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February 25, 2019

Start Your Project Off Right with 7 Free Adobe XD UI Kits

UI/UX design is tough work. Designing all the little pieces and screens from scratch can end up being extremely time-consuming. Luckily, plenty of amazing designers out there have released UI kits, a helpful resource that can seriously cut down on time as well as providing inspiration.

Premade assets, screens and pages will allow you to get right to the site or app design. Skip all the tedious setting up and start working on the actual product. Here are seven of the best free UI kits, made just for Adobe XD users.

Social Meet Up UI Kit

An iOS kit made for social media apps, Social Meet Up comes with an absolute ton of content. 80+ screens provide everything needed to create a social network, a perfect launching pad for your app’s UI. The strong, feminine design is just perfect for a project like this. And the kit is built to be easily customized, so keep the parts you like and mix it up with your own brand.

Non-Profit UI Kit

Designed for non-profits, this kit offers everything you need to build a website that looks beautiful and reaches further. Two colors and three fonts create a simple but memorable palette. The responsive website prototype comes with home, about, donation and various other pages relevant for a non-profit. 30+ components and 20+ screens will give you plenty to work with here.

Smartwatch UI Kit

There are plenty of resources for website and app designers, but what about for a smartwatch? With 60 screens, 20 customizable components and 30 icons, this UI kit leaves little to be desired. Whatever kind of smartwatch app you’re making, there’s something to build on here, and plenty of room to add your own unique style.

Pawtastic UI Kit

If you’re creating a website for pet services, look no further. Pawtastic comes with various super helpful components, including a well-crafted sign-up process and various customizable UI elements. The colors and typography look amazing here. And by downloading the free pack, you get 15 wireframes too! This is one that just can’t be passed up.

Fashion Influencer UI Kit

Fashion designer? You’ll adore this elegant UI kit. With 10+ pages to work off of and over 50 components, you won’t be running out of material any time soon. These designs are made with a careful, sophisticated style, perfect for a fashion portfolio or an online clothing store. For any project that’s trying to nail the fashionable look, the potential here is unlimited.

Dashboard UI Kit

This one is just awesome! If you’re building a site with data visualization, Dashboard has exactly what you need. 15 customizable charts, 10 screens and 100+ UI components – a dizzying amount of resources for your project. The prototype is actually interactive as well, so customizing and even embedding it into a website is no problem. Show the world your designs as you work with this comprehensive UI resource.

Navigo Transportation UI Kit

This unique UI kit is designed for transportation and GPS apps – specifically ones made for iOS and iPhone X. With 60+ assorted screens, spread across 6 categories, you’ll find plenty of content to keep you going. There’s even statistics and profile pages to really add some personality to your app.

Easily Create Website Mockups

People who create and release UI kits for free are a godsend for web and UI/UX designers. Finding or creating assets and components eats up so much time. Using one of these kits, you can skip all of that and start drafting your new website right away. Try out one of these professionally made kits and get right to the action! No more scrambling to meet a deadline.

February 25, 2019

Top 10 Google Web Fonts For Bold Header Text

Since webfont support is basically universal there’s no good reason to stick to the defaults. Google Webfonts is the largest source of free fonts with hundreds of typefaces to pick from.

Since page headers are the strongest elements they usually work best with custom fonts. However it can be tough whittling down the best choices, and that’s exactly why I wrote this post.

All the Fonts You Could Ask For

1. Montserrat

The first in my collection is Montserrat. This font can work for pretty much anything but I think it works incredibly well as header text.

I’ve used this for navigation text with all caps, customized letter spacing, along with many different font styles from thin to super thick. Montserrat fits the bill perfectly across the board and it’s one of the more universal fonts blending into anything from a tech blog to a funeral parlor website.

The font only weighs about 500 bytes using the default style so it’s incredibly light. And with so many different styles you can get a lot of different looks from this one family.

If you’re looking for a unique heading font try Montserrat. It probably won’t work for everyone but it’s a safe starting font that many designers love.

2. Merriweather

A much thicker serif alternative is Merriweather which I also like as a body font. This versatile typeface really looks great anywhere on your site and it’ll bring plenty of attention to your headers.

If you try Merriweather for a larger page heading I suggest using the bold or bold italic style. They are surprisingly clean but they probably need some letter spacing adjustments. Either way the style and darkness of the letters are super easy to follow.

When pairing this font I usually do a sans-serif body typeface. The contrasting styles create a natural divide between headers & body copy. Plus most people find sans-serif easier to read on average for body content.

But I see a lot of sites with serif headers and they all look great. Merriweather is a nice starting point for serif, but if you don’t like it you’ll find tons of alternatives in this post.

3. Josefin Sans

Modern and classy best describes Josefin Sans. It feels like a font straight from a 1950s jazz lounge, or maybe something you’d see on the front page of The New Yorker.

It does have a distinct curvy style and the thin letters save a lot of horizontal space. You can toy with all-caps or different letter spacings to create many unique styles all from this one font family.

Some sites just look better with thin heading fonts. If you’re looking for one to try I absolutely recommend Josefin Sans with its unique letter designs and its many bold/italic styles.

4. Arvo

One other serif font I really like is Arvo. This font has a lot of character which you’ll notice right away in the bolder styles.

I really feel like Arvo works best on blogs and digital magazines because the font grabs so much focus. It’s one of the strongest fonts in this list and the serif design grabs even more attention.

If you’re launching a magazine-style blog then Arvo can work well as a strong header. But if your blog works better with sans-serif fonts this can be too much. One alternative that’s a bit more subtle is Crete Round but it doesn’t have the same eye-catching appeal as Arvo.

5. Raleway

I’ve seen Raleway on many larger blogs and online magazines for its distinct style and large variety of font variations.

For big heading text I think a mid-level thickness works best so the letters don’t get too wide. Default letter spacing is great so every word is clearly legible.

One feature unique to Raleway is the “w” letter form. It crosses in the middle which looks like two “v”s stacked together. Some may like this, others won’t. But it’s definitely unique to Raleway so it’ll stand out in your page headers too.

6. Catamaran

One of the newer fonts I found recently is Catamaran. It comes with 9 font styles from thin to black and varying thicknesses inbetween.

What I like most about this font is the offbeat lettering. Each letter takes on a very unique style and you can see this in the bolder styles. When used in heading text these letters really shine and jump off the page.

Because the bold styles are so thick you should only use Catamaran in headers with larger font sizes. It can look OK at all sizes but Catamaran really feels like a thick header typeface.

7. PT Sans

PT Sans is soft with smooth edges and thin letters. For headers I only like the bold style of PT Sans because the “normal” style just feels way too thin.

I also prefer PT Sans for headers only since it just feels too soft for regular body text. But any PT Sans header is going to look amazingly clean and readable. This font actually has a sister named PT Serif that also works well.

Between the two, I personally prefer PT Sans. It has smoother edges than the serif version and I feel it just works better in page headings and especially for blogs.

8. Open Sans

Open Sans is small, versatile, and super clean. It deserves a spot in this collection because it’s a simple font and one of the fastest loading fonts from the entire Google Fonts library.

