Friday, August 31, 2007

Digital Photography Tips for Beginners and Experts

Do you own a digital camera? Have you started to make the most out of it? Without really starting the features of a digital camera, one can start using his or her digital camera to take beautiful pictures because of the technology embedded into that small little device.

A digital camera can help movies like me to autofocus I do on a mountain view, or a small little beautiful flower. When I first bought my camera, the salesman was very persuasive. And I quote, all you need to do is point and click. I was instantly sold on getting that wonderful camera.

As the days and weeks go by, I began to be familiar with the digital camera and suddenly digital photography became a passion for me. I wanted to take more than just ordinary pictures! I dug through my old closet and found the manual to this digital camera and started reading it. I learned about quality, that a 300 dpi will produce a better quality than a 72 dpi resolution. If only I have learned this much earlier! I learned about shutter speeds and exposure, white balance and how to remove red eye effects... digital photography is becoming very interesting!

Do you have problem taking pictures through a window? every time I take a picture to a window, there is always a reflection on the picture. Sometimes the reflection is so small I can only is it after I transfer it onto my computer. If only I knew to stand closer to the window, I would have reduced the reflection that reflects on shiny surface of the glass.

Have you tried to take pictures in the dark? if you try to use the flash with the camera, the picture could look too bright. Especially if you use it in a jungle, you will scare away most of the animals. There is a way to use the camera to take pictures without flash in the dark. That is to increase your light exposure. You can control your shutter speed by decreasing it. By decreasing the shutter speed, you allow more light to go your camera and brighten up the dark picture.

In addition to the light present, the amount of light that is reflected from the image is then absorbed into the shutter. The longer the shutter close its lead, the high exposure and brighter the image. Have you wonder how cats can see very well in the night? Their eyes are so sensitive to light, a candle in the dark can lid up a whole room for them. It takes some practice for you and I to learn about the shutter speed. Experiment and testing is crucial to know what is the correct speed.

As digital camera is getting cheaper and cheaper these days, digital photography is being picked up by many amateur Digital photographers. The younger generation to be able to pick up on softwares in many leading pictures past digital photography is a growing hobby.

Are you a beginner or seasoned professionals in digital photography? There is always something new to learn isn't there? Visit David Chong's http://digital-photography.for-free.com

Website Creation and the Eye of the Spider

Picture, if you will, a Rocky-style montage. A team is involved in website creation from the ground up. A driving, inspirational song begins. The first scene is a highly contentious meeting, with a sweating and nervous marketing executive frantically drawing away at a whiteboard in front of a hostile audience. Flash to copywriters, fingers cracked and bleeding, churning away at their keyboards. Jump to web designers, sporting blurred eyes rimmed with dark circles, peering into their monitors in obvious discomfort. Finally, we see signs of it all coming together. A beautiful home page briefly appears. The music ends. A bell rings. And...

Nothing happens. The website would seem to have tripped over its own shoelaces and fallen right through the canvas, disappearing into cyberspace. The credits roll, to the eternal shame of those whose names appear.

What went wrong?

The team engaged in website creation without any regard for the role of the search engine spider. You see, there is quite a difference in what is seen by humans on a website and what is seen by a search engine "spider" (a program that routinely combs the Internet indexing websites). There are an untold numbers of expensive websites out there that are beautiful to behold from a human perspective, yet all but invisible to search engine spiders (and thus searchers), just as there are untold numbers of expensive, beautiful yachts silently and pointlessly resting on the ocean bottom in the Bermuda Triangle.

What follows is a small list of common website elements, broken into two categories: what search engines can see, and what they can not.

Three Things a Search Engine Spider Can't See

Graphic text - Most professionals involved in website creation take great pride in their work, which is obviously a desired trait. Occasionally, however, this can present problems. When a web designer decides to use text in a graphic form (meaning that the text is actually an image), the search engine spider can not read what that text says. A common reason for a designer to use text in a graphic is because he or she wants to use a rare font that most visitors won't have on their machines. Another reason is that the designer wants to have absolute control over how the website text renders. When faced with the choice over which kind of text to use, it is important to weigh the aesthetic choice against the potential loss of search engine visibility.

Images - As touched upon above, a search engine spider is not yet able to look at images or pictures and determine what they are (although you can and should attach a tag to them which the spider can read - commonly referred to as an "alt" tag). A spider will skip directly over your logo and masthead, any pictures, and most other graphical ele
ments.

Flash - Search engine spiders will not read through the text in any Flash animation on your site (or any other animation). This does not mean that using Flash elements will render your site invisible; it merely means that you should not count on the text that appears in any Flash animation on your website to be indexed. If the team responsible for your website creation decides to build the entire site in Flash, however, you will encounter unique problems. While some search engines are getting better at trying to index websites built entirely on this platform, it is still an overall rankings killer. If you must have a website created entirely in Flash, it is wise to also have an alternate HTML version for search engines and people who prefer HTML sites.

Three Things a Search Engine Spider Can See

HTML text - A search engine spider relies heavily on HTML text to determine what a web page is about. Spiders, therefore, index HTML text and will even make distinctions between differences in how the text is presented. For example, text that is in a headline or is bolded is assumed to be slightly more important than regular text.

Links - Outgoing links on your pages are easily understood by the spider, especially if they are text links. The wording of these links (or the alt tags attached to them) can, like HTML text, give the spider an idea of what your page is about. However, there are certain types of links that are not easily indexed. If your website creation team embedded your links in a pull-down menu that utilizes JavaScript or other scripting language, most search engine spiders will not see them.

Tags - There are many kinds of tags, but not all are important for search engine optimization. Meta tags include the "keywords" tag, which should list keyphrases that describe the page. Another meta tag is the "description" tag, which should be one or two brief sentences that describe the page. Another tag, which is not actually a meta tag, but which has significant importance to search engine rankings, is the "title" tag. This tag contains the words that you will see in the blue bar at the top of your web page.

This list is by no means comprehensive - there are many other attributes that aren't mentioned in this article. The primary message here is that companies should do their homework before engaging in website creation. There are thousands of resources available on the Internet that can answer your questions about any element you are considering adding before you build (or redesign) your site. Take the time to study each so that you can be sure you aren't sacrificing your search engine rankings for the sake of something largely unnecessary.

As for the downtrodden website creation team mentioned earlier in the article, let's remember that Rocky has been known to get beat down in the first fight but then to pull himself up from the floor and triumph in the end. The team will go back into training and eventually understand the Eye of the Spider. Cue the music...

Source: isedb.com

Thursday, August 30, 2007

Brochure Printing and Persuasive Brochure Design - 12 Ideas

Be it through the allure of the product’s beauty, through an idea or fantasy or through a promise of better solution, brochures and brochure printing do all these things and much more.

Brochures are effective for promoting causes, ideas, products, services and even companies. Yet, more commonly, brochures used in marketing are made to steer customers towards a particular product or service. This, as designed, prompts the customer to avail of such products.

Yes, brochures are ingenious products of persuasion and creativity. And whether through individual effort or team ideation, the results are always geared towards making effective concepts and effective brochures.

Here are some tips on how to make your brochures stand out and capture your target audience:

Prepare your images
Images are made up of photos and illustrations. Combined, they will form the backbone of the brochure design. These images will be the first thing that prospective customers get to see.

• Use lively colors to indicate the exuberance of your brochure’s message.

• Likewise, the illustrations and images should complement each other. Along with the choice of color, these three could already reveal what the message of the brochure is.

Meaty Content
Your content are made up of text and statements representing your company or organization. It too holds the necessary information that will persuade and sway your clients towards your side. Hence observe the following in your content writing:

• Choose your words and sentences carefully. Words can help select and shape your target market. Use of certain words such as slang and lingo to embellish and add character to your tone.

• Slang and lingo can communicate well to a selective audience. It, however, limits itself and the general public may not understand or appreciate your brochures well enough.

• Make sentences short and catchy. Brochures are most often than not read on the go. So make it easy for your readers to grasp even complex ideas by exercising brevity.

• Brochures are, after all, a piece of literature, a very short literature that can occupy time waiting for the bus, standing in line and the like. Use bullets and numbering to organize information that clients can digest easily.

• It would also do well to provide clients with a short overview or outline as to what your product or service is all about.

• Highlight product features, it strengths and the solutions it provides that makes it different from other products.

• Provide useful product information as well as your company details and contact numbers.

• You have to put yourself in the position of your target customer and try to ask yourself questions that you as a client would want to know firsthand.

