Best Of Web And Design In July 2010

• August 2nd, 2010
• News

July was a great month in terms on new design tutorials being published, lucky enough where capable of capturing all the best tuts published all over the design community into one post. Next month should be a very exciting month as the Creative Nerds team are launching an new blog.

Photoshop Tutorials

How to create a melancholy model photo manipulation

This tutorial was born with a specific aim. I was playing with the image of a beautiful model, with the intention to realize a simple photo retouch tutorial, thought for all those who are approaching to photography and need simple Photoshop skills to embellish their models shots. As always, I finished with something totally different, with a pinch of “dark”. Today we will use several simple techniques to realize a beautiful melancholy photo manipulation starting from the image of a model. We will deal in particular with masks, brushes and lots of adjustment layers to have full color control.

Create Beautiful Abstract Female Art in Photoshop

Sometimes, all it takes to create a stunning piece of art is a stock photo, a bit of creativity, a great idea, and some time. Today, I will demonstrate how to create a piece of art that I created titled, “Beauty of Gold.” Let’s get started!

Make a Meteoric Composition with Stellar Light Effects

In this tutorial, you will create an out-of-this-world composition of a computer mouse that is streaking down like a meteor. You will focus on creating unique light effects and leveraging layer adjustment techniques for coloring and enhancing our scene. We will use Cinema 4D to create a simple backdrop for our stars, however, the important parts, we’ll do in Photoshop.

Make a Meteoric Composition with Stellar Light Effects

The design depicts the first light of morning in a distant solar system. The bright light from a nearby star illuminates the planet and its moons, while the surrounding nebula gives off vibrant pink, blue and green lights.

Create Astonishing Nightclub Themed 3D Typography

3D graphics are often created using several applications. Today, we will use Photoshop, Illustrator, and Cinema 4D to create a stunning nightclub themed 3D composite.

Illustrator Tutorials

Create a Detailed Vector Emblem Badge in Illustrator

Use a range of vector shapes in Adobe Illustrator to create a detailed black and white emblem badge. We’ll use a mix of basic tools to align the various shapes together, then add some cool detail using the more advanced Pathfinder and Blend tools.

How To Create a Trendy Seamless Pattern in Illustrator

The great thing about seamless repeating patterns is that once created, they can be used as a base for all kinds of awesome designs. Skateboard decks, custom apparel, package designs and website backgrounds are just some of the uses for the good old pattern swatch. Follow this tutorial to build a vector based repeating pattern of your own, featuring trendy graphics of skulls, stars, lightning bolts and other cool pop imagery.

Quick Tip: How to Create an Abstract Desktop Wallpaper

Looking for an abstract wallpaper but can’t find a color or shape that your like? In this tutorial you will learn how to create desktop wallpapers using simple geometric figures, the Blending Mode, and Gaussian Blur. Let’s get started!

How to Draw a Funny Bee Illustration

Although they can be very dangerous, bees are loved around the world for honey they are producing, and just like everyone else, I have a great respect for these little hard-working creatures.  From this tutorial you will learn how to create a funny illustration of a bee inside Adobe Illustrator.

Webdesign Articles

Drawing the Line: 6 Things You Shouldn’t Tolerate in Projects

I was pretty proud when I netted my first clients as a freelancer. Wow! Someone is actually willing to give me their money and have me design their site? I was ecstatic that someone had picked me out of all the talented designers out there.

Smart Logos with Hidden Symbolism

Try to figure what the hidden messages are before reading the explanations. Have the designers manage to convey the right messages for these logos? Please let us know in the comments’ area.

How to Resolve a Fluid Header/Footer Problem When the Window is Resized

The problem happens under the following circumstances: (1) The header and footer of the page have no specified width; (2) The content area has a specified width, and is centered using margin: auto; (3) The window is resized below the content area’s width, or the window starts out below the set width of the content area.

Colortip – a jQuery Tooltip Plugin

In this tutorial we are going to write a simple jQuery tooltip plugin. It is going to convert the title attributes of elements withing your page, into a series of colorful tooltips. Six color themes are available, so you can easily match it with the rest of your design.

Occam’s Razor: A Great Principle for Designers

Lex parsimoniae is the Latin expression of what is known in English as Occam’s Razor, a philosophical rule of thumb that has guided some of the world’s best and brightest minds (including Isaac Newton).

20+ Required Windows Apps: Web Designer’s Choice

In April, Jeffrey Way provided us with a list of the “20 Mac Apps You’ll Use Every Day.” Not one to be biased, if you prefer Windows, this article rounds up the best programs available for boosting your productivity as a web designer.

20 Steps to a Flexible and Secure WordPress Installation

A comprehensive WordPress installation, albeit simple to produce, often requires multiple steps — many of which can easily be omitted accidentally. How many times have you forgotten to customize your permalink structure? How about adding in a sitemap plugin? What about changing your timezone? If you’ve installed WordPress more than once, chances are you’ve missed something. Take the following steps and you’ll never miss anything again.

12 kickass SEO infographics

At Econsultancy HQ, we’re loving infographics in a big way. After all, what’s not to like? They’re great visual breakdowns of complex information,  far better than standard data charting, and are often extremely creative in their representations.

Freebies

Freestyle and Square, Two Free Social Media Icon Sets

The two beautiful social media icon sets we have on offer today have been designed by the talented Helen Gizi, from pinkmoustache.com, exclusively for the readers of Speckyboy Design Magazine.

Icon Pack: 256×256 Business Icons

This icon set contains 26 Business themed icons. Each icon is available in 256×256 .png format. Included in this set are User icons, Warning & Alert icons, Chat & Email icons, Maps & World Icons, and several other icons that are appropriate in business settings.

200+ Exclusive Free Icons: “Reflection”

Icons are a great and quick way to enhance your projects. They add a certain personality to your designs and make things pop when they need to.