Virtually everyday we see examples of surrealistic imagery all around us. Ever wonder why this particular style of graphics are so popular? It really isn’t that hard to figure out. The reason is that this surreal images are often extremely imaginative and stirring.

The word Surreal generally signifies bizarre or dreamlike. Surreal photography pushes the limits of the medium, just as most surrealistic art does for the medium it belongs to. Surrealism seeks to take you to an imaginary, dreamlike world with the aid of its various techniques and applications.

Here are some eye-catching surrealistic wallpapers to let you decorate your desktop with style. All the wallpapers are linked back to their original location. Take a look at this collection, and scratch that wallpaper itch you have that brought you here.

The Papers

Mano
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Surreal Storm
Download Wallpaper: 1600×1200

Surreal Man
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

My own Secret Place
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×1024

Cometary Nebulae WS
Download Wallpaper: 1920×1200

Ice Age Premonition
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Frank Melech Surreal
Download Wallpaper: 1024*768

Edges
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Surreal Hand
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Painless Light
Download Wallpaper: 1024×682

Angels and Demons
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Revival of Clear Reverberation
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Triceratops
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Let Go
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Surreal World
Download Wallpaper: 1440×900

Homage to Surrealism
Download Wallpaper: 1152×864

Surreal
Download Wallpaper: 1680×1050

Surreal Wonderland
Download Wallpaper: 1440×9008

Surreal Landscape
Download Wallpaper: 1600×1200

June 15 dream was surreal
Download Wallpaper: 2048×1536

Surreal
Download Wallpaper: 1600×1200

Magic river
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Surreal Eiffel Tower
Download Wallpaper: 1932×1449

Surreal Sunset
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Surreal
Download Wallpaper: 1600×1200

Infinity wallpaper set
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×960 1600×1200

Surreal Wallpaper
Download Wallpaper: 1920×1200

Surreal
Download Wallpaper: 1600×1200

Good Evening
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Dragon Fire Nebula
Download Wallpaper: 1600×1200

Colors Of The Storm
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×1024 1680×1050

Titan Mangrove
Download Wallpaper: 1600×1200

Surreal Wallpaper
Download Wallpaper: 1920×1200

The Rainbow Bridge
Download Wallpaper: 1024×640

Fantasy Bird
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768

Road to refuge
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Caravan
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Surreal Wallpaper
Download Wallpaper: 1920 x 1200

Freedom fields
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

King
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×960 1920×1200

Surreal Wallpaper
Download Wallpaper: 1920 x 1080

Nine
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Vessels
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

The last bond
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Desktopography 3
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Surreal Wallpaper
Download Wallpaper: 1920 x 1200

Urban Environment
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

It wasn´t enough
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Snail
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Guardians
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Blue Moon
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Surreal House
Download Wallpaper: 11920×1202

Surreal Wallpaper
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Junkasaurus at Sunset
Download Wallpaper: 1500×930

Wallpaper of the Week
Download Wallpaper: 1600×1130

Along Ruined Soul
Download Wallpaper: 1280×800

Fall of Lucifer Pieta
Download Wallpaper: 1280×800

Sky Hands
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1600×1200 1920×1200

Wood Hand
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Surreal Wallpaper
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Surreal Head
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×800 1920×1200

Fantasy Wallpapers
Download Wallpaper: 1024×768 1280×1024 1920×1200

Surreal City
Download Wallpaper: 1280×960

Dark Surreal
Download Wallpaper: 1024*768

Surreal Sky
Download Wallpaper: 1024 x 768 1280×800 1920×1200

You may also want to consider our previous posts:

• 40+ Absolutely Stylish & Creative Hand-picked Wallpapers
• 30+ Creative Hi-Res Wallpapers Only for Designers
• Dark Wallpapers for Bright Inspiration
• 55 Beautiful Apple iPad Wallpapers
• The Ultimate Round-Up of iPad Wallpapers
• 40 Amazing Dual Screen Desktop Wallpapers
• 35 Wallpapers Themes for Your Desktop
• Dual Monitors Desktop Wallpapers
• Halloween Special: 40 Spooky Wallpapers
• 40 Beautiful Triple Screen Wallpapers

(rb)

  

Many of us in the web design and development fields have worked, are currently working, or will work as part of a team on a project. This can provide invaluable insight for how we ourselves would build a team of our own, were we the ones calling those shots. Make no mistake about it, team building is a delicate science. You must have the right mix of skills and abilities to have the team and the project live up to its full potential. But what is the right mix? That is the subject of this month’s Community Roundtable discussion.