Brand Recall
Make your product more memorable. Use colors that maintains the integrity of your brand logo. Also, ensure that your colors make your brand logo stand out not just for the whole brochure, but against competition too.

• Provide customers an alternative name to remember. Include your company logo to accent and expose yourself better. Doing this builds your image and gains you media mileage. Doing this makes your presence felt among your clients and potential ones as well.

• And to end on a final note, a brochure printing company is necessary to fulfill all your desired goals for the success of your brochures.

With a professional brochure company, things can be fairly simple. With little research you will be able to find out about lots of sites offering online brochure printing Learn to compare what you read regarding the services they offer. From turn around times to cost of print jobs and folding options available, you will be able cut your list short and pick out the best printer for you.

This composition is projected to give the readers information about Brochure Printing and on how brochures can help you in your marketing schemes and provide you a higher sales rate. For more topics and tips about Brochure Printing please refer to Catalog Printing Experts

By: Carla San Gaspar

Corporate Logo Design

A corporate logo design is essential in today's corporate world. If used effectively, it will be highly instrumental in building your corporate identity and should successfully exude the company's attitude. The viewers must have some idea about the disposition, character, or fundamental values of your company through your logo.

Following certain basic principles can ensure that your corporate logo design is professional easy to remember and creates a great impact on its viewers while successfully expressing the nature of your business.

Go for Professional Logo Designers You might save a few dollars doing your own logo or getting it done from the next door boy who knows the basics of designing but if you are serious about your business you should always go for a professional logo design firm. Your corporate logo is your identity, your customers recognize you by your logo, so the more professional and sophisticated your logo is the better will be your customer's impression about your company.

Though most of the logo design companies charge exorbitant rates to create a corporate logo design but the industry is changing. These days there are companies that offer excellent professional logos for nominal charges ( e.g., corporate logo design

Simplicity – Keep it Simple An ideal corporate logo design should be simple and memorable. Corporate houses spend thousands of dollars to ensure that customers remember them at all point of time and a simple logo is the key to that. Think about the Nike logo, it's simple and memorable—once you see the Swoosh, do you ever need to think twice about the company name?

Colors Colors you use for your corporate logo are a very important factor in your brand establishment. If you already have your corporate colors ask your logo designer to use those colors for the logo. If you don't, suggest the colors that you think might give your prospective clients some idea about the type of business you do. For example, a company working in the fields of forest conservation might like their logo to be in green. At the same time, you also need to consider which colors will go well with your corporate stationeries as well.

Black and White version While emphasizing the colors we must also remember that it is important for a corporate logo to come out well in black and white. A corporate logo design is used in all corporate communications including fax and photocopied document where they will be in black and white and the logo design must be such that it holds the same impact even in black and white.

Minimize Colors this is more important from an economic and usability point of view. Corporate logos are often required to be printed for stationary and corporate literature. Using a one or two spot color logo can save a lot of cost compared to printing a full color logo.

Logo Format It is advisable to always use a vector format for your corporate logo design. A corporate logo may be required to be reproduced at any size for different purposes in the future. A logo design done in vector format can be expanded to any size without any loss of image quality, where as a corporate logo in raster format will loose image quality, if scaled up. Also it is easier to convert a vector logo design to bitmap than vice versa.

If you get a professional logo design firm to do your corporate logo and brief them about these basic tips (most of the knowledgeable firms are well aware of these principles) you are sure to get a satisfactory corporate logo design that would go a long way in helping you establishing your brand.

Use your Logo: Once you are ready with your corporate logo start giving it maximum exposure possible. Not only on your business cards and letterheads but also on your packaging, uniforms, pens and all possible goods should contain your logo. This gives wider exposure to your logo and people gets familiar with the corporate logo much faster. With all these you are on your way to establish your brand. Take leaps with your new corporate logo.

www.LogosArea.com is one of the largest logo design firms in the world. We've created a unique business model designed to eliminate the hassles and uncertainty of traditional logo design. Customers appreciate our streamlined, simplified process, talented designers, and personal service. That's why over 45,000 clients have chosen LogosArea to design their logo .At LogosArea, our mission is to make small businesses look great. We do this by providing small businesses with graphic design services that inspire you and enable you to emotionally connect with their customers.

By: Imran Adrees

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

How To Rescue Your Graphic Design Project When All Else Fails

Whether you're giving a critical sales presentation to a client, producing visuals for a meeting, event, trade show or seminar, or unveiling the new company logo before an audience of shareholders, top-notch graphics will help ensure that you, your products, and your message receive the attention they deserve.

Yet when you decide to do the graphics in-house to reduce turnaround time or cut expenses, those logos, photos, charts, graphs, pictures, timelines, illustrations, etc. can be a source of frustration, embarrassment, stress and perhaps lost business. Following ten simple tips to surefire do-it-yourself graphic design, however, will help maximize your visual punch, minimize your mistakes, and give you the professional-look your graphics deserve. Not to mention, cut down on the headaches.

1. -Take a deep breath

Especially if you have a key presentation looming that needs charts, graphs, and visuals and all you have are loose papers and a migraine, first take a deep breath. Put on a fresh pot of coffee. Clear your workspace. Handle those last minute telephone calls. In short, you are going to need to focus your attention on your design project, so prepare yourself. You're about to solve your graphic design problem in classic, do-it-yourself fashion.

2. - Outline your project

Make a simple list of the presentation graphics you think you'll need. Don't get into details at this point. For example, you might list: opening-- photo of young couple with product and company logo; midpoint-- new market piechart and bar graph of financial growth; close-- photo of new satisfied customer using product. You just want to create a rough outline that can help steer you through the project.

3. - Define what you're trying to say

To keep your audience visually interested you must keep things simple and avoid clutter that will confuse your focus.

Communicate one concept at a time with your graphics. Your message can contain various parts, but your communication as a whole must concentrate on the key concept you want to get across. To shoot for more is to court disaster. At all costs, avoid making everything important, as that's the surest way to create visual anarchy. When you attempt to give great importance to more than one message (or visual item), you introduce confusion and succeed only in dispersing the viewer¹s attention instead of directing it where you want it.

4. - Keep it simple

Visually, simple is better than complex, especially when images will only be seen a short time. Avoid the complex since it obscures your message rather than clarifies it.

Use pictures, illustrations, graphs, etc. to punch up an important point, and to make complex ideas simple. However, avoid literally mimicking what's said in the text. The graphics must enhance and play on variations of the text to make it more interesting - but never stray from the spirit of the message. At their best, graphics add humor, emotion, reality, believability, and playfulness to help bring about understanding and agreement in viewers.

Keep text simple and readable, without overdoing emphasis. Use changes of size, style, color, and position, including bullets, symbols and other devices to highlight and organize your text in moderation. To avoid distracting the reader, limit the number of fonts to two or three in no more than three or four readable sizes. Keep the background simple, and use contrast to ensure legibility. Contrast is the noticeable difference between things, and can be as simple as bolding or underlining text in some cases. But don't fill every bit of "empty" space, as well-chosen space can serve to "frame" graphic elements you may want to emphasize.

5. - Lay out your type, graphics, and photos

Look at how the elements blend together. Lay out the type, graphics, photos, etc. in rough format similar to how they will be presented. If you know how, use computer formatting on programs such as MS Word or Excel to experiment with layout. Or you may want to lay out the physical materials on a desk or conference table. Similarly, you may want to tape or pin them to a wall or cubicle to see how vertical display affects their visual impact.

Now, here's where a little strategic thinking can set your graphic design work apart from the norm:

Visually group graphics to show similarity and build interest. Try to visually group objects using similarities of theme, color, direction, position, alignment, etc. Show what goes with what, so your viewers will draw the proper conclusions. For example, a picture of worn-out old shoes could depict a potential client's current database management system (DBS), and brand new track cleats could depict your DBS product. Of course, things that belong together must have characteristics in common, and must be similar enough to be perceived as a group or set.

Also, make visual order part of your message. For example, decide WHEN the viewer should notice your logo: Before reading the copy? After reading the headline? Should the viewer note your company name before or after the product you're selling? These strategic distinctions can boost or detract both from your credibility and ability to persuade.

6. - Add emphasis with a little color and contrast

The graphics of your piece must be easily seen and attract more attention than anything around it. If not, your audience's attention will go elsewhere: to a competitor's ad, booth, flyer, banner, etc. To improve the odds of getting your audience's attention, use color and contrast in moderation to create interest. Remember to use emphasis sparingly, like spice in cooking, because a little goes a long ways but too much simply overpowers.