The majority of sans-serif fonts play well with any site. Plus you can use sans-serif fonts in both your header and body text making Open Sans a reasonable choice for the entire website. One alternative I really like is Muli which has a lot more character as a header font.

But Muli’s downside is the larger file size. Ultimately this is what makes Open Sans so great because slower sites don’t rank as well and they provide a worse UX all around.

9. Roboto Slab

For a strong serif header font you might try Roboto Slab and just see how it looks. The letters aren’t too thick and the tags that hang off don’t distract the reader.

I generally prefer Roboto Slab for headers instead of the sans-serif version called Roboto. The serif version just feels stronger and leaves a much bigger impression on the viewer.

Truth be told they’re both awesome and you can’t go wrong either way. They both support all the common unicode characters and they’re both amazing choices for your website headings.

10. Ubuntu

The free Ubuntu font can be used for practically anything from nav text to large headers and even body copy. It’s extremely versatile and it’s lightweight with a pretty fast load time.

Rounded edges on the letters make this feel sleek and modern. It’s also one of the few fonts that really can be used in multiple places on your site which can cut down the total number of fonts you need.

Ubuntu was designed back in 2010 so it’s been around for quite a while. Now that webfonts are much more common the Ubuntu family is widely used in web design.

Wrapping Up

Whenever I design a new site these 10 fonts are my go-to choices for headers. They’re much better than the stock OS defaults and your layout will really stand out from the others with these strong header fonts.

February 21, 2019

Top Free Extensions for VS Code

Microsoft’s VS (Visual Studio) Code is a free, open source code editor that is gaining in popularity. It’s very lightweight, flexible and yet still packs some powerful features. Plus, it supports just about every major programming language, including PHP, JavaScript, C++ and a whole lot more.

You might even be surprised to learn that VS Code is also cross-platform. Not only does it work on Windows, but versions for both Linux and Mac are also available for download.

But perhaps the coolest feature of all is the massive extension marketplace. There are free extensions available to support new languages, debug your code or add a variety of other custom functionality. This enables you to customize the editing experience to better meet your needs.

Today, we’ll introduce you to some of the very best VS Code extensions out there. Let’s get started!

GitLens

While Git functionality is already built into VS Code, GitLens aims to “supercharge” the editor with even more version control goodies. It offers deeper insight into code, showing you when it was changed and who changed it. You can even compare different branches, tags and commits. Overall, this extension will make version control a more visual experience.

Beautify

Are you very particular about syntax highlighting? If so, Beautify is just the extension you need. It takes advantage of VS Code’s already existing use of Online JavaScript Beautifier, but allows you to easily make changes to its styles. This means you can set elements like indenting, line wrap and other minutiae to your heart’s content.

ESLint

JavaScript can be quite difficult to debug. But the ESLint extension for VS Code can make the process much easier. It helps by pointing out potential problems in your code before you even execute it. Better still, the extension lets you create your own linting rules.

Debugger for Chrome

For developers who’d rather troubleshoot code during runtime, Debugger for Chrome will help you get the job done. There are a number of handy features, including the ability to set breakpoints in your code, watches and a console. Plus, you can choose to run an instance of Chrome within VS Code or attach the debugger to a seperately running instance of the browser.

React Native Tools

React is among the most buzzworthy JS libraries out there – so much so that the new WordPress block editor (aka Gutenberg) is built on it. If you’re among the many who have jumped on the bandwagon, React Native Tools is a must-have extension. It adds the ability to run react-native commands and will help you debug code.

One Dark Pro

When dealing with code, it helps to have an editor that is both visually appealing and comfortable. After all, coding sessions can last for hours on end. One Dark Pro brings the popular “One Dark” theme from the Atom editor to VS Code. You get the familiarity of this iconic look with the other conveniences of Microsoft’s open source app.

Bracket Pair Colorizer 2

Bracket Pair Colorizer 2 is a simple extension, but one that can make code much easier to digest. It color codes matching brackets, allowing you to visually determine where functions begin and end. You can even pick which colors to use.

vscode-icons

Perhaps one of the most effective visual tweaks for VS Code comes from vscode-icons. It takes a rather bland file listing and adds colorful, language-specific icons to the mix. This makes it easy to tell your PHP files from HTML, for example. Plus, the added personality is a welcome addition to any workspace.

Write Code Your Way

The incredible number of available extensions for VS Code makes it a compelling choice for everyday use. You have the freedom to set things up to match the languages you use and the type of visual space you prefer.

Plus, it offers an interesting mix of both corporate and open source culture. Being backed by Microsoft would seem to ensure that VS Code will be actively developed in the future. And the open source community has created a thriving ecosystem around the software. The result for developers is getting the best of both worlds.

February 18, 2019

17 Inspiring Hand-Letterers to Follow on Instagram

Instagram is chock full of lettering artists. These people put their awesome calligraphy out there for you to enjoy. You’ll find everything from traditional and digital lettering to graffiti, neon, and body art. If you’re looking for a little inspiration, give a follow to these great artists and watch your Instagram feed flood with beautiful artwork.

Gemma O’Brien

All you can say when looking at these images: Wow! These designs are super cool and complicated. Letters, colors and unique designs mix together perfectly to create these fantastic pieces.

Sarah Disney

This artist creates hand-lettering for weddings and home decor, and that sophisticated aesthetic permeates the whole gallery. You’ll find their work on everything from signs and cards to plates and book covers.

Ian Bernard

This page is full of totally unique lettering designs, and there’s no one style here, either. Traditional, digital, grungy, sketchy, and elegant art awaits you. The artist also created letter brushes you can purchase for Procreate.

Heyfoxy.au

Have you ever wanted to keep a cute journal filled with artwork and calligraphy? Look here for all the inspiration you’ll ever need! These pretty pastels are nothing less than breathtaking.

JansArts

This page is especially interesting because you’ll see both traditional art right on the paper and the artist’s work digitally overlaid on photography. The effect is pretty awesome!

Michael Moodie

This artist specializes in clean script font, but you’ll see other types of lettering too. Bold letters that look like something off a poster, or painted words with bleeding ink – but all pulled off with the same stylish grace.

The Inky Hand

This marker artist has a distinctively vibrant style. Mixed in you’ll find hand-lettering embroidery and digital pieces too, so there’s plenty of variety here!

Saskolinas

This artist is all about the atmosphere. Their black and white lettering and drawings are amazing, and you’ll also want to take note of the carefully arranged background! It all comes together to make the perfect image.

Shelley Hitz

Do you love watercolors and soft designs? Then you’ll definitely want to check out this artist! They make beautiful watercolor cards with calligraphy text.

Miichellabella

Have you ever seen prettier hand-made cards? You’ll definitely want to take a look at these cards with their artistic calligraphy and sweet designs.

Mateusz Witczak Designs

Do you love vintage lettering? This art looks like it could be engraved on a sign or as an established company’s logo.

Nim_br

Absolutely gorgeous calligraphy. You’ll see a lot of sketches, soft gradients and shiny gold lettering here.

Humletters

You’ll love these watercolors with a unique font! There are plenty of distinctive and pretty designs here, all on cute little cards that will brighten up your day!

Lettering By Usha

Here’s an artist who’s got their colors down. The gradients they create within letters are absolutely stunning, and there’s not a bad mix of colors in this whole gallery. The backgrounds are super fun and well-crafted too!

