Desktop wallpapers can serve as an excellent source of inspiration. However, if you use some specific wallpaper for a long period of time, it becomes harder to draw inspiration out of it. That’s why we have decided to supply you with smashing wallpapers over 12 months. And to make them a little bit more distinctive from the usual crowd, we’ve decided to embed calendars for the upcoming month. So if you need to look up some date, isn’t it better to show off a nice wallpaper with a nice calendar instead of launching some default time application?This post features 50 free desktop wallpapers, created by designers across the globe. Both versions with a calendar and without a calendar can be downloaded for free.Please notice:all images can be clicked and lead to the preview of the wallpaper;you can feature your work in our magazine by taking part in our desktop wallpaper calendar series. We are regularly looking for creative designers and artists to be featured on Smashing Magazine. Are you one of them?So what wallpapers have we received for August 2010?[Offtopic: by the way, have you already visited Smashing Magazine's Facebook fan page? Join the community for a stream of useful resources, updates and giveaways!]Superstar"Has “the man” got you down? Feel like nobody sees what a superstar you are? Well keep on shining all day long with this retro-tastic wallpaper!" Designed by Brennan Gilbert from USA.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Viktoria"A little wallpaper for all the Germany supporters during the World Cup." Designed by Ricky Linn from USA.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Aves LacunaDesigned by Kyle Wheaton from Buffalo, NY, USA.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Symbian World"Scene from Symbian World." Designed by Anna Alfut from UK.previewwith calendar: 800×600, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200, 2048×1152without calendar: 800×600, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200, 2048×1152Piranha fishing"Gone fishing in my little row boat." Designed by Natalia Shishina from Russia.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Simple BeautyDesigned by Dovydas Vystartas from Lithuania.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Photography"Hello from Singapore! This photograph was taken when I was walking along The Orchard Street, where you can find lots and lots of luxury goods. Hope you guys like this colorful wallpaper – Enjoy!" Designed by Juanita Ooi from London, UK (Originally Malaysia).previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 2560×1600Strawberry"I love this work!" Designed by Agnieszka Pluskota from Poland.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200August Sentense"Just motivating sentence for August :)" Designed by Temeshi from Poland.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1280×1024, 1400×1050, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1280×1024, 1400×1050, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1200A Square Meal"It’s August and we love picnics — it’s a great way to get your friends together and enjoy the weather! Being an integrated marketing agency, we know that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts… in marketing AND in sandwiches! These orange creatures are here to remind you to never forget the finishing touches and that no sandwich is too big-you can always use a ladder!" Designed by thunder::tech from USA.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050Girls Just Want To Have Fun"Inspired by Cindy Lauper’s famous song." Designed by Irene from Spain.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1920×1200Summers Freedom"A photograph to express sheer freedom a lot of people experience at the height of summer — “Summers Freedom” — in this case, the two enjoying a summers evening are Sasha Bell and Rosanna Bell" Designed by Olivia Bell from England, UK.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 2560×1600Relax, It’s SummerDesigned by Sasha Bell from England, UK.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 2560×1600Photography"This photograph was taken in the beginning of 2010, when I was enjoying my winter holiday in London. I believe all of you knew that the winter temperature dropped a lot this year — freezing and raining all day long! I was lucky enough to sense a short few hours of sunny day in the winter." Designed by Juanita Ooi from London, UK (Originally Malaysia).previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 2560×1600The Salt March"August 15th is India’s Independence Day. Depicted here is the Salt March of 1930 which triggered the Freedom Movement in India. The Salt Satyagraha campaign was based upon Gandhi’s principles of nonviolent protest called satyagraha, which he loosely translated as “truth-force.” Jai Hind!" Designed by Pixel Pundits from India.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 2560×1600México 1963"Harmonious life in México City in the 60’s." Designed by Aki from México.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Hot Balloons"August is one of the hottest months of the year. August is melting." Designed by Kari Andresen from USA.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1920×1200I Hate Mondays"Mondays are a freelancer’s nightmare. I’ve always wanted to cry out in all despair “I Hate Mondays!” Anger! Despair! Rivers of fire! Damnation! Let them all out for all the world to hear and see!" Designed by Bogdan Lazar from Romania.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Come Sail Away"Fillmore-style illustration featuring the lyrics to Styx’s song “Come Sail Away”" Designed by Allison Doty from USA.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Love knows no bounds"The message of this wallpaper is Love knows no bounds. Race, age, sex, (level in the food chain :)) it all doesn’t matter as long as you love each other. My boyfriend is 16 years older then me and some people just think we’re not supposed to be together because of the age difference. Next week we’ll have our 9 year anniversary… So for the cat and the mouse: as long as the heart is bigger then the hunger, they’ll be fine. " Designed by Nicole Bauer from Germany.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 960×640, 480×320without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 960×640, 480×320SinGiNg SuNFloWeRDesigned by Pietje Precies from The Netherlands.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Cherry"I love this work!" Designed by Agnieszka Pluskota from Poland.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Cows"Hopefully this August you’ll have some time to take a drive/bike ride through the countryside. If not, here’s a typical highway view from my part of the world. Maybe it will inspire you to get outside and enjoy the August weather, or at least do some cow tipping." Designed by Dan Sweet from USA.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1440×900, 1920×1200, 1920×1440, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1440×900, 1920×1200, 1920×1440, 2560×1600Chocolate DreamDesigned by Sasha Bell from England, UK.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050Summer CatDesigned by Marina Nozyer from Russia.previewwith calendar: 1152×864, 1280×960, 1400×1050, 1600×1200, 1920×1440without calendar: 1152×864, 1280×960, 1400×1050, 1600×1200, 1920×1440Happy Independence Day"15th August is the only important day in August for us to celebrate (Indians), so I decided to create a desktop wallpaper on the same theme. I hope you all will enjoy it. “HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY” 2 all the Indians." Designed by Meghna Sharma from India.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Focus Footprints"Maybe some abstract sort of meadows? Maybe some abstract sort of meadows?" Designed by Philipp Lehmann from Switzerland.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Glowing Dark AugustDesigned by Vincius Ervilha from Brazil.previewwith calendar: 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 2560×1600without calendar: 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 2560×1600Climate ChangeDesigned by Luciana Passaro from Italy.previewwith calendar: 480×320, 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 2560×1600without calendar: 480×320, 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 2560×1600Sleep. Surf."Peak of the summer gives you endless opportunities do sleep late, miss all the cooked meals featuring healthy vegetables, go offline and just hit the water. Peak of the summer is the reason of calendar absence. Ignore the clock and be good at it. Longboard models courtesy of Nunosk8." Designed by Antonio Hadrovic from Croatia.previewwithout calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Nature’s Dream"Nature’s Dream wallpapers created with Scribbler Tool and Photoshop." Designed by Silvia Bukovac Gasevic.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1024×768, 1280×720, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1024×640, 1024×768, 1280×720, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200Leaves in The Rain"A fresh green leave to keep you going without getting unorganized! Good morning." Designed by Melle Wynia from The Netherlands.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 2560×1600One Mad Cookie"August has always seemed like a month of strange & creative thoughts for me, so whenI recently read that August 4th was National Chocolate Chip day I couldn’t help my mindfrom pandering thoughts of cookies with personalities. I thought if I was a cookie Iwould probably be pretty upset if someone took a big bite out of me, so I decided toexpress this in my design." Designed by Jennie Waterous from USA.previewwith calendar: 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Watch out for sharks"Inspired while playing with Photoshop vectors, for all of you who like minimalism and blue. Oh, and don’t get eaten by a shark while you are enjoying your vacation." Designed by Lucijan Blagoni from Croatia.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1280×800, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200, 2560×1600without calendar: 320×480, 1280×800, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200, 2560×1600Into the HoleDesigned by Manish Jinwal from India.previewwith calendar: 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Color EmotionsDesigned by Gints Stikans from Latvia.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Do we need to say more?"August, as the summer is at its high most in the northern hemisphere, most people go out for vacation (at least in the US). So, do we need to say more?" Designed by Phidev Inc. from USA.previewwith calendar: 800×600, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1920×1200, 1920×1440without calendar: 800×600, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1920×1200, 1920×1440Geometric Summer"This is how I see my summer. Simple, geometrical, layered, yet full of color: beach = sand + sea + sun. Cheers from Spain and have a great summer ;-)" Designed by Antonio Bustamante Mirayo from Spain.