Design Vitality

Now that fixed width layouts are all the craze, what are we to do with all that blank background space? You could go the tried-and-true route with a gradient, but it doesn’t always add much to the background. Why not add some beauty and texture by having a pattern take up some space?

Using this collection of links you should be able to find the perfect background to fill the void in your design!

1. Squidfingers - Patterns
   158 free patterns from Squidfingers.
   
2. Brusheezy - Patterns
   Lots of patterns available for download. The site even includes a rating system to see what others thought of them.
   
3. Photoshop Patterns @ deviantART
   A TON of free patterns by Deviant Art users.
   
4. BioRUST.com :: Adobe Photoshop Patterns
   Free photoshop patterns from Biorust.
   
5. TipClique Photoshop Patterns - Set 001
   5 high resolution Photoshop patterns. Be sure to check the site for collections 2 and 3.
   
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Having a wide variety of brushes gives designers a larger toolset when creating images. Grunge brushes can be used to create a textured site design, floral brushes can help fill empty voids and even more brushes can be used to create nice little touches. Below is a collection of resources for expanding your Adobe Photoshop brush palette:

1. Free Brushes at Brusheezy!
   This site has a very large collection of high quality brushes.
   
2. PS Brushes.net - Photoshop Brushes
   This site currently has 511 quality brushes of all varieties.
   
3. Getbrushes.com - 150+ High Quality Brushes
   Like the name implies, get all your photoshop brushes here.
   
4. Designfruit » Photosho Brushes
   Amazing photoshop brushes made by Design Fruit. All the brushes are also available for purchase as vectors.
   
5. Photoshop Support - Photoshop Brushes
   A mix of swirling and stylish brushes.
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No matter how many fonts you have now, if you are a designer and you see a free font that you like you download it. Period. Of course whenever you go looking for free fonts, a crap load of the search results that show up will get you interested by showing you some good looking fonts and then tell you to pull out your credit card for that one you really liked.

Fortunately, we found just the thing to let you tell those sites that try to charge for fonts to take a hike. (more…)

Do you feel like something is missing from your site? Do you want to give your design a little snap? Make your site stand out with icons! When used correctly icons can add flavor and character to your site. Below are the top 50 sources for designer icons for use on your website: (more…)

We live in a world of automation. We get everything quicker and easier than before. Why not get the same when working on web designs? These tools and tips will show you how to quicken your workflow when designing or editing a website. (more…)

Your website navigation plays an integral role in keeping your site easy to use and navigate. Button tutorials are useful because you can take the techniques you like from a tutorial and use them to make your own custom buttons to match the site your working on.

I have filtered through the millions of results to highlight the 39 button tutorials you should have in your arsenal. (more…)

Video tutorials can make learning new Photoshop skills quick and easy. Unfortunately, hunting down decent Photoshop video tutorials online can be pretty tough.

To save you the trouble of searching through pages of the same videos about editing some girls face over and over, we’ve tracked down some of the better Photoshop video tutorials and put them all in once place. Enjoy! (more…)

Text and the way it looks is a major part of any design. A great design can be cheapened if the text on the page looks wrong. Any logo is almost entirely text. From water to fire, these 51 tutorials will show you how to create any style of text you want.

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Your logo is the most important factor in your brand’s identity and it has a huge impact on how users perceive your website, or company. So avoid making the Digg front page for having one of the web’s worst logos, and get started on your new fresh logo design today. (more…)

Anyone who has ever typed the phrase “graphic design tutorial” in Google knows there are millions of pages out there. To make things easier for those of us wanting to improve our design know-how I have scoured the web from Google to Technorati.

I’ve put together a list of 31 quality graphic design tutorials sources for Photoshop, Illustrator and more that have detailed instructions. (more…)