That said, attention does gravitate toward the area of greatest contrast. (That's why print is usually black-on-white, which makes the letters stand out for easier viewing, instead of say, black-on-brown). For example, in a visual ad or billboard, a single sentence on an otherwise empty page demands attention. You can't help but read it. Other examples of good, eye-catching contrast: a white spotlight in a dark theater; a 3-D object jutting out of a flat wall; a moving object among motionless ones (or a stationary object among moving ones); and a bright, colorful poster over a dull, monochrome background. Similarly, at a trade show you'd want your signage to run horizontally if you're competitors' signs run vertically. In each case, your audience is visually attracted toward what stands out or offers contrast.

Here are a few types of useful contrast to consider using in your graphics: large/small, light/dark, flat/3-D, high/low, short/long, strong/weak, smooth/course, one/many, full/empty, warm/cool (colors), before/after, complex/simple, straight/winding, round/angular, continuous/interrupted, horizontal/vertical/diagonal, etc.

For a series of visuals, use contrasting sequences to build interest as well. Contrasting sequences such as before/after, young/old, or gradations of color can guide and build the viewer's interest by suggesting degrees of importance, recognizable patterns, or consequences. When establishing what the viewer should notice first, second, third, etc., control the order in which he perceives the various items, using a scale of contrasts from most different to most similar. The greater the contrast, the more importance a visual item is given.

7. - Get a fresh perspective

After focusing on your graphics project, it helps to get a fresh perspective. Ideally, you should ask someone with art or design experience a few questions. How do these graphics strike you? Do they support the message? What would you change? The less they know about your presentation, company, or product the more helpful their opinion, as it will more closely approximate your audience's reaction. But really, anyone's opinion helps to pinpoint strengths and weaknesses in your designs, so don't be afraid to ask. And don't be afraid to accept criticism. If no one is available, take a break from your project if at all possible, so you can approach your graphic project with fresher, less biased eyes.

8. - Put on the finishing touches

Then adjust your graphics project according to the objective feedback you received. Here's where you may brighten or lighten colors, change font sizes, or rearrange graphics for better overall layout.

Also, round out your pictures and graphics with carefully chosen words. From caption to headline and story, words are a critical part of the message you're visually communi-cating, so they must be chosen and arranged carefully for the whole to work. Include only what's important, so as not to dilute your carefully crafted message.

Along these lines, speak your viewers' language in a way that addresses their problems and answers their needs. For example, if your picture shows a healthy Mr. Jones tussling with grandkids after successful bypass surgery, mention how your new medical product reduced recovery time to three weeks from the normal three months.

9. - Take one last look

No matter how careful you are there's always last minute mistakes to catch: misspelled words, misaligned margins, or graphics that still need to be rearranged to lessen distracting "white" or trapped space. Use spell and grammar checkers, then print out sample copies to test overall visual effect until you're satisfied with the results.

10. 0 - Print out and mount your final presentation

Since all your previous work counts for naught if the final graphic product isn't displayed and mounted properly, it's critical to prevent the wrinkling, bubbling, warping, and peeling that can sink an otherwise impeccable graphic presentation. To this end, I have long used and recommended Pres-On products. Well known amongst professional graphic artists and photographers, Pres-On has a broad line of do-it-yourself, self-stick mounting board products for just about every application. I've mounted everything from extremely large oversize prints like architectural renderings and giant logos, to small decorative items, and consistently Pres-On mounting products makes it very easy to do and gives me professional results.

Their newest mounting product Score & Snap, is made of a thin, surprisingly strong, plastic material that's coated with self-stick mounting adhesive. It was designed to mount logos, photos, charts, signs and other graphics quickly and easily, with the capability to correct mistakes, but with subsequent permanent positioning. Once a graphic is mounted, the protective plastic can be easily scored with an X-Acto knife, then snapped off into the desired shape. Because of the consistency of the plastic material, its versatility in positioning graphics, and its clean edges, it makes it easy to produce a spectacular looking finished product that won't come undone at the worst possible moment.

With a firm grip on your graphics project, you can now look forward to the presentation deadline without knots in your stomach. Who knows, with the knockout graphics you cranked out, on a shoestring budget to boot, you could be in line for a promotion. As a parting tip, ask for a raise, as you've just added polished graphic presentation to your list of job skills. Just keep your Graphic Design Rescue Tips handy because the next project might not be so easy.

Call Dali Bahat at (818) 765-6635 or email at ot_artist@earthlink.net for more information about Master Design. For more information on Pres-On "Score & Snap", and other Pres-On Self-Stick adhesive mounting products contact Pres-On Corp. at 21 Factory Road, Addison, Illinois 60101; Phone (800) 323-1745; Fax (888) 543-9406; www.Pres-On.com.

By: Dali Bahat

Graphic Design Help: Will A Freelancer Be Enough Or Do You Need A Large Design Firm?

There is a little greasy spoon in my neighborhood that always has a line out the door on weekends. The fried eggs are so greasy they could stop your heart, there isn’t a single homemade pastry or muffin in the joint, and the 99-cent cup of coffee tastes like coffee tasted before the American cuppa joe morphed into a gourmet addiction for the masses. The flowers are fake, the tablecloths are plastic, the cheese is of the fluorescent variety, and the silverware has spots. Yet there’s always a line.

People love the restaurant because they know what to expect, get what they expect, and the service is consistently friendly and efficient. Customers do not expect homemade bread served with homemade butter and fresh-from-the-grove OJ. They don’t come for lunch expecting panini with goat cheese and oven-roasted anything. They don’t come expecting to be served a seven-course meal. They come with a friend expecting to leave full and happy for less than twenty bucks including tip. The bottom line is this: if you want a couple of fried eggs and toast, don’t go to the Ritz for Sunday brunch. You’ll have to pay for the extra food, live music, puffy chairs, perpetual water refills, refined wait staff and crisp linens. On the other hand, don’t go to a diner if you want it all.

This analogy works well for design services. On one end is a freelance designer; at the other end is a large multinational design firm. Somewhere in the middle is probably a service provider to suit your needs.

I have developed a handy reference chart illustrating a range of service providers, what they do, and what they charge for a logo project and a brochure project. When you are looking for design help, if you need a simple brochure, avoid a large design firm; you’ll end up paying for a copywriter, account manager, administrative task master and one or two executive salaries that will not benefit you. On the other hand, if you need diligent project managing, extensive strategy development, copy, and cross-media implementation of a new brand, a freelancer will not give you the services you need. Bottom line: know if you need your eggs fried or coddled.

View the handy reference chart here (PDF file).


Audrey Nezer is an award-winning graphic designer in Seattle, Washington. Her company, Artifex Design, creates playful, edgy and effective marketing and communication materials for companies and organizations throughout the United States. Visit http://www.artifex.net to learn more (and win a prize!)

By: Audrey Nezer

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

The Best Page Layout and Design for Content Websites

I was chatting to a veteran print publisher, who had been producing magazines for over thirty years.

He shook his head in despair, as he told me that every year he sees new magazines hit the newsstands with the publications' titles placed vertically on the magazine cover.

"Whenever I see this," he said, "I know it has been produced by a new publishing company that does not understand the industry. Anyone with any experience of periodical publishing knows that publications with vertical titles fail, or at least have to change quickly to survive. The market has taught us this lesson hundreds, if not thousands of times, but still people make the same mistake."

This message is just as relevant to website layout as it is to magazine design. The web has been around for long enough that rules and best practise have emerged from years of trial error by thousands of website owners. You can either go with the flow and be grateful that you can learn from the experience of others, or you can swim against the tide and try to convince the market that you are right and they are wrong.

I would suggest that swimming downstream is far easier and will give you a much greater chance of success.

To understand which layouts work you only need to look at the industry gorillas. These are the online content publishers who have been around for years, and who have tested just about every layout combination. Good examples are some of the most read websites on the internet including:

- BBC (www.bbc.com)

- The Financial Times (www.ft.com)

- The Economist (www.economist.com)

- The Wall Street Journal (www.wsj.com)

You will quickly start to recognise elements of the page layouts which are common across all these sites. Just as with print newspapers and magazines, these are the layouts that have proven to sit most comfortably with the reader and with the way online users want to consume content.

The key design and layout elements which should remain constant are: Masthead across the top – the masthead is where the logo goes and usually imagery that supports the subject matter on the website.

Left hand column should contain all the primary navigation, which should remain constant across the whole website. It should list all the main categories of the website, so users can find their way around from every page.