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200Freedom"August 15th marks a wonderful day in the history. India, the largest democratic country in the world got freedom from British invasion. It was 1947 when our great freedom fighters got us the ever lasting success and made our lives flourish forever. Since that day, August 15th of every year is celebrated as Independence Day in India." Designed by Neelam Asrani from India.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050This too shall pass (Persian Calligraphy)"”In niz bogzarad” means This too shall pass , life is like that…" Designed by Soodabeh Amirakbari from Iran.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1152×864, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Smashing Team"A simple tribute to Smashing Magazine’s team." Designed by Kalyne Nobrega from Brasil.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050The King Of Pop"Michael Jackson inspired a lot of people, especially all of us here at Bright Oak? Creative Studio. His birthday falls on the 29th and so we dedicate this Smashing Magazine wallpaper to him and all of his fans around the world. Happy Birthday Michael!" Designed by Bright Oak from USA & Switzerland.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 2560×1600Beach TimeDesigned by Sasha Bell from England, UK.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050Independence Day"15th august is the independence day of India so I am showing few heroes who sacrificed their lives for their motherland. There are endless number of men and women other than I have shown in the wallpaper. The wallpaper I have designed is a Tribute to all our freedom fighters." Designed by Aditya L from India.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Over the Bridge"Sometimes we are so close to fulfill our dreams that it only takesa few more steps to finally reach them." Designed by Jany from Italy.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Sunscreen Novice"Avoid black in summer.”Avoid black in summer.”" Designed by Kate Jones from UK.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050Freedom"Freedom is the will to be responsible to ourselves." Designed by Pooja Taneja from India.previewwith calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 320×480, 1024×768, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200The TravellerDesigned by Surreal Illusions from England, UK.previewwith calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200Watching Universe TwirlDesigned by Andrei Verner from Russia.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1400×1050, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 1920×1440, 2560×1600without calendar: 1024×640, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1400×1050, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 1920×1440, 2560×1600Sand Between My Toes"It’s still pretty hot in the UK, but after reading comments in July’s wallpaper feature, I picked up that in Australia, it’s “winter” – so I thought why not try to do a beach shot which can be interrupted and doesn’t scream “summer”! I hope you like this simple beach shot – hopefully a nice change! Ps. the legs in this shot belong to Rosanna Bell ;) Happy August!" Designed by Olivia Bell from England, UK.previewwith calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200without calendar: 1024×640, 1280×800, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200Join in next month!Please notice that we respect the ideas and motivation behind artists’ work which is why we’ve given artists full freedom to explore their creativity and express emotions and experience through their works. And this is also why the themes of the wallpapers weren’t anyhow influenced by us, but designed from scratch by the artists themselves.Thanks to all designers for participation. Join in next month!What’s your favorite?What’s your favourite theme or wallpaper for this month? Please let us know in the comments! And have a smashing August, folks!© Smashing Editorial for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | Post a comment | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine Post tags: Wallpapers
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
Desktop Wallpaper Calendar: August 2010
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- wallpapers
July 31 2010, 3:54am | Comments »
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
Lessons Learned From Maintaining a WordPress Plug-In
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Recently I released a WordPress plugin for Google Analytics that adds a tracking code and dozens of various pieces of meta data to blogs. Since the release of version 4, I’ve updated it 6 times, to the point where it’s now at version 4.0.6. In this article I would like to share with you my experiences in maintaining this and other WordPress plug-ins and common good practices that I’ve distilled from that work.The updates that I released had a couple of purposes, ranging from bug fixes to new features and fixes in documentation. While all of these are nice to talk about, the bug fixes are the ones you’ll learn the most from, so let’s start by going through these.Website and Account ConfigurationAlmost as soon as I released the plug-in, people who updated were telling me that it worked wonderfully, and others were telling me that it didn’t work for them. Turns out I hadn’t tested the plug-in with a Google Analytics account that has only one website registered; I expected the websites to be an array. Fixing this bug was easy, but determining that this was the problem took a while.Being able to log into a few hosts of people who gave me access to their back end and FTP so that I could test my fix proved invaluable. This enabled me to release 4.0.1 within an hour of the 4.0 release.Another mistake I made was forcing everyone to reconfigure the plug-in. I assumed it wouldn’t be too much work for people, and it wanted to be sure the settings were clean, but it turns out quite a few people didn’t want to reconfigure. With 4.0.2, I came up with a way to inherit some of the settings and clean up the mess I made, and in 4.0.4 I made a change that I will add to all of my plug-ins:Large viewGood practice #1: Don’t assume anything about people’s websites and external accounts.Versioning Option ArraysAs a seasoned WordPress developer, I store all of the options for my plug-in in one option in the database, which is basically a big array. Why I hadn’t ever added a version number to these options is a mystery to me. Doing so makes it possible to do some very cool things: I can now add new features and set a default for these new features as soon as a user upgrades; I can show the user different messages based on the version they had before they upgraded; and more.Good practice #2: Add a version number to your option arrays.I’m still not using the WordPress option API stuff (check out this post by Ozh to learn all about it), which I probably should, but for now I find it easier to handle the saving and validation of options myself.Don’t Release Too SoonIf you’ve got a bug that’s bugging a lot of your plug-in’s users, you’ll probably want to release a bug fix as soon as possible. I know I do. This caused an issue with my 4.0.3 release, though, because I didn’t properly test some of the code I introduced, causing me to have to release 4.0.4 just two hours later to fix a stupid mistake I’d made with booleans. Nothing is as painful as 500 people downloading a version of your plug-in that doesn’t actually work.Good practice #3: Test, test, test before you release, even when you’re in a hurry.Know Which Version People Are OnOver the past two weeks, I’ve been helping several people who said they were on the latest version of my plug-in but in fact were not. To remedy this, I’ve started outputting the version number in the comment that the plug-in outputs before the tracking code. Problem is, if people run a plug-in such as W3 Total Cache (which everyone should use by the way) or anything else that minifies their output, that comment will get lost.There’s a solution for that, too: I’d already wrapped the script in <CDATA> tags, to help with Strict XHTML validation. Minifying will not occur within those CDATA tags, so I moved my “branding” comment to the CDATA section, and I can now always see, first, that my plug-in is active and, secondly, which version of the plug-in they’re using.Good practice #4: Make sure you can see which version of your plug-in people are running.URLs in WordPressOne of these things that can generate pretty awful bugs is a blog’s URL. Whether it’s due to people running their entire blog on https or “simply” running their blog in a sub-directory, it can cause headaches. It did for me in version 4.0.2 when I added URL sanitization: all relative URLs in posts and text widgets starting with a / were made absolute, in order to properly track these URLs. Tiny issue: I forgot about blogs in sub-directories, so a tiny portion of people would end up with links that used to go to /home but that now went to http://example.com/blog/home. I know, that was stupid; but that’s why I’m telling you: so you don’t make the same mistake.Good practice #5: Make sure all URLs you use will work in all circumstances, whether WordPress is in a sub-directory, on a subdomain or just in the root.Writing to the Root DirectorySomewhat related to the last issue, although I encountered this while developing my WordPress SEO plug-in, not the Google Analytics plug-in: if you write a file — say, an XML site map file — to the root of a website, and the website is actually a WordPress multi-site installation, things can go horribly wrong.Check out the following scenario:User 1 writes and publishes a post on example.com/blog-1/.An updated XML site map for example.com/blog-1/ is generated, and example.com/sitemap.xml is updated.User 2 writes and publishes a post on example.com/blog-2/.An updated XML site map for example.com/blog-2/ is generated and example.com/sitemap.xml is overwritten.See what just happened? The XML site map now contains only the posts from blog-2… This is exactly why the wp-content directory was created. There’s hardly ever a need to put a file in the root of an installation, and by not doing so, you make it far easier to run your plug-in in a multi-site/WordPress MU environment.Good practice #6: If you’re generating files, generate them in the wp-content directory of your blog. Do not write files to the root directory unless you absolutely, positively have to. And if you do have to do it, make sure it doesn’t go wrong when your plug-in is active on multiple blogs in the same multi-site instance.Rethink Your FiltersOn the day that I released 4.0, I got quite a few feature requests, ranging from very simple to somewhat more complex. One that came in quite rapidly and caught my eye happened to be quite simple: the user wanted the same outbound link that in my plug-in tracks the content of an article to track in text widgets. Because I don’t use text widgets that much, it never occurred to me to do this. It was a valuable lesson, though:Large viewGood practice #7: If you’re filtering content, try to filter it in as many places as you can, so that users get consistent results all over WordPress.[Offtopic: by the way, did you already get your copy of the Smashing Book?]Never AssumeIt’s true for everything, I guess, but especially true for WordPress developers: never assume. The seven best practices above mostly boil down to abandoning all assumptions about states, URLs and locations, and even about people knowing which version of a plug-in they’re using. Take all these matters into your own hands; your plug-in will be the better for it!(al)© Joost de Valk for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | Post a comment | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine Post tags: plugin, wordpress
