Thursday, February 24, 2011

Methods Of Creation Of Line Icons

The objects with the outlined contours is the one other kind of Line icons. Such design elements are known as contour drawings. There are items without some strict outlines which can be rather some hint than actual contour of line icons. They're called gesture drawings. Such drawings are being widely used by experienced artists who can repeat the outlines of the object right after seeing it.

One more technique is adding some halftones and shades to the object. It's possible by using short lines and crosshatching. Dont afraid to vary their frequency and also pencil pressure. And this variety impart more three-dimensional look to the object. This particular trick is widely used in world wide web design as well. So this method is definitely helping in designing of great Line icons, logos and buttons.Also lets get information about open lines. It is such type of the lines where the dots not combining the singular elements. It may look very striking when being applied to line icons design. The lines can be gesture-like, parallel, contour etc. as well. Contour drawing includes great simplicity and refinement of line design. The curves that are important for creating complex line shapes are called Bezier curves in computer graphics. These curves are real helpers in creation of the vector shapes such as line icons, different buttons etc. Computer technologies have the ability to reproduce the same designs or build new shapes based on some older ones without extra efforts and time. Another advantage is that you can easily go back to the previous adjustments with a help of the history panel. So you don't have to design Line web icons from scratch after you have made some mistakes.

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Simple Icons And Minimalistic Website Design

Simple icons are created to join forces of minimalism and modern trend. Light-weight Simple web icons are supposed to be built to improve web-site user interaction.

Minimalism in web site design

Lets find out what minimalistic web site design indicates. Definitely the first characteristics are simplicity and lightweight elements. Simple web icons involve all of this. This type of icons does not have complex wordings, figures, textures and patterns. Less even indicates more in some areas and to some extent. Internet site design is just that area.

Minimalistic design is quite an unexpected trend at present. As far as you know high present day technologies have one great weakness - usually they resulted in the loss of simplicity. Today the contemporary trend is to combine minimalistic web design with CSS3 and HTML5. Website which uses simple design often has off-color effects and also actively use CSS and Ajax.

The most significant features of the modern simple web site design:

  • grid based design;
  • simple icons;
  • light shading and reserved color transition;
  • light texture of patterns and backgrounds (often transparent like);
  • more empty or white space;
  • simple shapes and figures, clear lines;
  • less amount of various bright colors;
  • readable and clear typography;

Simple Web Icons Features

Simple web icons are among the principal features of minimalistic design. Do not forget that simple icons along with other design elements should be used moderately. One of the tips is minimizing icons use in general. Reduce the amount of simple icons. Use them only where it is essential. Optional simple web icons are to be refrained from repetition or eluded. They may serve multiple functions.

Limited amount of color, reserved tones, clear elements, soft lighting are being used for simple web icons design. One of the greatest advantages of Simple web icons is that they don't distract website visitors from the main idea of your site.

Rules for simple icons design:

  • minimal usage of duplication
  • less amount of graphical elements
  • maximum intuitive clarity
  • clear typography in simple web icons
  • less icons

Some important ideas for developing a minimalistic design with simple web icons

Don't forget about lightweight background textures and patterns. They're also important for the design and content perception as well as simple icons. The background pattern or images should not grab all the attention of your visitors. The eyes should focus on the website content or some main blocks. Building the background use a light simple shade. This makes it secondary compared with the foreground items like simple web icons.

Clear typography is another prominent feature of the lightweight and clear design. Pick simple icons names according to their function and remember that such names ought to be precise, and also meaningful. Headings placed on simple web icons need to be of readable font and large enough for easy reading. Clear hierarchy should be followed as well.

Also for creating a great clean simple icons design you can use enough white or empty space. Extra spaces keep elements individual and for that reason more readable and easier to work with. In case you use some extra space between simple web icons this do not harm to the design of your site at all.

Speaking about the minimalistic trend in most cases it's not totally minimal. In spite of its great amount of white space there are still some simple icons, light textures, neat styles and bold fonts. Bear in mind that minimal is not exactly the same as simple. Initially minimal meant plain typographic excluding images and styling. Nowadays there's a great amount of various website pages over the Internet. Thats why modern design demands something more than black text on white background. Add more zest to your web site layout with a help of some unusual coloring, catchy simple icons, half-transparent and lightweight textures and patterns. Also reduce design elements to the most essential items.

Simple is often used like a synonym of smart. Simple web icons look great and professional especially for a clean business style design.

Vintage Icons - Grab The Attention Of Your Visitors!