Right hand column on the homepage should provide navigation to individual pages in the site which you want to highlight. Or it can be used for small applications, such as email newsletter sign-up, scrolling news headlines, links to the forum, etc. This column tends to disappear on the content pages to leave more space for the article and images.

Top menu bar – some sites have most of their navigation in the top menu bar which goes across the page under the masthead (take a look at www.guardian.co.uk or www.forbes.com as examples). I don't like this for two reasons. First it restricts the number of menu links that you can have. Second it usually means that the site has flash based drop down menus to enable them to accommodate more links. Flash menus are not user friendly. They force your reader to search for links to the content they are looking for. Don't make your user work for their answers. Also search engines find it harder to index sites with flash menus

Bottom menu bar – This strip at the foot of every page tends to contain links to the sites terms and conditions, privacy statement, sitemap, etc.

The central column contains the content. On the homepage this can be a combination of an introduction to the website and teasers to articles. On the content pages, the articles and images sit in the central column.

Search top right on every page – this is the search box used to search the content of the website. This is a less rigid placement than it used to be, but you can't go wrong if you place it top right.

Time and date – usually placed on the right hand side under the masthead. This is optional, but does give readers the impression that the site is up-to-date.

Within this layout there is a great deal of flexibility to add your own personality and styles, particularly when you overlay your design on the basic page structure. However, at all times your number one goal should be constant; that is to make your website simple and intuitive, for every reader that visits. To achieve this learn from those sites that have a lot of experience.

Don't be the person that puts a vertical title on the front cover!

SubHub provides an all-in-one solution to enable you to rapidly design, build and run your own content website. Publish for profit on the web. Website: http://www.subhub.com SubHub Articles Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SubhubStartASubscriptionOrMembershipWebsite-OnlineMagazineOnlineJournalOnlineNewsletter?format=xml

By: Miles Galliford

How To Avoid 10 Minisite Design Mistakes That Is Hurting Your Website

Here are 10 common minisite design mistakes most web owners or webmasters make and how to fix them. Web design factors overlap with design elements and principles in general.

1. Not sitting down to plan your overall minisite structure and site layout including linking and navigation. This is also the best time to start thinking about your search engine marking.

2. Not doing your keyword research from the get go. Don't assume anything; get it right from the right start. Keyword is your rootword or the foundation of your minisite structure. If you miss this crucial step, every other part of your building structure falls apart including search engine optimization. Don't spend time, money and energy on a keyword nobody is searching for. That's a sure way to have a failed web business. Or, some people don't even have a specific keyword or phrase that will attract prospects to their site. Use keyword tools like wordtracker, goodkeyword, overture or google keyword suggestion tool.

3. Don't clutter your minisite with too many distractions like graphics, flash animations, bells, and whistle. All these are good if you want to impress a kindergarten child but bad for your traffic flow and cashflow. Minimize the use of Java scripts, flash animations and graphics. Search engines don't index them well. Just know that search engines love words and keywords or key phrases is what counts and thats what sells. Words are what your visitors use to querry the search engines.

4. Your minisite should load in 8 seconds or less. Beyond this time frame, most visitors lose patience. Sorry, we are in an instant, microwave society and nobody wants to wait. Besides, there is over information and too much to see and navigate, so your visitors are happy to hit the back button.

5. Don't go beyond 750 pixels in your minisite width if you don't want your visitors to scroll from side to side. It is annoying and jars your readers. To solve this problem, use percentage of the screen instead of pixels. Don't make the width too narrow by going less than 650 pixels, either.

6. Don't rely too heavily on WYSIWYG HTML editors like frontpage or mozilla firefox. They tend to draw you web pages to one side of the screen instead of being positioned at the center. It is still necessary to know basic HTML tags or at least what is it that you don't know. One way to correct this error is: div align="center" enlosed in angle brackets as other HTML tags. Or, you can use percentage instead of pixels to center the abnormal shift. More professional coders use cascading style sheet. However, Dreamweaver doesn't normally give this problem.

7. Not knowing and applying "the rule of 3" in minisite design. This rule is like a guide that should be at the back of your mind while doing any design work in a given space. The more you apply this rule, the more dynamic, lifelike and professional your design becomes. Three is the number of trinity. It states that it is safe to use 3 colors, 3 fonts, 3 tables rows, and three design elements in any given space. This rule also applies to your graphic panel design, banner ads and ecovers.

8. Not knowing color contrast and harmony. In other words, your design did not consider color theory and emotion of colors. Never use a dark color on a dark background. Even a light color on a dark background is suspect. It does not print well if you decide to download it. The best contrast is dark on a white background like black or blue on white background. This offers great visual appeal, and readability.(Details about colors are treated in my other articles). Also red is a warm or shouting color--use with caution and use sparingly because it call for attention that why red healines tend to convert better than other colors. Yellow is best suited for highlights. Avoid the use of blacks or gray if your are not advanced in minisite design. Use a lot of white space (negative space) for blending, color contrast and harmony.

9. Don't use welcome in your minisite design. Not only is it overdone and meaningless in your search engine rankings. Go straithttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif to your offer or what your website is about. The visitor has 3 seconds to figure out your site (from your headlines), otherwise they are gone. So, don't confuse them with unnecessary platitudes and pleasantries.

10. Not inserting an opt-in box or lead capture pop-ups in your minisite could make you lose potential customers and money. Even people don't buy, capture their names and email address for follow-up, and relationship building. This is a powerful marketing strategy and lead generation that could be of mutual benefit down the road.

Find how you can avoid minisite design mistakes and learn to design your minisite right from the right start by watching minisite creation videos. Afterall, your ministe is the foundation of your web business. This minisite video tutorial is loaded with design principles, SEO, ebook compilation, PPC ads, testing and tracking your ads, sales letter writing and much, much more clik to find out.

By: Uzo Onukwugha

Monday, August 27, 2007

How to Make a Book Cover Design that Flies Off the Shelf!

According to "The Wall Street Journal", “The average bookstore browser who picks up a book spends eight seconds looking at the front cover and 15 seconds reading the back.” You can’t tell — but you can sell — a book by its cover.” Here are a few powerful book cover design techniques that professional book designers use:

The essential elements for your front cover

The front cover presents your book title, subtitle, and your name. Golden opportunities often overlooked are including endorsements and short testimonials from VIPs.

Think of your cover like a billboard. The best designs communicate the book’s message at a glance, with simple, uncluttered design. Unique, distinctive, bold, colorful graphics work well. But keep the graphic style consistent with the content and personality of the book. Make sure there is a central focal point to your design.

I recommend using bold, contrasting lettering on the front cover. When choosing colors, consider how these colors will look when converted to black and white so your cover will reproduce well in black and white ads, catalogs, and flyers. Also make sure the font you use for the title is legible from a distance and appropriate for the book’s subject.

Covers that scream “amateur” and have a “made-at-home look” make it difficult to sell your book at all. If you lack talent in this area, seek the services of an experienced book cover designer. A professional designer has the creativity, skills, software, access to stock photography, and printing knowledge that will make your cover stand out above others in the marketplace.

What should you put on your spine

Your name, book title, and publishing company logo show up on the spine. Make sure the information on the spine is clean, uncluttered, and legible. I recommend using bold, contrasting lettering on the spine as well.

Critical items you should include on your back cover

Place the category name in the upper left-hand corner to help bookstores shelve your book properly. Write a headline that clearly addresses who should buy the book. It should be followed by sales copy explaining what the book is about. Then provide a short bulleted list of benefits to readers.

I recommend including no more than three testimonials and endorsements, as well as your bio and photograph. Close to the bottom, put “sales-closer” copy in bold print. Position the price in the lower left corner of the back cover. Also include the 13-digit ISBN number for cataloging and the bar code in the lower right corner (below ISBN number), which stores use for scanning information and price.

Don’t forget to include credits for your book cover’s illustrator, photographer, and/or designer.

What goes on the inside flaps (If Applicable)

- Sales copy

- Short “teaser” description of the book

- Your bio and photo

You now have a good idea of what makes a strong book cover design. Remember, book cover design is a form of packaging—and good packaging attracts buyers to products. That’s why successful organizations spend millions researching and developing the best product packaging possible.

