Design Festival Embedded web fonts can add stylish typography to your web design for just a few kilobytes. Techniques that used to require large, slow-loading images are now handled with lightweight font files and several lines of CSS. Ever since the @font-face CSS property garnered broad support from all major browsers, specialized fonts have become very popular. As a result, a wide…
Read More… Grunge fonts are a great way to add style and character to your design. If your website looks painfully ordinary, it may be due to the use of typical, tired web fonts that are employed on millions of websites, including your own. An edgy grunge font may be all that you need to achieve the style and appeal that you’re…
Read More… Banner ads, brochures, branding materials, and templates have many differences, but their common goal is to deliver a distinct, refined message that stands out and catches the eye. It’s often hard to attract prospects and stand apart from competitors if your designs look just like the everyone else’s. That’s why widely-used fonts and standard typography styles may not always be…
Read More… Sreeraman has been a visual designer for over 8 years. He began as a hobbyist, but he now works full time on a variety of design projects, including print design, branding, corporate identity, as well as T-shirt design and front-end development. Sreeraman hopes to delve deeper into user interface design and similarly interactive projects. You can follow Sreeraman on Facebook or…
Read More… A stylish portfolio is critical for any designer. Other professions have the luxury of describing their skills and accolades in words, but designers can’t just describe their work; they have to show it. Designers are most often compared, chosen, and hired based on the impression that their portfolio makes. Even if your work samples are stellar, the portfolio itself is…
Read More… Color choices come very early in any design process. Often, designers are constrained to using very specific colors from existing branding. Occasionally, designers are given full freedom (and very little guidance) to choose from millions of colors. Neither scenario is ideal; having too many constraints can be just as difficult as having too many options. Getting bogged down with color-based…
Read More… Catchy, memorable brand names and stylish logos are assets to any budding business, but a mascot has unique appeal that can foster a friendly, personal relationship between company and customer. For businesses that are primarily web-based enterprises with very little face-to-face interaction with customers, mascots are an especially good way to put a smiling face in front of your clients,…
Read More… Requests for “mobile-friendly” websites are becoming more and more common from customers of all kinds, from individual clients to large established companies. With millions of smartphones and tablets being sold every year, mobile design has gradually gone from a “nice to have” peripheral feature to a “must have” core component of your design. If you didn’t plan for mobile-friendliness from…
Read More… The distinct roles of graphic designers, web designers, and illustrators are fairly obvious. The titles themselves serve as clear, succinct definitions of their respective duties. But, the role of an “artworker” is a mystery to many, even those who work within the design and print industries. This is most likely because artworkers have a wide and varied role that can’t…
Read More… Brushes are one of the fundamental features in Photoshop. With brushes, you can blend masks, create effects, add textures, and create lighting. There are thousands of brushes available online that you can download for your projects, but sometimes it can take hours to find the right brushes to get the specific look that you want. It can save you a…
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