Retro steadily increases its right place in the modern internet site design field. No doubt the best representatives of traditional beauty and noble taste are Vintage icons. In the present day modern site style generally contains some vintage twist. Retro and Vintage are the most well-known and widespread trends in the contemporary digital art. Vintage icons, textures, patterns as well as clip-art bring mystery to your design. They make you dive into the atmosphere of the old good times, when everything appeared to be so simple, harmless and noble. People always associate childhood or youth with happy times. Thus vintage style revives due to this psychological peculiarity of the human nature.

What is retro and how it is realized in the modern day website design industry

In modern art retro becomes some conscious norm. It is simple to find sights of retro style in the present day web design in the form of vintage icons, old-styled backgrounds, aged photography etc. No doubt it gives some zest to the look and feel of the ordinary websites.

The new retro style quite often incorporates the Web 2.0 look with a vintage twist. It requires good recipe of combining the modern clean blocks and the outdated, aged elements of design like Vintage web icons, styles and color palettes.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Line Icons Helpful Info

Lines are more frequently used for outlining the contours of objects and putting an emphasis on edges. Line icons can be the wonderful decoration of any web page design, however if you have a skill to design them thoroughly.

What exactly are line icons?

What is actually a line? It's a form containing both width and length but eliminating depth.The line is not only straight but more often curved. Inspite of the being static shapes, Line icons can make an illusion of the dynamic objects. The mood is generally being conditioned by the lines direction. For example horizontal lines in Line web icons bring the feeling of calmness, harmony and stability. Speaking about the vertical lines - they strive for the light movement. Energy and stronger dynamic feeling pertain to the diagonal lines. If you'd like to develop refine and ultra-modern line icons designs you should use mix of straight lines and curves.

Line Icons Art

Definitely the 1st kind of line art that familiar to a great amount of artists is curve stitching. It was carried out with threads of various colours and also needle. The canvas was a cardboard first. This movement is also well-known as "String Art". Its creator was a Mary Boole. He developed it as the accessory material for kids to help them study geometry of angles and spaces. Spirelli is a type of string art that has been usually applied to scrap-booking and making cards. Line art lived also like illustrations for print sources before the photography was created. At that time line art involved only black and white colors. Several shades of gray were also acceptable.Line art includes geometry and art and in such a way becomes appealing to both technical and creative sides of human nature, Designing Line icons may develop special imagination and creativity along with calculation skills.Line art differs from photography or multi-color painting by its ability to be printed to the halftone pic with no extra conversion.

Vintage Icons And Vintage Web Design

In case your want your web site looks archaic - use Vintage icons. They are one of the most noticeable and easy-to-apply graphical elements. Vintage web icons suppose authentic use of vintage typography, less-saturated colors and retro textures to help creating the vintage air emanating from the web-site. Antique air is going to charm and brings unconscious smiles to the faces of your website visitors.

Retro trend is all about the styles of the70s and 80s. Speaking about retro advertising art it appeared in 1950. Computer technologies help to put a new face on this type of art using its characters in website design and printing. These faces outlined in the vintage web icons are more often retro cars, pin-up girls, soldiers and politicians of the former times.Without doubt among the most often used retro cars are Fiat 500, the 1970 Dodge Challenger, the 1969 Chevrolet Samara, the 1964 Ford Mustang etc. You can effortlessly find Vintage icons that contain hints to retro cars concepts. This will help to attract more attention to your webpage layout. They are ideal for the websites concerning auto sales, transporting services, tour sites etc.Also you can face a such common character as a pin-up model that is used in vintage icons design as well as other web page graphics styling. It usually depicts exaggerated, idealized images of how the really beautiful and sexy woman should look like. Pin-up images are great for vintage web icons or clip-art designed for the model agencies, websites regarding health and beauty areas.

In case you have a internet site that is connected with military and security guard you may effectively use images of soldiers and officers with outdated appearance to attract much more interest and win the visitors trust.

Usage of specific characters is not limited to the above-mentioned ones. Apply your creativity and use them as you want. Thus you will surprise your visitors. As far as you know it is a very good way to turn your potentional clients minds to your web business.

Patterns and Typography for vintage icons and other graphics

Highly recommended Vintage patterns in vintage icons design:

  • patterns containing vintage papers;
  • with vintage frames;
  • with outmoded florals;
  • paper and bagging, gold-cloth as the texture fabric;
  • wooden or bronze textures for vintage icons.

For producing vintage icons titles, content headings and texts you can use such authentic fonts as Matchbook, Bazar Medium, Embossed, Hill House,-Fontleroy Brown, Fusty Saddle, Just Old Fashion, Goudy Bookletter 1911, Rocket Script, Parisian, Star Avenue etc. You are absolutely free to find and purchase the fonts to match your design on the internet.

