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30 Free Photoshop Swirl Brushes
By Smashing Editorial, June 20th, 2009 in Freebies | 73 Comments
Today we are glad to release 30 Swirl Brushes, a set with 30 high-quality swirl Photoshop brushes with an average size 2000px. These brushes were created with Adobe Photoshop CS4 and also work with the version CS, CS2 and CS3. This set was designed by Thomas Béal especially for Smashing Magazine and its readers.
You can use the set for all of your projects for free and without any restrictions. You can freely use it for both your private and commercial projects, including software, online services, templates and themes. The set may not be resold, sublicensed, rented, transferred or otherwise made available for use. Please link to this article if you would like to spread the word.
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60+ Amazing Poster and Advertisment Tutorials
By Aquil Akhter, June 1st, 2009 in Tutorials | 95 Comments
Everyone in the business world knows the importance of posters and ads in advertising for specific products. Posters are an integral part of advertising. An eye-catching, attractive poster that conveys a professional, compelling message about a product, service or event will invariably hold the user's attention.
In this article, we have collected a mixture of Photoshop and Illustrator tutorials related to posters and advertisements. You will find some are intermediate and some are very advanced, but they'll all give you a lot of direction with photo composition, illustration, coloring processing, typography techniques, pen tool tricks, shapes processing and much more.
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Useful Glossaries For Web Designers and Developers
By Daved Brosche, May 29th, 2009 in Developer's Toolbox | 64 Comments
In a day in age where there are just as many freelancers as there are university educated designers, developers, and all around web gurus, it is amazing to me how much many of us don’t know or have forgot about our trade. As a self-taught designer, I will admit to you upfront that there is a lot I don’t know when it comes to official jargon or certain aspects of things like typography and graphic design. It is these reasons that I call upon glossaries from time to time.
But glossaries aren’t just for brushing up on old terms or for calling upon while you learn new things. They can also make a great reference point for your customers. I am sure we have all had clients who thought they knew what they were talking about when it came to SEO or web design. When you try to explain to these clients that they don’t know what they are talking about, the end result can sometimes turn ugly or at least bring on an unwanted headache. In these situations it is handy to have a glossary at hand to point your clients to. This way they can see that they were mistaken and you get the satisfaction of your own personal “I told you so.”
Last week we presented Web Design Industry Jargon: Glossary and Resources, a general guide to industry terms that should get you well on your way to understanding what web designers are talking about. In this post we go into detail in each single area of web design such as typography, usability, marketing, Photoshop, wordpress, graphic design, CSS, XHTML, DOM, JavaScript, print design, SEO, social media, software development, Twitter and further areas.
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20 Time-Saving Tips to Improve Designer’s Workflow
By Michael Shelton, May 26th, 2009 in How-To | 81 Comments
Want to save some time? Of course you do! You are probably always looking for ways to do this faster and make that easier, it's human nature! One of the best ways to save time is experience. The more experience you have, the more comfortable you are working, the more you have developed your own best methods, and with experience you know how to better avoid mistakes and disasters. So always stay hard at what you do and you will definitely save more than "just" time!
However, regardless of your experience level, there are ways to speed up the common design tasks. You should find some of these not-so-well-known tips and strategies listed below very helpful for your workflow. And please feel free to suggest more ideas in the comments to this post!
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Ultimate Collection Of Useful Photoshop Plug-Ins
By Vailancio Rodrigues, April 23rd, 2009 in Developer's Toolbox | 101 Comments
Can Photoshop do everything? Of course, it can. But one should have extreme skills, plenty of experience and a great deal of time before retouching images or creating graphics pixel by pixel. Photoshop is an amazing graphics application that has forever changed graphic, Web design and digital photo editing.
One should know how to use Photoshop to its full potential to get the most stunning results. This is where Photoshop plug-ins come in handy. (Plug-ins aside, though, if you have time to acquire extreme skills, we encourage you to do so because there is nothing better than learning something new.)