If you had the chance to create the proverbial Dream Team for your next web design/development project, would you get the mix right? Is there an optimal equation, so to speak, to solve this perfect team question? Using your experience as a member of a team, or just your experience with what it takes to fully pull off a web design project, could you assemble all the right pieces to get the website on its feet by the required deadline? And the more pressing question…

Who Makes Up Your Web Design/Development Dream Team?

Below we have a couple of different approaches you could take to assembling your team. Who are you must haves, who are your fallbacks, etc? Take a look through and think it over, then fill us in via the comment section on who and how many would make the cut.

Break it down however you like. By special abilities:

• Communicators
• Motivators
• Innovators
• Work Horses
• Problem Solvers

…or by titles:

• Graphic Designers
• Web Designers
• UX Designers (UI Designers, Content Strategists)
• Back-End Web Developers
• Front-End Web Developers
• Copywriters

(rb)

  

A beautiful and elegant icon set is an asset to any good web design. Creative use of an icon set can help make or break the overall look of the design. Freebie design components, especially beautiful icon sets can be found in nearly every designer’s toolbox, or if not already among their tools, then certainly on their wishlists. Which is what brings us here today…adding to that tool kit!

In this post, we are presenting an awe-inspiring collection of 50 magnificently designed, free and professional high-quality icon sets. All of the icon sets featured are free. Nevertheless, please be sure to read the license agreements carefully before using all icons since this can change from time to time. Enjoy!

Free and High-Quality Icon Sets

Symbolicons: Transportation
A free set of stylish transportation icons from the full Symbolicons set.

Multimedia Icon Set
The set is called the ‘Multimedia Icon Set’ and, as the name suggests, contains 14 multimedia icons in PNG format. You will also find included in the download the AI source files. You are free to use this icon set for both personal and commercial projects.

Exclusive Free Icons: “Appliance Icons”
The set includes 10 super cute looking icons of all types of household appliances.

A Set of 15 TV Icons
A fresh set of 15 TV icons of varied designs, available in 256 x 256 pixels.

App Icons
It includes 28 icons for various applications, available in both png and ico format, from 128 to 16px.

iPad 2 Icons
The set includes 18 beautifully rendered icons of the iPad 2 with varying colored covers.

Cute Twitter Icons ~ Chrome
A new range of twitter icons in 256 x 256 pixels. Liven up your website with one of these little cuties.

Leather briefcase PSD & icon
A set of briefcase icons available in 512×512, 256×256, and 128×128 pixels.

Style Guides: A Free Icon Set for Writers
This high-quality icon set features 5 icons, all in PNG format, ranging from 32×32 px to 512×512 px.

Follow Me Icons
4 png icons for your blog design projects which include Twitter, Facebook, Feed and Favorite.

RSS Icons
A choice of 16 chic RSS icons to liven up any site.

Brand New Social Icons ~ Teacups
A cup of tea, anyone? 6 social icons that look simply delicious!

Minimalistica Icon Set
This simple two-toned collection is available in PNG: 16×16, 24×24, 32×32, 48×48, 64×64, 128×128

Awesome book icon
Awesome icon of a set of books, viewed from the spines as though they were on a shelf. 512px, 256px, 128px and 64px versions of the icons available in one archive.

Button-style Social Icons
A simple and clean set of social media based icons in 256 x 256 pixels.

Shopping Icons ~ Brand new set!
A set of beautiful icons for any web based shop or retail needs.

Purse icon
Beautiful leather purse, filled with large bills. Open it, take it

65 Classic Cocktails
A cool and stylish range of icons that one might find quite refreshing.

48 pixels web iconset
Includes a total of 226 icons related to websites, design, e-commerce.

Credit Card icons
A gorgeous set of 31 credit card icons.

Dreadhead Creatures
10 cute and coiffed original vector creature icons.

Things Icon
A random set of six .png’s ranging from 512px to 16px.

Comic Icons
A set of outstanding comically illustrated Icons.

Junior Icons
The sharp set includes 146 beautiful icons.

Rabbit Icons
An intriguing special Easter Bunny icon set which comes in 4 sizes as transparent PNG files available: 64x64px, 128x128px, 256x256px

Kraftwerk
This collection contains 13 icons with large resources for Windows & Mac OS X.

