my company, Goldstein Media. I celebrated my first anniversary to the love of my life, my wife and I’ve renewed old relationships and forged new ones. 2009 has, overall, been a good year for me. You won’t see me complaining. I’ve grown as a person and for that I’m very thankful. In 2009, I started up a joint venture with, a now close friend and…

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  Make My Own Website Now

• How To Import Your PSD Layout Into Dreamweaver (Part 1)

  admin

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:52 pm

• How To Make Your Own Website With Photoshop (Part 1)

  admin

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:48 pm

• Welcome to Make My Own Website Now!

  admin

  11 Jan 2010 | 2:26 pm

  Welcome to Make My Own Website Now! You know, if you really want to make money online, you’re going to have to have your own website. The reasons for this are many and are clearly explained why in the free ebook “Create Your First Website By 3:45 This Afternoon” which you can grab a copy of here and which shows you how to create your first website using the Kompozer web editor and the FTP client Filezilla – both of which are free. As daunting as the idea of trying to make your own website from start to finish is, trust me, the only thing you need is the right…

• Filezilla Tutorial – How to Upload Files To Your Website Via FTP

  admin

  9 Jan 2010 | 4:08 am

  Technorati Tags: FileZilla, FTP, tutorial

• FileZilla (FTP Tutorial)

  admin

  9 Jan 2010 | 4:05 am

  Technorati Tags: FileZilla, FTP, tutorial

• 
  Powerusers

• 10 Alternative Uses for WordPress

  Tom Walker

  6 Feb 2010 | 12:48 am

  This is the Guest Post by Tom Walker. If you are interested in writing for us then check out the details here. WordPress is the best and most popular blogging platform around. It’s free, easy to use, endlessly customizable and supported by hundreds of excellent plugins. With WordPress setting such high standards, however, many people have started to question why other types of sites are so much more difficult to set up and manage. Fortunately, WordPress has become more than simply a blogging tool; it’s now possible to run almost any type of site imaginable using the right mix of plugins…

• Cross-Cultural Web Design: Thinking Global From the Start

  Christian Arno

  4 Feb 2010 | 5:36 am

  This is the Guest Post by Christian Arno. If you are interested in writing for us then check out the details here. Building an attractive, user-friendly website is one thing. Adapting it to fit with the language and culture of other countries is quite a different thing. Indeed, the very moment you launch your website into cyberspace you’re global. And it’s for this reason that you should make a few key considerations early on in the design phase, so that if you decide you need to adapt it at a later point, the process can be implemented a lot more smoothly. Content is King image source…

• Free Under Water Wallpaper Pack #2

  Nikhil

  30 Jan 2010 | 4:35 am

  This is a beautiful under water scene for your desktop or iphone. I hope this will inspire your thoughts to go more deep. The wallpapers are available in various resolutions 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 16801260, 1920×1200 and for iphone. Download Now! Submit your Wallpapers or Freebies: If you have created some quality stuff like Wallpapers, Icons, Textures then you can share it here on Powerusers. Only condition is that it must be free for personal use. You can license it under Creative Commons. So send me your creations in…

• Things You Should Consider Before Building Your Website

  Chris Holland

  28 Jan 2010 | 8:06 am

  This is the Guest Post by Chris Holland. If you are interested in writing for us then check out the details here. So, you have decided it’s about time for you or your business to get a website, but where do you start? Below are some important things you should consider. What is the goal or purpose of your website? image by scottwills This is the first and most important step to think about before contacting a designer. You will need to identify what you want your website to achieve – do you want to sell products? Advertise your services? Or just be a point for potential customers to…

• 9 Inspirational Bloggers & Freelancers

  Tom Walker

  22 Jan 2010 | 9:03 am

  This is the Guest Post by Tom Walker. If you are interested in writing for us then check out the details here. The life of a successful freelancer is hard, but tremendously rewarding. Without 9 to 5 hours or a boss breathing down your neck, you can pretty much do as you please. You can work how you want, when you want, where you want: in an office, at home, or from a beach in Barbados, assuming you’ve got a laptop and reasonable Wi-Fi signal! As glamorous as life as a top freelancer might seem, there’s no denying that lots of hard work and unflinching dedication are required to achieve…

