Free web templates, graphics, articles and more.

How to create your own emoticons

suz — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:43:24 +0000

Creating a custom set of emoticons does not have to be difficult. You will need a bit of graphical knowledge and an image editing program such as GIMP in order to begin. To make things easy for you, you can use an emoticon template (see link at the bottom of this article), or you can create your own.

If you want to create your own base, typical emoticons are designed in 32 x 32 square .png files so their background is transparent. This transparency is how the circular look of the emoticon is established, since the corners of the image are not displayed. Only .gif and .png image formats support transparency, so remember to save your work in these formats regularly.

Setting the palette color for transparency usually is not necessary if you are starting on a transparent background, but if you are not, you will need a bright color that is not associated with any color you will be using in the actual emoticon. The hex colors #33FF00 and #FF00FF are recommended for your background colors because lime green and hot pink are very rarely used.

In order to set one of these colors as your palette transparency, you will need to follow these steps:

Click: Adjust > Palette > Palette Transparency > Background Color

In the box, input the hexadecimal color code you’ve decided to use as your background. This will set everything in the image that uses this code as transparent.

After setting up your transparency, all that is left is to draw your base you want to use for your icon set. The typical emoticon base is yellow with highlights to give the set some depth, but feel free to be creative with your set. Creating green or black, or even themed emoticons is entirely possible.

To get started quickly, download Invision Power Board’s emoticon development kit.

Xara Photo and Graphic Designer

suz — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 03:45:37 +0000

If you are a user of Xara Xtreme you may be aware that it has had a major makeover recently and the product has been renamed from Xara Xtreme to the somewhat less catchy “Xara Photo and Graphic Designer 6” (not to be confused with Xara Web Designer 6 or Xara Designer Pro 6!!). Confusing name changes aside, the software does have some good improvements including a cool new completely redesigned interface. Other new features include drawing tool improvements and enhanced pressure support, improvements to the Text tool and some great photo tool enhancements like content aware scaling. If you liked Xara Xtreme I think this is an upgrade worth getting. Click here to visit the Xara Photo and Graphic Designer 6 site.

33 Free Online Image Editors

suz — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 11:11:00 +0000

Online photo editing has many advantages and has become a popular option for many people. Because there is no software to install there is no issues with the software taking up resources, there’s no need to spend money and it is often easier to learn then image editors like Photoshop.

There are many fantastic free image editors out there. Some are full featured professional quality, while others serve as quick and easy editing tools or they may have a specific purpose (such as adding one type of special effect – glitter, stars, blurs etc)

