Here are a list of creative words to help you expand your creative vocabulary when describing or critiquing work.

Symmetry: The quality of being made up of exactly similar parts facing each other or around an axis. an example of this could be a crystal structure with hexagonal symmetry.

Juxtaposed / Juxtaposition: To place or deal with close together for contracting effect. Black-and-white photos of slums were starkly juxtaposed with color photos.

Equity: The value of a property. You can used this creatively by describing a brand logo or some identifiable graphic as having value.

When designing skyscraper banners (160×600 and 130×160…etc.) try incorporating your logo in to the top and bottom portions of your banner layouts.
If you only want to include one logo, try positioning the logo in the top or middle portions of the banner.
If you only include your brand identity at the bottom, it’s will most likely fall below the fold (below the initial browser window area) and out of view of the user. Having a logo atop of the banner insures the viewer will be able to identity the brand associated with the message and call to actions.

Bitmap graphic Images
Bitmap images such as photos take up more file size than vector graphics. Use them sparingly.

Color
The bottom-line, always try to use a limited color palette for your banner design. Try using black and white or duotone photos whenever possible.

Backgrounds
Try to keep your background design simple so it can be recreated in Flash as a vector shape. Radio and linear gradations are ok but patterns and sceneries will have to be imported as bitmap graphics.

Effects and Filters
Most Photoshop effects like drop shadows and glows can be reproduced in Flash using Flash filters. Always keep your layer effects active (don’t flatten them) so they can be turned off when it comes time to save slices. This results in a smaller slice K sizes. After the slices are imported in to Flash, they can be recreated without impacting the banner K size.

Fonts:
Limit the number of fonts and font styles you use in your banner design. Also say away from heavy stylized fonts. They tend to add more weight to your flash file.

Setting Up Your Application for Web Design

Color Settings – When designing for the web, you should change your Proof Setup setting to Monitor RGB (sRGB). If not, your colors will shift and no longer matching your original design. The reason for the shift in color is that when you choose Save for Web, Photoshop automatically converts your image to sRGB and strips away any color profile attached, since web browsers don’t support color profiles. You can find this setting under View > Proof Setup > Monitor RGB.

The 960-grid system is an effective way to start your web design layout n Photoshop. You can use the grid as a guide over to help you build rows and columns that are consistent in dimensions and spacing. I don’t believe that all web site designs should follow a grid system, however, the grid is a great tool to keep around.

You can see live site examples at http://960.gs. Drupal has also produced a new implementation of the original grid located here http://drupal.org/project/ninesixty

Download and unzip the framework from the http://960.gs website

I forgot the name the font used to design my logo for this blog site. WhatTheFont? from MyFonts.com totally saved my behind from a long and painful font search. Checkout the accuracy of the tool below.

For this to work well, the image should be in a GIF, JPEG, TIFF or BMP format. Keep your file size around 360 x 275 pixels. The letter height should be around 100 pixels. The orientation is best at horizontal and make sure that each letter has a good amount of space between each character.

Head on over to DaFont.com to download free high quality fonts (freeware, shareware, demo versions or public domain).

There’s so many bad fonts out on the web, it’s always refreshing to find fonts like these to add to your ever growing font collection.

Note that some of these fonts when use for commercial use must be approved by the author. You can use them for most uses but be mindful not to try and use it for a fortune 500 corporate logo. If so, I’m sure the author would liked to be compensated. So spread the love .

Download Top 100 Fonts at DaFont.com

Having a hard time finding the right color patterns and palettes for you project? Colourlovers.com is a commutative effort to build a database of color schemes and creative insight. It’s a place for artist to check color trends, compare color palettes, submit news and comments, and read color related articles and interviews.
See more at Colourlovers.com

If you have small side jobs as I do from time to time, this is a really nice online invoicing application.
There’s a free account for small businesses (1-3 users).

It also comes with a desktop widget for Mac and Window users.
http://www.paymo.biz/