What are the best web-design sites?

webdesign

• pls,i would need help to some links. i have 3 questions. i need sites that i can use to create stunning logos for webpages. 2.this site christembassy.org has a stunning animated logo,i want to know the kind of software used or softwares that can be used. 3. need sites that offer 3d webdesign softwares. thanks

• Answer:

  narnia-ga, I’ll address your Question point-by-point. Then, since I’m a professional web designer myself, I’ll offer some personal advice on how to get started creating stellar logos on your own. Here we go: 1) “i need sites that i can use to create stunning logos for webpages”: There is a wide range of websites meeting your criteria. At one extreme, there are some sites that provide free “clipart,” some of which may be suitable for logo use. However, keep in mind that if you use clipart, you’re not dealing with original art, and there may be many other instances of the same art elsewhere on the web. However, some clipart may be modified further using software such as Adobe Photoshop (which we’ll cover in more detail later), after which it may be rendered original enough to suffice for your purposes. Here are some links to a few quality clipart sites [Note that on most of these sites there is a condition for use of the art that you give credit to the artist of the clipart you use, or that you link to the clipart site from your site the art is used on]. Some clipart sites offer free art, while others are by subscription. I’ll provide links to both types below: Here’s a link to Clipart.com, which offers “the largest subscription selection of clipart, photos, fonts, animations and sounds on the web!” You can search for clipart by keyword from the search box on the site’s home page: [http://www.clipart.com/en/index ]. Barry’s Clipart Server is a free clipart site: [http://www.barrysclipart.com/ ]. Here’s a link directly to a sample gallery from this site. The category is “animals”: [http://www.barrysclipart.com/barrysclipart.com/showgallery.php?cat=149&thumb=1 ]. Next, we come to CliparartConnection.com, which is a free clipart site: [http://www.clipartconnection.com/ ]. Here’s a link directly to a representative gallery from this site. The category is “food”: [http://www.clipartconnection.com/clipartconnection.com/showgallery.php?cat=153&thumb=1 ]. For this, and most other free clipart sites, to download the image, simply click on the thumbnail image in the gallery, and then right-click the enlarged image and select “Save As.” Here’s one more clipart site: “Free Clipart Kingdom”: [http://www.clipartconnection.com/clipartconnection.com/showgallery.php?cat=153&thumb=1 ]. Warning: You will have to put up with answering a couple of web survey forms in order to access the site’s free content. I did this in about one minute. Here’s a representative gallery from the site’s free content area. The category is “money”: [http://www.clipartcastle.com/cgi-bin/imageFolio.cgi?direct=webgraphics/Money ]. Okay, this rounds out our look at clipart sites. All of the above clipart sites link to other clipart sites from themselves. If you need even more clipart sites, the following link is to the Google search results page for keywords, “clipart”: [://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=clipart ]. The other extreme of sites you can “use” to make logos include those of professional graphic designers, who will create an original graphic for you, based on your description of your needs, for a fee. Also, if you have a partial graphic that you like the idea of, but want it to be more polished, you can give that to them as a starting point. Here are some such sites: 360 Logo Design: [http://www.360logodesign.com/ ]. Here’s a summary from their home page of what they do: “Looking for a new image? No problem. We specialize in custom logo design for any business...small or large! We can design a logo that sets you apart from your competitors, giving your business the look it deserves! You can get custom logo design for as low as $149 with no compromise on quality. 360 Logo Design also provides you money-back guarantee, which no other designing site offers.” Usually the professional sites provide you with the same logo in many formats: .jpg, .gif,. .png, .bmp, print, and in different sizes as well. Here’s another professional graphics website: Ars Logo Design.com: [http://www.ars-logo-design.com/ ]. An excerpt from their home page: “ARS LOGO DESIGN is a graphic design company composed of professional graphic designers and communication experts, focused on logo and brand development.” They say they will give you “5 basic logo concepts” with “10 logo revisions” with “5 final logo designs for you to choose one of them” within 7 days, for a fee of $125. For more web-based professional graphics services, see the following link to the Google search