Copyright 2006 Karen Saunders

Karen Saunders is the author of “Turn Eye Appeal into Buy Appeal: How to easily transform your marketing pieces into dazzling, persuasive sales tools!” Hundreds of business owners have used her simple do-it-yourself design system to create stunning marketing materials that really SELL their products and services! FREE audio classes, articles and an eCourse on design and marketing tips are available at http://www.macgraphics.net

By: Karen Saunders

Web Design Tips: How to Increase Sales with Effective Online Brochures

Do you have an online business? If you would like to drive traffic to your website you can do so with proper web design. Even if your actual business is not online you can inform people about what your business is and what you can do for them. It doesn’t really matter what type of business you have, online brochures are a great way to go, and simply one of the most effective marketing tools. An online brochure can be a simple set up that incorporates color that will grab the attention of those online, and will be informative. Many small business owners find that this drives traffic, even if they do not run an online business but want to take advantage of the web and market their offline business online.

If you don’t know how to create online brochures on your own you can have a professional do it for you. There are many web design experts out there that can create a great look for your website that will tell your visitors exactly who you are and what you can do for them. It’s important that your web design lends itself to easy use and an understanding of what is offered there online or if it is also an online business what can be done online. Many online publishers make their websites too busy and this affects their sales because the website is not focused, so the client is not focused.

If you have your web page redone, you might want to think about a brochures printing services. You can have brochures made that can be put in places where your target buyer frequents so that they know about your website and your products. For instance, if you provide computer based business you can put up your brochure in computer stores, if you are allowed. Thinking about your target customer when brochure printing is important, whether you plan to have an online design, an offline paper design, or a little bit of each.

When you create your brochures and you do so in a manner that will attract people, it will be like your products and services are selling themselves. You won’t have to struggle to explain things and you won’t have to worry about the impression you are giving, because the customer will have already gotten this information from the brochure. Start driving traffic to your business with the help of online brochures today.

Caitlina Fuller is a freelance writer. If you have your web page redone, you might want to think about a brochures printing services. You can have brochures made that can be put in places where your target buyer frequents so that they know about your website and your products. Thinking about your target customer when brochure printing is important, whether you plan to have an online design, an offline paper design, or a little bit of each.

By: Caitlina Fuller

Friday, August 24, 2007

5 Top Design Tips to Help Your Site in the Search Engines

It seems pretty straight forward. You are designing a website because you want people to look at it, maybe participate in it, maybe buy from it. You will have spent a lot of time thinking about color schemes, headers, and pages. Your website might be an original idea that looks set to make you a million. What you need to do before you even make a single click of your mouse in your favorite HTML editor is think about your website marketing strategy.

I am not going to go into the realms of advanced search engine optimization techniques in this article, but rather look at the very basics needed to get your site in the search engines. Believe it or not, web designers don't always pay attention to this. There are some amazing looking sites out there with no visitors because nobody can find them.

This is not an exhaustive list of tips nor are they in any particular order, but they should give you a sound basis with which to get your website out into the world.

1. Decide what services or products you want people to use you for and use these as your keywords. Keywords are single words or phrases that people use to find things on the net.

2. Put your keywords into your meta tags in the header of your page. Nowadays some search engines don't put too much importance into the meta tags but it is still worth putting them in for the ones that do.

3. Make sure that all of your keywords are mentioned in your main content. This may sound silly but a lot of people pad their meta tags out with keywords that they never write about. Search engines don't like this because it can be seen as an unethical technique to get high rankings for a broad range of subjects and could get your site banned.

4. Use your title tags to tell people what your site is about. I see lots of sites with title tags that are so wishy washy, it's no wonder they don't get many visits. It is simply not enough to put your business name. Try and get into the mind set of the searcher - think about what they would type into the search box to find a company like yours. Unless they know your company name and what you do, they will not search for it. If your company is called Visage and is a hair salon, don't just put 'Visage Hair Salon' in the title. Think about what people want from you and what they would search for to find you. Things like 'hair cuts' or 'hair colouring' is a much better bet. Use your imagination and get results.

5. Use your H1 and H2 tags as a headline to tell the people on your site and the search engines exactly what the page is about. Forget about catchy tag lines or intriguing marketing wizardry, tell it as it is. If your page is about 'Rainbow Trout in the River Trent' put 'Rainbow Trout in the River Trent' in your H1 tags. Then all things being equal and you have followed the other points, a searcher or a search engine will know what your site is about because it says so in your meta tags, content, title tags and headings. In fact it will be so obvious that it would be a crime not to include it in the search.

Now you may be thinking that it all seems a bit obvious but take a look at some websites and check out the source code. There are plenty out there not following the tips mentioned above.

If you want to know where to find these sites - go to the last page of a search listing.

Andy Stocks is a web designer for http://www.wheresyourbusiness.co.uk a website design company specialising in web development, search engine optimisation, hosting and corporate identity. You can email Andy direct at andy@wheresyourbusiness.co.uk

By: Andy Stocks

Online Website Design Builder - Web Site Builder Tools

Have you ever used an online website design builder? If so you may have been left with a less than professional website. Most of these tools are not what you would call a professional solution for designing or building your website. No matter how hard you try they are not going to turn out a professional website.

These tools will insert poor code and a lot of time your website will suffer from "code bloat" in other words there will be a lot of extra code that you are not even using. Although this is behind the scenes and your visitors can see it unless they do a "view source" and look at your code this causes serious problems concerning load time and it can affect your search engine rankings. Think about it, if you have all this "extra code" in your website then the search engine spiders have to dig through this junk just to get the relevant information they are looking for.

Online website design tools are just programs written by people, they cannot think, they cannot make recommendations or tell you that some element in the design you are creating is not going to be best for you. These programs will do exactly what you tell them to do so unless you are an experienced website design professional you will probably be in trouble and besides if you were a website design professional you would not be using a tool like this.

Is your competition using some online website builder? If you think so then think again. How will you expect to outsell or out rank your competition on the search engines if you are driving a Volkswagen and they are driving a Ferrari? It's just not going to happen.

What is the difference between online website design builder tools and Content Management Systems or CMS? A lot! The online website design builder tools are for designing the layout of your site, the code behind your site and the elements that will make your site usable by your visitors and viewable and rank able by search engines.

Content Management Systems will allow you to update the content of your website and keep it fresh for your visitors and for the search engines. Unlike online builder tools a good Content Management System fits inside an already designed professional website layout.

The content you place within the pages of your website will affect your sales and your search engine rankings but there is little danger that you will destroy your website by using a good CMS.

Anthony McMurray is the owner of Proimpulse Website Design a 6 year old professional website design and marketing firm offering website design services and website marketing services. Contact us today before you spend money on an online website design builder program or if you already have an existing website that was created with one of these programs let us show you how much more is possible if you have a website designed the right way.

By: Anthony McMurray

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Color Help: Color Theory and Design Psychology

Color theory is an entire science unto itself, and to get a full picture of how it all works, I'd suggest picking up a few art books. In this article, however, we're going to take a brief look at the essentials of color theory, in light of the concepts of Design Psychology. we'll first list a term, and then offer a short summary of how the term relates to Design Psychology.

Hue

The base name of a color without any white, gray, or black added. The terms hue and color are interchangeable.

Color wheel

A color wheel contains twelve colors, based on primitive pigments. The three primary colors are red, blue, and yellow. Three secondary colors (composed of combinations of the three primary colors) follow: red and blue make purple; red and yellow make orange; yellow and blue make green. Six tertiary colors (comprised of combinations of primary and secondary colors) form the remainder of the color wheel: yellow-orange, red-orange, violet, blue-green, and yellow-green. Black is the total absence of color and white is the reflection of all colors.

Value or Lightness

This denotes the degree of lightness or darkness of a hue, in relation to pure white or black.

Intensity, Saturation, or Croma:

This term describes the degree of purity of a hue as compared to neutral gray of the same value. This is the freedom from added white or gray; how bright or dull a color appears in relation to the basic hue.

Shades

These are deep tones, in which black is added to a color.

Tints

These are pastels, in which white is added to a color.

Tone

Adding gray of the same value to a hue or adding its complement creates a tone.

Saturation

The intensity or depth of color, such as dark or light.

Monochromatic Color Schemes

This term is used to describe rooms with only tints and shades of the same color. Neutral color schemes are usually monochromatic.

Analogous, Side-by-Side, or Related Color Schemes

These rooms use adjacent colors to the principal color on the color wheel. This is considered a friendly scheme, because the colors blend well and create a soft effect.

Complementary or Opposite Color Schemes

Rooms that use colors from opposite sides of the color wheel. This is considered to be a power and action scheme.

Triad

Consists of three colors, spaced an equal distance apart on the color wheel. Triad color schemes can potentially cause glaring and confusing feelings when all the colors are intense.

Tetrad

Consists of four colors, spaced an equal distance apart on the color wheel. Tetrad color schemes create interesting effects because of the potential variety available. They are best when two colors dominate.

