Best of the web for Design and Web Development December 2018

• December 31st, 2018
• News

This is the penultimate monthly roundup of the year. This monthly roundup features Photoshop tutorials on different methods for cutting out images, for creating  seamless patterns using illustrator. We have also included some must read articles one in particular how to create a better user experience for web forms. Its a jam packed roundup to conclude the year. I hope you enjoy the post, and we look forward to you visiting Creative Nerds in 2018.

Photoshop

How To Cut Out Hair in Photoshop (Even Difficult Backgrounds)

Clipping a subject from its background is one of the fundamental procedures that is required for a variety of Photoshop projects. I’ve covered the best selection methods for a range of situations in my video titled How To Cut Anything Out in Photoshop, but cutting out hair always proves to be the most challenging, especially when dark or detailed backgrounds are involved where there isn’t sufficient contrast between the portion you want to keep and the areas you don’t.

How to Make a Movie Poster in Photoshop

You will be learning how to make a movie poster in Adobe Photoshop, paired with Placeit’s poster maker!

How to Create a Realistic Neon Light Text Effect in Adobe Photoshop

Layering glow and gloss effects can help create nice, shiny objects. Learn how to modify a brick texture for the background, and then use layer styles with the Pen Tool to add some bright, glowing neon text and a simple cable over it.

How to Turn a Photo Into Art by Creating a Painting Photoshop Action

In this tutorial, you will learn how to turn a photo into art. I will explain everything in so much detail that everyone can create the effect, even those who have just opened Photoshop for the first time.

Illustrator

Glam It Up! Diamond Happy New Year Vector Text

Ring in the new year with glitz, glam, and this Happy New Year vector text effect tutorial that’s sure to bring cheer to all.

How to Create Line Patterns in Adobe Illustrator

You’re going to take a quick look at the process of creating a set of vector line patterns in Adobe Illustrator, using nothing more than some basic shapes that we’re going to adjust here and there.

How to Create a Winter Seamless Pattern in Adobe Illustrator

In this new tutorial you will learn how to create a seamless pattern inspired by the winter holidays in Adobe Illustrator.

Create a Christmas Card in Adobe Illustrator

In this Illustrator tutorial you will learn how to create a Christmas planet card.

Web and Design news

What is the Shadow DOM?

The Document Object Model is a representation of an HTML document. It is used by browsers to determine what to render on the page, and by Javascript programs to modify the content, structure, or styling of the page.

HOW TO IMPROVE UX OF WEB FORMS

Forms are like conversations between people. They help automate things and reduce a bureaucracy if done right.

E-commerce SEO: guide on when to create and optimise new categories pages

Without considering a website’s homepage, category pages on e-commerce sites generate most of your organic traffic – are any of you surprised by this statement? If this comes as a shock, I have bad news: you might need to reconsider your information architecture. If you have done your job right then you have nothing to worry about.

How to Use Google’s SMTP Server to Send Emails for Free

Google’s SMTP server is a free service that you can use to send emails from your custom domain, website, or web application. SMTP stands for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol. Basically, it’s an internet protocol for email transmission between servers. These days most emails are sent from an SMTP server. Anyone with a Gmail or Google Apps account can use Google’s free service, albeit it does have a daily sending limit.

So What’s New in Typescript 3.2?

A quick overview of the newest release of Microsoft’s typescript version 3.2 and all the news about changes and stricter types.

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1—for People Who Haven’t Read the Update

Happy United Nations International Day of Persons with Disabilities 2018! The United Nations chose “Empowering persons with disabilities and ensuring inclusiveness and equality” as this year’s theme. We’ve seen great examples of that in 2018; for example, Paul Robert Lloyd has detailed how he improved the accessibility of this very website.

All about prefetching

Prefetching is a technique that can be used to achieve near-instant page loads. This technique has been used for decades to speed up hardware and compilers; but it’s only been recently, thanks to the introduction of the Network Information API, that it’s usage to speed up web applications has become practical.

Combine Webpack with Gulp 4

Webpack is so hot right now! Webpack is great when it comes to module bundling and working with frameworks like Vue or React, but it is a bit more awkward when handling static assets (like CSS). You might be more used to handling your static assets with something like Gulp, and there are some pretty good reasons for that.