Jessica Hische

Not only is this artist a talented lettering artist, she’s also a best-selling children’s author. Her art is incredibly intricate and spans a wide variety of looks and genres. You’ll find anything from classic, homemade craft to modern styles within her gallery.

Creatifolio

This elegant hand-lettering looks like it could be on a greeting card. Scroll down to see a rainbow of colors and beautiful typography.

Hello Tosha

These cursive designs just exude positivity. Maybe it’s the cute drawings or the splashes of bright colors. Either way, it’s impossible to be unhappy when you see this gallery.

Add Some Creativity to Your feed!

These awesome artists are sure to bring a little color and variety to your Instagram feed. If you find someone whose work speaks to you, make sure to like your favorite posts and give them a follow. Every artist could use a little love. And these fantastic hand-letterers definitely deserve it!

February 14, 2019

10 Free Clothing Mockups for Your Designs

Need some clothing mockups for your next design project? Maybe you’re creating an eCommerce store and need some temporary graphics. Or perhaps you’re actually designing clothing with custom logos. Whatever your goal, these ten free clothing mockups are super easy to edit and apply designs to.

Woman T-Shirt Mockup PSD

This women’s V-neck T-shirt mockup comes with a front and back image, as well as smart layers to allow you to easily add your own logos and artwork. With a huge 4000 x 3000px resolution, your design will look great at full size or downscaled. And it’s simple to edit: just change the T-shirt color and paste in a design.

Psd Woman Long Sleeve T-Shirt Mockup

If you want to show off an apparel mockup with a model, check out this long-sleeved T-shirt design. Change the color, add in some custom graphics and even remove the model with the touch of a button. This one is great if you want to see how your design will look on a real person.

Snapback Cap PSD Mockup

This is a great resource. With seven predefined colors, three different angles, and two logo layers, this cap mockup is super customizable. There are tons of elements and room for plenty of changes, so go crazy with this one.

Hoodie Mockup PSD

If you need a hoodie mockup, you’ll love this. Everything on this design is tweakable, from the cords and cuffs to the pocket and inner hoodie color. And of course, you can easily add your own designs to the mix.

Tank Top PSD Mockup

Here’s a realistic tank top mockup for all of your apparel projects. Just change the color, drop in a logo, and tweak the background if needed. There’s a front and back version so you can know just how the final product will look.

Baby T-shirt Psd Mockup

There are all sorts of placeholders out there for adult clothing, but what about for infants? This baby T-shirt mockup comes with various editable elements, including a tag that you can customize. Your design will look photorealistic here!

V-Neck T-Shirt Mockup

Looking for a simple V-neck shirt mockup? This one comes with front and back versions, and a few layers you can change to reflect your design. With just a few essential layers, editing is straightforward and easy to do.

Polo Shirt PSD Mockup

Need a professional-looking polo shirt mockup? This PSD is very editable; you can change the colors of every piece of the shirt, including the buttons. There’s room for a logo both on the shirt and sleeves.

Long Sleeve T-Shirt Mockup PSD

A simple long-sleeved shirt gives plenty of room for artistic designs. The smart layers will allow your logo to look realistic on the shirt. And, changing the other aspects is super easy as well – thanks to this well-put-together resource.

Folded Psd Sweatshirt Mockup

Here’s a folded-up shirt with a tag that looks like it came right off a store shelf! Customize every aspect of this helpful mockup, from the various label areas to even the texture and lighting on the shirt. You can also remove the tag if you want, thanks to helpfully marked and ordered layers.

Clothing Mockups for Designers

It’s important to use high-quality mockups for your designs, even if they’re just placeholders. These clothing mockups are easy to edit, which is a huge plus. You can change colors, add logos and tweak the image as you please. Some even come with multiple editable areas to give you maximum control.

If you need clothing mockups in your next project, these ten awesome resources will definitely do the trick. With these, you can have a better idea of what your designs will look like in the final product – no more trial and error.

February 11, 2019

10 Amazing Examples of CSS & JavaScript Animated Logos

Take a peek over this gallery of 10 incredible examples of custom logo animations for unknown entities and world-famous brands alike.

1. Flowers SVG

One of the hottest animation trends on the web is SVG animation. It’s a growing topic of interest and this flower logo animation is a great example of SVG in action.

The icon & text of the logo has been created inside an <svg> tag in the HTML markup. Then sequential animations are controlled through CSS and automated on pageload. This requires a number of SVG-specific CSS properties like stroke-dashoffset which pushes outline motions in sequence to create this brilliant animated effect.

2. Carbon LDP

The Carbon LDP logo is fairly detailed and complex. But developer David McFeders took this to another level with his animated Carbon logo built on CSS/Compass.

Every piece of this code is easy to customize from the logo size to the animation speed. It’s built in pure CSS and made to loop endlessly. And even though the letters are made of a single PNG image you can always reverse-engineer that design with your own custom fonts.

3. Binary Lab

Binary Lab’s animated logo is one of the more complex animation effects in this list. It pulls numbers from a flask and fades them in & out of view above the logo.

The animation itself is controlled through CSS. But this pen also relies on the TweenMax library for adding repeating digits and custom alpha transitions. All-in-all a very creative use of CSS and JavaScript for modern web animation.

4. Pure CSS3 Stack Overflow

The Stack Overflow logo is one of my favorites because it’s simple, yet recognizable. And this snippet animates the Stack logo icon using nothing but pure CSS3.

This is by far one of the most impressive pure CSS animations I’ve seen. The final output really does look like the official logo and the animation feels smooth in every major browser. Anyone who loves pure CSS/SCSS animation will adore this snippet.

5. Monster Energy Logos

Tim Pietrusky animated this series of Monster Energy logos using SVGs and well-spaced CSS transitions. His code is free to study and replicate on your own if you want a similar fading effect on logos.

All of the animation timing is controlled directly through Sass which makes this a pure CSS animation. But you can alter variables to change the speed, fade colors, or pretty much anything else.

6. Subvisual

The team at Subvisual has a highly unique logo which was animated by Miguel Palhas. It works on two factors: the logo text and the “S” icon.

Everything is built on SVG elements which makes manipulation a bit easier. This pen also relies on the TweenLite library for JavaScript, although the vast majority of the animation is done via CSS. It’s a neat effect that can be repeated or triggered based on user action (hover, click, etc).

7. Pixel Logo Animation

Using the free pixel font Jura allows any developer to create a custom pixel-by-pixel animation effect. And that’s exactly what CodePen user Khaosmuhaha did in this pen.

It uses plain text manipulated through an HTML canvas element. The animations are powered by CSS3 animation properties, but they’re controlled through jQuery which makes the sequential pixel animation possible.

Definitely a cool effect and a fun use of the canvas element combined with a webfont.

8. Alex Aloia Logo

If you’re looking for a real complex logo animation then check out this example created by developer Alex Aloia. Using his name as the brand he created a complex series of SVG shapes which animate using a “drawing” effect.

The entire effect isn’t possible with only CSS. It requires a number of JS transformation libraries like DrawSVG and the more popular D3.js. But it’s a fun way to use open source libraries to create this one-of-a-kind animation.