July 30 2010, 9:04am | Comments »
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
In Defense Of Photoshop
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Waves of change are currently rippling through every aspect of the Web. The iPad and other mobile devices are changing the way we access the Internet, while HTML5 and CSS3 promise to change the way we develop it. However, another storm is brewing that threatens Photoshop’s throne as the application of choice for Web design. The battle suggests a fundamental shift in the design process from Photoshop to mark-up.A militia of designers have assembled to launch this coup. Their propaganda is convincing, and their proposed successor is worthy, capable and sexy. Their cause is important, but their manifesto is flawed.[Offtopic: by the way, did you know that we are publishing a Smashing eBook Series? The brand new eBook #3 is Mastering Photoshop For Web Design, written by our Photoshop-expert Thomas Giannattasio.]The ArgumentThe argument against Photoshop focuses on the effect of the final product. Photoshop can be used to create impeccable designs, but after hours of hard work, you end up with a static mock-up that is incapable of emulating the experience one gets when the design is converted to mark-up and viewed in the browser. HTML and CSS mock-ups require no explanation. They present the final product in the final environment. They also take full advantage of browser capabilities, such as fluid layouts, progressive enhancement and animation. These are things that Photoshop simply can’t do.If we compare the two methodologies even closer, we find a number of other disadvantages to the Photoshop approach. For example, Photoshop’s text rendering is nothing compared that of modern Web browsers. CSS classes also make the process of updating similar elements easier than hunting down all instances within a Photoshop document. Even making certain structural changes to a website can be done more easily with CSS. Finally, I can’t overlook Photoshop’s propensity to crash, especially when opening the “Save for Web” dialog.I admit: the benefits of mark-up are undeniable, and Photoshop doesn’t offer any of them. In fact, the mark-up generated across the entire Creative Suite is rather atrocious and unusable. Why then do I think Photoshop is still the most important Web design tool available today? The answer lies in the creative process.Process Makes PerfectThe creative process is exactly that: a process. Clients may think we simply snap our fingers to make creative goodness flows directly from our brains to the screen, but we know better. We know that it takes hours or days of deep thought to devise the perfect solution. And if you’re anything like me, you often don’t find the perfect solution until you’ve explored a number of dead ends. Essentially, we need time and experimentation to work towards the goals of a project and determine the best way to communicate what needs to be said.Experimentation is the key to creativity. Without it, the brain simply follows what it regards as the safest route, and the result is as mundane as the thought behind it. Most of the designers I know start all of their designs on paper: creating thumbnail sketches in order to quickly experiment with possible solutions. However, these sketches serve as jumping-off points; the design process is by no means over once the pencil is traded for mouse and keyboard.Photoshop is vital to good Web design because it extends the process that was started on paper. It gives stakeholders a direct connection to the visuals without regard for the technical execution of the product. In other words, it accommodates visual processing. The designer is given a blank canvas—a playground for experimentation—on which anything is possible.As designers, our medium is in a visual language. It’s a language of the subconscious, and it allows us to connect to other people through our work in ways that the spoken word cannot. Great design relies on an open dialogue between the artist and the medium. Interfering with that dialogue only impedes the process and distorts the message.Designing with mark-up, however, creates a disconnect with the medium. Ideas no longer flow fluidly onto the screen. They must first be translated into a language that the computer understands. Like a game of telephone, this methodology requires a great deal of interpretation, which inevitably dilutes the idea and its potency. This chain of translation introduces a latency that kills experimentation and compromises the design.The Foreman Or The ArchitectTruth is often seen clearer in extremes. So, let’s try a little thought experiment. Imagine yourself as an architect tasked with designing a large corporate skyscraper. How would you proceed? If you’re like most architects, you would start by sketching, and then work your way into AutoCAD. Eventually, you’d end up with a computer-generated 3-D model. You’d probably take it even further by constructing a small-scale model. All of this processing gives you a better feel for the project without actually building it. It’d be preposterous for the architect to go out and start welding I-beams together as part of his design process; that is the foreman’s responsibility, and construction begins only once everything has been designed.Designing with mark-up is like welding I-beams without a blueprint. The client understands—or should understand with your help—that the mock-ups are not the final product and that this actually benefits them. They want to get an idea of what the website will look like without having the entire thing built first. It allows them to change the direction of the project before investing too much. Our responsibility is to explain the differences between the mock-up and the final product. Moral of the story: don’t play foreman when you’re the architect.A Call To ArmsAlthough mark-up can provide a truer experience for clients, Photoshop is clearly an important part of the design process. Ridding it from our toolbox could prove disastrous. What we need is not to change our methodology, but rather to amalgamate our tools. We need a tool that supports the creative process but at the same time gives us access to the subtleties of our medium.Modern WYSIWYG editors are off the mark. We need something more like Photoshop, but with capabilities that allow us to create DOM elements as easily as we can create shapes. John Nack seems to be on the right track with his idea of HTML layers, which would enable users to create and style HTML elements and render them with the WebKit engine all within a standard PSD file. While this idea is not completely practical, it gives us something to work with. Imagine opening the layer styles dialog and being able to add CSS3 styling to an element. What bliss! An example of what HTML layers might look like with CSS styling.Jeffrey Zeldman makes a number of valid points about why creating such a tool is impossible:HTML is a language with roots in library science. It doesn’t know or care what content looks like. (Even HTML5 doesn’t care what content looks like.) Neither a tool like Photoshop, which is all about pixels, nor a tool like Illustrator, which is all about vectors, can generate semantic HTML, because the visual and the semantic are two different things.I have to agree. Any tool that is meant to translate visual elements from canvas to code will inevitably fail in the semantic realm. Computers are monolingual: they need us to make that translation. However, do we need perfectly semantic code if we’re only creating a mock-up? Why can’t we accept the reality that we’re not crafting the final product and simply spit out HTML and CSS that’s “good enough” for mock-up purposes. Once the design is approved, we’ll put on our foreman hat and begin the real construction.Until our paradigm is rocked by some killer new app, Photoshop will reign as the best tool for designing websites. Although it doesn’t currently speak to our medium the way we wish it did, it proves itself priceless when it comes to the process of designing. Photoshop is a virtual playground of experimentation; dropping it from the process only prevents your design from being fully developed. So, before you switch to the mark-up methodology, understand that you’re sacrificing creativity for a few browser capabilities, which could be explained to clients anyway. For the sake of your client, creativity and work, stick with Photoshop.For more on information on designing websites in Photoshop, check out my Smashing eBook Mastering Photoshop Web Design, a book for advanced and intermediate designers who want to brush up on their workflow and improve their Photoshop skills.Further ReadingMake Your Mockup in Markup A walkthrough on designing in the browser.Time to Stop Showing Clients Static Design Visuals Describes the benefit of showing clients dynamic mock-ups.Designing Websites in Browser (Gasp!) A Stack Overflow discussion on the topic.Why We Skip Photoshop 37signals’ take on things.Designing in the Browser A good back-and-forth from Drawar.Why the “Design in the Browser” Argument Misses the Point Aaron Russell outlines the benefits of Photoshop.Feedback, Please: HTML5 Layers in Photoshop? John Nack proposes HTML layers within Photoshop.CSS is the New Photoshop John Nack explains the importance of CSS in the argument.An InDesign for HTML and CSS? Zeldman in response to John Nack.(al)© Thomas Giannattasio for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | Post a comment | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine Post tags:
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July 29 2010, 1:16am | Comments »
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
Passing The Holy Milestone: How To Meet Deadlines
