2009 April | Webdesigner Depot

30 Apr
24 Free Exclusive Vector Icons: ‘Handy’
Freebies, Icons
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‘Handy’ is a set of 24 free and exclusive vector icons that can be used on websites, logos and more.
The icons have a unique hand drawn feeling and look great in color or black and white. The set also includes most social media websites, such as Delicious, Digg and many more.
These icons are completely free for personal and commercial use and they’re being released exclusively to all our readers.
If you’d like to share these icons, please refer your friends to this page so that they can download them from here. Read more
29 Apr
100 Amazing Futuristic Design Concepts We Wish Were Real
Design, Inspiration, Photoshop
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Concept designers are also referred to as “visual futurists”.
These concept designs may not be on the market yet, but they can still inspire you to create something just as futuristic and exciting online.
The designs may be impractical in some cases, but the idea is to put the concept out to the world to see how it evolves and grows.
Remember that these are all just conceptual, you can’t buy them yet! Some may be closer to being produced than others, particularly when they come from a large company like Braun or Samsung. Otherwise, who knows if or when they will be available.
With that said, here you have 100 amazing futuristic design concepts that will make you crave more.
Read more
28 Apr
Results of Self Portrait Design Challenge
Challenge, Design, Photography
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Thanks for all the submissions received over the past few days for our weekend Self Portrait challenge.
Your submissions were of very high quality once again and a true source of inspiration.
The self portraits you’ll find below are very diverse, extremely creative and full of emotion.
Thanks to all for your hard work and we’ll continue to bring you more design challenges in the coming weeks.
Please leave your comments after the photos below and give us feedback as to what design challenges you would like to see next. Read more
27 Apr
Winners of ‘Sexy Web Design’
Books, Contests
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Today we’re happy to announce the winners of the SitePoint book giveaway.
Congratulations to @innervoices, @kmog, @sherri_g, @6bdesign and @TylorSkory. Each of you have won a full copy of the book “Sexy Web Design”.
All winners will be contacted via email for details as to how to receive their prize.
For the ones that didn’t win, don’t despair as SitePoint has generously provided a 25% discount for all of our readers that would like to purchase the book. Note that this discount is only valid until May 1st: Discount link
Thanks to the almost 600 of you who participated and thanks to SitePoint for sponsoring this great contest for the WDD community.
27 Apr
40 Awesome iPhone Application Websites
Applications, Design, iPhone
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iPhone applications are hotter than ever. So how do these applications stand out and get noticed?
One great way to do this is by creating a great website design that showcases these applications in the best possible way.
These sites are usually very focused, professional and clean. You will also notice that there’s usually a video displayed in an iPhone casing that shows how these applications are used.
In this post we bring you 40 excellent websites designed to showcase iPhone and iPod touch applications. Read more
24 Apr
Weekend Design Challenge: Self Portrait
Challenge, Design, Photography
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After reviewing your feedback on last week’s photomontage design challenge and knowing that you truly enjoyed the experience, I think it’s time for another great design challenge…
Do you recognize the picture on the left? That’s Sharbat Gula, an Afghan woman whose photo became the world’s most famous portrait after appearing on the cover of National Geographic magazine in 1985.
In this week’s challenge, we’re concentrating on self portraits, having just covered this in today’s article: How to Take Excellent Portrait Photos
Will you possibly be the face of the next world famous portrait? You certainly have the power to do it! Are you ready for the challenge? Go grab your camera and get ready for some serious fun!
Read more
24 Apr
How to Take Excellent Portrait Photos
Design, Photography, Tutorials
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Simply put, a portrait is a representation of a person.They usually focus on a person’s face, mood and expression.
Traditionally portraits were sculptures or paintings however, in modern times, a photograph is the most recognized way of taking a portrait.
In most cases, the subject looks straight at the camera in order to engage the viewer.
In this article, we’ll be giving you simple techniques to help you take portraits and also self portraits, to make the very best of your photos.
At the end of the article, you’ll find a showcase of great portraits and self portraits that you can use for inspiration. Read more
23 Apr
20 Excellent Plugins for Safari
Extensions, Plugins, Safari
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These days we have great choices for Web browsers: Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Opera, Chrome and the list goes on.
Each browser comes with its own set of advantages and features and one of the greatest benefits of Firefox has been the ability to fully customize it through the use of plugins and add-ons.
This feature is especially important for those of you using Mac OS X, when deciding whether to pick one of the two heavyweights: Firefox or Safari.
But Safari actually does support plugins. While the choice is nowhere near as extensive as that of Firefox, there is still a good variety of them to choose from.
Here’s a list of 20 useful plugins for Safari for OS X. Read more
22 Apr
10 Tips for Surviving The Economic Downturn
Business, Financial, Freelancing
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The immediate challenge for smaller web design companies is how to attract new business and keep old clients in a downturn economy.
Customers are falling off of maintenance contracts and smaller businesses may not be looking to start a website right away.
Enterprise level clients are becoming more price-conscious. What can we do to make sure our collective heads stay above water in this tough climate?
Here are 10 tips to survive the economic downturn. Read more
21 Apr
101 Examples of Text Treatments on the Web
Design, Text Effects, Typography
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Typography is often a deciding factor in the success of a design. Its importance cannot be overstated. Effective typography can be achieved in so many different ways, as demonstrated in the 17 different categories below.
Some of the most common ways to treat type is with size, color variation, creative illustrations, and use of textures. The examples below are just the tip of the iceberg as far as the possibilities for type.
Don’t be afraid to flip it, color it, resize it, draw it, or even design your own.
Check out these fantastic 101 examples of beautiful text treatments and please let us know of any other great examples we may have missed. Read more
17 Apr
Weekend Design Challenge: Photomontage [UPDATED]
Challenge, Design, Photoshop
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Ready for an exciting challenge? As you know, we always like to bring you great resources for inspiration, as well as tutorials and tools to empower you to become a great designer.