9. Bayleys

The Bayleys logo is an obscure choice for animation. But it does have strong solid edges which makes re-creating the logo easy as pie.

That’s where Rafael Contreras comes in with his animation snippet using just 38 lines of code. The logo itself is built using SVG tags and the animation manipulates these tags accordingly. Many logo elements move in different directions making this effect mesmerizing to watch.

10. Nintendo Switch

The newest gaming console from the minds of Nintendo comes with a brilliant logo animation. This can be seen in all of their commercials and in this pen created by Koto Furumiya.

Koto re-built the Nintendo Switch logo using SVGs while animating the entire thing with CSS. And would you believe this animation only requires ~50 lines of CSS?

One thing I have to praise about this logo animation is the authenticity. It genuinely matches with Nintendo’s animation from the forceful push down and the rebound/bounce back up.

Wrapping Up

All of these examples are free and open source to study, clone, and manipulate for your own projects. I hope you like these demos and if you’re looking for more examples of CSS animation, take a look at this collection to see what other people have made.

February 7, 2019

Four Best WordPress Plugins for Content Marketers

Content marketing is such an important part of running a business today. Without it, it would be nearly impossible for a business to grow, regardless of its industry. And while many business owners are aware of what content marketing is and understand that it’s an effective tool for brand building, many don’t realize exactly how Read More →

The post Four Best WordPress Plugins for Content Marketers appeared first on WPArena.

February 4, 2019

Top 12 Web-Based Color Tools for Web Designers

Picking the perfect color scheme shouldn’t be a miserable task. All you need are the right tools for the job and an eye for design.

I can’t help develop your eye for picking colors, but I can share a bunch of handy color tools that’ll likely improve your eye as you use them.

These tools are all 100% free, so they’re easy to bookmark and reuse time & time again. They can also work for web, mobile, print, or any other medium that needs incredible colors.

1. ColorHexa

Recently I was browsing the web and stumbled onto ColorHexa. It’s by far one of the coolest color tools I’ve ever seen.

This isn’t technically a color generator or a scheme design tool. Instead, it’s an information library on all colors with suggested gradient ideas, related shades, and dozens of color codes(ex: hex, RGB, CMYK, CIE-LAB, HSL and more).

You’ll never find a more complete list of information on color. This is super useful for all designers, including web designers, and it’s a great place to start researching colors for your projects.

2. Colors.css

If you do some research into color psychology you’ll learn how different colors stack together & what sort of mood they give. This plays into contrast for certain types of colors and how they work together.

Every browser comes with default colors that are often too harsh. Colors.css fixes that.

It’s a free CSS library that restyles the default color palette. This means you can use color names like “blue” and “red” with totally different values.

They even have an entire accessibility page full of ideas for matching color schemes that’ll improve readability on your site.

3. ColorPick Eyedropper Extension

How often do you find a site with a beautiful color scheme? I find amazing sites all the time and it’s difficult to export those colors from the stylesheet.

You can use Chrome DevTools but this requires digging around in the code to pick out the hex colors. Instead you can use the ColorPick Eyedropper extension made exclusively for Google Chrome.

You just click the toggle window in the extensions panel, then hover any color you want to study. This gives you the full hex code along with a “copy” link to copy the exact color to your clipboard.

Pretty cool right? And it’s a free plugin, so there’s nothing to lose by trying it out.

4. Coolors

The Coolors site is a large color scheme generator. You can find dozens of generators on the web, but this one’s a little different since it supports Adobe programs with its own add-on.

You can also get this as a Chrome extension or even as a custom iOS app for your phone.

Really the true value is in the browser webapp that auto-generates color schemes on the fly. You can then mix & match colors, change settings, adjust for color blindness, and randomize your own schemes based on certain criteria.

It’s a great application, but it comes with a small learning curve. Shouldn’t take you more than 15-20 minutes to figure out how it all works.

5. Palettte App

Palettte is color editing and remapping tool. It allows you to build color schemes that flow from one to another and fine-tune individual color swatches. You can also import, analyze, and editing existing color schemes. The creator has written more on the motivations behind this color app.

6. Material UI Colors

With a quick Google search you’ll find a bunch of sweet material design tools on the web. They seem never-ending and many of them rely on the color styles typically found in Android apps.

With the Material UI Colors webapp you can find perfect color schemes that match with Google’s material guidelines.

Easily change the tint of all colors with the slider in the top-left corner of the screen. Or randomize your selections to match an existing site’s color choices.

You can also switch between hex and RGB depending on whatever format you want. A great app for material design lovers.

7. Color Supply

The Color Supply website is pretty unique but also very strange. It gives you a bunch of interesting color tools for matching color schemes, picking the foregrounds & backgrounds, plus different ways to compare how those colors would look on a page.

But this doesn’t have any guide or specific purpose. It acts like a color scheme generator that you have to just kind of learn as you go.

It will output different colors with hex codes near the bottom of the page to copy. Plus it’ll show you how those colors work in a gradient, in icons, and with text. Nice tool but it comes with an awkward learning curve.

8. Color Safe

The WCAG works hard towards a more accessible web. Color is one of the easiest ways to build your accessibility without losing time testing.

Color Safe is a free webapp that can test your color choices. You pick from a small set of fonts & sizes, then pick whatever colors you want for your foreground & background.

From there you’ll get an accessibility rating along with suggestions on how to improve your color choices(if needed).

Really great tool for anyone concerned about accessibility on the web.

9. Color Hunt

For a user-curated gallery of color schemes take a look at Color Hunt.

This free project was launched a couple of years back and continues to be a source of design inspiration. People submit their own color schemes into the site, then others vote on those color schemes.

You can sort by newest or by most popular and even vote on your favorites. Pretty cool right?

It’s an extremely simple web app so don’t expect too many features. It’s just a neat way to visually browse through many different color patterns at once.

10. Open Color

Looking for something a little more web-friendly? Then check out the Open Color library.

This is a massive open source collection of color choices built around accessibility and browser support. Each color has been optimized for easy matching regardless of your layout’s design.

Check out the GitHub repo for more info and to download a copy of the styles.

11. HTML Color Codes

HTML Color Codes is another info-focused color webapp.

This lets you pull all forms of HTML/CSS code for your color choices right from the app. You can search for any color you want, or go by their recommendations. Plus this even has a tool for generating color palettes that you can download as Adobe Swatch files.

Don’t let the name fool you: this app is for more than just HTML color.

It’s a brilliant tool for digital designers of all types who want easy access to color codes and reusable palettes.

12. Adobe Color CC

I can’t pass over the incredible Adobe Color CC webapp.

This free tool used to be called Adobe Kuler but it’s gone through a few iterations over the years. It’s still a free color picker but the interface has changed to make it easier for designers to build & save color schemes.

If you’re an Adobe user this tool is worth bookmarking. It supports up to 5 different colors in one scheme, and you can even upload images to pull dynamic color schemes automatically.

January 31, 2019

7 Fantastic Landing Page Designs

What is a landing page? Knowing this can help you generate leads and retain more customers when you design a website. Simply put, a landing page is where someone “lands” after clicking on a search result, call to action, or advertisement. These pages have one core focus: converting people into customers. Any page on your site can be a landing page for certain search terms.

