I just looked around on the internet, found some ideas of what I thought was good design at the time and then created a design. I was not armed with any knowledge about grids, typography, colour, hierarchy and so on that an education would have given me. Even though my design could have been called a success (it got featured in all the galleries and noted as a trend setter for 2008 with its handwritten fonts), I felt I was missing something.

Fast-forward a year or so and I was designing more of the same – browsing around the internet for inspiration and jumping into Photoshop and putting out a layout. It was only when I started to get to know other designers via Twitter and IM that I became aware of what I was missing. I needed to educate myself, and do it fast, if I was to survive in this world of design.

This question arose again recently as we kicked off a major web project with a client. The goals of the project were typical enough: improve usability, differentiate the firm, and close the gap with competitors.

But that was the problem. These goals have become the stock objectives for most major web initiatives, pulled from the shelf and recycled for every website and product redesign. And it’s not hard to see why. They’re safe. They’re familiar to your colleagues. They provide easy benchmarks and sometimes easy wins.

1. Deviantart

How can you write about digital art inspiration and not mention Deviantart? As a community destination, deviantART is a platform that allows emerging and established artists to exhibit, promote, and share their works within a peer community dedicated to the arts. The site’s vibrant social network environment receives over 100,000 daily uploads of original art works ranging from traditional media, such as painting and sculpture, to digital art, pixel art, films and anime.

2. Behance

With Behance you can showcase your work on the world’s leading platform for creative professionals, and gain exposure to millions. You can build your portfolio, gain exposure and get hired by top companies. You’ll find some of the best artworks around the web on Behance.

This presentation, by Stoyan Stefanov and Nicole Sullivan, primarily details the huge performance benefits to using Object-Oriented CSS, as well as a crop of other common CSS hurdles.

This presentation, by Stoyan Stefanov and Nicole Sullivan, primarily details the huge performance benefits to using Object-Oriented CSS, as well as a crop of other common CSS hurdles.

Recently the domain http://www.webdesigncompany.com was purchased by one of the leading web design companies in India Miracle Studios Pvt. Ltd. As a part of this process, Miracle Studios plans to release sub domains of its property to other Web Design Companies all over the world.

As we all know in the web design and development industry that the competition to be at the top of search engines is increasing by the day. Most of the small and medium sized companies totally depend on search engine rankings and the business that they generate from Google and other search engines. The Keyword "Web Design Company" alone has 41,300,000 in competition, and companies try very hard to push up their SEO and other marketing efforts to out beat one another.

If you are customizing your WordPress theme for BuddyPress or creating a brand spanking new one, you will definitely find the following two plugins very handy.

Theme Test Drive

This awesome plugin Read more » Related posts:

1. How To Test A New WordPress Theme Without Affecting Live Site
2. A Template For BuddyPress Settings – Settings.php?
3. How To Disable BuddyPress Custom Header

The report should serve you as an ongoing view of where logo design is headed. The word “trends” in itself can have a very negative cast, but in truth, trends aren’t bad. They reveal our growth. It’s our take on them that allows us to move even further forward.

Cubist

Dan Benjamin recently blogged about his decision to venture into full time podcasting. We love to hear about anyone branching out and trying new things so we wish him all the best with his venture.

Two of his new shows solo shows are The Pipeline and The Conversation:

• The Pipeline, an interview show talking with designers, developers, writers, and entrepreneurs. Episode one featured Jeffrey Zeldman and upcoming shows will include Kottke, Storey, Vaynerchuk, Coudal, Mann, Siracusa, and many more.
• The Conversation, a live-streamed talk show featuring topical discussions, reviews, special guests, news with Christina Warren from Mashable, and, your calls, all live.

For his second episode of The Pipeline Dan interviewed our own Ryan Carson and discussed how he works, his inspiration, how he’s built such a strong personal brand, the Carsonified 4-day work week and unique offices, and more. You can check out the episode online: http://5by5.tv/pipeline/2.

We always try to bring you links to new and interesting content, let us know what you think in the comments.