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For too many projects, there comes a time when every action taken, every decision and sacrifice made, is spurred on by pressure to finish. Tempers seem to shrink along with the available days, talk about “high standards” gives way to “good enough,” and people realize that deadlines are aptly named. During the last-minute crunch, someone may well wonder, how did it come to this? Could it have been prevented?Every Web project has deadlines. But not every designer or developer deals with them the same way.[By the way, did you know we have a brand new free Smashing Email Newsletter? Subscribe now and get fresh short tips and tricks on Tuesdays!]What Causes A Deadline To Break?Because a deadline marks the end of a project, everyone involved in the project must understand the deadline’s role. Most projects follow a schedule or have an estimated date by which they must be completed. The concept is simple then: when the work takes longer than expected, deadlines get missed. A deadline is the end point of a time estimate, making it a known quantity. But how long will the work actually take to get done?Of course, projects can be more complicated in their details. Unexpected technical problems and unanticipated changes will affect the amount of work required. Sometimes other tasks take priority. Sometimes the time estimate wasn’t considered carefully enough.Whatever the cause, too much work needs to be done in the available time. That’s the problem, but not the challenge.Rate Deadlines By Severity Of ConsequencesThe hardest deadlines are tied to events that cannot be moved, such as a date promised to the public, an upcoming trade show or a date stipulated in a contract. Retailers know that their holiday sales must end at Christmas, and theater owners can expect movie-goers to be upset if a 1:00 pm showing doesn’t start until 2:00. Likewise, if a website is tied to a time-sensitive event, its relevance is lost once the event has passed. Hard deadlines have clear consequences when missed. Deadlines exist for a reason. The severity of the trouble caused by missing them increases dramatically after they have passed.Deadlines tied to less public events are no less real, but a project will soldier on if the deadline slips. Company-imposed target dates, for example, rely less on public demand than on the temperament of managers. Meetings routinely start 10 minutes late because “something came up.”The softest deadlines lack teeth or are set at some vague point in the future. That’s not always bad: not every missed deadline will cause a life-or-death crisis. But the same methods of solving the crisis apply. There are many strategies for handling a last-minute crisis. Most involve planning, setting priorities and knowing one’s limits.Strategies For Preventing Deadline CrisesThe beginning of a project is a great time to prevent problems later on.The first solution is both obvious and difficult: do not take on a project that cannot be completed in the given time. Declining paid work requires discipline and confidence, but if the deadline is impossible, then the project may not be worth the money. Money cannot replace time.Because deadlines with consequences are taken more seriously, keep a written list of definitive reasons why certain tasks must be completed by a given date. Losing money, customers and other assets create real incentives to work.Schedule deadlines as specific tasks, not the ends of phases. Rather than “Content will be completed by 4 April 2010,” state “Review the content over lunch on 4 April 2010.” This ties the deadline to an event at which results must be shown. Mini-deadlines tied to specific events are more powerful than general statements. Making up for minor time discrepancies during the course of a project is easier than facing a big shortfall when no time is left.Plan For Unpleasant SurprisesIncentive may not be the problem, though. Unexpected problems cause many people to break deadlines. Their unpredictability make these problems hard to plan for, and good intentions don’t help you see the future. The key is to recognize that, whatever their nature, problems will likely occur.If everything seems accounted for in the project plan, then invent a problem. Keep it realistic: “reshoot staff photos” is more likely than “spontaneous server combustion,” but it doesn’t really matter. The point is to create extra time to allow for a deadline crisis. One rule of thumb is to add between half and all of a project’s expected duration. That is, increase the full time that has been budgeted by between 50 to 100% to allow for surprises.A plan of time estimates for major tasks in a project could look something like this:Task:Time allotted:Content audit15 hoursDevelop content strategy15 hoursMake WordPress theme changes20 hoursImport data from old website15 hoursTest on multiple browsers5 hoursTotal70 hoursBeing conservative, let’s take half of 70, which is 35. Now we invent a problem: say, having to retype all content from print-outs. Is 35 hours for that ridiculous? Perhaps. But obstacles are unexpected by nature, and they always steal time from an otherwise ideal budget. Scheduling for unknowns is hard, but acknowledging that extra time is required will better align estimates with reality.A line item needs to be added to the budget. It could be “Time to make changes” or “Allowance for unknowns.” The description isn’t as important as the fact that you have planned for surprises.Is half of the original budget too much? It may drive cheaper clients away, but overestimating and finishing under the deadline is better than the alternative.Mitigate A Deadline’s Threat By Adding Other DeadlinesImplement mini-deadlines within a project’s timeline. Mini-deadlines minimize last-minute problems by serving as checkpoints to gauge how far off track the schedule is, if at all, at certain phases.Start While the project is fresh in everyone’s mind, a schedule for the other phases should be set.First quarter Everyone involved should have a sense of whether they can work together. Work begins, and the pristine project on paper comes up against the sticky details of reality.Halfway point The bulk of the work happens here. If you doubled your estimate to account for surprises, you would actually be aiming to launch the project right now.Third quarter If everyone pushed to launch by the halfway point, then almost everything should be done by now. But it rarely is.Deadline Launch the project.Review Win or lose, everyone should ask what should have happened at each phase of the project? What should have been done to meet each mini-deadline along the way?Notice that mini-deadlines are based on time, not task. Tasks have a way of expanding, of taking up more time than planned, which mini-deadlines should prevent. Think of a mini-deadline as a chance to review the project’s timeline. While this approach may not entirely stave off a deadline crisis, it gives you opportunities to catch and correct problems along the way.Plan Sacrifices In AdvanceEvery project has absolute requirements, which are essentially the reasons the project exists at all or the problems it is designed to solve. But many also have supplemental requirements. If a project requires A, B and C, then by all means include D, E and F, but only with the understanding that they might have to wait.For example, a newsletter is an important marketing tool for an e-commerce website, but less important than an easy-to-use cart and secure log-in page. Likewise, the top priority for a photo gallery should be to present photos. If the deadline is looming and the AJAX is buggy, then perhaps the blog should wait.Marking certain features as secondary provides relief when things go wrong. These features don’t need to be cut, but their deadlines should be later than those of the core project.PracticeMeasure the rate at which you work by timing how long you take to perform various tasks. You want to figure out how much time you need to comfortably perform each task, not how fast you can get it done.For example, the schedule might allow for 30 minutes to create a favicon. But in reality, it consumes 8 hours.Wait a minute. Eight hours for a measly 16×16-pixel graphic? Isn’t that… excessive?That’s not the point. You’re not learning the rate at which you work so that you can gasp in embarrassment at the result. Workflow efficiency can be improved later. The question is, how much time are you comfortable with right now? In this case, it’s 8 hours.Deadlines aren’t the problem. Problems arise when the work outweighs the allotted time. Learning how long you take to accomplish certain tasks is the best way to set a realistic schedule.ConclusionNot every deadline drama can be prevented, but even the worst can be dealt with professionally. Prepare for surprises, break up large tasks into manageable segments and prioritize. It’s a matter of respect: deadlines mean business. Do you?How do you prevent deadline emergencies? What’s the worst problem you’ve faced under time pressure? What’s your greatest solution? Share your story in the comments below.(al)© Ben Gremillion for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | Post a comment | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine Post tags: deadlines, timing, Workflow
July 28 2010, 5:45am | Comments »
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
Overcoming the Obstacles of Usability Testing
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When people hear about ‘usability testing,’ many things come to mind—eye-tracking cameras, big HCI labs, a long testing process, a lot of expenses, and maybe a little confusion as well. Even at this stage in the proverbial game, usability testing isn’t so well understood, and misconceptions abound.While it’s true that when doing usability testing there are several stumbling blocks that can impede your progress (lack of funding, lack of time, lack of motivation, and especially lack of testers), there are also many ways to get around these issues. There may even be reasons why they’re no longer valid in today’s Internet world.Today I will address these issues and give you some advice based on my own experience in conducting usability tests. With any luck, it will help you design and develop a more usable world.High costIn the past, usability testing meant getting people into labs, arranging testing sessions, utilizing eye-tracking cameras, and so on; clearly, high costs to go along with that. Times have changed, and the Internet has heralded a new generation of usability testing solutions. Some online services out there do charge a packet, there are other services out there that charge significantly less and are very affordable for any kind of project. The service I’m involved with (IntuitionHQ.com) only charges $US9 a test, which is affordable by most anyone’s standard. There are many low cost options out there, so price really doesn’t need to keep you away from testing your site, designs, and UI. In fact, investing in usability can generate a handsome return as you develop superior, more usable designs and the happier clients and users that come with that. Costs vary based on requirements. There is something for everyone.