These awesome landing pages are a great source of inspiration when you’re trying to improve your own. Take a look and see why they work so well!

Spotify

If you’re going to make your homepage your landing page, take a tip from Spotify. While navigational elements exist, they’re overshadowed by the huge background banner and noticeable button asking you to register. The pitch may be only three sentences long, but it says all it needs to.

Netflix

Netflix opens with an absolutely huge call to action button that’s just begging to be clicked on. When you do, you’re taken to a clean page, free of distractions but for a simple footer. Walking through the sign-up process doesn’t take long, and it even saves your progress if you leave the page.

Mango Languages

Mango Languages does a great job on its landing pages. The sign-up link is very prominent and posted multiple times on the homepage. Clicking it leads you to a page free of distracting navigation. Just choose your language and sign up!

Web Profits

Sometimes it’s impossible to condense your landing page down to a single action for users to take. The best thing you can do is make the distinction clear, and that’s what Web Profits does. The homepage is very simple with just three distinct links. Click one, and you’ll be directed to a landing page more suited to what you’re looking for. The page may be long, but the inclusion of at least four identical CTAs makes sure there’s always a button in sight when you’re ready to get started.

Google Store

Google’s full-screen, animated page already does a great job putting the focus on the products. Click one of the calls to action and you’ll be presented with a page that gets right to the point. Pricing and order buttons are always visible in the header as you scroll through videos and feature lists. And, advertisements for other products are kept at the bottom of the page.

Upwork

When you’re creating a landing page, it’s extremely important that you waste no time. Upwork’s sign-up dialogue exemplifies this quality. An eye-grabbing header and title draw your eye towards the Get Started button, which immediately begins walking you through creating a job post and the sign-up process. You may only have a few seconds to grab a visitor’s attention, so make sure you waste no time. This is also a fantastic example of above-the-fold content, with the site features all being below it and the important CTA above.

Facebook

If you visit Facebook without an account, they keep their pitch simple. With three concise bullet points explaining what the site is and an obvious sign-up form right on the page, it’s easy for anyone to get started. They also keep the form short and leave the in-depth questions for later, which is a good practice.

Design Great Landing Pages

The best landing pages are concise, have few distractions, and get the visitor to take the action you want them to take. Remember that when you’re designing your next landing page for your email campaign or advertising banner! Make your argument short, compelling and tailored to the audience likely to click on the landing page. Accomplish that and you’ll be converting in no time.

January 24, 2019

12 Incredible Pure CSS Experiments

You may know CSS as a language for simply styling your website, but it’s capable of a whole lot more than you might think. From photorealistic images to even video games, you’ll be shocked to see what a great developer can accomplish with just CSS.

There are all sorts of filters and effects here, all open source and available for use in a web design project. These modules are JavaScript and mostly HTML-free. That means they’re more lightweight than you’d expect. Check out these amazing pure CSS experiments, and maybe try a few for yourself.

Solar System

See the Pen Solar System animation – Pure CSS by Malik Dellidj (@kowlor) on CodePen.

Wow! If you love space, you’re going to be blown away by this solar system animated with CSS. This isn’t just a pretty animation either; each planet accurately revolves around the sun relative to an actual Earth year.

Gradient Background Animation

See the Pen Pure CSS3 Gradient Background Animation by Manuel Pinto (@P1N2O) on CodePen.

Animations are a notorious problem-causer for websites. If poorly optimized, they can cause a big slowdown. This beautiful animated gradient is extremely lightweight, not to mention easy to edit and add your own colors.

Stack Game

See the Pen Pure CSS Stack by Ben Szabo (@finnhvman) on CodePen.

You don’t need JavaScript to make a game. It may be simple, but the pure CSS Stack Game is fun to play with and the graphics are pretty nice too. This couldn’t have been easy, but it just goes to show what a little CSS is capable of.

3D Progress Bars

See the Pen Pure CSS Progress by Rafael González (@rgg) on CodePen.

Beautiful, lightweight progress bars, easy to customize to suit your project. The bars are made in 3D with a unique liquid look to them. You can even turn them into mini 3D charts!

Glitched Text

See the Pen CSS Glitched Text by Lucas Bebber (@lbebber) on CodePen.

Glitchy text always looks cool, and this CSS experiment brings it to life without any gifs, JavaScript or HTML. If you want to add a glitch effect to your website, check it out.

Francine

You can make art with HTML and CSS! Francine is an 18th-century styled painting made and displayed purely with code. And yet it looks no different than any other traditionally created piece of artwork.

Mobile Phone

See the Pen Photorealistic pure CSS mobile phone by Grzegorz Witczak (@Wujek_Greg) on CodePen.

Similar to Francine, this phone was created using nothing more than CSS and HTML. Yet it looks like any other photo on a website! If you’re interested, you can play with the code and see how this experiment was created.

Map Creator

See the Pen Full CSS Map creator by Vincent Durand (@onediv) on CodePen.

You think you need JavaScript to create something like this? Think again! This cute 3D map creator is made with nothing but CSS (and a smidge of HTML). Isn’t that mind-blowing?

Instagram.css

Need some fake Instagram filters for your website? This set of minified files comes with an install tutorial, too. Now you can easily add Instagram filters to any of your images.

Animated Gradient Ghost Button

See the Pen Animated Gradient Ghost Button Concept by Arsen Zbidniakov (@ARS) on CodePen.

It’s amazing that this was coded with nothing but CSS. With its pretty animation and gradient effect, this button would look fantastic on any website.

Devices.css

If you’ve ever wanted to put a fake phone or computer on your website and fill the screen with an image of your choice, check out this experiment. These are modeled after modern devices, too!

Dynamic Image Colorizing

See the Pen Dynamic Image Colorizing with <input type=”color”&rt; by Noah Blon (@noahblon) on CodePen.

This is pretty cool: Change the color of an image with nothing but CSS and the color picker tool from your computer.

Small, Responsive and Beautiful

A lot of the amazing effects you see on a website can be attributed to JavaScript. But sadly, JS isn’t always the most lightweight solution. However, you might be surprised what CSS is capable of. And, if made correctly, it can often have far less of an impact on performance.

Either way, it’s interesting to see all the creative ideas CSS developers can come up with. These experiments were made by some real innovative developers, so go give them some love, and let us know which one you thought was the coolest!

January 21, 2019

Enhance Your Look with These Free Hand-Lettered Brush Fonts

Want to add a spark of originality to your website or graphics? Hand-lettered fonts are just the thing. Fonts that look hand-made are a great way to make your site feel more comfortable and personal. And, they go well on almost any type of website.

If you’re ready to amp up the personality of a webpage, logo or banner, take a look at these gorgeous hand-lettered brush fonts, sure to dazzle and inspire!

Knewave

Knewave is a beautiful font sporting bold strokes and a neat, painted aesthetic. This is the sort of font that looks amazing in graphics like logos or banners. Make sure to also try out the outline version!

Cylburn

This script font is perfect if you’re looking for that elegant aesthetic. Big loops and careful brush strokes make this ideal for only the most sophisticated websites. You can pay what you want (including nothing) for a personal license, or purchase one for commercial use.