• 
  geeksonsteroids.com

• Competitive Prices For Web Design Templates

  janeth

  5 Feb 2010 | 1:44 pm

  At one time web designers created websites from scratch. At that time designers would spend months trying to create the perfect website design. Once the design was finished the website would be turned over to a programmer to handle the programming and web developer to handle the completion of the website creation. However things have changed greatly since that time. Today we have website templates that are created much easier, faster and are more affordable. The programs we use cut down significantly on the amount of time and work it takes to develop a website. While a good template can cost…

• Cost Effective Website Designs

  janeth

  5 Feb 2010 | 1:37 pm

  A web developer’s perspective: The availability of website templates has opened up a new world of opportunity for web developers. A web developer can now create better quality websites in much less time, thanks to web template websites. A web developer can quickly choose the template he needs, purchase it, customize it and give it to the client as a custom designed website. It is no surprise that there are currently more quality websites being created today than at any time in the past. Business perspective: Entrepreneurs or small business owners now have more choices when it comes to…

• Best Prices On osCommerce Templates

  janeth

  5 Feb 2010 | 8:05 am

  Best Prices On osCommerce Templates I deal with a lot of people that are looking for the best price on certain web design items however; the best price isn’t always the best way to go. The purpose of a website is to make money and if you start cutting corners on the amount of money you are willing to spend, you will also be cutting corners on the amount of money you are able to make. I’ve been designing websites for the last 8 years but what is more important than that is that I’ve been making my living online for the last 8 years. And I can tell you that the look and feel of your…

• Dog Website Designs

  janeth

  3 Feb 2010 | 4:11 pm

  You can take any of the websites below and customize the look and feel a little and have a nice looking custom designed site. It doesn’t matter if you are trying to sell Rottweiler’s and the sites got photos of horses or even a color you don’t like. All that can be customized to have the look and feel you are wanting with the photos of the dogs you are trying to sell. To customize one of the templates you would be looking at $150.00 plus the cost of the template and to take that same template and place it into a wordpress content management system you would be looking at another…

• Keyword Research

  janeth

  1 Feb 2010 | 3:29 pm

  A website should have three levels, the home page for your most competitive keyword then coming off the home page we should have our medium competitive keywords. Then under each of those we should have related theme keyword phrases that are extremely specific. The extremely specific keyword phrases would be the long tail keywords. This allows us to build a theme based website; each keyword is based on the same theme as the one above it and links back to the category above it. Now, keeping in mind that all pages start with some type of PR, by building long tail keyword specific pages and…

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  Productivedreams.com

• Welcome 2010 – A Free Wallpaper For Your Desktop & Iphone

  Gopal Raju

  24 Jan 2010 | 2:27 pm

  I know its late for a New Year gift, but better late than never. This wallpaper is for all my readers who have always been supporting, motivating and encouraging me throughout the years. This was created digitally using Fireworks and Photoshop and is something along the lines of the design of IndoFolio. I hope it will enrich your desktop. Its available for 1024×768 (standard) and 1280×800 (wide) resolutions. An Iphone version has been included as well. The wallpaper is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License and mainly should not be…

• 22 Sites & Galleries to submit your logos

  Gopal Raju

  17 Jan 2010 | 4:36 am

  So you have done a few nice logos, what’s next? Go ahead, submit them on the best logo galleries. I’ve compiled a list of websites that accept logo submissions, along with the link to their submission forms. The ranking and other details of each site has been included as well, for your ease.PS: The ranking details are provided just to give you an idea on how popular each website is. The information may vary from day to day.Only three in the list requires registration to submit your logos Logo From DreamsAlexa Rank: 147286Page Rank: 5Famous in Countries: China, India, USA and Spain…

• How to improve the page rank of your twitter profile page

  Gopal Raju

  12 Jan 2010 | 12:09 pm

  As I mentioned in my previous post, a good page rank for your twitter profile means you are someone worth following. Before reading further, I would suggest you to check the PR of your twitter profile page. Also try checking the PR’s of the giants. I’m glad to see Google Page Rank impacting the public social media profiles of services like twitter.So what is Google looking for? Check out this quote from Marketing Professor. What is Google Looking For? * Credible inbound links from sources with credible inbound links * Quality thematic content in their Twitter stream (jumping from…