Classic Cars Icons
The set includes 6 beautiful icons of some classic cars.

HYDROPRO ICON PACK
HydroPRO Icon Pack contains 50 high quality (256×256 pixels) icons; PNG and ICO formats. This package includes: HDD Icon, My Computer Icon, Keyboard Icon, Mouse Icon and more…

Smooth Metal Software Pack
A set of 50 wonderfully illustrated icons for apps.

GPS navigation icons Part-2
This set includes GPS navigation icons in 4 colors and each icon comes in a 128×128 pixels fully layered PSD file.

Farm Fresh Icons
A set of beautiful and clean icons that contains an astounding 2000 application and mini icons.

Social Media Icons by Iconshock
This set includes 12 fantastically designed Social Media Icons.

PSD Shopping Bag Set
This set containes 9 beautifully crafted shopping bag icons.

Free credit card Icons
The most complete credit card icon set ever, 457 payment and credit card icons packed in this fantastic collection, it includes 9 sizes, pixel perfect icons for smaller sizes and vector for larger sizes.

Home icons
A set of home icons available in 512×512, 256×256 and 128×128 pixels with psd files.

High detail social icons
A set of visually stunning social media icons.

User icons
This set include 55 awesome user icons.

3D Download Icon
This set containes 4 transparent PNG files (64px; 128px; 256px; 512px) to help meet your project download needs.

Blue Icons by Shek
A set of 5 beautiful icons in a blue hue.

PSD Thank You Bubble Set
A wonderful set of 9 attractive bubbles that can be used for any purpose.

Free Briefcase Icon
A highly detailed briefcase icon presented in 3 different dimensions.

iPhone & iPad PSD templates & icons
A beautiful set of PNG icons in sizes 256×256, 128×128 and 64×64 pixels for use in your web projects.

Twitter Icons
A well designed set of Twitter Icons in vector format.

World globe PSD & icons
A set of different world globe icons with fully layered Photoshop files. Icons in various standard sizes such as 512×512, 256×256, 128×128, 64×64 and 32×32 pixels.

Ice candy PSD & icons
A set of tasty looking frozen dessert treat icons available in 512×512 and 256×256 pixels.

Free iMac Icon
Free iMac icon that will perfectly suit your creative headers, presentations, business cards, portfolio websites and print works. This quality illustration has been resized in three different dimensions to be useful for various needs.

GPS navigation icons Part-1
Each icon comes in a 128×128 pixels fully layered PSD file and isolated on a transparent background for the use in web projects as icons.

Html5 icons
A set of beautiful icons inspired by the html5 icon.

Battery Icons
This set includes PNG icons in sizes 512×512 and 256×256 pixels complete with psd.

Monochromatic Iconset
A simple, yet classic, set of monochromatic icons with an available PSD file.

Leaf Mimes Icons
A unique set of icons that can add a bit of style to your project.

(rb)

  

Many designers don’t use graphical Open Source Software. This is not a coincidence: usually they don’t understand it, don’t like or even despise it. Since using the free software requires more time and technical knowledge — it seems easier to pay for a working package from a well-known vendor.

This approach is common, but it could be useful to take a peek at another one. Today’s OSS provides so many possibilities, that it becomes relatively easy to create almost anything that’s possible to make with the proprietary software, especially in the web design areas. In my opinion, it happens to be so good, that it may be worth taking a leap of faith.

The WHY

Usually, when it comes to graphical design, few people agree that open source software is capable of producing the same level of quality work that the proprietary software does. My intention in this article is to question this stereotype and to present a strong case for using OSS for graphical web design, without going into a discussion over which one is better to use. The bottom line should sound like this: it’s possible, and isn’t necessarily more difficult to create any type of web graphic or design using only OSS.

Ubuntu Tux Floats to work by Daniel J. Porter

In spite of all the mentioned appeal, most graphical designers prefer to keep using the proprietary software, and for a good reason — it provides in many cases easier, more stable and more intuitive interfaces that save professional designers’ time. In the professional web design environments where a client waits for the results, this is very critical. Also, it takes time to learn something new, so many question why spend it… But for the majority of website creators, and for those who just starting to take their first steps in the web industry and aren’t sure whether they really need to spend money on graphical software, open source software can offer all the necessary tools, educational opportunities needed to enrich and shape your creative thinking and technical skills.