If being relevant to the topic, general style and idea of your website vintage-inspired design is supposed to look modern and appropriate, but no old-fashioned. The goal is to create the warm and noble, antique feel using Vintage web icons and also images and styled blocks for the site design. Definitely your visitors will return to your site with a thankful smile over and over again.

But try not to make your vintage design look too stuffy, you must be aware that professional layout is formal-looking and the major emphasis should be made on the goods, services or content your internet site provides.

Monday, February 21, 2011

Realistic Icons Information

Realism traces back to the 1850s when this movement unfolded in French art. Over the centuries it came through all types of art and design. Realism in internet site design is successfully represented by Realistic web icons.

Details about history of realistic icons

Sunday, February 20, 2011

Discover All Benefits Of Realistic Web Icons.

Realistic icons are very important elements of the modern pieces of software program, applications and add-ons.

As far as you know online sites require special means of representation and promotion. One of the most successful way is of course including realistic icons into the web page design. They help users to get a effective initial impression of what business area and what products he/she is going to have to do with. The icons should be placed on web page homepage to be noticeable at once.

You may hire the skilled designer to create some unique set of icons meeting your website individual requirements and products. But keep in mind that such way of designing of realistic icons is very expensive and takes a great deal of time. In fact the results of custom order aren't clear. Even professional web-site designers fall short of the mark known as non-uniqueness. In order to save time and smoothen things down they take icons designed earlier and simply play with the colors and shades, use some other effects and sell realistic icons as exclusive items. Though in fact they aren't.

Another source of getting awesome web icons is finding authoritative icons resources. You can easily find a great amount of various Realistic icons stocks and providers on the internet. You see what you buy and the price may occur essentially lower than in case with custom orders. Besides, you save much valuable time. So as far as you see now - stocks are much more preferable for finding well designed and affordable realistic icons . All these advantages make icon stocks the great deal.

Some helpful tips for utilizing realistic icons

If you decide to create a realistic icon first of all you have to build the basic pictograms. It should look simple and motivated enough to produce one icon significantly differ from another. Also it should look vivid enough if being shown at worse resolution. The person should be able to recognize the icon meaning just by looking at its outlines for a short time period. How to check your icons? If it is possible to discern the icon within less than a second - it is well done.<\p>

After you find the formula of the basic silhouette and it is stable you may make realistic icons more eye-catching by adding decorative elements. Icons shouldn't be overloaded with the details and color tints. Icons should look well design and reserved. You can also make the edges anti-aliased. The decoration shouldn't detract from the icons essence and functions.

Vector format in which the icons are stored makes them pretty easy to modify. You're free to resize, rotate, adjust the edges and edit outlines, change the color scheme and add more details etc. And don't be afraid - there's no need to have extra knowlages in web page design.

If you wish to design the interface layout of the new software or IT services - Realistic icons may be very useful in this task. Creating high quality, eye-catching and good-looking realistic icons is not an easy task. Generally you need to modify the high-resolution photos in order to get truly realistic images.

Saturday, February 19, 2011

2d Icons And Models

2D icons along with other objects are remarkable for their flexibility. This is achieved by the peculiarity of rendering them at different resolutions ideal for various output devices.

2D Icons may include the next items:

  • raster pictures (digital graphics);
  • styled text as a typeset for 2D Icons;
  • vector models (geometric graphics).

The above-mentioned items can be managed by 2D transformations such as rotation, scaling or angular position and so on. Meshing simple models you may get more complex ones.

Because of the layers technique 2D icons can create the illusion of all 3D characteristics such as shadow, reflection or highlighting. The layers should keep the definite hierarchy and order carefully. This makes modifying 2D icons and related objects simpler.

2.5D Icons vs 3D and 2D Icons

The layered 2Dicons are also known as 2.5D models. This technology allows web developers to work with any layer without touching the others. This kind of 2D object creation is liked by the most of the leading graphics editors.

2.5D is a synonym to pseudo 3D. This means "two-and-a-half-dimensional" graphics. Models created with 2.5D technology look like tridimensional while in fact they are not.

This technology used for designing 2D web icons is often achieved by the special lighting effect. 3D illusion is reached due to the virtual source of light to the left or to the right side and above the users monitor.

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Helpful Information Regarding 2d Icons

2D icons is a wide spread trend in the website development of nowadays. Being two-dimensional, they are notable for their flexibility and comparative simplicity. 2.5D Icons is the type of 2D Icons that is closer to pseudo 3D representation.Such models depict both front and side views.

2D computer graphics was initially based on vector graphics devices. 2D icons are one of the most major two-dimensional digital design items.