Today, we’re trying something new… This should be a fun weekend project, where you can let your imagination run wild and put to practice some of what you have learned from reading WDD.
The challenge is to create a unique photomontage using at least three specific images from Sxc.hu. The theme and feeling of the image that you create is entirely up to you, so use your creativity in any way you want.
To enter, simply email your creations as a JPEG file. On Monday, I’ll be posting the best images received and featuring the designers. [THIS CHALLENGE HAS NOW ENDED, SEE THE RESULTS BELOW] Read more
16 Apr
Win 5 Free Copies of ‘Sexy Web Design’
Books, Contests
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I’m always reading tons of design blogs as well as buying books and magazines to gain more knowledge on design and bring fresh ideas to WDD.
A little while ago, I ordered Elliot Jay Stocks book “Sexy Web Design” and after reading it, I thought it would be a great idea if I could bring this book to the loyal readers of WDD.
So, I’ve partnered with the publisher SitePoint, one of the leading resources for designers, to bring this great book to the WDD audience.
Starting today, we’ll be running a 10 day contest here on WDD, where you can win one of 5 free copies of the book that we’ll be giving away. Read more
15 Apr
Is Self-Centered Web Copy Hurting Your Websites?
Freelancing, Writing
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Web developers frequently launch websites with self-absorbed web copy, which turns off visitors and kills conversions.
Who’s to blame? Self-absorbed copywriters and business owners.
To engage prospects and turn them into customers, web copy needs to appeal to the visitor’s self-interest.
Most would say that’s brain-dead obvious. Yet, it seems 90% of websites miss the mark completely.
Who is your clients’ web copy written for – the target audience, the business, or the writer? Read more
14 Apr
50 Excellent Corporate Website Designs
Corporate, Inspiration, Webdesign
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Web design is all about conveying information to the users in the most direct, clean and usable manner.
A corporate website also needs to capture the feel of the company and its purpose, while remaining professional in order to attain a solid and lasting impression to its customers.
Graphics, layouts and color palettes are all essential in how the customers perceive a company when visiting their website. Dark color designs, for example, can be interpreted as serious, while blue hues give a feeling of trust.
Here are 50 corporate website designs that you can use for inspiration in your own corporate designs. Read more
11 Apr
Introducing Avatar Wall: Show Your Avatar to the World
Avatars, Design, Webdesign
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Today we turn the focus to you, the loyal readers of Webdesigner Depot…
Through the Internet we get to know you through your websites, blogs and even more, your avatars. Avatars appear in most blog comments these days and they truly enhance a comment with each person’s unique personality and design.
A few weeks ago, I was preparing to do a round up of avatar designs around the web to showcase here on WDD, when I had the idea to take this a step further by making a full website for this.
Today I’m happy to bring you the results by introducing Avatar Wall, a brand new website dedicated to showcase avatars from around the world. Read more
8 Apr
Meet Jos Buivenga: The Designer of the Museo Font
Fonts, Interviews, Typography
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If you frequent design and CSS galleries, you may have stumbled time and time again upon an excellent typeface released last year that took the design world by storm. I’m talking about Jos Buivenga’s font ‘Museo’.
I’ve never seen a font being adopted so quickly and fondly by web designers across the world. It’s been listed as one of the top 10 fonts of 2008 by MyFonts.com
Museo is being used everywhere, web and print, including our own logo here at Webdesigner Depot. Museo Sans, its sans serif companion, was recently introduced and another style is in the works.
In this article, I’m interviewing Jos Buivenga, the author of the popular Museo font and find out more about his influential typeface, his design process and what the future holds. Read more
6 Apr
10 Tips to Design Usable Shopping Carts
Design, Usability, User Interface
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The everyday tasks in our lives are being revolutionized by technology. One task that technology is helping to simplify is shopping: the task of buying products in stores is just not as convenient as online shopping.
With that in mind, it is becoming more and more important to pay attention to the usability of e-commerce websites.
When customers want to buy a product, they want the process to be quick and easy, without any hassles.
Here are 10 tips to help you create usable e-commerce checkouts and shopping carts. Read more
3 Apr
50 Beautiful Websites with Illustrated Landscapes
Illustrations, Inspiration, Webdesign
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The use of illustration in web design is an excellent way to add a theme and take a website to a whole new level.
Some websites go even further by basing and designing the entire layout and background on illustrations, usually vector based illustrations.
Many websites today feature complex and visually stunning landscape illustrations, which is what we’ve decided to focus on in this article.
Here are 50 beautiful websites with landscape illustrations in a variety of styles. Read more
2 Apr
How to Make a Photoshop Montage
Design, Photoshop, Tutorials
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Anyone can cobble together a few photos and textures and create a humdrum montage.
To elevate yours beyond this it takes a few simple tricks using Photoshop’s awesome array of tools.
Do it right and the style has got dozens of applications from static navigation or graphics, through to animated banners and interactive collages.
I’ve picked a musical theme, as the style works really well for band graphics or music based sites.
This tutorial explains how to create a great Photoshop montage in 19 steps, so let’s get started and have fun with it. Read more
1 Apr
Breaking The Design Cycle: Get Creative To Be Creative
Design, Inspiration, Webdesign
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Designers, we have a problem. It seems we have forgotten how to be creative.
It is true, the very nature of what we do is based on creativity, however more often than not we tend to be swept away by the latest trends or “what’s hot” rather than seeking out fresh inspiration.
“A wise man makes his own decisions, an ignorant man follows public opinion.” – Chinese Proverb
There are several reasons for this creativity block in which we are suffering from and in this article I’ll list some of these as well as alternatives for where to find appropriate sources of inspiration. Read more