A quick warning: using and learning gOSS usually requires more time than learning proprietary software. How much more? It depends. But if you have some spare time, and are ready to have fun with exploring another mysterious world of software, then you will only benefit from it. However, trying to go for broke right off the bat, expecting to be exactly at the same level you are in other more familiar software and setting somewhat unreasonable or out of reach goals, might not be the best attitude to start with. After all, most things in life become more rewarding after we have taken the time to learn more about them, and our grip on them improves. Same with OSS.

Where gOSS is extremely useful? — In web design agencies it’s common that the web designs and layouts are composed by a graphics expert. Then these designs are passed to the developers, which can decide what and how to slice in order to optimize the graphics better for the general consistency of the web site. For simple operations like these a natural choice would be using an OSS program such as GIMP and not wasting the money on proprietary software.

If you’re new to web design, you’ll quickly learn that the proprietary graphical software is very expensive. So if you’re unsure which one to choose, my advice to you is to first try the open source software. One big plus of using OSS, is that you can get it all for no cost. Another advantage becomes clearer with some of the more popular gOSS programs: they are developed quickly and newer updates include more and more interesting features. The beauty of this quick development is that anyone from anywhere in the world can extend or improve any program. So if someone wants a new feature in their program, every other user can have it as well.

To inspire you, and to let you taste what is possible to create with these free software tools — please have a look at this Sintel open movie, which was entirely created using graphical OSS. I worked in a relatively large animation studio, which couldn’t produce during one year a fraction of what this tiny and talented group produced with gOSS in less than a year. This important lesson in life taught me the following: it’s not the type of software which is important, but the kind of professionalism, passion and will that are keys to succeeding.

To start, let’s separate four common graphical types. Under each type, you’ll see a name of the program that handles it, and it’s brief features list.

Inkscape screenshot by Val Kotlarov

• Vector graphics — great for creating icons, illustrations, charts, web decorations, and other usually quick and impressive vector art.
  Inkscape — Spiro curves, Converting rasters to vectors, Gradients, Basic vector shapes and Boolean operations.
• Photos — probably the most popular graphics type. Software helps you to batch-process photos, for example, when you need to cut down the image size and in the same time to enhance the quality.
  GIMP — Layers, Brushes, Selection tools, Masks, Image and Canvas transformations, Filters etc. A lot of free plugins are available too, such as G’MIC. A lot of file types are supported, so converting to a transparent PNG or creating sprites can be real fun.
• Rendered 3D graphics — probably the most time-consuming to create, but also very impressive when well done.
  Blender 3D — Basic shapes: cubes, cylinders etc., Lights, Textures, Shaders. Different rendering engines.
• Drawings — for any artist, the natural way to express himself or herself.
  MyPaint — Provides the ability for a free hand drawing when used with a digital tablet. It has a very impressive set of prebuilt and customizable brushes, Layers, different color pickers and very intuitive keyboard and mouse shortcuts.

© copyright Blender Foundation | www.sintel.org

Sure, there are many other gOSS programs and tools that can be used for the various types of graphics. However, the programs suggested offer a specialized and a narrower set of tools to handle the graphic type they were associated with on the list. So for example, if one wants to edit a photo, best practices suggest using GIMP instead of something else, because it’s built exactly for that. Similarly, if you want to create a vector icon, although GIMP allows doing it with paths, converting them to selection areas and filling with gradients, it’s much easier and more fun to use Inkscape, and the rasterized result will have better quality in addition to allowing easier changes to it later.

Other related programs which can be interesting are:

• Krita — allows sketching and painting.
• Xara Xtreme — handles vector graphics manipulation.
• Luminance HDR — for High Dynamic Range images processing and tone mapping.
• exiv2 — a handy utility if you want to modify images’ metadata.

The HOW

Before you start, you need to define your need then use a suitable program. Often you’ll need more than one program. For example, after creating and saving a vector graphics image, you might want to correct the colors or try to optimize it for web. GIMP always comes in handy here.

Generally speaking, using gOSS might initially be a bit confusing. Usually, these programs are initiated by creative developers, for whom the programming languages feel just like a mother tongue. Since they develop it usually for themselves, there might be some lack of good documentation with some programs. Though a quick trip to Google usually satisfies the any beginner’s need: be it the need for good tutorials or documentation, there is plenty online from those who came before you and were willing to contribute.