Odachi

Named after a type of samurai sword, Odachi is cutting edge font that’s perfect if you need something a little rougher. Odachi looks like a grungy calligraphy, carefully designed but with little scrapes and scratches that make it unique.

Merienda

Looking for something a little cleaner? Merienda keeps the brush-stroke look but is significantly more polished than many handwritten fonts. It comes with a regular and bold style which you can download for free, or use on your site via Google Fonts.

Sophia

Beautiful imperfections are what handwritten fonts are all about. Sophia is full of these: Letters slant and tilt randomly just like actual handwriting. This font isn’t perfect, but that’s what makes it beautiful! It also comes with two cute decorative symbols.

Restless

Here’s a font suitable only for the most elegant websites. The cursive-like typography is so elegant and stylish that people will think you painted it yourself. To get it for free, you just need to subscribe with your email address.

Boomville

Boomville is all about personality. The connected cursive font has a light-hearted feel, which is great if you want your graphics to look more animated and fun. You’ll need to buy a license to use it in commercial projects.

Europa Brush

This textured font was manually painted and underwent very little editing to give it that authentic hand-made feel. The strokes are wide and bold, making this great for those branding projects you want to make sure people remember.

Caveat Brush

A handwritten font you’re sure to fall in love with, Caveat Brush is simple but beautiful. Many of the letters come with design variations, which will make it look like actual handwriting on your site. Download it or serve it right from the Google Fonts API.

Calafia

An informal font, Calafia was inspired by left-handed lettering. This is a font that looks perfect in product advertising, with its friendly and relaxed, but carefully drawn, appearance. Make sure to buy a commercial license if you need it.

Mission Script

If you love cursive fonts, Mission Script is perfect for you. This font is perfectly well-rounded – it fits a variety of tones, from business-like and sophisticated to free and casual. Try it and fall in love with its universal appeal. Pay what you want for a personal license.

Kust

You’ll never forget this beautiful rugged typeface, painted with a thick brush before being converted to a font. Each letter is wonderfully detailed, with every little stroke and drop of paint visible. Kust is a bold font that will look best in large to gigantic font sizes, so go crazy!

A Sprinkle of Personality

Using hand-drawn fonts can instantly make a website seem familiar to visitors. This makes them perfect for blogs, small businesses or any website that wants to feel a bit more casual and easy-going. Even professional websites could benefit from using hand-lettered fonts in its graphics or scattered briefly throughout the site.

So, give these free brush fonts a try in your next design project! You’ll love the sense of style and friendliness they can bring.

January 17, 2019

11 Inspirational Designer Portfolios For 2019

For web and graphic designers, it’s important to nail that portfolio, instantly convincing anyone who visits that you’re the one for the job. With the new year rolling around, it might just be time for a fresh redesign.

There are so many amazing portfolios out there to draw inspiration from. If you’d like to explore and learn from the work of your fellow designers, you’re going to love this list. These are the portfolios that get it right!

We Ain’t Plastic

We Ain’t Plastic definitely leaves its mark. Its subtle effects, animations and images all come together to create a website that was obviously crafted with love. It also gets right to the point, careful not to overload you with too much information.

Melanie Daveid

This beautiful one-page portfolio proves that simple-but-strong design is often the best way to go. The perfectly elegant animations are the most memorable part of this website, alongside the dynamic layout.

Steve Mengin

Stylish and well put together, navigating this portfolio is no less than delightful. Every animation looks great, and though many navigation elements are fairly unique, getting around is very intuitive thanks to fantastic UI design.

Gal Shir

Fun animations and colorful images quickly bring this site to life. You won’t be able to stop scrolling, stopping to see each animated image. And a pretty parallax effect brings the site to a satisfying end.

Portfolio of Nathan Riley

This dark, modern website is filled with all sorts of fun little details, animations and browser interactions. Discovering them all is a joy. You know this is a designer who loves his job. Click to see the projects and you’ll get some interesting behind-the-scenes info on design choices, too!

Jack Jeznach

Everything about this website indicates excellency at both style and skill. There’s so much attention to detail that it’s astounding. As you navigate the well laid-out portfolio you’ll be constantly driven to keep exploring and learning more about the developer.

Weightshift

What’s better than a collection of case studies so nicely presented? Scroll through the clean, brightly colored website and check out the examples to see a short demonstration of the company’s past work!

Timothy Achumba

This portfolio uses a pleasant block-based layout that’s easy to navigate on any device. Images are the focal point, taking up a majority of the screen. What text there is tells you exactly what you need to know.

Friends

Here’s one reminiscent of a business card: Sophisticated, beautiful and simply but carefully designed. There are plenty of case studies to learn more about the company and its methods. Nothing is better than understanding your designer’s goals and processes.

Baptiste Ringot

This is a portfolio made with readability and ease of navigation in mind. There’s a lot of content and past work, but text is frequently broken up by interesting images of past design projects. It’s simple to navigate the sections. And the slight change of background color as you scroll is a nice touch.

Youandigraphics

A beautiful palette, unique layout, and cute art and animations certainly make this a standout website. Looking at this portfolio, you know the designer truly has an artist’s eye.

Amazing Portfolios by Designers

There’s nothing more inspiring than a skilled web designer’s portfolio. Experts and innovators are always pushing the limits of what a website should be capable of, with portfolios that skillfully display their mastery in design.

Which portfolio was your favorite? There’re just too many awesome ones to choose from!

January 6, 2019

10 Free Barebones Starter Templates for Bootstrap

The Bootstrap framework is quite popular with web designers. It provides everything you need to get a design project off to a running start. Plus, it’s been created with mobile devices in mind.

On the downside, it seems like many sites using Bootstrap tend to have a similar look and layout. But that is more of a product of taking design shortcuts rather than an indictment on the framework itself. Going beyond the default styles is quite possible and much easier than you may think.

With that in mind, we went on a search for free Bootstrap templates that lean toward the barebones end of the spectrum. They offer a virtual clean slate and give you the power to customize both the look and layout as much as you’d like. So, instead of ripping apart an existing design, you can get straight to making your own mark.

All the Bootstrap Templates You Could Ask For

2M+ items from the worlds largest marketplace for Bootstrap Templates, Themes & Design Assets. All of it can be found at Envato Market.

Bare

Bare is designed to help you get started without any fuss. There are no fancy styles applied and it comes with predefined paths. The template works with Bootstrap 4 and sports a fixed top navigation.

Simplex

Touted as both “Mini and Minimalist”, Simplex contains some basic styles that will provide you with a great starting point. You’ll find minimal navigation, buttons, typography, forms, containers and more goodies within this lightweight package.

Understrap

Understrap is a clever mix of Automattic’s Underscores barebones WordPress theme and Bootstrap. Thus, your next WordPress project can utilize Bootstrap without the excess bloat of a prebuilt theme. Understrap features Bootstrap 4, is compatible with the WordPress Customizer and supports WooCommerce.

Initializr

Initializr will generate a simple HTML template based on your requirements. Bootstrap 3.3.1 can be bundled right in with your template.

Bootply

Use Bootply to build your own custom Boostrap starter template. Using their online builder, you can make things as simple (or complex) as you’d like. There are options for different layouts, various sidebars (including off-canvas) and more.