Browser based free image editors
http://www.pixlr.com/editor/ – Some cool Flash based editing tools suitable for serious editing as well as simple jobs like cropping or resizing.
http://a.viary.com/tools/phoenix – “From basic image retouching to complex effects, Phoenix delivers the key features of a desktop image editor with the simplicity and accessibility of a web-based application.” They even have 75 tutorials to help you create te things you want.
http://pixer.us/ – Some basic image editing like sharpness, rotate, blur, special effects etc
http://fotoflexer.com/ – Fun features like shapes, fonts and special affects as well as more advanced options too.
http://www.sumopaint.com/app/ – No registration (unless you want to!), no fuss, fast loading image editor. Professional features, stunning effects.
http://www.picnik.com/ – An easy to use photo editor which allows you to do standard editing such as crop, rotate etc as well as some nice effects, great fonts and shapes from hand picked designers.
http://72photos.com/ – Nice site which allows great special effects to be added to photos. Pictures can be saved on the site and shared (up to 200mb for free).
http://www.drpic.com/ – An easy free online image editor
http://www.photoshop.com/ – Online photo editing and sharing. Perform basic editing, collaborate with others on a group album and more.
http://www.thepiclab.com/ – A no fuss, easy to get started with image editor. Crop, label, apply filters etc
http://www.splashup.com/ – Splashup, formerly Fauxto, is a powerful editing tool and photo manager. Layers, brushes and other features professionals use, this is a similar setup to Photoshop or Gimp.
http://webresizer.com/ – Optimise your photos so they take less time to download. You can also sharpen photos, crop, resize, convert to black and white or add a border. No registration required.
http://imageedit.infobind.com/ – Resize, Add Text or Add an Effect to an image from your computer or anywhere on the web.
http://www.pxn8.com/ – Easy to use image editor. All the usual crop, add text etc as well as some fun effects. Upload the edited image straight to Flickr, save to your computer or turn it into a gift like a mug or t-shirt.
http://www.onlinephototool.com/ – Resize, crop, add text, sharpen, rotate, paint, remove red eyes and more with this simple tool. If you want to save your images online you need to register.
http://www.myimager.com/ – Edit images (under 500kb), buttons or backgrounds. You can add text, crop rotate and add effects
http://www.phixr.com/ – Full featured online image editor. It has all the basic photo editing features you would expect, plus some advanced ones, like sepia-tone, speech-bubbles and more.
http://www.picture2life.com/ – over 50 different, fully customizable, effects to apply to photos. You can collage, animate and label images with text also.
http://www.cellsea.com/media/index.htm – Quickly rotate, resize, and crop photos, draw on them or apply some basic special effects like blur or distortions. You can use an image from your computer or from any place on the internet.
http://www.preloadr.com/ – edit Flickr photos. Free, no registration required.

Specialized or for fun
Lunapic – Add over 100 fun effects to your photos such as glitter, animated hearts, waves, snow and lots more.
online-image-editor.com – Add animation (including glitter) to your photos or do some basic editing like crop, resize, add border etc.
PikiPimp – Pimp your image with fun effects and optionally make personalized gifts with them.
JPGfun – Add cool photo effects to your pictures
CutMyPic – A simple service that lets you crop and add rounded corners to your pictures.
Magofun – Create funny fake magazine covers with your own photos.
Tuxpi – 42 Photo Effects and Picture Frames that will make your photos more lively.
PicSlice – Easily slice a picture into parts, resize it or crop it.
Speechable – Add a speech bubble to any photo.
PicGhost – Edit your images online quickly and easily. You can edit more then one photo at once and even lets you add a watermark to your photos.
Pixuffle.net – Breaks a photo of your choosing into pieces which you can shuffle around and create interesting effects.
Redigone.com – Get rid of red eyes in photos.
FixRedEyes.com – Another red eye removal app.

FontSquirrel – Free fonts

suz — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 11:37:04 +0000

FontSquirrel is a site featuring hand picked fonts that are 100% free, even for commercial use. Nicely organized with displays of newly added as well as the most downloaded fonts. There’s also the @font-face Generator, which allows you to upload your own (properly licensed) fonts and generate a full @font-face kit, complete with all the web fonts you’ll need and the css code. Found via Nenuno

Wordpress themes by PliablePress

suz — Thu, 13 May 2010 01:10:02 +0000

PliablePress is a brand new site (launched only within the last 48 hours) offering brand new professionally designed Wordpress themes. If you join within the next few days you can get a $25 discount on the regular price by entering coupon code LAUNCH2010 in the signup form.

Anyone who joins in the next two weeks will also receive the below (not yet released) theme for free, amongst other nice extras.

So to take advantage of this offer head over to PliablePress WordPress Themes

10 free social networking icons

suz — Thu, 13 May 2010 00:09:51 +0000

Liverpool web design team Tropica is offering the above set of 10 social media icons to download for free. So if you are looking for any one (or more) of Twitter, Technorati, Last.Fm, Digg, Reddit, Myspace, Mixx, Facebook, Delicious or an RSS feed icon, head over to Tropicaweb.co.uk to download.