“If the user can’t find it, it doesn’t exist.” —HFI ButtonLack of time With modern methods, you can get results in minutes, not months.With regards to lack of time, this may have been a problem in the past. If you wanted to get people in for lab testing sessions, the time requirements were immense. The Internet has changed all that too, as there are all kinds of remote usability testing services out there, with a huge range of different features depending on your requirements. Depending on the feature sets you require, and time frame for your project, you can find a number of options to fulfill your needs. Again, looking at IntuitionHQ, setting up a test takes just a few minutes depending on the tasks you include, and you can easily get results back in no time.There are many different kinds of remote testing solutions depending on your own unique requirements for testing. See what fits for you and run with it—you won’t regret it, and you’ll end up saving time by having less micro-management from clients.“Pay attention to what users do, not what they say.” —Jakob NielsenLack of motivationThere are usually several reasons for lack of motivation—people don’t think their clients or users care about usability, they think their designs already work flawlessly, they don’t understand the testing process, or they can’t see the benefits that come from testing. Well, it’s safe to say: if you’re reading this, you probably don’t hold this opinion, but bear in mind all of the positives that testing can produce:Your designs can be validated;Any potential usability issues can be picked up;Your clients can be involved in the process without being over-involved;Your clients can better see the value of your service;You can avoid design-by-committee;Testing can be sold as an added value service to clients and can help sell your service and designs.These are just a few of the points to consider. Of course, there are many more reasons why you should be pro-usability testing. See my previous article for more on this.“Design is so critical it should be on the agenda of every meeting in every single department.” —Tom PetersLack of testersTesters are obviously crucial to conducting any usability test (I challenge you to conduct a test without them). There are two things to consider when finding testers. Crowd source with the power of the Internet.First is the oft quoted number from Jakob Nielsen about picking up 85% of usability issues with just 5 testers. There is a really great explanation of this at MeasuringUsability.com. The basic premise is that according to statistical analysis, a small number of users will pick up the vast majority of usability issues, and the cost for testing with more than 5 users isn’t worth it (at least generally speaking) to find the last 15% of usability issues. Well, this is obviously dependent on the kind of tests you are performing (and the costs for getting people to help you test), but it’s nice to keep some sort of number in mind so you know when you start receiving useful information.Second is the testing method and timeframe for the project. If you were bringing people into a lab, 5 people may be enough. With heatmap tracking (à la IntuitionHQ), larger numbers will produce more concrete evidence of issues and help you to track them sooner. Some sites can also provide you with testers, but when looking at their methods I get back to both the cost issue and self-selecting samples again. It seems to me if you can control and distribute the test yourself, you will end up with a broader range of feedback from a wider audience. So, how to distribute your tests?Distributing tests Social media—the perfect medium for distributing tests.Ok, with all that out of the way, and assuming you have your tests set up, the next step is getting it out to the people. How you choose to approach this may depend on the site you are designing and what the objectives are. These are some steps that have worked for us:Clients: Clients almost always want to see what they are paying for and to feel like they have at least some say in the design process. They are enthusiastic about the project (or at least they should be), and if you can involve them (especially without taking up too much of your time), you should do it. Send them tests and get their feedback—they are probably in the right demographic of the market for the site since they are the ones who are trying to sell it.Stakeholders: These can be investors of the sites, current users, or anyone else with an interest in the site. Again, they are the perfect demographic for finding issues with the site; after all, if they have difficulties, you know something probably needs changing. You can get them involved in a number of different ways—sending the link out via email or on the RSS feed, having a link on the body of the site (if redesigning), asking the client to distribute it to friends, family, or other people interested in the site (this of course depends on the kind of site, the client etc.)—you are only limited by your imagination.Social Media: In this day and age, they are so many people on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn et al that you’d have to be living in a Faraday cage to miss them. Make the most of this resource; get out there and share your tests with your friends and followers—people love to see what others are working on and to be able to contribute to the process. It generates talk around the brand too, demonstrating that they put extra thought into design and usability.Forums: Yes, forums do still exist, and in fact, a large number of people still frequent them. You can find a million and one different design and development forums, but you can also find ones more specific to the genre of the site you are testing (fashion forums for a fashion site, camera forums for camera sites, etc). Whatever the case may be, this is another great way to generate feedback.Surveys: We often see people who are redeveloping their sites run surveys to gather feedback. While you are pulling in this information, why not throw in a usability test as well? It’s just as easy to complete as a survey, and can tie in very nicely with other feedback you are pulling in.To sum things upHopefully these suggestions will give you some ideas on why you should integrate usability testing into your design process, and how you can get it out there when you’re ready to go. If you have any questions about usability testing, or this article, be sure to let me know in the comments section. I’m really happy to help if I can.
July 27 2010, 6:30am | Comments »
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
New eBook From Smashing Magazine: Mastering Photoshop For Web Design
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Mastering Photoshop for Web Design is the third book in our eBook series, and it’s definitely the best eBook we’ve published so far. It was written from scratch by our regular writer Thomas Giannattasio, exclusively for Smashing Magazine and its readers. We are very proud of the result, in particular because of the high quality of tips, ideas and techniques that Thomas — who is a deep expert in Adobe Photoshop — presents in his book.Mastering Photoshop is written for advanced and intermediate designers who want to brush up on their workflow and improve their Photoshop skills. The eBook contains 178 pages, explaining fundamental techniques that Web designers need to know to produce high-quality work in Photoshop. You won’t find any generic step-by-step tutorials or learn random effects. You will gain a profound understanding of what you can do with Photoshop and how to use it effectively in your work.All chapters have undergone a careful technical review by well-known designer, illustrator and speaker Elliot Jay Stocks. The book was proofread by our regular proofreader Andrew Lobo, and it has an attractive layout. The PDF can be printed and read on all devices.The AuthorThomas Giannattasio is an interactive designer who resides in the Washington DC metro area. He specializes in Web design and front-end development, particularly art direction, website design and application design, and has 14 years of experience. Thomas cares strongly about typography, simplicity and user experience. He works as a senior designer for a global marketing firm and freelances under the name attasi.Thomas’ articles on Smashing Magazine prove his expertise in Photoshop: The Ails of Typographic Anti-Aliasing and Unknown Photoshop Tricks and Time-Savers are two of the most useful Photoshop-related articles that Smashing Magazine has published over the years.The Expert’s Opinion“Photoshop is a powerful tool, and although the basics can be easy to grasp, mastering the application can be extremely difficult. This is where Mastering Photoshop comes in: it takes readers through the app in depth and relates all tasks back to the creative process. There’s much to learn in here, for beginners and experts alike.” — Elliot Jay Stocks, designer, illustrator and speakerThe eBook, in PDF format, is ideal for archiving, for armchair or mobile reading (including the iPad and iPhone via iBooks and other apps) and of course for printing. You can order your copy of Mastering Photoshop for just $19,90 (or €16.95 if you live in the EU) starting now and exclusively in our Smashing Shop.The book contains eight chapters:Color Management Colors can appear lighter or darker, more or less saturated, cooler or warmer, or just plain wrong depending on the user’s environment. This can be quite a problem, especially with a client’s brand-specific colors. As Web designers, our responsibility is to ensure that the experiences we craft are as true to the original as possible.Paths While Illustrator’s vector tools are much more powerful, Photoshop’s benefit lies in its ability to blend vector and raster data together seamlessly. Because Photoshop documents are based on a pixel grid, the path tools in Photoshop make them superior to Illustrator for designing on-screen media.Layer Styles Layer Styles are essential to creating flexible and non-degradable documents, because they’re separated from the layer’s actual content. In this chapter, we’ll cover how to create great-looking and reusable styles. We’ll also cover some unique effects and non-typical uses that help to consolidate excess layers.Brushes Mastering the digital brush is by no means easy. It carries the same difficulties as the sable brush hidden at the bottom of your art bin. In fact, the difficulty is multiplied by the disconnect between the hand and monitor. Developing Photoshop brush skill takes time, but it is well worth the effort.Typography While the majority of type on the Web is rendered by HTML, Photoshop is still necessary to handle treatment beyond the grasp of CSS. In this chapter, we’ll explore Photoshop’s type tools and discover ways to maximize the software’s typesetting capabilities.Photography A photograph — especially of the human face — immediately draws the user’s attention and can be used to direct eye flow to important areas of the page. Placing a large photograph above the fold is a common