Topographical Color Schemes

These schemes contain colors from nature, such as rocks, earth, sky, sea, and plants.

Floral Color Schemes

These schemes use brilliant or pastel colors found in plants and flowers.

Colorways

Fabrics and wallpapers come in different combinations of colors, or colorways. A fabric pattern will have several selections of colorways to choose from. A pattern may be available in colorways of: yellow, blue and green, red, blue and green; or purple, burgundy and blue.

Visual Vibration

This occurs when neighboring colors appear to clash and vibrate in our vision, creating a dizzying effect that adds to nervousness and tiredness.

Cusp Colors

These are colors on the edge of two colors that take on different values under different lighting situations, such as, dark blue/purple (periwinkle), orange/red (terra-cotta reds), and blue/greens (teal). Periwinkle may appear more purple than dark blue at night or under different lighting systems.

Simple Color

This is a true color, without additive colors, such as sky blue, grass green, or apple red. A simple color is a pure color.

Complex Color

This is a combination of colors, such as silvery blue, or lichen (grayish green-brown). A complex color is a color that requires a long description, such as “sort of a grayish-blue with a hint of pink.”

Palette

The entire range of colors used in a design project.

These are the basic terms used to describe color schemes within the concepts of Design Psychology. Learning them is the first step toward creating dynamic spaces for both the interior and exterior of your home.

(c) Copyright 2004, Jeanette J. Fisher. All rights reserved.

Professor Jeanette Fisher, author of Doghouse to Dollhouse for Dollars, Joy to the Home, and other books teaches Real Estate Investing and Design Psychology. For more articles, tips, reports, newsletters, and sales flyer template, see http://www.doghousetodollhousefordollars.com/pages/5/index.htm

By: Jeanette Joy Fisher

Targeted Web Site Design - How To Go For Web Site Design

Web site designing is a very important art and science these days. The basic reason is that the world of online business and communication is growing at a very fast pace. The number of web sites existing on the World Wide Web has increased manifolds in the past few years. Every one wants to have a web site designed for his or her business. There are many advantages of doing business online. You cut your over head costs to almost a minimum.

There are many other advantages of doing ecommerce as well. All these factors contribute towards the growing importance of web site designing. A well designed web site supports you in getting maximum business. It supports you in promoting the products and web based business. All these factors add to the importance of a proper web site design.

If you want to get your web site designed, you can hire the professional web designers for this purpose. It is important that you remain involved in the complete process. No one can understand your business better than you do. You must be sure about your requirements from your web site before you actually get it designed.

The web design should be according to the latest technology being used in this field. A web site should be designed in a way to makes it user friendly. These are very important points. If you pay all due attention towards these points, you will be able to get your web site designed according to the exact requirements of your business operations. A use friendly web site will improve your chances of getting more business. Web site design is very important to the success of your web based business. Pay all due attention towards it.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Download it free here: Secrets of Article Promotion

Sean Mize is a full time internet marketer who has written over 1574 articles in print and 11 published ebooks

By: Sean R Mize

Profitable Web Site Design - 7 Best Ways to Web Site Design

Web site designing has become one of the very important sciences and art related to the web presence of businesses. There are millions of web sites which currently Exist on the web. The competition in the online world of business is increasing on a very fast pace. The huge number of web sites are in competition with each other to get a reasonable share of web traffic. No website can survive without a proper flow of web traffic towards itself. This is the reason that all the web sites pay due attention towards promoting their web site. If you want your web based business to be a success, you need to make sure that your web site is designed properly. A well designed web site supports those who want to promote it. Thus it is important for a web site owner to be involved in a web site design if he or she wants it to be successful.

The most important way of doing it is to hire a professional web designer. Discuss the importance of your web site to your business with him or her. It is better if the web designer knows the basics of your business. As no one else can know your business better than you do, it is better that you stay involved in your web sites design. Be sure about the target market. Try to make your web site user friendly according to the nature of your target market. State of the art technology should be used. This is a very important aspect. These are the ways which will help you in designing a really impressive web site. If you follow these steps your web site will be a success.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Download it free here: Secrets of Article Promotion

Sean Mize is a full time internet marketer who has written over 1574 articles in print and 11 published ebooks

By: Sean R Mize

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

How Can You Design Your Own Wedding Logo?

Most couples want to make their wedding as unique as possible. One of the ways to make something unique is to personalize it. No one will doubt that everyone is unique and by personalizing the wedding items they should be unique to some extend.

In the design industry, there is something called brand building. By the name of brand building you will know that the idea is to build the brand for a corporation. Making a logo is one of the essential tasks in the process of brand building. The logo can help people to distinguish one company from another. Although a wedding is not the same as building a brand for a company, making a wedding logo is still a good idea to make the wedding unique.

To make your wedding items more unique, you should of course print or have it embossed on your wedding invitation. Besides, you can print them on the wedding favors. You may also make a backdrop with your logo on it for your wedding reception. In this way you can use your logo to make your wedding more unique. However, you may have a question in you mind that if you can design or make the logo yourself. The answer is certainly yes.

One of the easiest ways to make your wedding logo is to design a monogram. In the past it is nearly impossible for one do make such a logo himself / herself without the help of a professional graphic designer or illustrator. We should thank to the advance in computer technology that with the software you may use everyday, both at work and at home, you can create your own monogram wedding logo without any difficulty.

In most cases you will take your initials to make your wedding monogram. You can use just Microsoft Word to create you wedding monogram. You can try to create you monogram by composing different fonts. If you find that there is only a limited number of fonts in your computer, you can search in Google for free fonts. These "free fonts" are usually free for personal uses, you can use them without any problem.

In some cases you may want to use your full names to make the wedding logo. This will need a bit more skill and time. And in this case time is more important. If you take enough time to test various combinations of different fonts and typefaces, you should be able to make your wedding logo with your full names.

Some professional designers may think that Microsoft Word is not a software meant to be making designs. However, it should be good enough for you to make your wedding logo.

Using a monogram as a wedding logo is a good idea since it normally can deliver a sense of nobleness. However, some people may think a monogram (especially monograms in Victorian style) is too formal. You may want to go for something less formal since a wedding is meant to be fun. The followings are some concepts you may use to make your wedding logo

1. Your occupation
2. Your date of wedding
3. Your dates of birth
4. The place you two were born

The above only gives you a direction for you to start designing your wedding logo. There should be many more concepts. With your imagination, you should be able to create the best wedding logo of your own, and on your own.

Jerry Leung is a wedding invitation designer with great interest in Chinese Style Wedding cards. He designs unique Chinese Wedding Invitations in different styles. Besides, he runs A Wedding Blog to share wedding tips. You can also find lists of wedding vendors from his Wedding Directory Websites.

By: Jerry Leung

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Using Graphic Design on Your Website

Almost everything is available on the web… products, services, e-books, software, audios, videos, membership sites, or newsletters. Regardless of what you’re promoting, there’s a never-ending supply of prospects and customers on the world-wide-web. Your goal is to capture and turn those prospects into paying customers.

Perhaps the best avenue is by the use of graphics. Three important sections of graphics that should be used for a compelling website are 1) header graphics 2) product cover and 3) background graphics.

Let’s start at the top with the header graphics. Without excellent quality header graphics it won’t much matter what’s on the rest of the page. Here’s why. Once a prospect clicks on your site you’ve got approximately 8 seconds to convince him to continue with the information you’re providing. You only get one chance to make a dynamic first impression.

The next area is your product cover. No matter what you’re selling you should have a product cover. Even if you’re promoting services you should still have a graphic image. People want to see what they are getting for their money. There’s no better way to do it than with a picture. There’s an old saying, “ You can’t judge a book by its cover.” Guess what? Most people do exactly that! Their opinion is based upon a visual image. Even as you read, your mind creates visual images of the perception of the words. Make sure your product cover fits the bill. Don’t sell this area short!

The last area is background graphics. Most people will spend very little time considering the background graphics for their website. This can be a major mistake. Properly crafting the background will have subliminal, almost magical effects on the overall potential of the entire website. It’s like the glue that pulls every other aspect of the site into a uniform, well functioning profit-making machine. This area is the major play in helping to create the overall flow and unity to your site. Again, don’t sell it short!

In the creation of each 3 areas of your graphics special consideration should be given to the overall theme of your site. The theme will help with continuity of branding and marketing. Today, the Internet surfer is often bombarded with look-alike products and services. Your key to a successful website lies in being faster, more imaginative, and more unique to get your prospect fired up. Simply put, you must stand out from the crowd. The theme of your site will help you do just that. This is not to say every aspect of your graphics should look alike. Far from it! Each area should however, complement the work of the other.