MyProduct Wodpress Theme

suz — Tue, 11 May 2010 02:36:31 +0000

Elegant Themes‘ Wordpress theme release “My Product” is the latest addition to their stylish, growing members section. For $19 per year you can download this and all other templates (currently 37 of them) which I think is fantastic value for money. All templates are professionally designed, have many features and come with support should you run into any trouble.

Amara Web Animation Software

suz — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 12:59:28 +0000

Amara Software is a line of 5 creative, useful and affordable Flash animation tools that make it easy to create web animations and text & photo effects for websites. Ideal for people with a limited budget and not a lot of time, and for people who don’t own or don’t know how to use Adobe Flash to create animations and effects for their website.

Above Flash animation is created with Amara Intro and Banner Builder

The software is owned and made by an Australian-based company that has been at the international forefront of animation software applications for more than 10 years.

The Amara Software range contains these 5 applications:

• Amara News Ticker
• Amara Slideshow Builder
• Amara Menu & Button Maker
• Amara Intro & Banner Builder
• Amara Photo Animation Software

More details of each are set out below.

All of Amara’s animation software applications have the following benefits:

• Software can be downloaded for free to try it out first
• Easy to use programs, even for inexperienced web designers
• Saves animations in SWF format for playing in Adobe Flash Player
• No technical skills, Flash knowledge or other Flash software are needed
• FAQs & tutorials explain how to easily insert the SWF animations into HTML editors and other commonly used software

Information about each of the 5 applications:

Amara News Ticker (US$19.95)
Use this to create horizontal and vertical Flash news tickers and scrollers for your site in just a few quick steps. Some of its features include: configurable scrolling speed, text & rollover fonts & colours, URL links, background images, optional XML data feed, and much more.

Amara Slideshow Builder (US$29.95)
The perfect tool to help you put together fantastic photo albums and Flash slideshows for your website. You can turn a selection of your photos into a stunning picture slidehow or photo album and add special effects, URL links, background music, text, buttons and more.

Amara Menu & Button Maker (US$39.95)
Create professional Flash buttons and complete menus and navigation bars for your website in just minutes, horizontal or vertical, including scrolling menus with submenu items, background pictures, sounds and loads of special effects.

Amara Intro & Banner Builder (US$39.95)
Easy-to-use program to design Flash banners, animated intros, Flash advertisements and any other text animation. Just enter your texts, select font styles, colours, sizes and positions and one of the many text effects available, add sound files, background pictures or Flash animations, URL links and you’ll have an incredible Flash banner.

Amara Photo Animation Software (US$49.95)
Take your visitors through your still pictures by panning, zooming, fading in & out, pausing and providing comments at different points in your still photos. This animation software is great for creating ‘virtual tours’ through your images, particularly panorama photos and large images with a lot of detail. Includes loads of special effects for a professional virtual tour slideshow.

Free themed animations

Having a themed Flash animation on your website for an upcoming event or holiday is a great way to capture the spirit of the season.

Amara Software makes it easy to do just that. It offers a huge selection of free animations with different themes that can be imported to any of its applications. Just add your own text or make changes where needed to create your own themed animation for your website.

Some examples of its free themed Flash animations:

• Valentine’s Day animation
• Christmas animation
• Halloween animation

Shareware: Free downloads

Because all of Amara Software’s programs are shareware applications, you can download them for free first and try them out before deciding whether to buy them. Once you register them, you will be able to continue to use the program to create an unlimited number of animations for as long as you want.

Package deals: Discounts apply if you buy 4 or 5 applications at once.

Find out more on the Amara Software website at www.amarasoftware.com

Help Desk Software

suz — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 04:20:45 +0000

Unless your web site is purely a personal one, chances are you will have questions and comments from visitors. Until a site reaches a certain volume this can be handled manually via email by one person. However as more and more questions, comments, complaints, orders etc come in it can start to become overwhelming not to mention confusing.

Customer support can quickly start taking up a lot of time and many hours can be spent answering questions, many of which are the same ones time and time again. This is where helpdesk software can come in very handy.