Exploring the program’s interface also produces greater understanding of available functionality. Many plugins can be found online, if some functionality is missing. For example, GIMP plugin registry has a lot of great plugins. Save for web for example, helps to optimize and preview the image before saving. Liquid rescale is another interesting example – it allows resizing an image without shrinking/stretching of the objects.

Several tips for using gOSS.

• Like with any graphic work you are doing no matter the software, get in the habit saving your work more often. Unfortunately, some gOSS is not always that stable.
• You may want to check frequently for the new software updates, and download them. Security updates are of course of the main concern, and they should be updated. Ubuntu linux and other distributions, automatically check for these updates, and suggest you install them.
• Keep the stable release for your work. You can additionally download and install the development release, with newer features and bug fixes, but they will tend to lack the stability. So they should be used for your main work only if some added feature is indeed indispensable.
• Participate in online forums to get extra help, or help others. Explaining to someone how to make something can often result in discovering new features or techniques, and lead to a better understanding of the work. Writing a tutorial has a similar effect.
• The real power of gOSS is, of course, in the open source code. If you feel like coding, you can take the program, and change it the way you like. You can make it really shine, to look and behave exactly as you wish.

What to use, how and when?

GIMP is comparable to Photoshop. You can achieve virtually the same results with it. Usually any tutorial for Photoshop from the web can be done with the GIMP. The missing functionality can be substituted with a few simple steps. For example, in Photoshop, you can apply a shadow effect to a layer. In GIMP, you will need to apply a shadow filter, which will create a separate layer with the shadow below the desired one.

Here is a very handy batch processing plugin for GIMP, David’s Batch Processor. It allows selecting a bunch of images, resizing them, enhancing, changing their format and more with a few clicks.

GIMP can be easily transformed to Gimp Paint Studio (GPS) — additional features that bring in rich sets of brushes and makes GIMP easier to use.

Use Inkscape when you want to create logos, web icons, cartoon-like illustrations which are so commonly used in the web design. It’s possible to create those beautiful, colorful and shiny posters, this blog has many tutorials for Inkscape. Inkscape has the Spiro curves — simpler and more intuitive curves than Bezier. It has plenty of filters, modifiers, layers, paths and so much more. Sketch easily practically any shape. Save vector files as PNGs, in varying dimensions. The interface is very easy, and for the beginner as always it’s advised to explore the menu, as well as going through the documentation.

Since Blender belongs to other graphical programs category, the UI is less intuitive and requires more time to learn. This program is great if you want to bring some realism to your website. Things like adding a realistic shadow to a photo can be done quickly. It’s a really good choice if your drawing skills aren’t good enough and you want to draw realistic objects in space. Another advantage is that you can crate and render an amazing red car from any angle, change the environment, lights etc. Of course drawing these from scratch would require more time and skills. So what’s possible to create with Blender? You can find fine examples here, or here, or here.

The WOW

Shark Ride by Kjartan Tysdal

Finally, I decided to interview some great artists who use OSS. I found their email addresses, contacted them, and they kindly agreed to answer a few questions about using OSS.

A work in progress from Andrew Price

David Revoy

David is better known as an art director from the Sintel open movie. He uses programs like MyPaint, GIMP/GPS, Inkscape and many others. More info can be found on his website.

Electron Donor by David Revoy

You have many beautiful and interesting works on your website. Which one is your favorite?

Thanks a lot. It’s hard for me to define a ‘favorite’. That’s probably because I still see something to fix in each illustration I did. When I update my portfolio, I always let my wife decide which artwork she would choose for inclusion. My real favorite illustration — is certainly the idea I have in mind just before trying to lay it down with my tools. I still try to get closer and closer to this original idea.

Can you describe some difficulty that you encountered while using Open Source software?

It was a real challenge, and only 2 years ago for me. The first set of difficulties was purely technical : installing and choosing a distribution, makes almost all the hardware working, configure the tablet ; all of this is difficult and I had to spend time and patience to understand how it worked. The second set of difficulties is more related to my artworks. . No other users at this moment did professionals digital painting with graphical OSS. I had almost to invent a way to do it , test many softwares and try to find a professional workflow. I had to find alternative to a lot of things, and change totally my way to think an artwork. Thanks to Mypaint, Alchemy and the fork Gimp-painter , I discovered great tools.

2 years after, I can see things grew so fast that 95% of the difficulties I encountered totally disappeared : Distribution, tablet and most of the OSS I use are really easy to install, and documentation and tutorials now exist.