Color, size, tone, relativity, and uniqueness are all important attributes to consider when designing your graphics.

Copyright 2005 Andrew Eaton

Andy Eaton is one of the most sought after graphic designers on the web, not only does he create quality graphics, but he also teaches you how to create them step by step in his video membership site, Right now you can get access to some FREE quality videos by signing up to his action packed ezine Visit http://www.graphicsecretsexposed.com/ezine

Optimal Graphic Design

Pleasing graphic design can be broken down into four steps. Any good designer knows that designing involves more than throwing elements on a page. Want to know how to create professional looking documents? Well, keep reading.

Proximity

Novice designers often place design elements arbitrarily. Some believe that filled space is good space. This misconception leads to bad design. White space is advantageous, and scattered design makes information inaccessible.

Proximity simply means you group related items together. Move them close together so the human eye can recognize them as a cohesive group. It’s a visual cue that the reader will understand almost immediately. Items or groups of information not related to each other should not be placed in close proximity. Don’t confuse the reader by forcing them to figure out what belongs where. Don’t confuse the idea of proximity with simply placing any items close together. The items should have a logical connection for proximity to make sense.

Alignment

Novice designers sometimes put elements wherever they’ll fit. This can create a messy unprofessional appearance. Good alignment means nothing is aligned on the page arbitrarily. Each item should have a visual relationship with something else on the page. Paying attention to alignment forces you to pay close attention to what’s actually on the page.

Properly aligned items create a pleasing appearance. Readers know that, although the items may not be in close proximity, they certainly are all a part of a system. Lack of cohesive alignment is a major cause of bad design.

Repetition

The idea of repetition involves including reoccurring images that repeat throughout your piece. It doesn’t matter if you’re designing a newsletter or a website, repetition is important. The repetitive element can be a logo, font, photo, or whatever you want. Repetition unifies your design.

To create a consistent webpage, stationary system, or e-book, you need a strong display of repetition. Readers must be able to understand that all of the pages are related. Repetitive elements establish continuity, and present a professional appearance.

Contrast

Contrast is a terrific way to add visual interest to your graphic design. Contrast results from placing two vastly different elements together in close proximity. If two elements are slightly different, then it may look more like conflict than contrast. Contrast is good. Conflict is bad.

Contrast can be created in a variety of ways. You can use an extremely large font with an extremely small one. You can contrast a large sans serif font with a small serif font. The possibilities are endless. But remember, you want contrast not conflict. Conflict occurs when two items are too similar to have an immediate noticeable difference.

For example, using two serif fonts in one design is likely to create conflict. Even if they’re different weight sizes or colors, their characteristics are still too similar to create good contrast. However, graphic design rules aren’t set in stone. Just remember that you must know the rules before you can decide if it’s a worthwhile idea to break them.

Andy Eaton is by far the best graphic designer I have ever come across! Not only does he create quality graphics, which actually do increase your website sales he actually goes one step further and teaches you his exact methods to crank out profit pulling graphics. Check out his work at http://quickpaypro.com/x.php?5086_u17

By: Andy Eaton

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Design Website With Website Optimization

In the current scenario the website is the most important part of your business and website must be visit by the user is also a very important part of your business development, so the point is that how we attract visitor to come and stay at our site. Now the question is arise that how a visitor can reach at our website, there are several methods like your web address, email, friends, and search engines. So all the other factors can work but they are slow and target very few person and may be costly but search engine is a totally free, very fast and target lot of person at the same time. For the listening in the search engine we do the search engine optimization or web site optimization for the search engine and Content is key factor in the Web site optimization. Content is the main reason why visitors are looking for your site. Your content should fulfill a need for the visitor, whether this need is for information or a service and your website should have a very clear explanation.

For an instance, suppose my site is related with the wild animals and is no text other then the graphics of the wild animals then what will you get from my site or how search engine will find anything from my site, because search engine spiders are textually based, they can’t “see” these images. So I would not blame to anyone for leaving my site and looking for another one.

Now there are some tips that should keep in mind when you are going to make a website.

First of all your website should have very good Web content that Target your audience and they can understand easily theme and services of your website..and also they should find a proper solution from your website and become a returning visitor.

Second the images are the most import part of your website, a good image can attract the visitors and human can understand images better then text but search engine not so you put fine images with a proper description in the form of the “ALT Tags”

Third the Site Navigation is also a very important part of your site means a visitor that is at your site can reach at any part of your website without any use of the buttons on internet explorer.

Fourth thing is that your site should have text that is easy to read and understand by the visitors, for the search engine point of views pages of your site have right percentage of the keywords and phrases by this search engine give you a good place in there result page.

Fifth thinks that is meta tags for your site there are three tags that are very important for the search engine optimization's point.. title tag, description tag and keywords some are use key phrase and abstract tags in there title and description tags are easy to understand and keyword rich because they are come at the search engine result pages and seen by the user and visitor and other tags must be keyword rich but in a limit because the access of keywords can harmful for your website.

Sixth that is very important and useful every search engine explain there guideline that should keep in mind at the time of web site design and optimization

I hope that you have understand that a search engine and use friendly website can give you a very good business and that type of website can be made by us.

Hi myself Ambrish Shrivatava By profession I am a SEO, if you have any comments and ideas to improve the Search Engine Ranking of website then feel free to contact with me.

By Ambrish Shrivastava

Good Design Makes Good Sense

Organized your pencils and pens lately? Sorted your clothes into a logical system in your drawers? Then you already understand the basic elements of good design: it's practical, it's systematic, and it makes life easier.

In the same way, marketing materials that use good design make business easier for your customers. Layout and presentation make the difference as to whether people will understand your products and services. This is why a well-designed ad outperforms one that's thrown together using intuition alone.

Well-designed materials become even more important as their complexity grows. For instance, an ad typically gets someone's attention for five seconds. In contrast, a brochure has the potential to claim much more of your prospect's time and commitment. Hand a customer a poorly-formatted, hard-to-read piece and you may lose them forever.

So is good design really as simple as organizing your tie collection? Well, not quite. But there are some hard and fast rules you can follow. Use this checklist for your next project. Structure and time your piece correctly, and then brace yourself for every businessperson's dream: informed customers who are ready to do business with your company.

Five Basics of Good Design

1. Never obscure your message. The KISS (Keep It Simple, Smarty) rule applies equally well to writing copy, creating graphics, and choosing a format.

2. Work backwards from your goal to your marketing piece. Listen to your customers' needs before you make a decision about how to fill them. A website may not initially appeal to you as a tool, but if your customer base is using the Internet, it may be a great way to deliver your message.

3. Present similar kinds of information in similar ways. People love to look for patterns. And we feel good when we find them, so let your customers in on that happy feeling. Chances are it will help them retain your information better and use it more effectively.

4. Save special effects for the 4th of July. Just because you can print in all caps in that cool new font, it doesn't mean you should. Readability wins out over gimmicks every time.

5. Be practical and be dedicated. Consider all the steps involved in a project, from the time you spend creating it all the way through to postage or follow-up calls. Commit to following through on every item or your project may not succeed.

Wendy Gray Maynard is the co-owner of Kinesis. Kinesis specializes in marketing, graphic design, and business writing. Visit http://www.kinesisinc.com for more articles and free marketing wisdom.

Want to harness the power of kinetic marketing? Sign up for Kinesis Quickies, a free bi-monthly marketing e-newsletter: http://www.news.kinesisinc.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Wendy_Maynard

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Web Site Design - What to Put on Your Web Site

Your web site should reflect the business or services it offers. It should provide easy navigation for the visitor and the message should be clear. The graphics should be small so the page loads quickly (some people still have older browsers) and further more there should be some basic information on you that should be on your site.

Your mission statement, services, and products. Provide enough information to not leave the visitors guessing or questioning you. Have an “About us” section, here provide information on the staff, team, qualifications along with any other information that you feel will better connect you with the visitor. Express why they should choose you.

List what sets you apart from the others and provide testimonies of past customers if possible. This allows the visitor to feel more at ease knowing that “real” people have had both negative and positive results from using you. Provide all the contact to include phone numbers, email address, hours of operations, fax numbers. This provides the customers a way to reach you should they have further questions or concerns. If possible, have a search tool or a site index.

A site index provides a list of what is on the site. A search tool will allow the visitor to search by keywords or sentences for particular information.

