Archive for December, 2008
Top 10 Photoshop Tutorial Sites for Web Design
Written by admin on December 31, 2008 – 12:46 pm -Adobe Photoshop, or simply Photoshop, has been an indispensable tool for web development. Though Photoshop was commonly used as a graphics editing program, Photoshop today is now integrated for web development purposes such as creation of website layout, buttons, navigation, logo, fonts, and graphical materials frequently seen in a website.
There are hundreds of sites in the web that provide learning materials in using Photoshop, may it be for the web, photo editing or others. Here is the top 10 list of popular websites that offer different and useful tips and tricks in Photoshop.
PSDTuts.com
PSDTuts.com is one of my most favorite sites that provide useful “Spoonfed” tutorials for beginners and professionals. Much like any Photoshop tutorial sites, PSDTuts.com also offers different kinds of how tos for text, image effects, and web design. The unique thing about this website is that, this is open for all who are willing to impart their knowledge in Photoshop for the use of all.
PSDTuts.com provides a great way of exposure by allowing artists to write tutorials and articles as well as earn cash.
Visit an online Web design Philippines site to learn more about web design tips and tricks.Visit http://www.myoptimind.com for more info.
PSHero.com
PSHero.com is another site that provides useful and effective Photoshop tutorials as it offers comprehensive graphic designs that include navigational bars for web, complex repeating background patterns, and cool and useful font effects, as well as the popular artistic sepia on photos.
Tutorial9.net
Tutorial9.net is a collection of teachers, experts, and caring folks from around the world, all gathered in one place to pass along their knowledge to absolutely anyone interested in learning.
Tutorial9.net offers Photography, illustrator, and web tutorials which include SEO, blog designs such as adding thumbnails to wordpress or usability improvements for blogs, and other tools to understand a website’s viewers.
PSDLearning.com
PSDLearning.com also provides some of the juiciest and coolest effects in photo, text, other special effects, and interface for web pages. One of its features is its comprehensiveness, i.e. step by step guidelines in Photoshop.
This site is a perfect place to find various ways on creating portfolios, in addition to coolest trends in web design such as smart objects and videos. It offers a detailed step by step process on each tutorials.
Pixel2Life.com
Pixel2Life.com caters to graphic designers, webmasters and programmers, having 45,154 tutorials listed in 88 categories. They also feature a massive and diversified community with 36,847 registered members that participate in their forums.
Different webmasters can benefit from Pixel2Life.com by receiving a large initial influx of traffic for every accepted tutorial they submit, and continue to do so as long as it stays in the site’s index. The best thing about this site is that it’s free. No membership is required, and there’s no requirement to link back to them.
Learn more about web design by visiting an online Web design Philippines site.
Good-Tutorials.com
Good-Tutorials.com is a website that provides a collection of different how tos from Photoshop, Illustrator, JavaScript, PHP, CSS, Flash, HTML, and many more that web designers can benefit from. One good thing about this site is that, much like PSDTuts.com, it also offers a way to submit tutorials which can help beginners and professionals alike.
TutorialSphere.com
TutorialSphere.com offers 3D graphics, audio editing, video editing, and other website development tools such as CSS, HTML, JavaScript, PHP, XML, and Photoshop among others.
Same as the previous sites, it also allows designers and developers to submit their own know hows and articles in the site.
Pegaweb.com
Pegaweb.com directly gives out web design tips using Photoshop. As owner is a web designer himself, he can provide the latest trends in web design, and a way for beginners to learn how Photoshop can enhance the site’s capability to attract viewers.
PhotoshopTalent.com
Another great website is PhotoshopTalent.com as it offers how tos on photo, text, color effects, animations, buttons and icons, web layouts, and Photoshop basics for beginners.
One great thing about this website is that it also shares videos so as to help beginners learn how to use Photoshop in creating specific effects on images, texts, and on web layouts.
For web design and development needs, visit an online Web design Philippines site to learn more.
PhotoshopSupport.com
PhotoshopSupport.com is one of the best places where enthusiasts can come and learn the tips and tricks involved in Photoshop. It provides different information from PS scripts, web templates, web design tips, blog templates, tips and tricks for beginners, to the simple keyboard shortcuts. PhotoshopSupport.com specializes in offering their viewers a comprehensive list of tutorials mainly from Photoshop.
