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I recently needed to find out the optimal height to design for when building a website. This is sometimes called “the fold” height, a term borrowed from newspaper displays. Basically, the fold refers to anything seen on screen without the user scrolling. Ideally, keeping important content “above the fold” will allow the user to understand [...]

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This video posted on the Google Adwords blog, talks about well converting landing pages and the “7 deadly sins of landing page design”.  If you are a web designer or web marketer, it’s a must watch. The breakdown of the 7 sins goes like this: 1. Unclear call to action 2. Offering too many choices [...]

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I’m changing a red easy button to green in this example (who ever heard of a red easy button anyway). I’m also using Photoshop CS4. Feel free to use this photo and copy it to your desktop if you want to follow along. 1. Hit the “create new fill or adjustment layer” button at the [...]

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Designer “I’m depressed” Psychiatrist “What seems to be bothering you?” Designer “I hate having to upgrade my Adobe Suite. Every time they change things around, I can’t find my shortcuts and they change the interface in ways that are very disconcerting, it’s awful…” “… I used to look forward to upgrades but now I can’t [...]

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A good way to learn to use the pen tool is to try this “follow the circle” exercise. Drag this circle image (Fig A) to your desktop or right-click/save to desktop. Open the image up in Photoshop and blow it up to 300%. Select the pen tool by hitting the (P) key. Follow around the [...]

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