results for keywords, “logo design”: [://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=logo+design ]. Here’s a link to a Macromedia Flash-based logo creation site (Flash Logo Design.com): [http://flash-logo-design.com/ ]. The following excerpt is a tip on how to select a professional logo designer (if that’s the route you decide to take), from [http://www.thelogofactory.com/library/articles/things_to_look.html ]: “EXPERIENCE IS CRUCIAL Does the house have a gallery of logo design samples? Logo design is a developed skill, and requires both technical and artistic prowess. Look for REAL logo designs - examples of ACTUAL design projects. It's easy to create a nice design and show it as an tutorial example of what COULD work as a 'high-tech' company or a 'quaint little bread & breakfast'. It's not so easy to create an actual design that pleases the client, their marketplace, and the designer as well. Also, watch out for designers that feel it's necessary to tell you why a logo is fantastic. If a logo needs a paragraph to explain what this color means, and what this shape represents, then ask yourself - "is this is a really effective design?" Keep in mind that you will never have the luxury of explaining the wonderful abstract meanings of your logo to anybody else. Select professional design houses that are able to display this experience and design savvy.” In between these two extremes are sites that offer tutorial-like, general instructions and examples for how to design and create original logos by yourself. Some of these types of sites may be specific to a particular software tool, such as Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator or Macromedia Flash, whereas some are more general. Some of these sites use fictional logos as examples, and have you create them step-by-step as a way of seeing the types of things necessary to complete a logo of a certain type. Here are links to some sites fitting this general description: The following site is to Desktop Publishing-Logos, and offers lots of advice on how to create your own logo: [http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/logos/ ]. Here’s a link to a logo design tutorials section from the maker of a commercially available software product called, “The Logo Creator”: [http://www.thelogocreator.com/tutorials.html ]. Although the purpose of the tutorial is to show users of their product how to create logos using it, they also offer decent general advice on designing logos. From tutorialfind.com, the next link will take you to an entire page links to logo design/creation tutorials: [http://www.tutorialfind.com/tutorials/design/ ]. Here’s an example of one of the tutorials available from the above tutorialfind.com page, entitled “Logos For the Design Challenged, Part I”: [http://www.unleash.com/gary/logo/logo1.html ]. Here’s another article from the [http://www.tutorialfind.com/tutorials/design/ ] site, entitled, “Design Basics”: [http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/html/97/05/index2a.html?tw=design ]. And here’s an interesting one on how to create 3D logos from those dingbats found in your MS Word fonts. An excerpt: “Shirley takes the simple dingbat and turns it into a stunning 3D graphic, all with a little graduated fill work, and a little Eye Candy "magic." [http://www.webreference.com/graphics/guest/3d_dingbats/ ]. Okay, now lets’ move on to your point #2: 2) “this site christembassy.org has a stunning animated logo,i want to know the kind of software used or softwares that can be used”: First of all, here’s the link you refer to: [http://christembassy.org/ ]. Okay, I believe you’re referring to the main animated logo on the pages accessed by clicking either, “English,” or “Spanish,” etc. The logo reads, “Christ Embassy Healing School: AIDS,” with a predominantly red background and white font. This animated logo was done using Macromedia Flash. I’m not sure exactly which version was used to create it, but I viewed it myself using Macromedia Flash Player 7. The current version of Flash is Flash MX 2004, and prior to that, Flash 5 and 6 were common. This type of graphic definitely has the distinct look and feel of a Flash movie, but you can tell for certain by right-clicking the graphic and noting on the pop-up menu, the “About Macromedia Flash Player 7.” Here’s a link to the official Flash page, on Macromedia’s website: [http://macromedia.com/software/flash/?promoid=home_prod_flash_082403 ]. Note that this product costs $499. There is also Flash MX 2004 Professional, which is $699, but the Professional version isn’t necessary to create animated graphics/logos such as the one on christembassy.org. [Note: the extension of a Flash movie ready for web deplyoment is ".swf"]. Furthermore, you can download a free, trial version of Flash (and most other Macromedia products) for 30 days. This may