Featured below are Useful Adobe Photoshop Plug-Ins that will make your work easier, faster and better and reduce the number of steps needed to accomplish tasks. They will also allow you to do things you just cannot do with the features built into Photoshop. Some of the plug-ins are collections of filters, whereas others are programs or utilities that you may find useful.
Please also take a look at the following collection of (free and commercial) Photoshop plug-ins from our friends:
- Free Photoshop Plugins Collection
This post present over 150 high-quality free Photoshop plugins. - Huge List Of Highly Extensible Photoshop Plugins
Dainis Graveris' huge collection of free and commercial Photoshop plugins. - 25 of the Best FREE Photoshop Plugins and Filters Resource Sites
An extensive collection by Smashing Magazine's author Paul Andrew.
- Free Photoshop Plugins Collection
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Friday Freebies: Photoshop Brushes, Vector Graphics, Icons
By Smashing Editorial, March 27th, 2009 in Freebies | 57 Comments
Over the last months we focused on releases of icons and themes, so we thought that it may be useful to release Photoshop brushes and vector graphics for a change. Hence, in this post we release a set of Photoshop brushes for space effects, a set of brushes to simulate the effect of a painted canvas, a hand-drawn vector illustration set and a Moleskine icon set.
You can use the sets (except the bonus set) for all of your projects for free and without any restrictions. You can freely use it for both your private and commercial projects, including software, online services, templates and themes. The set may not be resold, sublicensed, rented, transferred or otherwise made available for use. Please link to this article if you would like to spread the word.
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50 Stunning Photoshop Text Effect Tutorials
By Smashing Editorial, March 4th, 2009 in Tutorials | 168 Comments
Photoshop’s text and layer tools can be used to create some really awesome effects. We’ve put together a list of 60 of the best tutorials we could find to help you stay up to date on the latest trends and techniques. You’ll find some really cool grunge and glass styles (plus a few surprises!) and learn how some of the best designers create their unique effects.
Instead of listing 100 plus tutorials that you'll bookmark never to come back, we've decided to take you through the basics of typography, hopefully inspiring and then teaching you. Typography is an art just like any other. You have to feel the form, admire the curves and connect with the flow.
You may want to take a look at the following related posts:
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Space Explosion Photoshop Tutorial
By Tyler Bramer, February 22nd, 2009 in Tutorials | 81 Comments
Digital space art is one of the most inventive and beautiful art genres of this era. This tutorial shows you how to create your own space scene using three stock photos and Adobe Photoshop. The majority of the effects use the brush tool, layer effects and the filter gallery. You may want to set aside an hour or two before starting this tutorial because it requires quite a bit of work to accomplish. So get those creative juices flowing and let's get started!
Before we begin, we need some resources to use for this tutorial. Let's also preview the image that we will have created by the end of this tutorial. You can also download the full source files.
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The Ultimate Collection Of Free Photoshop Patterns
By Steven Snell, February 12th, 2009 in Developer's Toolbox | 106 Comments
Photoshop users can save themselves a great deal of time and end up with better results by taking advantage of readily available freebies, such as brushes, patterns and shapes. With the wide variety and (often) high quality of resources available, whatever you need or are looking for is in most cases already available somewhere. The only problem is that the vast quantity of freebies can make it difficult to track down what you need. Hopefully this collection of excellent Photoshop patterns will help.
The resources featured here are all available as downloads in PAT format, which can be placed in Photoshop. In addition to this format, there is also a number of quality resources online for creating or using patterns in other formats that can be used by any program, not just Photoshop. As with any type of freebie, always be sure to check the license or requirements set by the creator.
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Light Blurs Brushes and Decoration Pack For Photoshop
By Smashing Editorial, December 15th, 2008 in Freebies | 74 Comments
Over the last few weeks, our readers have complained that we have been releasing "way too many freebies". Apparently, we have been posting "too many filler articles" containing freebies that can be found elsewhere on the Web. We would like to make it clear that we do try to release useful things, and we do try to keep the high quality of these freebies and it has never been our intention to fill our publishing schedule with freebie posts.