Most helpdesk software can usually handle support tickets, you can create canned responses so that you are not typing the same answer time and again as well as other features, depending on the software you choose.

If you are looking for a free php Helpdesk option (runs using Php and a mySQL database) Hesk is a choice worth looking at. It offers the above mentioned options as well as a knowledge base, unlimited administrators (in case there is more then one person handling the customer support) and lots more handy features.

The software can be downloaded and installed for free with the option of paying $40 for a license which grants you the option of removing the “powered by” link at the bottom of pages. This is optional however and you can use the free version of the php help desk for as long as you need without any limitations.This is a good way to decide if this option is right for your particular web site or not.

The company also offers a remotely hosted option (for a monthly fee) in case you don’t feel comfortable installing it or running the software from your own server or don’t want to have to bother with upgrades.

Easy-to-Edit Flash Website Templates

suz — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 08:15:01 +0000

Everyone can get a complete, professional website up today, based on one of hundreds of easy-to-edit Flash templates from EasyTemplates.com. These impressive website templates are fast-loading, simple to customize and many come complete with a Photo or Video Gallery or a functional Shopping Cart.

The Website Templates with Photo Gallery and Video Gallery are ideal for artists, web designers, photographers, videographers, businesses and individuals who need to have a professional Flash photo gallery or video gallery website up and running quickly.

Simply edit the template copy in an external text file. This makes the whole process of customizing and updating your site extremely easy. The Photo/Video Gallery Website Templates include a special Admin tool to easily upload and change photos and videos in your gallery.

There are thousands of websites that use one of the easy-to-edit web templates from easytemplates.com, so have a look at the stunning designs and choose yours now!

5 Customer Benefits of EasyTemplates:

Stunning, Professional Designs: Our Easy Templates have been designed very professionally and look sensational. They are more attractive and professional than most templates you’ll find on other websites. You’ll really stand out and impress your visitors.
Easy to Edit: Our Easy Templates are very easy to customize. This really makes a big difference, it gives you the freedom to everything yourself and publish your website within a couple of hours. And by changing things you will have a unique website that is truly one-of-a-kind.
Photo Gallery: We have made it easy to publish a photo gallery on your site, as many of our website templates include a fully functional Photo Gallery. It comes with an admin system so you can easily upload photos from you computer and add them to the gallery.
Video Gallery: Publishing videos on your website is easy if you use one of our web templates with a fully functional Video Gallery. They work the same as the Photo Gallery – you upload videos from your computer via an easy admin system that is included.
Fast Loading Websites: Because our Easy Templates keep the content external, it means the websites load fast, which is crucial for any website as visitors don’t like waiting forever for the website to appear. An additional benefit of this is that Google is increasingly favoring websites that load fast.

Browse our Flash Template Designs

See for yourself what our Flash Website Templates look like by clicking one of the links below.

Flash Photography Templates
These are fast Flash websites with a functional and attractive Photo Gallery. Simply edit your textual content in the external “text.html” file using Notepad or any HTML editor, and change your photos with our easy Photo Admin tool.

Flash Video Templates Select a complete Flash website with a professional Video Gallery. You can edit your textual content in the external “text.html” file using Notepad or any HTML editor, and upload and change your videos with our easy Video Admin tool.

Flash Video and Photo Templates We also have complete Flash website templates with a fast-loading Photo Gallery AND Video Gallery. Our Photo + Video Gallery Templates with Admin tool let you edit text in the external “text.html” file using Notepad or HTML editor, and change photos and videos with our easy Photo and Video Admin tools.

Easy Flash Templates Homepage To browse through our many hundreds of easy-to-edit Flash website templates by design theme or functionality, please select a category of your choice on our EasyTemplates homepage.

Customer websites

See examples of REAL websites of some of our customers based on some of our EasyTemplates website templates in our Flash Templates Customer Gallery.