Web Design Blog - Webdesigner Depot

20 May
Our favorite tweets of the week
May 14 – May 20, 2012
Best Of, Compilation, Twitter
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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 Read more
19 May
Comics of the week #130
Comics, Funny, Humor
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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… Read more
18 May
Free download: 40 Exclusive Photoshop Patterns
Freebies, Patterns, Photoshop
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We’re back with another great exclusive freebie for you.
This one is a Photoshop pattern file (.PAT) which contains 40 beautiful textures that you can apply to your designs.
A detailed step by step instruction is provided inside the file to help you use them. You can use these as textures for your websites or any background.
Thanks to Rayz Ong from LemonGraphic for creating this awesome freebie for WDD readers.
Redistribution is not allowed, so if you’d like to share this one with your friends, kindly direct them to this page so that they can download their own copy from here.
The file is free for personal and commercial use… see the full preview and download after the jump! Read more
17 May
Atomicdust: explaining design process
Business, Clients, Freelancing
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A St. Louis design group announced a special gathering at a local design studio for a program entitled, “Educational Night: The Business of Design.” The evening’s program was hosted by a local design studio that is making leaps and bounds in the local and national scene, so it didn’t take long for the reservations to pour in until there were no more spaces to be had.
The studio, Atomicdust, certainly seemed to have the inside information on success, having been recognized by the One Show, Step, Print, and Create Magazine as well as local and regional Addy awards, so getting some inside information was highly coveted by members of the design group.
The notice read: “Jesse McGowan of Atomicdust is going to talk about the business of design, focusing on what we all went to school for vs. what is usually required of designers in the real world, especially those who freelance or start their own companies. He will touch on pricing strategy, client management and then talk about a couple resources that are out there for small firms/freelancers.”
Obviously, no one could turn such information down. The promise of free beer, wine, and soda certainly didn’t hurt, either.
Read more
16 May
Telling stories with your designs
Design, User Interface, Web Design
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Websites are incredibly versatile as a medium, to be used to display information and other content, and if well designed they can do this in an enjoyable way that’s easy for the reader to digest.
This can be done through combining a site persona with an ongoing narrative, consistent throughout, which will all come together to create a ‘story’ through which you can deliver relevant content.
It’s important to recognize as a designer that the story, which the content is then based on, comes before anything else in the site.
The content can’t simply be ‘dropped’ into the site post-design; it needs to be built up in the correct order: story, content, and then, finally, design.
Read more
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Customizing the WordPress login page for consistent branding
Tutorials, Web Design, WordPress
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Despite the consumer-focused nature of the WordPress content management software, an increasing number of larger organizations and even businesses are adopting WordPress to manage their site’s content — especially corporate blogs and customer outreach programs that take advantage of social media and interaction humanize a company’s brand.
These larger organizations aren’t content to let their backend user interface be branded using WordPress logos and design cues; instead, they prefer to customize the software and ensure that all of their employees know that they’re working within the company’s structure and purview.
It might sound complicated, but customizing the WordPress interface is actually pretty easy, especially when customizing the initial login screen that brings users to the traditional Dashboard homepage.
Because WordPress is styled using CSS, and can be customized with PHP functions, it’s straight forward and even encouraged to give this crucial part of the interface its own look and feel. Read more
14 May
What’s new for designers, May 2012
Apps, Compilation, Web Design
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The May edition of what’s new for web designers and developers includes new web apps, jQuery plugins, grid tools, CSS tools, WordPress resources, productivity and business tools, responsive design resources, and some really great new fonts.
Many of the resources below are free or very low cost, and are sure to be useful to a lot of designers and developers out there.
As always, if we’ve missed something you think should have been included, please let us know in the comments. And if you have an app or other resource you’d like to see included next month, tweet it to @cameron_chapman for consideration. Read more