How do you contribute to the Open Source community?

I contribute as a user can do : I report bugs, I communicate with developers to give them feedback on new features, I use them and I maintain a blog to share my resources/tips/tutorials. I’m mostly around Mypaint, Krita, Ubuntu/Mint and Blender.

As an active user in the community, can you share some of your thoughts about the future of the graphical OSS?

Graphical OSS will grow ‘slowly by surely’ and become stronger tools, this is sure. I already see many studio adopting FLOSS, or schools learning to student with them and I guess it will grow too in the future. So, I’m confident about a very bright future for graphical OSS.

Andrew Price

For many, Andrew is better known as Blender Guru. He has created/creates many great works, you can find more info about him, and a lot of smashing Blender tutorials on his Blender 3D tutorials website.

Dream House by Andrew Price

Why did you choose Blender? Was it a hard decision to go the ‘Open Source’ way?

Nope! I started way back when I was 15, and had the choice between $3000+ commercial software or the open source Blender. It was a no brainer for me :)

How would you compare Blender to a proprietary 3D software in terms of ability to create great 3D scenes?

One of the great things about blender is that it’s a complete 3d suite. It allows you to create an entire animation or artwork from start to finish without ever leaving blender. Once you’ve used the built-in compositor you won’t ever want to leave ;)

However, Blender is not without it’s shortfalls. The internal render engine is severely lacking when compared with commercial render engines. In my opinion it’s the one thing that is stopping Blender from being production ready, so I hope it’s improved shortly.

Do you think it would be difficult for someone who’s not familiar with Blender to learn to use it?

Of course! But that comes with the territory. All 3d software has a very steep learning curve, it’s up to the artist to persevere through the roadblocks until they become good at it. The hardest part for most beginners is getting used to working in three dimensions. Once you’ve got that down pat, everything else usually falls into place.

Leaving the financial side, would you recommend Blender, or would you suggest buying a 3D editing program? Why?

In all honesty, if you want to get employed in the 3d industry then you need to be using 3ds Max. It’s just a simple fact. It’s the industry standard application and most employers will expect you to know how to use it. However having said that, Blender is the perfect application for beginners to get their feet wet. They can learn the fundamentals in a supportive community, do almost everything with it that commercial applications can and with no costs. It’s a seriously powerful program, but it may take a while before the industry realizes that.

Sebastian Zakrzewski

I found Sebastian’s portfolio on DeviantArt. He uses GIMP / GPS among the other tools. Take a look at his amazing works.



Edgewalk by Sebastian Zakrzewski

Why do you prefer using the open source programs? Which benefits do they give you?

Open source is free and legit. It’s also solid alternative to commercial programs — it offers same basic functionality and performance.
It’s also about flexibility — commercial projects usually stick to one design and approach to work,
while community behind open source doesn’t hesitate to experiment and often comes up with great ideas on how things can be done in different way.

Do you encounter situations when you would prefer using similar proprietary software for your art works instead?

Yes and no: I miss few handy tools like freeform transformation from Photoshop but I can live without them. On the other hand there’s no good alternative in open source for ArtRage or Google Sketchup I sometimes use, but they’re addition to software I’m using on regular basis. If need arises and I won’t be able to find anything suitable in open source, I won’t hesitate using proprietary software.

Would you recommend others use open source software?

Yes, it’s definitely worth trying — it may suit your needs and thanks to popularity it’s constantly gaining I think more and more solid programs will show up.

Useful links

Here’s a bunch of download links for free graphical software to try out. The first four programs were described in this article, and can be downloaded straight away, others can be easily added on Linux machines.

• GIMP!
• Inkscape!
• Blender 2.5!
• MyPaint!
• VirtualBox and appliances
• Chrome / Firefox: the ultimate WYS part of WYSIWIG.
• Netbeans / Eclipse: the coding part (html,php etc).
• Firebug
• Firepicker
• Fspot / Shotwell photo manager
• FontForge
• Luminance HDR
• UFRaw
• Hugin – panorama photo stitcher
• OpenOffice Presentation in particular.
• mtPaint – pixel art

(rb)

  

Ask nearly any blogger or website runner and they will tell you that content is king. We hear it all the time. However, still many of the design and development community ignore any responsibility for this aspect given that the users or client will usually be responsible for creating said content. But if content is king, we need to focus on this elemental liege as we develop and design the site and provide the king a proverbial carriage in which to travel in.