WP Bootstrap Starter

WP Bootstrap Starter is aimed at developers who want to build upon basic features to make their own custom theme. Like Understrap above, it’s based on Underscores. That means it’s lightweight and ready for full-on customization.

LayoutIt!

LayoutIt! is a tool featuring a drag-and-drop interface for quickly building Bootstrap-based templates. There are three base templates to choose from (Starter, Basic Marketing Site and Article). Once you’ve selected a template, you’ll be able to add elements such as grids, components and even JavaScript. You can have a basic, yet functional template set up within minutes.

Sage

A competitor to Undesrcores, Sage is a WordPress starter theme that comes with Bootstrap baked right in. The theme features task automation via gulp, and the ability to easily add front-end packages via Bower. Template markup is based on HTML5 Boilerplate.

Bootstrap 4 Starter Template

If you’re looking for dead simple way to start off a new site, WebNots has put together their own Bootstrap 4 Starter Template. Not only can you grab a copy of their template, there is also a handy guide for building your own.

BS Starter

~~BS Starter~~ provides the basics you’ll need to get up and running with your design project. The template features a full-width slider and is minimally styled. It gives you just enough to help you create your own look and layout.

Give Complex Templates the Boot

When embarking on a new project, you’re better off using a starter Bootstrap template that lets you make all of the important design decisions. That’s where these minimal and barebones options really shine. Instead of having a Bootstrap-based theme that simply looks like everyone else, you’ll have the flexibility to use the framework to create something unique.

You might also like these Free Bootstrap Dashboard Admin Templates.

January 4, 2019

10 Free High-Quality Photoshop Brush Packs

Whether you’re a photographer, artist or designer, Photoshop brushes can be a huge help. Simulate watercolors, clouds, smoke, grain, explosions – the extent of what they can do is limitless. People seem to collect and hoard Photoshop brushes like they’re going out of style.

The huge demand has led to an abundance of free resources across the web. Even if you can’t afford huge, premium packs, you can still find quality brushes for use in your work. Here are ten invaluable and beautiful brush sets – available for anyone to download.

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Ultimate Brush Pack 5

Who could say no to 87 high-resolution brushes? These explosive patterns can add a paint-like, textured feel to your images. Great for clouds, abstract pieces and anything that requires a dynamic texture.

83 Light and Burst Brushes

Lens flares, sunbeams and bursts of light; these brushes can give any image a sunny, bright effect. It also works great for general lighting, magical effects and even as background textures. Along with rays and waves of light, there are also halos and coronas to give the sun a more striking ring.

Bling Effects Pack

Sometimes a picture needs some extra bling. Maybe some sparkles, a lens flare, or a perfectly-placed light flash will do the trick. The Bling Effects Pack can help you add some pizzazz to a boring picture. Just remember that effects like this should be used sparingly as enhancements.

Watercolor 93

This pack of nearly a hundred brushes was created from actual dabs of watercolor that were scanned. There are varying shapes, intensities and luminosities to each brush – so there’s a ton of variety. If you’re creating something that requires a softer look, these watercolors will do the trick.

Hair Brush Set

Whether you’re painting hair or just need a wispy, soft texture, the Hair Brush Set can get the job done. You’ll need a pressure sensitive tablet to get the full detailing effect. Perfect for creating fine, feathery textures.

lazy brush set

Need a huge pack of essentials? The lazy brush set contains 174 brushes, varying from basics to textures to silhouettes and light flares. It’s great for artists, but many of these brushes can be used in design work too. If you can only download one brush set, choose this one; it’s huge and contains just about everything you’ll need.

Free Brush Stroke Photoshop Brushes

These 15 high-resolution brush strokes look great in almost any project. Modelled after watercolors, they have a multitude of uses, from professional effects to sketches to grungy art pieces. Basic, but essential.

Free Hi-Res Photoshop Brushes: Acrylic Textures

If you need a rough, realistic, watercolor-like look, these acrylic textures will be perfect. At 2500px, every stroke will be detailed and gorgeous. If your designs turn out looking false or cartoony, these brushes can help them to appear more organic.

Radiate Brush Set

Looking for something a little more abstract? Great for posters, backgrounds and tech projects, Radiate was created by modifying different shapes. The fringe style is just what you need if you’re trying to make your piece look extra cool.

Mad Fractal

Fractal brushes are great for backgrounds, wispy textures and abstract designs. Their randomness makes an image more interesting. And there’s 30 brushes, so your design options with this collection are limitless.

Beautiful Brushes

Finding the best brushes can take some experimenting, so feel free to download lots of them to test out! The sites listed here have plenty of free brush packs to try. Do some digging and testing until you have some that you feel comfortable using. Once you find one (or ten) that work for you, you’ll be effortlessly crafting beautiful art, photos and web design layouts.

January 3, 2019

Free Avatar Icons and Mockups

Whether you need a personal avatar or a mockup for a website you’re designing, there’s no shortage of avatar icons online. SVGs for your designs, photographs for those website mockups; you’ll find a variety of different avatars and icons perfect for your next project.

Humaaans

Humaaans are little vector people, available for commercial use in a free design library. You can customize hair, clothing, pose and skin color. The vectors are simple and match well with many design styles, too. Add some scenery and you have a versatile set of avatars.

UI Faces

Need some faces for your mockups, such as to fill an author or bio avatar spot? UI Faces aggregates faces from free photo websites like Unsplash and Pexels, collecting them for you to use. You can sort by various factors like gender, age and emotion. A super useful resource!

People Avatars

This perfect pack of simplistic human avatars comes with a variety of hairstyles and outfits! Download the whole package or individually. All you need to do is credit the author.

Avatar and Userpic Pack

50 faces, three sizes and carefully compressed to retain maximum quality and minimum file size. All sourced from various free stock photo sites across the web and with a Creative Commons Zero license. What more could your mockup need?

Avataaars

Need a simple vector avatar/headshot? Avataaars allows you to quickly customize and save an illustrated character. Then embed or save as a PNG or SVG. If you just need a character quick, click the Random button and save.

Bottts

Sketch user? Bottts allows you to create and customize the heads and bodies of robots! Tall, short, pink or grey, this quirky Sketch library is free to use in all of your more lighthearted projects.

16 Free Vector User Avatar Icons

This kit of cute illustrated vectors is perfect for those using Sketch and Illustrator. There’s a variety of male and female choices with slight variations in clothing, hair and expression so they remain consistent.

Cute User Avatar Icon Set

Simply adorable! This pack of fifty cute SVG/PNG faces comes in three styles: Colored, flat and outline. Everything from a variety of simple people to costumes like ninjas and nuns are here. And you can easily change the colors to your liking.

Diversity Avatars

Available to download in four different formats, these vectors were created with the diversity of various cultures in mind. You’ll also find a few throwbacks to popular characters and historical figures. If you like the sample there’s an even bigger project with hundreds of icons with customizable elements, but this set will cost you.

Free Avatar Pack

This set of 200 faces make for great temporary avatars. Each image has a transparent background, so use it with your own scenes or mix and match the ones provided to create a diverse set!