way to provide an entry point to the content. Because photographs are high above other elements in the hierarchy, they need to be handled with care and precision.Exporting Once you’ve polished every last pixel, it’s time to get your work into the browser. This is a pretty straightforward process, but properly optimizing your images is crucial. You need to maintain a balance between clarity and download speed. This requires multiple formats, varying levels of compression and other optimization techniques. In this chapter, we’ll explore the workflow of exporting images via the “Save for Web and Devices” dialog.SummarySample Chapter and ScreenshotsYou can download the Chapter 4, Brushes (4.7 Mb, PDF) for free. Please consider buying the eBook if you find it useful or helpful.Large viewLarge viewLarge viewMotivation behind the bookIn the foreword, Thomas describes his motivation:“This book was written in the hope of filling a gap — a gap that has existed for as long as designers have been using Photoshop for Web design; a gap that we so often fill with tutorials focused on the latest trends and on inspiration galleries that are quickly browsed and forgotten; a gap that is growing as quickly as our technologies. It’s a gap of foundation.The fast pace of the Internet has focused us on the latest and greatest techniques, which typically have a lifespan of only a few months. Rarely do we focus on the fundamentals — the principles that outlive the trends. Unfortunately, the principles often appeal to us less than the shiny and new.Photoshop tutorials offer quick results. They hold our hands step by step until something incredible appears, but they rarely explain in depth the principles that allow us to create something unique and incredible of our own. If you’re a beginner, I hope this book gives you the comprehension you need to bring your ideas to life. If you’re a veteran, I hope it unveils some of the mysteries that have always boggled you.”The book is not protected by DRM and is available exclusively in the Smashing Shop. Please respect our work and the hard effort of our writer. If you received this book from a source other than the Smashing Shop, please support us by purchasing your copy in our online store.Thank you.(al)© Vitaly Friedman for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | Post a comment | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine Post tags: ebook, mastering, photoshop, smashing
July 27 2010, 5:23am | Comments »
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
50 Useful Tools and Resources For Web Designers
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An effective, well-organized workflow is an important asset of professional web designers. The more useful and time-saving your tools are, the more time you can focus on important things, thus creating a foundation for timely good-quality results. The problem is that there are just way too many tools, services and resources out there, so it has become difficult to keep track on them and find those tiny little time-savers that will spare you headaches and save time in a long run.And this is where we come in. Back in old days, Smashing Magazine used to publish lists after lists, with plethora of links that covered different topics all somehow related to web design and development. We have undergone quite a development since then, and are now publishing almost only in-depth articles — written by some of the best professionals in the industry. However, useful, carefully prepared and filtered lists are still useful, and therefore we keep publishing them as well.Below you’ll find 50 useful tools and time-savers for web designers developers. Among other things, you will find recently released tools, useful reference sheets, articles and further resources. Such posts are prepared over months, each containing resources found, reviewed or bookmarked by the Smashing Editorial Team. We hope that at least some of them will help you improve your workflow!You may be interested in the following related posts:50 Powerful Time-Savers For Web Designers50 New Useful CSS Techniques, Tools and Tutorials45 Incredibly Useful Web Design Checklists and Questionnaires[Offtopic: by the way, did you know that there is a Smashing eBook Series? Book #2 is Successful Freelancing for Web Designers, 260 pages for just $9,90.]TypographyMeet Your Type: A Field Guide to Typography (free PDF)This eBook will help you better understand the foundation of typography and overcome common obstacles and problems when choosing type.Web Font Specimen This template lets you check the typography by analyzing the HTML-specimen in your browser. The specimen contains whole paragraphs in various line heights and font sizes, different headings, ordered and unordered lists, as well as italic and bold text. You can analyze the body size comparison that reveals aspects of the typeface that can’t otherwise be seen and study single glyphs, measure, grayscale as well as light on dark and dark on light previews. You may want to check out Good Web Fonts for the actual specimens of various legible screen fonts.Font Anatomy WallpaperThis wallpaper (1920×1200) covers the terminology of typography, showcasing individual parts of the characters of the alphabet.Web FontFont User Guide (PDF)This Web FontFont User Guide contains information about typography aimed at different groups of people: web developers, system administrators and website visitors. You may want to consider giving it to your clients or colleagues.AltFontPrev This is a simple JavaScript bookmarklet that lets you view the font stack of any website and then deactivate each font with a single click. It makes it easy not only to make sure everything looks okay when certain fonts aren’t installed on a user’s system, but also to view the fonts included in the website’s font stack in a single click, rather than opening the source code. You can even specify a custom font, which makes it handy when you’re considering changing a design’s current font.Typografix This tool is an HTML re-processing script for creating beautiful typography. It corrects things like ellipses and smart quotes and adds tags for <script>, <pre> and <code> automatically. The en dash, for example, is created automatically when a hyphen is surrounded by spaces, and the em dash is created when two dashes appear in a row. Typografix is written in C#, requires Windows Installer 3.1 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1.Unicode Codepoint Chart This chart is broken down neatly by type of character and symbol (and by language in many cases), with a visual reference under each category. From there, just click on the symbol or character you want and you’re brought to a page with detailed information about the character, along with a browser test page, an outline (in SVG format) and a variety of encodings and character sets (HTML entity, UTF-8, UTF-16, UTF-32, ISO-8859-8, etc.).BookmarkletsQuix We have covered Quix several once already, but when one talks about bookmarklets, it is just necessary to mention Quix as well. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a powerful command line in your browser, some kind of shell that lets you use handy commands and shortcuts for a quicker and more productive workflow? That’s exactly what Quix offers. The tool is a clever extensible bookmarklet that lets you both access your bookmarks and perform various operations on other websites.WP-Toolbar bookmarklet This tool will save a lot of clicks as you edit or update posts on your WordPress-powered blog. The bookmarklet gives you quick access to the entire administrative back-end directly in your browser’s window. There is also a GreaseMonkey script that automatically loads the toolbar when you visit a particular website.Print Friendly BookmarkletThis bookmarklet strips advertising, navigation and all things that you don’t want to have when you decide to print our a page. It formats the content of an article or a document for great readbility and generate a minimal and clean PDF for printing.Bookmarklet Combiner This tool creates a master bookmarklet which can either run all bookmarks at once or display a menu at some area of the page. Nice service for users who wants to avoid using a special folder only to hold all bookmarklets.The Printliminator The Printliminator is a bookmarklet with some simple tools you can use to makes websites print better. One click to activate, and then click to remove elements from the page, remove graphics, and apply better print styling.Bespin BookmarkletUsing the Bespin Bookmarklet, you can replace any textarea you encounter with a Bespin editor, making editing the text much more pleasant.CSS, HTML and JavaScript ToolseCSStender Extensions built with eCSStender simplify the design process because you can author modern CSS using advanced selectors, properties such as border-radius, or custom font faces and rest assured that your design will work — even in IE6.CoffeeScript This is a little programming language that compiles JavaScript while simplifying the code that developers actually have to deal with. It works with current JavaScript libraries and compiles clean code, leaving even comments intact. Once developers familiarize themselves with how CoffeeScript works, they could potentially save themselves a lot of time and headaches with the simplified code.#grid #grid is a little tool that inserts a grid onto the Web page. You can hold the grid in place and toggle it between the foreground and background. To display the grid, just press a hot key on your keyboard, and you can set your own short keys to switch views.Primer CSS This tiny generator works online and has only one function: it extracts from an HTML page (copying and pasting will do) a framework of classes and IDs that can be used as the foundation of an external style sheet. This can be wonderful if you work by first doing the structure in HTML, and then the forms and colors in the style sheet.CSS Usage CSS Coverage is an extension for Firebug which allows you to scan multiple pages of your site to see which CSS rules are actually used in your site. Each time you run a scan, the CSS files that are included in the current page are shown with the number of times the rules has been found applied on your page before it.JS.Class: Ruby-style JavaScript JS.Class is a set of tools designed to make it easy to build robust object-oriented programs in JavaScript. It’s based on Ruby, and gives you access to Ruby’s object, module and class systems, some of its reflection and metaprogramming facilities, and a few of the packages from its standard library. It also provides a package manager to help load your applications efficiently.JS Bin JS Bin is an application specifically designed to help JavaScript- and CSS-developers to test snippets of code, within some context, and debug the code collaboratively. JS Bin allows you to edit and test JavaScript and HTML (reloading the URL also maintains the state of your code, new tabs doesn’t). Once you’re happy