Today I want to find out what actually 2D is.It really is being associated usually with computer graphics and determined as the two-dimensional method of digital images generation. Two-dimensional models are mainly 2D geometric ones, digital images and texts. The term 2D comprises not only the models themselves but the techniques and tricks specific to them at the same time.

2D web icons and objects are independent objects with their own semantic value. 2D graphics means that we can get more direct control of the image than 3D technology. This may be one good reason why they're so beloved and preferred in the world of contemporary web site design and digital art.

Friday, January 28, 2011

Ideas To Create High Quality Web Page Layout With Business Web Icons

Choosing design for your future web site is a complex and tedious task. The header graphics, logos, business icons and content placeholders and of course the fonts - all this stuff needs to be properly designed. While doing this bear in mind the business area and wishes of your potential customers.

The powerful web site should include your potential customers expectations. For this purpose use the suitable business icons, buttons and styles for content blocks.

The initial step as the first brick is really crucial. At the very begining you have to decide what's the main audience of your web-site. After this think about what can your potential customers expect. Name, hosting provider, content and design style must be carefully chosen in line with the results of your research. Initially you are to correlate the planned color scheme and layout together with your potential customers expectations. Also think over exactly what colors and styles of business icons and also other design elements should be used to reflect the business area your company presents.

To make the right choice you should take into account that various colors evoke certain emotions in various groups of people. For example, you've got a night-club related business and wish to create astonishing web presence. Use business icons of bright disco colors and unusual forms and you'll get the fantastic result. Also in such a case pay attention to the fact that tints of red as manifestation of passion and sex are pertinent for business icons, logos or buttons. But do not use bright colors if you want to build the web page for some consulting company. Web design should be clear, calm and reserved. As well avoid playful lines and also light-minded graphics. Cool colors and simple recognizable shapes of business icons are preferable. As a result you'll get an internet site . that show professionalism and stability of your company to your potential clients.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

Types Of The Glossy Web Icons

Glass icons can be viewed as an independent icon style though it is logical to assume that glass style is just one of the types of the shiny, glossy design.

The examples below - other types of the glossy web icons design can be marked out:

  • glass icons;
  • metal icons;
  • glass-metal icons;
  • transparent icons.

Glossy icons can be aqua, crystal, plastic etc. and at the same time transparent and half-transparent.

Moreover, there are partly glass and partly stained icons meaning the objects contain some glassy or stained elements.

Glass web icons as well as other kinds of icons are usually depicted with reflecting. It is one of the standard features of the "Web 2.0" icons. You may find various tutorials on the net instructing to make vertical reflection effect for web icons.

The pure look of glass icons makes navigating through the websites playful and attracts a lot of people. In the Internet sources you may find a huge selection of tutorials concerning the ways of creating such neat web icons.

Creation of glass web icons.

Adobe Photoshop is the number one software program for creating web icons. Photoshop is becoming more and more flexible and multitasking software for design. Originally it was rather an image editor and nowadays it allows to produce almost all visual effects used for the graphic design. A lot of the great web icons designs were made up of a help of this software. The main feature of the latest Photoshop versions is the ability to combine pixel painting with vector tool for creating glass icons, buttons, characters etc.<\p>

The easiest way to design Glass web icons is to make the "glass" layer overlap the image. With a help of the "eraser" tool you will be able to build an empty diagonal line through the image. You are supposed to proceed using eraser for making adjustments to the glass layer until the moment when the glass effect repeats the contour of the icon. As a result it should create a kind of the glass haze in the opposite sides. After this procedure complete the further adjustments should be applied.

Professional web designers should use this effect carefully and keep in mind that glass-fever may look ridiculous. Glass icons should be used with taste so that the site style could remain professional and reserved.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Business Icons Valuable Tips And Facts

Remember the easiest way to success -it is simplicity. Simple business icons, clear typography and sufficient air (white spaces) are indicators of great potential, safety and stability of your company. Black, white, gray and blue are the most often used colours in creation of business icons. If you will use wordings for business icons keep in mind that Verdana is the greatest simple and readable font that you can find. Black text on white business icons - classic is usually up to date. The content blocks are to be of light, close to white colours. business icons style demands minimalism. Do not create a great amount of multi-color icons, flashy objects, logos and graphics. In such a way you risk to make the internet site messy.

Place exclusive logos and business icons

The rule is simple if you want to attract the interest of your potentional customers - make something distinctive. The most widespread web page design style used by the artists all over the world is web 2.0 style. The web 2.0 logos and business web icons look fresh and clean. A unique logo is the face of your company. So it's value should be taken into consideration.