77 Free Avatars Pack

Besides various photos of people, this pack also includes characters and landscapes. A great choice if you just need an assortment of icons fast.

Free 50 Avatars

Here’s some cartoonish avatars that are extra shiny! Catch peoples’ eyes with these bright and colorful avatars just packed with personality. There are 25 female and 25 male avatars, each with its own unique design.

Male and Female Avatar Vector Faces

These six vector PSDs are super easy to customize in Photoshop, or you can download and use the faces as-is.

Give Your Website Some Life

Illustrations can really add some vibrancy to a website. And they’re also a great source when you need quick graphics for your mockups.

These avatar icons are beautiful enough to use on a live website, but easy enough to set up that they can be a great fallback resource for placeholders. Try them out and see for yourself!

December 20, 2018

10 Free Handwriting Fonts for Design Projects

Sometimes, those plain serif and sans-serif fonts aren’t doing it for you. These fonts are great to use for the bulk of your website because they’re very simple and readable. But when you’re designing a logo or want to add a personal touch to select areas of a website, fonts that look like handwriting might be a better choice. Here are ten free handwritten fonts to get you started!

Black Chancery

This calligraphic font would look great on any site that needs an extra bit of elegance. The vaguely medieval feel will work well with history and literature websites, or sites that simply want to look a bit more graceful and royal. It’s also a very legible font, so you can use it pretty much anywhere. Pick up Black Chancery Italic while you’re at it!

Signatura

Need to emulate someone’s signature? Signatura is just the thing! It easily creates a beautiful and legible signature that looks like it was scanned right off the paper. Use it to sign the website creator’s name, or just as a sophisticated script font.

Great Vibes

Great vibes is simply gorgeous. If you run a business that wants to radiate dignity and sophistication, try out this font. The calligraphy is unsuitable for blocks of text, but try it out with short sentences or a few words and you’ll love the result.

Tahu!

Tahu is a bold, eye-grabbing font, easily readable but not lacking at all in that individual handwritten style. Tahu italic’s look and thick lines would make for a great header, or as the central text in a banner or poster.

Amatic

This thin, narrow font is very versatile. It comes in regular and bold style and is made with entirely uppercase lettering. If you need a neat, hand drawn font that makes a statement, Amatic might be right for you.

Architext

Architext was created to emulate the lettering you’d find on hand-drawn architectural sketches. Neat, pristine and thin, this font really looks like someone transcribed their own handwriting. The little flairs on the lettering make it beautiful. Try Architext if you’re after familiar and informal, but stylish.

Windsong

Perfectly elegant, Windsong is a great choice if you’re looking for something delicate and tasteful. This beautiful script lettering comes with support for nearly all symbols and letters, so it’ll work with non-English languages, too.

TrashHand

TrashHand’s bold strokes and slight serifs make it look really unique. The neat handwriting would look great on any website, professional or personal, if used in the right spots. Try it out; you’ll definitely love it!

Jo Wrote a Lovesong

Need a horror font, or something exceptionally scribbly? Jo Wrote a Lovesong sacrifices legibility for a unique style. It definitely isn’t a font to over-use. But carefully placed and used correctly, it can make a big impact on a site’s tone.

FFF Tusj

FFF Tusj is a sketchy font, perfect if you need something that looks like it was made with a pencil. The font takes an interesting spin on Georgia, and it’s surprisingly easy to read. The small imperfections and variance on the shading of each letter just adds to the effect. Try it if you want something rougher.

Personal Handwritten Fonts

Stylistic fonts generally shouldn’t be used for the bulk of a website’s text, as they can be difficult to read when used for more than a few words. But for logos, headers, and little snippets of text, these fonts can really spruce up a webpage! Whether you’re going for elegant, down-to-earth, or artistic, one of these script and stylistic fonts should be able to help you.

December 17, 2018

6 Plugins to Help You Design a Killer WordPress Landing Pages

So, you decided to build your website using WordPress, huh? You’ve made a great decision. Not only is WordPress easy to learn and use, but its ever-growing library of plugins also give it a level of flexibility that blows other platforms out of the water. You can effortlessly build a forum, create contact forms, inject Read More →

The post 6 Plugins to Help You Design a Killer WordPress Landing Pages appeared first on WPArena.

December 12, 2018

10 Free Device Mockup Templates for Web Designers

A great mockup for a website, app or other design helps to drive sales – just as eCommerce stores have models wearing available pieces of clothing. It’s easier for customers to visualize the look and feel of the product when it’s placed in a real-world image. That’s why mockups are so important when it comes to web design. You’ll see these mockups on developer’s websites and when you search for apps on the Google and Apple stores.

Although sometimes you’ll want to pay for mockups, you can typically find high-quality free options that look just as professional as the premium ones. That’s why we’ve put together a list of free mockup templates for web designers.

Some of these include tablets, phones and other devices on their own, while others show those devices in the midst of various scenes. For instance, it’s not uncommon to see website mockups with a computer in a coffee shop or on a phone in someone’s hand.

If you’re looking for free web design mockups, this is the place to be.

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Free Vintage Macbook Photorealistic Mockups

This is an excellent free mockup for creating a simple, elegant presentation for your website. You’ll receive multiple views of the Macbook on the same table, allowing you to get creative with your mockup.

Floating iPhone X Mockup

The floating iPhone takes a different route than what you typically see from phone mockups. This would work great in a website header or on a landing page trying to sell an app or mobile website.

Responsive Web Design Showcase Mockup

All web designers need to show how they can develop websites for multiple devices. One of the best ways to sell your site is to have a showcase of all devices supported. This way, customers get a taste of what the theme, template, or final web design looks like on phones, tablets and computers.

Apple Watch Mockups

Web designers also create interfaces for wearable devices, so it’s nice to have an Apple Watch mockup in your arsenal. This one is a free PSD file with different views on multiple wrists. This way, people can visualize what the watch will look like when they actually wear it.

Morning Device Mockups

Today, many people work from home. That’s why it’s essential to have some mockups with computers and phones sitting on kitchen counters, coffee tables and beds.

iPad on White Table Mockup Bundle

This mockup features a white iPad with bright colors and even a little clipboard to include some other graphics to go with your brand.

Free Galaxy S7 Mockup

Don’t forget Android devices! It’s all too common to limit most of your mockups to iPhones and Macs because of how sleek they look. However, lots of people have Androids and Windows computers, meaning you want to make those people feel included as well.

iPhone 6 & iPad Air 2 Photo MockUps

Some mockups bring the technology you have worked with into the real world. And that makes sense, since some folks plan on using their phones while camping or at coffee shops. Allow your users or clients the opportunity to envision themselves using your web design in their natural habitats.

Simple Gadgets

Here’s another mockup with multiple responsive designs. It’s simple and sleek, using white and grey colors to mimic something you might see on the Apple website.

iMac on Wooden Desk

One of the most popular ways to show a visual of your website design is to go with the standard iMac on a desk. The tricky part about using a mockup on a desk is ensuring that it looks like real life. Sometimes you see desks that are way too pristine or they don’t have anything on them at all. I like this one since it’s a wooden desk and you can see several other devices like speakers, phones, and even some books and decorations. This is more realistic and similar to what someone would have at their own home office.