By: Margarette Mcbride
About the Author:
Margarette Mcbride is a copywriter of Optimind Web Design and SEO, a web design and seo company in the Philippines. Optimind specializes in building and promoting websites that are designed for conversion..
Tags: Graphic Designs, Image Effects, Learning Materials
Posted in Tutorials | No Comments »
How To Promote Your Web Site Content
Written by admin on December 30, 2008 – 10:07 am -The whole purpose of developing a web site is driving targeted traffic and generating revenues from the online medium. Apart from factors like appealing design, easy navigability and round-the-clock availability, a web site needs good content to hold visitors. In fact, content plays a pivotal role in helping visitors understand your products or services.
Content writing works best when left to professionals. Instead of loading your site with piles of information, it is always better to be clear and concise. It is here that professional web site content writers can be of help. They are well-versed with the online users’ behavior and can therefore create strategies that will work for your e-business.
How can you promote your content online?
• Go for organic search engine optimization. Optimize the use of keywords in your web pages; but do remember to be judicious in including them only when needed. Moreover, you can also optimize the meta tags (title and description) of your web site so as to attract the search engine crawlers.
• Writing articles related to your products or services can also be a great help in web site content promotion. Create simple, relevant write-ups and post them on popular article directories. These directories not only act as sources of information, but also aid in directing traffic to your pages.
• Create comprehensive e-books and offer them to your visitors free of cost. This will help you increase the number of return visits, thereby bettering your chances of making conversions. However, you should ensure that you offer information that is correct and relevant for your target users.
• Write blogs that are relevant to your industry and likely to be read by your prospective customers. You can syndicate your blog posts by creating RSS feeds and distributing your web site content to other online sources.
Web content writing is a specialized service undertaken by most web solutions companies across the globe. Olive e-Business is one of the fastest growing content writing agencies in India and offers a range of options to businesses looking at boosting their web site content.
By: Ashish Goyal
About the Author:
SEO Consultant
Tags: Content Writers, Conversions, Ups
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4 Modern Trends in Logo Design
Written by admin on December 25, 2008 – 11:51 am -Two most important vital parts of your marketing campaign are business brochures and advertising flyers. It is always important to do your brochures, cards and flyers with an overall design in mind. You want to project the image of your business that is favorable and will stick in the minds of your customers. The best way to do that is to have an interesting and unique logo, and to plant that on everything you print.
The next question arises, how to design a logo that is not only eye-catching and unique, but also modern. Well, the answer is to keep up with the latest trends of designing. Let us now look at the four hottest trends in logo design in today’s market.
Waves
Companies that want to project an image of fluidity and rapid movement might go for waves in their logos. These waves give positive images to customers and also make for attractive designs. The shape of the waves, and the fading color pattern usually used within them, are very adaptable to other types of items included in the logo. Waves have quickly raised up the ranks of popular logo designs.
Web 2.0
According to the definition in Wikipedia, Web 2.0 is a trend in the use of World Wide Web technology and web design that aims to facilitate creativity, information and collaboration among users.
Creativity, information sharing and collaboration – All three are important for a company trying to establish itself. But Web 2.0 is a trend, not a particular type of design. However, its popularity has risen so high in a short span of time that in the logo design business, Web 2.0 has come to be defined as any new, innovative and trendy logo.
There are certain features that distinguish Web 2.0 designs. They have bright colors, accurate icons and shiny surfaces.
Transparency
Transparency is the ability to see through something. This concept might not fit into logo design. You want your customers see your logo, not see through it. But transparency has two major benefits: it is easily adaptable to include other designs and it is wonderful at focusing a customer’s attention on particular spot.
3D Images
3D logo design has been in logo design for years. But logo designers face problems designing 3D logos. For one, making a 3D logo look the same on paper as it does on a computer is not always an easy task. But the new trend in 3D logos is to create an organic effect. The idea is to make the image appear alive and original at the same time, while not being overly intensive. This has become an effective technique in logo design.
By: Sam D’Costa
About the Author:
Sam D’Costa is well known professional in Online Marketing and web promotions.
Tags: Business Brochures, Creativity, World Wide Web Technology
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Powerful ways to promote your website
Written by admin on December 19, 2008 – 4:46 pm -Great! You’ve got your new Web site up and running, and whether you’re selling collectibles or business consulting services, it is now that the big job begins—promoting yourself. Now, you’ve probably done all the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) work with keywords (if not, go back a step and return here later), set up a Twitter account and Facebook page, sent out as many non-spam e-mails as possible and done a few of those “Internet newswire” press releases. So you’re set, right?
