84% of Americans currently own a mobile phone. Sadly, there are no figures showing how many of these devices are ageing bricks without internet capabilities, but you can bet that, within a few years, the majority of mobile phone users will be able to browse the internet, wherever they are. Right now, most websites are […]
Archives for February 2010
Expanding Your Design Empire: 7 Other Careers that Benefit from Design Knowledge
Web design is a field that, while saturated, is very likely to keep expanding in the years to come. More businesses are moving online, more major companies and brands are embracing the internet as a business tool, and far more individuals are adapting their one-person businesses to incorporate the internet into their strategy. Despite this […]
Agencies, Labs, Studios, Media, Interactive and Creatives: The Many Names Of A Design Business
We’ve all seen them (and probably use them) – extensions of your company name. Agencies, Labs, Creatives and many others are used as a way to set us apart, but how far apart are we, really? More and more you see designers straying away from the traditional “design” at the end of their company name […]
30 Excellent Logo Design Tutorials And Walkthroughs
This post is supported by Webdesigner Depot, a popular web design blog covering tutorials, design trends, blogging and inspirational posts. You can visit WDD at webdesignerdepot.com and follow WDD on Twitter @designerdepot. Designing a great logo is no easy task. It’s something people will remember, something that tells a story. In fact, your logo is […]
UPrinting Die Cut Business Cards Giveaway
This contest has ended! The winners have been selected using random.org – their names are below :) Thanks to everyone who participated! Michael Tyznik Donnie Rolando uPrinting has always been a great supporter of the design community and today we’ve partnered with them to give away 500 die cut business cards to 3 lucky winners. […]
How To Design Your Own Valentine’s Day Heraldry Illustration
Happy Valentine’s Day! In celebration of the day of love (even corporate, over-sentimentalized love) here is an Adobe Illustrator tutorial in which we are going to look at how you can create your own Valentine’s Day heraldry Illustration. Of course, if you’re not interested in the whole Valentine’s Day thing, that’s okay too. The techniques […]
20 Fantastic Usability & Conversion Analysis Tools
Once you’ve built or designed a website, it’s absolutely vital that you perform some degree of usability testing to ensure that it’s functioning as it should. Analyzing conversion rates (the percentage of visitors to your site who perform a desired action) is also a must. Usability and conversion rates are inextricably linked. If customers are […]
Trends Used In Comedy Movie Posters From 1915 to 2010
Movie posters are a fantastic source of inspiration for artists and designers of all kinds. Different genres of film tend to have different techniques and trends – sci-fi posters tend to be dark, gloomy and atmospheric for example, whereas comedy posters (as showcased in this article) are quite minimal (especially posters designed in the more […]
The Benefits And Drawbacks Of An Over Active Creative Mind
You’re a creative person. We all are. That’s one of the reasons we are designers. But, how many of us have heard from someone that we have an over active mind and we come up with too many ideas? An over active mind can be both positive and negative. In today’s article we’ll explore both sides.
As a creative community, we want to believe that there are positive aspects of the creative minds we have but rarely do we look at the downside of it (or maybe we’re just too busy thinking of creative ideas that we don’t notice the down side?). So instead of just discussing the benefits of an over active creative mind (which I do below), I want to also discuss the drawbacks of the over thinking that we tend to do.
How To Design An Abstract Wallpaper In Photoshop (and Illustrator)
Combining Illustrator and Photoshop can produce some dramatic and intense effects. Illustrator has the powers (and tools) to easily create abstract shapes, whereas in Photoshop, although possible, this can take up a lot more of your time. In this tutorial we will be creating abstract shapes using the Pen Tool and Shape Tools in Illustrator […]