• Twibies.com – The ultimate twitter resource for designers

  Gopal Raju

  3 Jan 2010 | 9:50 am

  Happy New Year friends! Being a freelancer gives me time to come up with more posts Before we dive into more details about Twibies, let me ask you something. Have you ever checked the page rank of your twitter profile? Well… I did recently and it turned out to be 5/10. I was really surprised to see this initially, but upon further research I figured out that my twitter background/theme was featured on many sites.What does that mean? Simple… Design matters! And here’s something useful for designers!Twibies.com - The ultimate collection of twitter bird illustrations, icons, themes and…

• Announcing the launch of IndoFolio

  Gopal Raju

  18 Dec 2009 | 4:33 am

  Good News! I’ve quit my day job to get to do the things I enjoy doing very much on the internet! Yes, that means I’ll be spending more time on ProductiveDreams and taking up freelance projects at the same time. As a first step, I am launching my portfolio – Indofolio.comIn this post I would like to give you a brief overview on IndoFolio and its design.Why IndoFolio?I wanted to use a domain name that makes it clear that I am from India and Indo is the most popular prefix used to indicate India. My second requirement was to include “folio” which makes it obvious…

• 
  Designtopx

• Liquid Width Multi-Column Layout

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:47 am

  Have you ever needed to layout columns on a page with a fixed height but different widths per column? This demo uses definition lists and fluid css to achieve that effect.  Features  1. The columns are presented in three different widths so that there are three possibilities on each line. i - One long column ii - One medium and two small columns iii - Three small columns2. %'s are used to define the column widths so that the columns can resize based on browser screen size3. The columns fill up the width until there is no more room at which point a new line is started4. *Bonus1* I…

• 21+ Javascript WebUI Frameworks

  2 Feb 2010 | 10:47 am

  There are times when a web designer will have to emulate a desktop program for the web. There are many tools written in javascript which can help web designers create consistent user interfaces for the web. Designing web elements and letting the browser determine how it should look may be okay for some projects but for products where branding is important additional help is required to keep the look consistent regardless of the web browser used.Here are 21+ javascript based web Graphic User Interface tools which can help design consistent UI elements across different browsers. *Javascript…

• PSD to HTML Service Review: SEO Semantic XHTML

  2 Feb 2010 | 10:37 am

  This is a sponsored article/reviewI am writing this review as a client for SEO Semantic XHTML. I recently hired them for PSD to HTML conversion projects I had. After the completion of the project I was asked to provide a review for them. So, in appreciation of professional and quality work they provided, I agreed to share my experience during the project cycle.Let me first thank them for the superior work they provided at a reasonable rate ($89 for homepage and $44 for every inner page). Last month, due to holiday seasons, seems like every single person wants to have this site built. Lots of…

• jQuery UI Default Themes

  1 Feb 2010 | 10:37 am

  jQuery UI offers a fast way to create widgets for your website that are easily customizable using the jQuery UI themeroller technology. They currently have 25 skins that you can customize on their website or you can simply use a particular skin as is.The quickest way to get the skin of your choice is by calling the proper CSS file hosted on jQueryUI server. I have included a screenshot of all the themes with the url to call for the theme in your html file. Further customization can be applied to any widget by taking advantage of the cascading nature of CSS when you call a new CSS file or use…

• Speedy Two Column Blog Framework

  28 Jan 2010 | 10:37 am

  This is a simple html/css/js framework that you can use to quickly develop a web page in the classic 2 column blog format. It should be useful as a base to create your final webpage as many of the alignment issues have been sorted out already.  Preview  Here is what the base html framework looks like: Click on the above image to view live version Features include: 1. Separate stylesheets for desktop, mobile, print2. Optional CSS reset for desktop3. Fluid desktop using percentages (800 min-width)4. jQuery library and popular plug-ins5. Additional folders for images, video (.flv),…