Well, perhaps, but it’s not likely. It takes a lot more work to get people to your Web site than it does to build one. Maybe 15 years ago you could settle for the foregoing activities and actually get some traffic out of it, but no longer. The World Wide Web is fairly drowning in sites, and regardless of how unique you think yours is, there are doubtless about a dozen just like it, from Argentina to Zimbabwe. What on Earth can you possibly do if you’ve already covered the semi-mystical, near-magical high-technology bases in your business rollout plan?
Back to real basics
The answer to that is simple, and also allows for a good lesson in what “begging the question” really means. In recent years this once-potent and very particular phrase was not just an Ivy League synonym for “asking a tough question.” It means that the question itself presents as fact the very thing that it is supposed to establish. In this case, the question suggests that the “semi-mystical, near-magical high-technology” measures that you took to register and promote your site are the most effective ones possible. As the song says, “It ain’t necessarily so.”
There are many low-tech, low- and no-cost ways for you to promote your Web site. Depending on your business model, you can restrict and define your efforts in any number of ways to get the most bang for the least bucks. You don’t need a global communications plan if you are starting a drop-off center for eBay auctions, a local business by definition. Therefore, local and focused efforts are often more beneficial than technological overkill.
Simple, straightforward, sensible
Think back to pre-Internet days, if you’re old enough, and recall the many bulletin boards that decorated community centers, libraries, laundromats, city parks, public squares, college quads, downtown parks and other locations. Most are still there. These are perfect places to advertise your enterprise with flyers, but simply because they are local venues doesn’t mean you can scrawl a message on a 3×5 index card. People today expect competent layouts with legible headlines and decent images. Get help on your flyers if you need it.
Local newspaper delivery people will often make a deal to enclose your flyers with their delivered papers, too. Not only that, but you can simply go from store to store along all the main commercial routes in your city or region, asking to place your flyer in the windows or set your business card tray on the counter. You may get 10 “no’s” for every “yes,” but one well-placed flyer or business card can bring you a customer or client who will pay for the entire effort. While you are hitting the pavement, of course, don’t miss any opportunity to talk up your business with passers-by, business owners or anyone else. You just never know who might need just what you offer.
Advertising means paying, but it can work
The old publicity hacks had a few disparaging sayings about advertising, the most gracious of which is something like, “Don’t pay for advertising until you’re done with the free stuff.” After you have distributed a few thousand (yes, thousand) flyers and business cards, pasted your message on all the local bulletin boards and affixed your printed pitch to the inside of strip-mall donut shop windows everywhere, you can consider shelling out a (very) few bucks for some “advertising with legs.”
Daily newspapers most certainly do not have legs, as they go from timely to dated in a day, ending up as kindling or birdcage carpet. The weekly community newspapers are a much better bargain, and have a little shelf life which will spread your cost out over a few days, a week or longer. Don’t forget that pet stores, hair salons, day spas and all sorts of other local businesses have their own newsletters, too, both printed and Web-hosted. Sometimes you can barter for ad space, offer a discount to the business’s customers or otherwise ingratiate yourself with the distributor to get a listing.
Use every available avenue
Last but not least, you can take a lesson from the seminar hotshots of the world, establish yourself as an expert in your field and the offer free seminars that are, in fact, marketing opportunities. If you ally yourself with the local library or a businessman’s group, you can often get free mentions in print, on the radio and even in the “public service” announcements of local TV stations.
If you put your thinking hat on, you can probably think of any number of other ways to promote your new Web site in the tried-and-true, old-fashioned ways. Naturally, you will want to use all the free PR services, send e-mails and snail mail, “talk up” your site to everyone in sight, distribute your promo materials widely and generally “sing a one-note song” about what you are doing. Yes, it is quite challenging, but the only way to separate yourself from the growing pack is to work smarter and harder than your competition—and the time to start, of course, is yesterday.
By: Gary Klingsheim
About the Author:
Moonrise Productions is a full services San Francisco website design company. They offer complete design services, social networking website design, ecommerce development and more. With New York, San Diego, San Francisco and a Los Angeles presence no matter where you are, we’ve got people to serve you.