be enough time for you to create your logo, as well as deciding if it’s really worth it for you to purchase the product. There is a certain learning curve associated with this product, so if all you care about is having a quality logo A.S.A.P., it would likely be more cost effective for you to have a professional Flash designer do it for you. If however, you’re interested in doing it yourself from now on, the free trial download is a great place to start. Now on to your third point: 3) “need sites that offer 3d webdesign softwares. Thanks”: 3D is a vast area of computer graphics that goes well beyond logo design, but I’ll present you with some of the more common 3D software tools that may be suitable for logo design and creation for the web. The top echelon professional 3D programs, such as 3D Studio Max and Maya, cost thousands of dollars because they are geared towards much more complex tasks than logo design, including full-length movie making. I’m going to provide you with links here to the official sites of some of the “lower end” 3D graphics programs which are more than suitable for logo design and creation. I happen to own and use both of the next two products, Bryce 5 and Poser 5. Poser 5 (from Curious Labs) is a 3D graphics application used to create 3D animated and non-animated figures, such as human, humanoid and animal. Here’s a link to the official Poser 5 website: [http://www.curiouslabs.com/ ]. Poser 5, full version costs $249. What may be better for you in the case of logo design is Curious Lab’s “Avatar Lab” which is only $50. Also, they have a program called Poser Artist, which is a truncated version of the full version (Note: Poser Artist is to Poser 5 what Photoshop Elements is to Photoshop 7). You can see plentiful examples of Poser-created work by searching Google for keywords, “Poser 5 galleries”: [://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=Poser+5+galleries&btnG=Google+Search ]. Bryce 5 (from Corel) is a 3D graphics application used to create still images and animations of landscapes, seascapes and “space” scenes. Here’s a link to the official Bryce 5 website: [http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=Corel/Products/productInfo&id=1042551234521 ]. Bryce 5 costs $79.99. Note that the .obj files created by both Poser and Bryce can be exported from one program to the other. For example, you can create a human figure in Poser, and export it as an .obj object into a landscape you created in Bryce. Then, you can save the resulting creation as a single .bmp image. This .bmp image can then be further modified, if desired, in Adobe Photoshop Elements, and then compressed to .jpg format for web usage. You can see plentiful examples of Bryce-created work by searching Google for keywords, “Bryce 5 galleries”: [://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=Bryce+5+galleries&btnG=Google+Search ]. Okay, at this point I’ve addressed your 3 main points. Now, I’ll give you my personal advice, which is to obtain Adobe Photoshop Elements for $99, and learn to use it. It has the same principle features as the full version of Photoshop, i.e. Photoshop 7, but is $549 cheaper. It’s great for logo design. Here’s a link to the official Adobe product page for Photoshop Elements: [http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshopel/main.html ]. Here’s a link to the full version of Photoshop page: [http://www.adobe.com/digitalimag/main.html ]. Other professional graphics programs include Macromedia’s Freehand MX [http://www.macromedia.com/software/freehand/ ], which has a 30 day free trial, and costs $399. Keep in mind that if you are good at pure art, i.e., actually drawing things, then you can draw a logo and then scan it into your computer, and import it to Photoshop Elements for additional manipulation and .jpg or .gif creation. I certainly hope that this information helps you to get started producing and/or obtaining stunning, professional web logos. Please do not hesitate to ask for Clarification if anything I’ve written isn’t clear to you, or if I have left something out which you consider to be very important. Below are the primary search terms I used in finding the sources used in my Answer. Google search strategy: Keywords, “clipart”: ://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=clipart , “logo design”: ://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=logo+design , “logo design tutorials”: ://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=logo+design+tutorials , “logo creation techniques”: ://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=logo+creation+techniques&btnG=Google+Search , “logo design techniques”: ://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&safe=off&q=logo+design+techniques&btnG=Google+Search Good luck with your graphics! Sincerely, omniscientbeing-ga Google Answers Researcher