you can save, and send the URL to a peer for review or help. They can then make further changes saving anew if required.jQuery 1.4.2 Visual Cheat Sheet jQuery Visual Cheat Sheet is a updated version of the useful jQuery Cheat Sheet. It includes all the reference you will need for jQuery 1.4.2 API.Turbine Turbine is a collection of PHP-powered tools that decrease CSS development time and help you avoid headaches. Among other things, it has a simple syntax, automatic packing and gzipping of multiple style files, OOP-like inheritance and templating features as well as a shell for experiments and debugging.Jo: JavaScript Application Framework for HTML5 Jo embraces JavaScript’s object model and leverages CSS3 to handle as much of the presentation and animation as possible. It also provides a consistent and modular event model between objects and plays nicely with other libraries like PhoneGap.Sencha: HTML5 Mobile App Framework Sencha Touch allows you to develop web apps that look and feel native on Apple iOS and Google Android touch screen devices.Aloha Editor, The HTML5 EditorAloha Editor is an advanced browser-based editor that is faster than other editors and provides you with better and richer formatting in real-time in your browser.JavaScript Regex Syntax HighlighterDo you want RegexPal-style regex syntax highlighting on your webpages? This library takes care of it for you, so you can spend more time writing regular expressions and less time deciphering them. Currently, JavaScript regexes only are supported.OpenStack Open Source Cloud Computing SoftwareThe goal of OpenStack is to allow any organization to create and offer cloud computing capabilities using open source software running on standard hardware. OpenStack Compute is software for automatically creating and managing large groups of virtual private servers.sweet-templateSweet (Simple WEb front-End Template) is a lightweight JavaScript template with high performance. It’s small, fast, easy to use, and, most important, extensible. It also can be integrated with jQuery.jQuery DeconstructedThe Deconstructed series is designed to visually and interactively deconstruct the internal code of JavaScript libraries, including jQuery, Prototype and MooTools. It breaks the physical JavaScript into visual blocks that you can easiliy navigate. Each block opens to reveal its internal code. Clickable hyperlinks allow you to follow program flow.Alloy UI Alloy is a UI metaframework that provides a consistent and simple API for building web applications across all three levels of the browser: structure, style and behavior.Google JavaScript Style GuideThis document provides a set of conventions (sometimes arbitrary) that hold the style guidelines used for Google code. It covers general good practices for open-source projects and well-written and well-documented code. It covers a lot of ground, from “use camelCase for variable names” to “never use global variables” to “never use exceptions.”gleeBox Gleebox provides a way to navigate web pages via keyboard. For instance, it allows you to hit the ‘G’-key and every link on the page will be highlighted. This application is available as an extension for Firefox and Google Chrome.shellinabox Shell In A Box implements a web server that can export arbitrary command line tools to a web based terminal emulator. This emulator is accessible to every browser that supports JavaScript and CSS and does not require any additional browser plugins.Juicer: a CSS and JavaScript packaging tool Juicer is a new command line tool that helps by resolving dependencies, merging and compressing files. It can check the syntax, add cache busters to and cycle asset hosts on URLs in CSS files.Jake: A Build Tool for JavaScript Jake is a new build tool built entirely in JavaScript that runs on top of the CommonJS. As its name suggests, it is based on the existing and already popular Rake tool and benefits from the same simplicity.Closure Compiler The Closure Compiler is a tool for making JavaScript download and run faster. It is a true compiler for JavaScript. Instead of compiling from a source language to machine code, it compiles from JavaScript to better JavaScript. It parses your JavaScript, analyzes it, removes dead code and rewrites and minimizes what’s left. It also checks syntax, variable references, and types, and warns about common JavaScript pitfalls.Useful Online Tools and ServicesComparePSD (Win only) This tool lets you compare two Photoshop files side by side and see every little difference. Look for differences by layer or by effect. You get a scaled view of the files, so you can see them next to each other and pick out differences more quickly. ComparePSD is available for Windows only and is free to download and use.Secure Passwords GeneratorThe tool lets you enter parameters, including the length of the password, whether to include uppercase and/or lowercase letters or numbers or punctuation and whether to eliminate characters that resemble each other (such as i and l, 1 and I, and o and 0). Then, just select the number of passwords to generate, and it returns a list. It even includes phonetics for each password to make it easier to read out loud (in case you’re giving a password to someone over the phone, for example).SwatchSpot: Random Color Swatch GeneratorThis tool creates random color swatches to inspire you. Lock in the colors you like and shuffle away the ones you don’t. Once you’re done, grab the color codes or download your palette.Yuuguu: Instant screen sharing and web conferencing This tool provides instant web-conferencing, online meetings and collaboration and enables you to work with your cusomers, partners and colleagues right away, without a single download. The free version allows for 100 minutes per month of web conferencing.Web Form Recovery Firefox Plugin Lazarus securely auto-saves all forms as you type, so after a crash or server timeout you can go back to the form, right click, “recover form”, and breathe a sigh of relief.Which loads faster?This tool lets you see two websites load side by side in real time. Then it shows how long each took to load and the percentage difference.FaaryFaary is an online form builder that operates with the help of text lines, and the form is generated as such. The tool creates an HTML form with CSS, which can be downloaded as a ZIP archive.Scr.imScr.im lets you use a shortened URL to give out your email address safely and securely on forums. Just enter your email address on Scr.im and it will give you a link to a page with your email address, with security to prevent bots from viewing it.Name ChecklistThis tool will help you find out if your brand name, username, domain and vanity url are still available online or they are already taken.Quora – Web DesignQuora is a continually improving collection of questions and answers created, edited, and organized by everyone who uses it. You can follow web design, usability and related discussions and ask your questions as well.Ex-blockerThe Ex-blocker is a plugin that hides any information about your ex online. The tool is available as a Firefox and Chrome extension. Todo.txt Command Line InterfaceIf you’ve got a file called todo.txt on your computer right now, this script is for you. You probably don’t want to launch a full-blown text editor every time you need to add an item to your to-do list, or mark one that’s already there as complete. With this simple shell script, you can interact with todo.txt at the command line for quick and easy, Unix-y access.Note and PointThis gallery highlights beautiful Keynote, PDF and PowerPoint-slides on the Web (mostly Web design-related) which is great for inspiration if you are thinking about creating beautiful and attractive slides for your next presentation.ManyBooksThis site offers a huge collection of public domain e-books, as well as other newer books that have been released in the public domain or under Creative Commons licenses, in a variety of formats.TweetmentThis service allows you to design sexy web pages for your tweets.Browser Cover GeneratorThis simple tool generates a browser preview of an uploaded image and can add address bar URL, window title, shadow, status bar and various browser skins to the image.Linkification Firefox Plugin Linkification Converts text links into genuine, clickable links. To view and set options, you can use the Linkification right-click context menu.Useful References and GuidesDesign Is HistoryThis resource showcases the evolution of design through time. It was created as a teaching tool for young designers just beginning to explore graphic design and as a reference tool for all designers. As a designer it is important to understand where design came from, how it developed, and who shaped its evolution. The more exposure you have to past, current and future design trends, styles and designers, the larger your problem-solving toolkit. The larger your toolkit, the more effective of a designer you can be.User Interface Style Guides This page features some useful links to style guides used by large websites, corporations and news agencies (e.g. the BBC Style Guide), including editorial guidelines, quality guidelines and online standards.Trademarkia Trademarkia is a free search engine for U.S. federally registered trademarks on the Internet. They provide up to the minute contextual information about the current use of interesting business names, slogans, and logos through pictures, commercials, and conversations from Flickr, Google, Youtube, and Twitter for each U.S. trademark filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) since the year 1870.Icon Reference ChartThis chart, created by Jon Hicks, was created to collect the sizes, formats and the related information about icons used on different devices. At the moment it covers browsers, Android, iPad, iPhone, iPhone 4, Linux, Mac OS X and Windows. And you can also download a template for iPhone and iPad icons. Useful.OpenWith.orgOpenWith is a directory of existing file extensions and free tools to open them. You’ll find a free program for just about everything you would ever need to open, including source code, data files, disc images, spreadsheets and video files.ScriptSrc.netThis site puts all the latest versions of script tags from the various JavaScript libraries in one place. Whether you use jQuery, swfobject, Chrome Frame, MooTools, Ext JS, YUI, Prototype, Dojo or Scriptaculous, you’ll find the most recent script tags here.Colours In Cultures Chart This map shows how colours are perceived in different cultures and nations across the globe.Guidelines and standards manuals Handy examples of guidelines and standards manuals used by companies and brands online. Also check Branding & Corporate Identity Design page.Code Standards and Front-End Development Best Practices This document outlines de-facto code standards in professional modern front-end development. The primary motivation of the document is code consistency and best practices. By maintaining consistency in coding styles and conventions, we