As graphic designers, we are constantly looking to learn and refine our skill sets. The wealth of inspiration and knowledge that can be found in a good book is usually incomparable to the readily available content on the internet. Whether you are an established design professional or a beginner who is looking to learn new skills, we recommend this list of 12 inspiring graphic design books to fuel that creative spark.
Month: November 2018
Slow Website? How to Improve Site Speed
The speed of your website means more than just convenience for visitors. Site speed can make or break the success of your website. Without acceptable page load times, visitors will become impatient and leave your site, or worse yet, not hang around to give you a first glance.
Slow site speed is seen as a major red flag. So much so that search engines, like Google, will drop your site down in rank to provide their users with a quicker solution to the information they are seeking. Beyond simply inconveniencing visitors, slow site speed may significantly affect many related factors like UX, bounce rates, SEO and overall site traffic.
The 10 Most Popular Google Fonts of 2018
Google Fonts is an open source collection of nearly 900 font families that are used by graphic designers, web designers and content specialists for both digital and print design projects. Google Fonts have been downloaded over 19 Billion times by users. All the fonts are available for download from the Google Fonts GitHub repository or you can download the font library into your server. While companies like Adobe and others have followed suit and built their own font directories, Google Fonts remains the top choice for personal and professional use due to its breadth of quality open source font options.
The Nuances of Typography: Ligatures, Diphthongs, Swash Characters & Variables Fonts
Typefaces are designed keeping the tiniest details in mind. It is also the emotive quality of these individualistic typefaces that help us express and communicate ideas with clarity. Our fascination with letterforms and typography and using it as a tool for expression has evolved with time. So has the typefaces and how we use them today. Here are some examples of typographic elements and nuances that are quite often overlooked by designers but their relevance and importance haven’t changed.
10 Commandments for WordPress Blogging Beginners
If you’re wondering how to start a blog, look no further than the most popular publishing platform on the market, WordPress. With more market share than all other content management systems combined, there is no question which CMS is best for bloggers both new and seasoned. The reason why 27% of the internet is powered by WordPress, is because it has the simplicity to support blogging for beginners and the capacity to run massive corporate sites.
Shopify vs. Bigcommerce: Detailed Comparison
Do you want to launch an online shop and don’t know where to start? If your budget is on the minimum and you don’t want to spend a lot on hiring a web designer to create your website, e-commerce platforms like Bigcommerce and Shopify may be the best solution for you.
How to Choose the Best Website Template for Your Website
A web template can be described as a boxed or pre-designed webpage which can be used by any company, organization or individual to connect or plug in whatever images or copy they want to, to create their own unique site. Web templates help both developers and web designers to automatically provide custom pages that meet the basic needs for companies, with much less hassle than coding a brand new website from scratch. Templates also allow non-developers and novice website administrators to create their website vision without professional assistance.
How to Create a Mood Board to Inspire Your Website Design
Whether you’re working on a brand new website or a stylish redesign, inspiration and dreaming up the style you want to portray is always the first step. This may sound like a difficult task if you’ve been in an inspo-rut. On the other hand, you could be brimming with inspiration but struggling to organize all of your fun ideas into a cohesive plan.
As you read through this guide, you will realize that it is easy to hone-in-website design inspiration and manage it into digestible concepts and drum up new ideas to make your site its best. This mood boarding process works well whether your website is for your personal brand, your own company, or for a client! Mood boarding is the best way to synthesize everyone’s input, too.
5 Essential Elements of Modern Package Design for Beauty Products
Beauty brands have been growing exponentially in the last couple of years. Last year, the industry was estimated to be worth $265 billion worldwide. The industry is defying gravity by growing at a skyrocketing rate. Use of the online sales and changes in lifestyles have steered growth in a speedy way. Timing as also played a major role as we’re living in a generation where everyone wants to look good. Diversification of brands has led to the rise of new brands that are steering the growth of the overall beauty brands. Social media has pushed the brands even higher by encouraging self-expression and an opening myriad of possibilities to young generation consumers who are tech-savvy. With the advent of influencer marketing, more and more people are buying makeup products to try their hand professionally or to follow along with the latest tutorial from a so-called “beauty guru” on Instagram or YouTube.
How Blockchain Will Impact Web Design in 2019
The blockchain technology that you keep hearing about has already had major impacts in different aspects of the digital sphere, despite being so new. Blockchain can transform the way we use the internet and in some ways, changes have already taken form. The technology has especially affected the web design aspect of internet use. In the coming year, it is expected that blockchain will have more effects on web development. Web developers will need to adapt to this fast-growing technology. As things are right now it is anticipated that some changes need to be done in web design to accommodate this new technology. This makes it important to know how blockchain will impact web design.