Tags: Global Communications, Phrase, Technology Measures
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Basics of Psd to Xhtml Conversions
Written by admin on December 10, 2008 – 6:48 am -“PSD” is used for Photoshop design. PSD files are the design files which web designers prepare for any respective site to put on. These files are mere pictures or the imitations of one’s creative thinking. They are the stills as they lack any movement and usability. After designers pass their piece of architecture to web developers, these pictures get life and they start their assigned functionalities. The codings which are responsible for the navigational structure of the site are done in XHTML/HTML/CSS mark ups. These codings are responsible for the behavior of web pages on web browsers. The coding of web site must be done very carefully as the assessment of the web site depends upon its usability.
Earlier, web developers used to code the designs in table forms but now they do it in more relaxed and sophisticated manner which is called divs (divisions). To explain it better, let’s say there is a web design. Now developers will slice the whole design into specific divisions and then they perform their coding exercise. But earlier they used to make tables of the whole design and then code them all, which was a very cumbersome task and little tacky too to inspect the whole coding, if needed. Hey, no need to create a mess in your brain, if you didn’t get it right. It’s all technical insight and as a client you may not need this but there are many other things that must be in your knowledge like the services and features which various slicers and PSD to XHTML converters are providing:-
1. Source Files Format- Hand coded images ( PSD, AI, JPEG, PNG and others) to XHTML.
2. Cross Browser Compatibility-The xhtml conversion which is friendly to most commonly used browsers like FireFox, Internet Explorer (6 and 7), Safari, Opera, etc. Any compatibility mismatch results in the uselessness of conversion.
3. Hand coded XHTML Strict markup- All the codes are written 100% manually and no automated tools are used to ensure highly optimized codes.
4. Fast Delivery- The slicing doesn’t take much time. Generally one or two business days for each internal page are taken and rest depends upon the complexity and length of the page.
5. W3C Validation- This checks the markup validity of Web documents in HTML, XHTML, etc.
6. Unchanged Originality- All the conversions are done maintaining the originality of the design of structure.
7. Implementation of CSS/XHTML into third party CMS, shopping carts, blogs and more.
These are the common features which all services providers give in their packages. The only thing which may differ one from another is the professionalism and quality of work and this can be judged only when you avail their services. Your experience can be useful to someone looking for these services. This is the reason why blogs, forums and other social forums are very popular to get the reviews about any such service provider.
By: Manish Rawat
About the Author:
Xhtml.pixelcrayons.com converts your design files from various common image formats (PSD, JPG, GIF, PNG, AI) into best quality cross-browser compatible W3C validated XHTML/CSS markup. Check xhtml.pixelcrayons for our PSD to XHTML Conversion and PSD slicing Services
Tags: Navigational Structure, Psd Files, Web Designers
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Gardening Design Ideas and Tips
Written by admin on December 8, 2008 – 9:43 pm -With Spring right around the corner it is never too early to start planning your garden… For those gardeners looking to be more innovative this year, we recommend using a special theme to help you design your garden.
The Zen Garden
A Zen garden or Japanese rock garden is an enclosed shallow sandpit containing sand, gravel, rocks, and occasionally grass or other natural elements. The main elements of a rock garden are rocks and sand, with the sea symbolized not by water but by sand raked in patterns that suggest rippling water. Plants are much less important (and sometimes non-existent) in many rock gardens. Rock gardens are often, but not always, meant to be viewed from a single, seated perspective, and the rocks are often associated with and named after various Chinese mountains.
We recommend this option if you have an unused shady lot on your property. Instead of trying to fight nature, clean up an area that would normally not support a garden.
Trial Garden
A trial garden is a test garden where gardeners try out new types of plant and/or vegetables. Any gardener might enjoy creating his or her own trial garden to see which plants fare best in a specific garden environment. Gardeners can evaluate their test plants for desirable qualities such as novel flower forms, flower colors, flower show above foliage, fragrance, length of flowering season, and disease or pest tolerances or resistance. Vegetables and fruits should be judged for such traits as speed to harvest, total yield, fruit taste, fruit quality, ease of harvest, plant habit, disease, and pest resistance.
By choosing to make a trial garden for a season, a gardener can improve their garden for years to come. This is a great way to find out how much work certain plants require and if they will flourish in your garden.