Nice, considered content used in present-day design is really efficient. But unique design is what really makes your business websites unique. Elegance of its unique business icons and logo, simplicity of the content layout and clear arrangement of buttons and blocks promote the site not worse than optimized and reasoned out content.Forget about stealing ideas of other companies logos. Even copying of competitor company style is harmful for your web-site reputation. Never risk! Unique logos and business icons should be easily recognizable and carry a pure idea of what is actually being offered by your company.

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Glass Web Icons

Web icons provide classy and clean look to your website making its design eye-catching and professional. Nevertheless this effect should be reasonably used because it can be harmful for the design perception.

Nowadays Glass web icons are extremely well-known elements of web-site or blog decor. This glass icon style imparts the ideal, clear and professional look to your internet site, presentation or desktop and embodies a kind of the "Web 2.0" spirit.

Pluses and minuses of the glass icons usage.

In spite of the elaborate and intricate feel and look of the web icons designed in the glass style, it is obvious that the process of their creation is rather simple. You can create Glass icons within a couple of minutes using Photoshop, Illustrator or Corel software. All you need is some helpful tutorial, some skills of working with these pieces of software program and the images you are going to turn into glass web icons.

The glass effect is considered to have been borrowed from the Apples OSX operating-system style and copied by Windows. Some may believe that Glass web icons are so strongly associated with Apple product that the glass-styled elements make people think of the completely different brand which makes the usage if this type of web icons worthless, but the advantages of the glass icons style are obvious.

One of the most essential feature of the modern web-site is social bookmarking web icons. If you want to have got a great advantage for the internet site promotion use eye-catching glossy icons for this reason. Eye-catching social bookmarks improve the possibility of the visitors clicking on them and the amount of the clicks increases correspondingly. As a result you'll be able to promote and bookmark your content more effectively.

Friday, January 21, 2011

3D Web Icons Technical Issues

The thoroughness and truthfulness of the picture may be even the weakness 3D web icons possess. It means you're much more free to use artistic vision while drawing some object. Let's take a mobile-phone as an example. So its possible to draw it rather similar to a real one but eliminate additional details, shades and highlights. Sometimes schematic drawings work even better than 3D models. You should analyze each particular situation. High-quality 3d icons should repeat each detail and line thoroughly, make the object seem closer to reality. So to answer the question we can say it is more like a kind of technical representation than a piece of art. However sometimes we can see 3D icons that involve innovative thought and look like true works of art. Realistic and accurate modeling is one of popular trend of 3D design today.If you are going to use some characters as icons, 3D icons are going to appear much more realistic than 2D ones. The characters may remain cartoonish and this will give zest to your web page.

Let us enumerate the technical issues you may face while using 3D icons.

So take note of these useful facts while creating the icons design for your web page:

It's not possible to show all the glory and details of 3d icons with very poor resolution of the viewers displays;

due to the fact that the monitor screen is 2D device we cant see the true three-dimensional object as we see it in reall life.

3D space is harder to be manipulated and controlled in comparison with 2D one;

the non-standard applications required for correct viewing of 3D web Icons may force the user to download additional software which is definitely not convenient.

As far as you can see both kinds of graphical representation are based on geometric data but 3D objects are actually the sculpture models, more complex items. And the requirements for creating the high quality 3D web Icons are much severer. Of course you can claim that 3D web icons may lack creativity and abstract air, nevertheless the facts of depth and volume that are created with a help of 3D technology are incontestable.

Monday, January 10, 2011

2d icons vs 3d icons in modern-day web graphics

2D and 3D web icons design - what's the big difference?

Speaking about 3d Icons we need to point out that the source of light plays a really important role for creating authentic three-dimensional images. No doubt the using several light sources in web page design nowadays is more effective but take into account that they should follow fundamental rules of physics and be truthful. If you need to make 3D web icons look softer and more realistic - use several lights.

Both 2D and 3D icons represent the volume found in the three-dimensional world but use different means of creating this illusion. 2D Icons can certainly represent volume to less extent than 3D Icons. Usually the images are flat and present just one perspective. Detailed highlights and imperceptible soft shadows are missing as a rule. The shades usage is limited as well.

3D icons can be proud of all these features instead. But 3D is mathematical replication of the data which anyway limits its usage. Sometimes you can effortlessly replace 3D Icons by 2D ones or by the videos with the sounds - but all this depends on situation. The sounds give some extra dimensionality to the videos that actually use 2D images.Software used for 3D modeling allows to make that 3D dimension. It is recommended to depict 3D icons in correlation with the other objects in the neighborhood and the environment they are placed into.