can ease the burden of legacy code maintenance, and mitigate risk of breakage in the future. Nice and useful overview.Essential Tools You Always have Handy When Fixing a PC Problem? This forum thread features must-have tools that you should keep loaded on your thumb drive when asked to deal with a family member of friend’s personal computer issue.Project Management For DummiesBecause of the ever-growing array of huge, complex, and technically challenging projects in today’s world, project management has become a critical skill. This page provides a nice project management cheat sheet that will help you handle your project management assignments, such as confirming a project’s justification, developing project objectives and schedules, and maintaining commitment for a project.Expression Engine Reference ChartA quick and useful reference guide for ExpressionEngine users. A PDF-version is available as well.Computer Hardware Chart A detailed and handy hardware chart for notebook RAM, desktop RAM, CPU sockets, hard drives, ports, processor card slots, processor card sockets, peripheral cards, desktop card slots and power connectors.Corporate Identity / Logo Usage GuidesA collection of documents that illustrate how organizations and companies ensure that their branding remains consistent online and in print.ASCII: The Pronouncation Guide ASCII stands for American Standard Code for Information Interchange. Computers can only understand numbers, so an ASCII code is the numerical representation of a character such as ‘a’ or ‘@’ or an action of some sort. The non-printing ASCII characters are rarely used for their original purpose. This page features an ASCII character table and includes descriptions of the first 32 non-printing characters and the guide to their pronouncation.Name Pronunciation GuideInogolo is a practical, easy-to-use website devoted to the English pronunciation of the names of people, places, and miscellaneous stuff. The site contains a searchable database of names with both phonetic and audio pronunciations in English.Usability and User ExperienceHand picked UX related resourcesUXMARKZ is a collection of hand picked UX related resources, updated daily. You will find interesting sites, articles, videos, images and slideshows from the field of interaction design, usability, information achitecture, user interface design and other. All submissions are moderated.UX MythsThis ressource is supposed to help you build your website based on evidence, not false beliefs. UX Myths collects the most frequent user experience misconceptions and explains why they don’t hold true. And you don’t have to take their word for it, the site shows you a lot of research findings and articles by design and usability gurus.User Interface Design Patterns for Ideas and InspirationA user interface design pattern library. It is a collection of Web design patterns and best practices which helps you to find inspiration and design interfaces with great user experience. It is also a user interface gallery full of real world examples of our patterns.Last ClickHow Do I Win Rock Paper Scissors Every Time?Now, that’s a handy resource: have you ever gotten tired of being crushed by Rock, cut to shreds by Scissors, or smothered by Paper? This graphic has information compiled about Rock, Paper, Scissors (RPS) from the World RPS Society, the masters of Rock, Paper, Scissors, to help you overcome your opponents and understand the strategies needed to win Rock, Paper, Scissors every time.The Universal Packing ListThis tool generates a custom packing list for your journeys. You have to provide some basic information about the journey and a packing list appears immediately.Not Beans AgainAn online tool that finds a recipe from your ingredients. Enter what you have got in your fridge to the “Ingrediometer” and see if the tool can come up with a recipe for you.A Coder’s Guide to CoffeeAs most software and creative professionals know, coffee is an important technology for boosting mental acuity and maintaining peak on-the-job performance. But did you also know that coffee can be a damn tasty beverage? All you need is the appropriate amount of disrespect for the mainstream coffee industry and a desire to enjoy a better beverage.FlipboardFlipboard is a free personalized social magazine for your iPad. It allows you to quickly flip through news, photos and updates your friends are sharing on Facebook and Twitter. The emergence of tools like this is what will make iPad a truly useful and handy device for many people.Related PostsYou may be interested in the following related posts:50 Powerful Time-Savers For Web Designers50 New Useful CSS Techniques, Tools and Tutorials45 Incredibly Useful Web Design Checklists and Questionnaires© Vitaly Friedman for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | Post a comment | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine Post tags: Coding, Design, tools, typography, usability, Workflow
July 26 2010, 5:30am | Comments »
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
The Showcase of Beautiful Pinhole Photography
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Camera is a remarkable piece of innovation. However, it is people — professionals and newbies alike — who make it truly remarkable. It’s the photographer behind the camera. It’s their imagination, passion and talent and knowledge of the medium. You don’t need a high-end costly equipment to get beautiful results. Just your talent, a way of looking at different things and imagination is together more than enough for a great shot. It’s also the ability to envision the final result in your mind which is important.Pinhole camera is a simple home-made camera (toy camera) which only uses film or CCD sensor (more recently) enclosed in a fully opaque container and does not use any lenses or any kind of optical instruments. You can easily construct this camera yourself using things lying around like match boxes or any kind of boxes, paper, duct tape etc. The small amount of light passing through this pin sized hole produces image onto a photographic film or a CCD sensor.If you don’t want to get your hands dirty on creating a pin hole camera by yourself, you can use your DSLR with some modifications (replacing camera lenses with a pinhole). Also, pinhole cameras are available in the market: and they are quite popular, too — after all, you don’t have to worry about the focus and distortions as there are no lenses involved. Also, you might end up with lovely motion blurred photographs.In today’s weekend post we present beautiful and inspiring photographs shot using a pinhole camera. Please notice how photographers use the camera creatively to produce quite remarkable images. At the bottom of this post you will find links to some photographers and references to related resources to get you started. Also, we listed related Flickr pools which contain thousands of further examples of what can be achieved with this techniques. Get inspired, folks![Offtopic: by the way, did you know that Smashing Magazine has one of the most influential and popular Twitter accounts? Join our discussions and get updates about useful tools and resources — follow us on Twitter!]Beautiful Inspiring Pinhole Camera PhotographsTarquin CoatesTetsuyaThe calmness of blue by Andrew WatsonDaniel TückmantelInvader by TEIKOMackesonDanielle HughsonTea RoomA. WallisAn Oceanic Ghost Forest by Danielle HughsonZeb AndrewsMackesonDanielle HughsonScott VanderStouwTea RoomScott SpeckScott SpeckMackesonBruno MaleguegonebikingThe Iron Cycloid by Scott SpeckMatteo BagnoliThe Sleeping Zebra by Scott SpeckSarah KnopfFollow The Tunes by Tim FrancoBill Breslernhung dangDarren C.Scott SpeckTea RoomCeleste BrignacA. WallisDarren C.Zeb AndrewsKakkiKent MercurioMackesonSaraErikZeb AndrewsMichael C. Pasturmist-yZeb AndrewsTea RoomAlways de SunRemarkable PhotographersAnd here is a brief overview of some remarkable photographers from Flickr. These are some of great photographers that will come to your mind every time you think of pinhole photography. They have added a new demission to photography: their photostreams are full of beautiful photographs.Zeb AndrewsTea RoomScott SpeckFurther ResourcesThe Ultimate Guide to Create Your Own 35mm Pinhole Camera.Exposure Times for Pinhole PhotographyPhotography 101 – Light and the Pinhole Camera20 Strange Beautiful Pinhole CamerasTurn Your DSLR into a Pinhole CameraTurn Your Holga into a Pinhole CameraDIY: Pinhole Lego CameraDIY: Panoramic Pinhole CameraPinhole CalculatorFlickr Pool: PinholeFlickr Pool: Pinhole PhotographyFlickr Pool: Color Pinhole PhotographyFlickr Pool: Polaroid PinholeFlickr Pool: Pinhole Perspective© vailrodrigues for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | Post a comment | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine Post tags: photography, pinhole
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July 25 2010, 7:36am | Comments »
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I posted to smashingmagazine.com
Free Full Layered Facebook GUI PSD Kit
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In this post we release a free Facebook GUI PSD Kit, designed by SurgeWorks and released for Smashing Magazine and its readers. The main idea behind the kit is to speed up the prototyping of Facebook application UIs and thus sparing you from drawing all the comps and letting you customize all the texts, buttons and data as you need. As usual, the kit is free to use in all projects, without any restrictions.The kit brings the Facebook vector icon and logo. Also, since the focus of this resource are the UI elements, it brings a main window with the header, menu and the chat window for you to set up your realistic mock-ups. Plus all the modal components, comment boxes, buttons, message boxes, tabs, etc. All the components are full layered, built using vectors and blending options, so that scaling and editing the objects will not be a problem.Download the set for free!The theme is released under Creative Commons. You can use it for all your projects for free and without any restrictions. Please link to this article if you want to spread the word. You may modify the kit as you wish.large preview (.png, 0.72 Mb)download the .zip-package (zip, 6.5 Mb)alternative download link (zip, 5.1 Mb)release on the developer’s pageFeaturesThe PSD set consists of 3 PSD files:Facebook-GUI.psd contains all Facebook UI elements;Facebook-App-Authorization-Request.psd and Facebook-App-Template.psd contain the basic structure for Facebook applications design.Facebook App Authorization Request (large view)Facebook App Template (large view)Features (large view)Features (large view)Features (large view)Thank you, guys. We appreciate your work and your good intentions!© Vitaly Friedman for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | Post a comment | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine Post tags: Freebies
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July 23 2010, 7:10am | Comments »