The concept of content strategy has been making waves throughout the design and development community for years now, yet there are those in the ranks who still discount the importance of this aspect of UX design. As creators of the environment that the content is delivered through, knowing the various ways that the content will be influenced and effected by our work is key for developing stragetic systems for connecting it with the users and enhancing the overall interaction with the data.

How Important is Content Strategy?

So what about your design and development work? In this post, the first of our new community roundtable discussion series, we are giving you the floor to openly discuss your ideas on this particular desi/dev topic. Use the comment section below to share with us your thoughts so that this topic dissection benefits from multiple perspectives and can really be fully explored.

Given that there are still those who fail to give this UX design element its due, we really do have to ask how important is content strategy? To you, your sites and your process, to the field as a whole, or even to the client and users? There are multiple angles that we can approach as we seek to assign value to this area of designing and developing for the Web. We look forward to your thoughts and personal views!

For More on Content Strategy:

Rachel Lovinger’s Content Strategy: The Philosophy of Data and Kristina Halvorson’s The Discipline of Content Strategy are two fantastic posts that address this topic and provide some key insights on understanding how this aspect of UX design works. Highly recommended reading for those struggling to fully grasp this concept.

Also, you can learn more from Colleen Jones’ Make Your Content Make a Difference over at Smashing Magazine for more on the topic at hand.

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]]> http://www.noupe.com/community-roundtable/community-roundtable-how-important-is-content-strategy-on-your-sites-2.html/feed 14 http://www.noupe.com/how-tos/showcase-of-excellent-graphic-email-newsletter-designs.html http://www.noupe.com/how-tos/showcase-of-excellent-graphic-email-newsletter-designs.html#comments Tue, 19 Apr 2011 09:30:16 +0000 Nousheen Aquil http://www.noupe.com/?p=48086

  

  

Sending email newsletters is an effective way of marketing and communicating with your clients and customers, and can serve you best when designed properly to attract potential customers, as well as the attention of your existing customers. Email newsletters are a powerful medium to maintain an extra connection with your audience beyond just the reach of your website alone.

Email newsletters allow you to keep your clients and customers in the loop with latest things that are happening, and products to pay attention for. In this way, you can build a healthy relationship with your customers and can significantly increase your sales. Now get a load of these exceptional Graphic Email Newsletter Designs for your inspiration.

Showcase

Heroes Over Europe
This is one of the most creatively and skillfully designed newsletters in the showcase, which truly stands out among the rest.

Percept Brand Design
A creatively designed newsletter created keeping the target audience in mind. Sufficient space is allotted for the content as well.

ScrapBlog
Very well designed newsletter that not only attracts the customers with its alluring graphics but also informs them in detail about the ScrapBlog.

EVE Online
This is one of the best newsletter designs in this collection that uses high quality and visually alluring graphics to grab the attention of their potential customers and buyers.

eMAG Newsletter
This newsletter brings extremely high contrast colors and top notch quality graphics into play that will for sure grab the attention of onlookers.

The Misadventures of PB Winterbottom
To portray the dramatic nature of the game, a dark black theme is chosen for this newsletter. Furthermore, customers are also informed that it is available on Xbox Live Arcade.

Icon Inc.
This newsletter design perfectly matches with their tagline “Your Creative Partner”. The newsletter is actually presented as if you are reading a newspaper.

Think
The main content area is highlighted against the vividly colored background so that visitors do not get distracted and read the entire newsletter.

Bioshock
The use of high quality graphics in this newsletter is making it stand out from the rest in this collection.

Dress Up Diana
The adage “A picture worth thousands words” best defines the nature of this collage like newsletter design.

Brandtalk
A simple and memorable design for the branding purpose. Here, Brandtalk used a unique approach to represent Nike’s logo.

Sephora
A wonderfully designed newsletter for promoting beauty products. The use of excellent graphics and color contrast helps in making this newsletter more appealing and stylish.

Paul Frank Industries
Excellent use of graphics to call attention to their flat rate shipping.

Elizabeth Davis
This newsletter is started with a catchy line that not only grabs the attention of the readers but also makes them read the entire newsletter to find to the solution of their problem.

Manual Design
In this design, you can see that more emphasis is given to the content of the newsletter rather than the images, yet it looks visually startling.

Urban Outfitters
This newsletter is primarily intended to market their limited time Free shipping campaign, and therefore is designed accordingly.