Virtual Garden
While researching this garden I found a great tool that lets you plan your garden on your computer. You can become your own landscape architect and easily add or remove plants and items from your virtual garden. The program comes in three versions available from the BBC… an online version and both a PC and Mac version which you can use offline. The program lets you save your gardens so that you can work on it when you have some free time. I love the idea because it allows you save your garden designs and compare them with the final product. Click here for the Virtual Garden.
Hose Reels
Another great idea for designing your garden is to get a hose reel. I recommend a No-Crank hose reel for design and watering purposes. No-Crank hose reels will keep your garden aesthetically pleasing and with the automatic hose reel rewinder you will never have to leave your hose laying in the yard again. No-Crank hose reels come in a wide variety of styles; I like the Country Hose Reel model, a wooden box which blends nicely into most gardens.
By: Ariel
About the Author:
Ariel is a writer for Compucall-USA.com. To learn more about winter gardening, please visit http://www.no-crank.com
Tags: Garden Environment, Sand Gravel, Test Plants
Posted in Design Inspiration | No Comments »
What Is The Best Website Marketing Strategy?
Written by admin on December 7, 2008 – 2:28 pm -If you’re involved in affiliate marketing at some point you will need to consider what your website marketing strategy is. After you have selected your merchant for your selected niche there are multiple marketing website strategy you might consider.
One of the best ways to maximize your affiliate earnings would be to build a website around your merchant’s products and/or services. for visit to:-www.instant-video-streamer.com Here is some of the website marketing strategy you might consider to promote your website:
- Content Website
Content websites are probably the most common website marketing strategy. Usually content websites will contain features like news, advice, articles and more. You might even find a blog or community forum. The last two are very effective methods to generate fresh content to your website and increase visitor loyalty.
Tips: Don’t Choose a to competitive niche try to be specific and much targeted. This will make sure you get very qualified traffic to your website.
- Directory Website
If you want to promote only one merchant or multiple related merchants you might consider building a directory website. Just make sure the products listed in your directory a closely related. This is a very powerful website marketing strategy.
Tips: Website should focus on a single category. Also make sure add your merchant text links into your content don’t waste your time adding banners. They always get ignored.
- Review Website
This is probably my favourite website marketing strategy. more visit to:-www.html-lockdown.com As the name mentioned this website model purpose is to provide critical review of your merchant product or services. You could write the reviews yourself or you cold have your visitors write them for you.
Tips: Always add rating with your review. The most important part of this website marketing strategy is to be objective, don’t try to write your review as a sales letter. Always provides review of similar products this give your visitors something to measure your reviews against.
- Hybrid Websites
Finally you could use all those website marketing strategies suggestion and try to mix them to see what works best for you. You could build a directory website and put some reviews on it. There are no written rules about the perfect way to build a website so try different options see which one works for you.
It is very important that you choose your website marketing strategy and stick to it. Don’t try to give everything to everyone choose a specific niche and attack it hard, be specific and be focused that is the way to make money online.
By: Jasneen
About the Author:
Tags: Marketing Strategy, News Advice, Website Marketing
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Web Design Template
Written by admin on December 6, 2008 – 6:57 am -If you’re one of those people who have been looking for a free and easy way to design your webpage, then join the club. We all know how important it is to have an attractive looking website. But what if we just don’t have enough time to develop one from scratch? Or for some, we simply can’t afford to pay for the tools professionals use to make an amazing webpage. Now there’s finally an answer to this dilemma. Why not use a web design template for free?
Yes you read right. You can access web design templates over the Internet for free. With the endless range of designs, you will be able to design your webpage into anything you like. Are you thinking of going for an all green theme? Or are you in the process of making a sci-fi website?
You can even create a trademark lay out that can only be associated with your line of products and services. The choice of colors, fonts and graphics is just simply never-ending. And it’s convenient. It is as easy as one, two, three! If you’re a busy person who simply doesn’t have the time, choose from the wide array of pre-built themes that will suit your web page. With a click of a mouse, you’ll be able to see how it’s already going to look like, without the fuss of waiting.
Look for a free web design template that will meet the demands of your website. Don’t settle for anything less because we all know design is crucial.
By: Elijah James
About the Author:
For more great information on Free Web Design Template visit our new website www.myecommercecenter.com. And for more great resources visit www.webarticlemarketing.net today.
Tags: Access Templates, Array, Dilemma
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