We are going to continue to release freebies from time to time (though not as often as we have over the last months), and we'll make sure they meet our (and your) standards of high quality. Please let us know your opinion in the comments section below and in the poll below. Thank you.
In this post we release two sets, a Light Blurs Photoshop Brushes, a set of 23 high-quality "light" brushes and Vector Photoshop Brushes Decoration Pack, a set of decoration brushes for Photoshop.
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The Ultimate Collection Of Photoshop Custom Shapes
By Steven Snell, December 11th, 2008 in Developer's Toolbox | 207 Comments
Photoshop users are able to benefit from the vast amount of high-quality resources that are freely available to the community. Brushes get a lot of attention, but custom shapes are also extremely useful in the right situations. Finding a custom shape that has already been created can save you some time and headaches in your design, and fortunately there is a very wide variety of custom shapes available.
This post highlights 80 different sets of custom shapes (over 2,500 individual shapes) in several different categories. If you plan to download and use any of these shapes be sure to check to terms and conditions set by the creator of the shapes.
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50 Excellent Digital Photography Photoshop Tutorials
By Jacob Gube, December 7th, 2008 in Tutorials | 103 Comments
Adobe Photoshop is the industry standard for digital-image editing and graphics creation. Photoshop's versatility makes it a popular choice among Web designers, graphic designers, digital media artists, print designers, photographers and other professionals in design and image-editing. Whether you're designing a business card or website or digitally enhancing an image, you can rest assured that Photoshop will give you the necessary tools to get the job done.
In this article, we focus on tutorials on digital photography. You'll find an assortment of top-notch tutorials that deal with applying post-production techniques and effects, color correction, enhancement and photo retouching. So fire up Photoshop and try out some of these wonderful tutorials on your own photos!
Without further ado, we present you with 50 Excellent Photoshop Tutorials for Digital Photography.
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Innocent Invaders Photoshop Brushes Set
By Smashing Editorial, December 3rd, 2008 in Freebies | 64 Comments
Today we are glad to release Innocent Invaders Photoshop Brushes Set, a set that features a curious cast of characters who are ready to infiltrate your creative projects. Inspired by designer vinyl toys, this high resolution set includes a collection of 15 different creatures accompanied by 10 background illustrations. These brushes are designed by Katie Canada and Jason Gaylor of Mediaslap. This set was designed exclusively for Smashing Magazine and its readers.
You can use the set for all of your projects for free. You can freely use it for both your private and commercial projects, including software, online services, templates and themes. The set may not be resold, sublicensed, rented, transferred or otherwise made available for use. You may not use these brushes on designs for sale on stock photography sites. You'll find installation instructions in the package. Please link to this article if you would like to spread the word.
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50 Must-Have Photoshop Brushes
By Daved Brosche, November 10th, 2008 in Graphics | 177 Comments
Having a good collection of Photoshop brushes is essential for any designer. There is certainly no shortage of Photoshop brushes on the Web these days. The problem with Photoshop brushes isn’t in finding brushes, but in finding quality brushes.
Below you'll find a collection of quality Photoshop brushes that every designer should find handy. These 50 Photoshop brush sets are ones I find myself using over and over in a variety of projects. This list is the result of years' worth of downloads, trials and experiments. I hope this list helps you find some new Photoshop brushes that improve your collection.
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Photoshop Tutorials To Improve Your Modeling and Design Skills
By Vailancio Rodrigues, November 3rd, 2008 in Tutorials | 70 Comments
You have to use Adobe Photoshop for a really long time to understand its potential completely. There are many things you can do using its endless features. You need to discover them and decide how to use them in new and innovative ways to create the creative, beautiful and realistic digital art. In this article, we look at Photoshop in a different way: as a tool for designers to create realistic objects and 3D models.