Threadless
With this newsletter, Threadless is promoting their Classics Sale. By specifying the date this sale will end, they urge the customers to avail themselves of the offer right now.

Action Method
iPhones are everywhere and it is quite difficult to cater to such a huge market with a single newsletter but Action Method has successfully accomplished this difficult task.

Paul Frank Earth Day
Simple graphics with the detailed information on the celebration of Earth Day.

Garden Sheds
Garden Sheds uses lots of color variation to give this newsletter an eye-catching look. The content of the newsletter is the main area of focus.

Lonely Planet
Light refreshing color is used as the background for this newsletter design that is pleasing to the eyes. The purpose of the newsletter is defined with the help of supporting text placed beneath the image.

Juxt Interactive
Not much content is placed in this newsletter rather Juxt Interactive puts lots of emphasis on the graphical elements.

IrelandHotels
With a breathtaking look at Ireland accompanied by the necessary details on going, there is enough in this newsletter to attract potential tourists to check out the hotel for their next trip for sure.

ExpoLit09
Use of high contrast color combination compels the visitors’ eyes drawing them to the content of the newsletter.

Life’s Not Fair But….My Knickers Are
Since the newsletter is about a feminine brand, the newsletter is also given a very feminine look by using loads of pink shades.

Club VTech
This newsletter is also designed keeping the target audience in mind i.e. kids. Therefore, they use graphics and images that will appeal to youngsters.

Owl City
Here, you can notice a more sophisticated and professional approach is being taken to impress the potential clients. Visitors are thoroughly informed about each and every thing the company has to offer.

Nike – Run it Your Way
Nike like its simple and effective logo design created a neat and visually attractive newsletter that fulfills its primary action.

Nation Toys
A funky design that is well suited for the toys outlet. This one would definitely appeal young children and teens alike.

Totally Rad
Loads of information is provided with this newsletter to inform visitors how they can follow Totally Rad on Twitter and get special goodies.

Envato
Envato captures the attention of their prospective clients with unbelievably amazing graphics. You can see that the content is not being highlighted much.

Indiemark
A very cool and soothing design that mainly focuses on the content of the newsletter.

Fitness 5022
Fitness 5022 has incorporated a fitness video to give their visitors an idea of what they can expect if they join Fitness 5022.

Ragged Edge Design
Ragged Edge Design makes use of a sophisticated template that equally puts emphasis on the graphics and content of the newsletter.

Bonobos
Bonobos follows a unique marketing approach in this newsletter by showing a high quality picture of a shirt to give an idea of the quality of the product and then they follow up with how you will be entitled to a huge discount by purchasing in bulk.

Apple iPod summer accessories email
Again in this newsletter, graphics are emphasized more as compared to the text.

Making Ideas Happen
Here the white space is used for this newsletter to more effectively highlight the content along with the places you can get this book from.

Paul Frank Newsletter
Paul Frank always sends prompt newsletters associated with any recent or upcoming events. Here, they are celebrating Mother’s Day by offering all of Mom’s favorite items at a discount.

Australia Post
A simple but effective design that executes its purpose even without the use of much content and images.

Pizza
A yummy and delicious pizza on the plain background in enough to captivate the onlookers.

ADC Young Guns
An extremely artistic approach that uses bizarre graphics against simple grey background to perplex the potential customers and make them read till the end.

Apple
Loads of Apple iPhones are placed in the shape of a heart to exemplify the love that we all have for the device. Imaginative use of beautiful graphics.

Banana Republic
Main area to be focused here is their offer that says 25% off after the five style event. Banana Republic is quite clear on what they want to be highlighted as their best selling point.

Bing
Bing introduced lots of new things in the word of the internet and here with this newsletter they invite their users to find out what’s popular on Bing.

Miche Bag
A well suited template design for the offer being given through this newsletter. Very well thought out and executed!

Jon Burgerman
Equal importance is given to the content and graphics to grab as many customers as possible. The huge empty space highlights the content.

Made
High contrast color graphics are placed against simple and white background that make the graphical elements shine.

MapMyRide.com
The excitement of cycling is the focus here. The appealing graphics and catchy tagline are the key components of this newsletter design.

StarbucksStore.com
A subtle approach is taken in this newsletter design. It is neither over loaded with the graphics nor with content. On the whole it is a decent approach.

The Plebs
The snapshot of their recently initiated shop is placed against a black background in order to call attention to the shop only.

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