Best Of Web And Design In April

• May 2nd, 2011
• News

The best of the web a very slow month in terms of new Photoshop tutorials, maybe because of the great weather we have been having. There has been a ton of sweet illustrator tutorials worth checking out, especialy the chrome text effect by Chris Spooner. Hope you enjoy and your more than welcome to share your favourite tutorials, freebies and articles from the roundup

Photoshop

Create a Plaid Pattern in Photoshop

Patterns can be extremely useful for quickly creating backgrounds for your work. Having a diverse catalog of Photoshop pattern sets at your disposal will make it easy to try a variety of different patterns. In this tutorial we’ll walk through the process of creating a plaid pattern, which you can then duplicate with other color combinations to compile your own set of plaid patterns.

Stylish Metallic Button in Photoshop

So in this tutorial I will show you how to create a nice metallic button using Layer Styles in Photoshop.

How to Create a Flaming Manipulation in Photoshop

Learn how to create this photo manipulation of a flying man similar to Iron Man. This Photoshop tutorial will show you how to apply cinematic lighting effects and manipulate fire to create this composite.

Tutorial: How To Design a Realistic Takeout Coffee Icon

Learn how to create this photo manipulation of a flying man similar to Iron Man. This Photoshop tutorial will show you how to apply cinematic lighting effects and manipulate fire to create this composite.

Illustrator

Create a Burning, Vector Match Using Gradient Meshes

In this tutorial you will learn how to create realistic vector fire, using the Gradient Mesh Tool and Screen Blending mode. Believe me, there’s nothing overly complicated.

How To Create a Cool Chrome Text Effect in Illustrator

Follow this step by step tutorial to create a super cool retro chrome text effect in Illustrator. We’ll use a range of gradients to give the impression of bright highlights, then take the text into Photoshop for some finishing touches.

Create a Royal Crown Using Adobe Illustrator CS5

In today’s tutorial you’ll learn how to create a crown using four stages of design: 3-D modeling, creating of elements of the crown, colors, and creating glare on the surface.

How To Create a Stylish Skull Based Vector Illustration

The skull and crossed pistons mark is a popular adaption of the tradition skull and crossbones symbol and is commonly seen in motorcycle culture, amongst other.

Web Design Articles

The Most Important CSS3 Properties Explained

It’s an exiting time for web designers. Major new browser releases are coming in very fast and with them massively extended support for CSS3. Especially Google Chrome leading the way and showing what’s possible with today’s technology.

Saturation in Web Design

Over the years, web designs and layouts have increased in complexity. Yet, while our work becomes ever more polished and interactive, moving away from the static boxy layouts that dominated the ’90s, the central goal has not changed.

Effective Communication Tips for Web Designers

Over the years, web designs and layouts have increased in complexity. Yet, while our work becomes ever more polished and interactive, moving away from the static boxy layouts that dominated the ’90s, the central goal has not changed.

3 New Tools for Creating Website Mockups on the Fly

Web developers are constantly churning out free tools that are incredibly useful in reducing the amount of small, annoying tasks that you have to deal with when building a website or mockup.

11 Lessons Web Designers Should Learn from Painting Portraits

Many designers stumble into the web industry from a fine arts background. Working commercially is a natural progression for artists – not only does it make for a reliable income, but you have the pleasure of making something useful for a wide audience. Furthermore, both art and design draw on many of the same concepts and we artist/designers are often able to incorporate our art skills into designs and illustrations.

6 CSS Shorthand Tricks Every Developer Should Know

Today you’ll learn how to use CSS shorthand for backgrounds, margins & padding, borders, fonts, list-styles and transitions.

The Fundamental Rules of a Successful Designer-Developer Relationship

A designer working with a developer, and vice versa, is a great idea to speed up the website creation process, and it can also often times yield better final results for the project. Working together can let each professional focus on what they are best at, and what they also prefer to do – meaning both parties will enjoy the project a lot more.

Freebies

Free E-Commerce Icons

Crisp e-commerce icons, included in the pack are eight 128x128px icons in transparent PNG format, ready to use in your own projects.

Chunky 3D Web Buttons (PSD)

Today’s freebie is a set of ten 3D web buttons. They may have gained some popularity (and perhaps enemies) in recent times but, when used sparingly, they’re still an option.

“Food and Drink” Icons

An awesome food and drink icon set.

A Simple Yet Beautiful Abstract Vector Pattern

This is a a simple great abstract pattern which was a pleasure to create. I created a few of these types of simple pattern so watch this space for further patterns. If you enjoyed your more than welcome leave a comment or just feedback.