Below you'll find over 50 Photoshop tutorials that teach you how to create beautiful realistic objects and 3D models. Let's see what it takes to turn Photoshop into a design workspace.
We also have plenty of tutorials on using Photoshop to improve the quality of your images:
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40 Beautiful Grunge Photoshop Tutorials
By Jacob Gube, October 28th, 2008 in Tutorials | 113 Comments
Grunge is a popular trend that attempts to give designs a more organic and realistic look. It also provides a stark contrast to the simplistic, polished, and rigid "web 2.0" trend, opting instead for a less uniform and more elaborate form of design.
We've discussed grunge style in modern web design before, as well as the tips and tricks to achieving the grunge look. Now, it's time to put theory into practice by finding ways to infuse grunge thems into your artwork using Photoshop. In this collection, we present to you 40 excellent, high-quality grunge Photoshop tutorials. So fire up Photoshop and get ready to get your hands… dirty!
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Splatter and Watercolour Brushes For Photoshop
By Smashing Editorial, October 22nd, 2008 in Freebies | 104 Comments
Another day — another fresh freebie. Today we are glad to release Splatter and Watercolour Photoshop Brushes, 3 sets of 21 high-quality brushes, with the average size of 2500px or 2200px. These brushes were created for Adobe Photoshop CS, CS2 and CS3 and also work with GIMP 2.4.
The sets are created by Abdullah, the creator of Qbrushes.com where you can find further high-quality Photoshop brushes available for free download. This set was designed especially for Smashing Magazine and its readers.
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The Ultimate Collection Of Useful Photoshop Actions
By Jacob Gube, October 20th, 2008 in Developer's Toolbox | 254 Comments
Saving repetitive tasks as Photoshop actions can save you a lot of time, allowing you to automate your work and improve workflow efficiency. A Photoshop action is a recording of a sequence of commands and operations that you can save and access later on.
We've searched for the most useful Photoshop actions that can help you improve your workflow and perform complex techniques with the push of a button. In this collection, you'll find more than 350 free hand-picked Photoshop actions that you can use to speed up your graphics creation.
Note: It's important to check the license of each action set you download and use.
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40 Photoshop Tutorials On Rain Showers and Water Drops
By Glen Stansberry, September 25th, 2008 in Tutorials | 91 Comments
With fall just around the corner, designers are looking for ways to complement their work with Fall imagery like water droplets, rain on leaves and fall rain showers. Including rain or water drops in a scene can be a nice effect because water is a very compelling element. As you’ll see in the tutorials below, water drops and rain can completely change the dynamic of a design or photo.
Adding the illusion of water and rain to photographs using Photoshop can be a bit tricky. Many times the effect feels forced and cheesy, as if you’re looking at a grainy picture instead of an authentic rain shower. The tutorials below will give any designer inspiration for incorporating water scenes in fall designs and showcase some amazing water work by excellent designers. You’ll learn how to create realistic photos.
Here are some other tutorials and Photoshop tutorials from Smashing Magazine:
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Health And Beauty Photoshop Brushes Set
In our previous releases we focused on icons and Wordpress themes; however, there is a variety of further tools that graphic designers need on a regular basis; for instance, Photoshop brushes. You can find dozens of our other releases in our Freebies section.By Smashing Editorial, September 12th, 2008 in Freebies | 95 Comments
Today we are happy to release Health and Beauty Photoshop Brushes: a free set of 67 Photoshop brushes ranging in resolution from 69 to 2463 pixels. The set is compatible with Adobe Photoshop 7.0, CS, CS2 and CS3 (you can use it in Photoshop Elements, Paint Shop Pro, GIMP and Paint.NET, too). The brushes were designed by Silvia Bukovac Gasevic, the creative mind behind graphics-illustrations.com, especially for Smashing Magazine and its readers.
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