All of these combined will increase an easy to view site and that will make visiting a happier experience for those who come and visit. Use these simple suggestions and your site will have satisfied visitors.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Download it free here: Internet Article Marketing

Do you want to learn how to build a massive list fast? Click here: Email List Building

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sean_Ray

Sunday, August 12, 2007

How To Find The Best Logo Design Company

Finding a good logo company is not the easiest task in the world, but it’s also not the hardest. The problem lies in the number of logo companies out there, there are over a thousand websites offering the same service all across the internet.

Most likely you will find hundreds of logo design websites with similar services, standards and quality but with huge price disconnections. The best way to find the right company for you is to research companies with different features.

Some websites will ask you to pay 300 dollars and will offer you unlimited logo revisions, they will work on your logo until you say you like it. Some other websites will only offer you a single logo revision or maybe not even one. It all depends.

You are probably thinking “Of course I would like to get unlimited revisions, I want designers to work on my logo until I’m 100% satisfied with it”, but you should consider that 80% of people who buy logos don’t even need a logo revision, 18% need from 1 to 3 revisions, and only 2% of buyers need more than 3 revisions.

When you pay 300 dollars for a logo, the fees from the revisions are hidden inside the price, which basically means that you are paying for about 15 reviews that you won’t even use!

That’s why sometimes those little websites selling logo designs at extremely low prices are the ones that are true to the customer, they don’t hide the fees from you. If you need a revision, they will probably ask you to pay an extra fee for it, but at least you will be paying a fair price.

Remember, buying a logo design from a website just because it’s the first result that Google showed is not the smartest thing to do. Research, visit portfolios and pick the one with the best price.

If you are getting started now and would like to buy a logo from the most affordable website on the internet make sure to check www.tendollarlogo.com, if you are willing to spend more money check out www.thelogocompany.com

Do you need a logo for you website or company? Click here: logo design If you are running a blog and would like to get a logo for it, click here: affordable logo design

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Bill_Hanagan

Business Cards Design- Creative Steps to Creative Business Cards

There are creative steps you can take to make your very own business cards. Through business cards design, you can exercise your inventiveness and ingenuity all you want. Make designs that would show off your individuality or ones that would help enhance your image.

Business Card Options

• Good business card designs could easily be dismissed as a matter of personal taste. You can easily shape your cards the way you want to. You can experiment with from your design using different type face or fonts, images, and color schemes.

• You can also go beyond by certain conventions by opting for a different size, shape, and paper stock that gives your business cards a different texture. You could also have a folded business card that looks similar to a miniature greeting card.

• Business cards, which have the standard 2x3.5 size, can be designed by aligning your business cards to be printed on crosswise or lengthwise.

• Long gone are the days when business cards were only printed using one side. Today, you can have full color business cards printed on both sides or with full color on the front while the back side is rendered in black and white.

Business cards design is no science. While there are many tips and tricks you can use to achieve certain effects, sometimes, it still isn’t enough to show you what to do. Creating business cards that suits your taste and your purpose aren’t exactly defined by the laws of science.

If you want to create a sound and effective business card, then just get right down to it. Brood over what you want your business card to say about you as a professional and the like. And to get you started, why don’t you take note of these great tips on building your business card design.

Creativity takes the shape of many forms

Many business cards traditionally contain only a logo and the usual personal contact information. Being creative means putting a spin on things.

You can use different themes used in movies, in art, and in different eras where pop culture emerged with different styles. You can source out inspiration from these and apply it to your business cards, again changing its overall appearance from design to its shape and size.

There is literally no limit to the designs you could do. Look to the web for examples and be amazed at how simple you can layout and create different looks for your business cards.

Again, it is a matter of taste

What is stunning for some might be mind-boggling for others. There can be a lot of hits and misses with your business cards design. Do not be disheartened. Continue enhancing your design.

You can add things and remove some. Try different combinations and see what you get. You’ll eventually have your own eureka moment, like Einstein did with his won equation.

Be yourself

Let your business card reflect who you are and what your stand for. Always ensure that your business cards generate great impact to promote brand recall. And that brand can be you and how you perform business.

Some people lead their personal lives different from their careers and approach both situations differently. Create a marriage of these two and select which qualifies as positive traits that would benefit your image and your professional career.

Keep an open mind and open your eyes to possibilities

The answer probably is lying somewhere near. Try and test your ideas before dismissing them. You never know, the inspiration you need might just be under your nose.

Now, there are probably other pieces of advice you can find in books or online, but it is often more helpful to distinguish what you want and select ideas that are close to what you are looking for and concentrate on that.

Business cards design is awfully more enjoyable than tasking to make. Seize this opportunity to make business cards that fits you like a glove. And remember to make business cards using only the most qualified, professional printing company to truly get the most out of all your effort.

Business Cards Design tips can be found at U Printing: Business Cards Printing Services

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Carla_San_Gaspar

Friday, August 10, 2007

Graphic Design Training -- Enhancing Your Computer Graphic Design Skills

Graphic designers nowadays require not only creative abilities, but also some understanding of other graphic design-related areas such as computer graphic design.

During the 80's, the advent of desktop publishing and of design software such as Adobe Illustrator and Macromedia Fireworks, put the power and versatility of the computer at graphic designers' fingertips. Designers for the first time were easily able to manipulate images and create 3D images using the computer. Computers are now considered to be an indispensable tool in the graphic design industry, though some traditional graphic designers may still prefer to use manual and traditional tools for their creative endeavors.

With modern graphic design concepts and methodologies always changing, graphic designers need to continually advance their knowledge of different graphic design techniques, innovations and graphic design software packages. At present, the basic instructions in graphic designing cannot guarantee for a competitive product anymore without the use of high technology, so that the demand for highly skilled graphic designers is higher than ever.

To become a computer graphic designer, the basic requirements include good creative abilities, good computers skills, and good communication skills.

Computer graphic design helps graphic designers complete their tasks faster and easier. They can effortlessly translate ideas into visual imagery, save it onto their computers and edit it whenever alterations are necessary.

There are great many benefits if you undergo computer graphic design training geared towards arming you with a wider range of cutting edge graphic design skills. Having computer design training also means a greater choice of employment. Computer graphic design skills are in great demand in such sectors as:

1. Advertising agencies - You can use your newly acquired graphic design skills to design appealing and eye-catching advertisements for different media.

2. Web design companies - Help design appealing web pages.

3. Design studios - Apply your design skills to photo editing such as editing the contrast and the brightness of colors on the photos.

4. Publishing houses - Perform layout design and editing tasks. Publications usually follow a distribution schedule; so make sure you are able to meet deadlines.

5. Corporate advertising departments - Design professional corporate ads.

6. TV and film companies - out of all the other jobs, this is where a graphic designer is most suited as it requires a comprehensive application of the designer's skill and ability, especially if working on animation films.

Your computer graphic design training will open new doors for you into a world of greater opportunities. Your computer design knowledge, combined with your dedication and commitment, will surely help you reach your goal.

For more on Graphics Design visit Graphic Design Training and Graphic Design Job, and also at Health and Fitness.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Susan_Jan

Raster And Vector Graphic Design - The Two Types Of Graphic Design Software

A graphic design software is a computer program that allows you to create and edit digital images. In can help you in several tasks, including resizing images, rotating, cropping, color correcting, adjusting brightness and contrast, red-eye reduction, photo filtering, and even superimpositions, to name a few. Images can be imported from digital cameras, scanners, the internet, and images from the hard drive for editing.

A good, reliable graphic design software is an integral part in web design; magazine publications; the creation of graphic novels, the creation of marketing materials such as posters, brochures, covers, sleeves, and billboards; and in designing t-shirts, mugs, and collectibles among a host of other things.

Types of graphic design software

Generally, there are two types of graphic design software: raster graphics and vector graphics. In simple terms, raster graphics is used to create simple and static graphic images while vector is used to create more advanced graphics.

Raster graphics creates images from simple line arrangements and usually has a bitmap format, where the image is pixelized (those visible squares that appear when you enlarge a photo).

Some examples of raster graphics include Paint Shop Pro, GIMP, and Adobe Photoshop. Vector graphics on the other hand, uses mathematical formulas in creating geometric figures, polygons, and lines. It can create and resize images to infinite proportions without losing the image quality. It can also be used to create interactive and animated images, as well as games and advanced web designs. Some examples of vector graphics include Macromedia Flash and Adobe Live Motion.

Recommended Graphic Design Software / Consumer Information

A complete Guide to GRAPHIC DESIGN SOFTWARE is available in Picky Guide one of the fastest growing online magazines giving free consumer advice and product information.