PSDTUTS - Create & Shatter a Grid, While Making a Typographic Poster
VECTORTUTS - Create a Sweet Pair of Glossy Vector Lips
CSS-Tricks - Create a 404 Page on a Static Site
Photoshop Lady - Create a Retro Grunge Poster
Spoon Graphics - 30 Stylish Examples of Doodles in Web Design
Smashing Magazine - Celebration of High-Speed Photography
Cuzoogle - Who Does Gregg Popovich Look Like?
This past week I spent more time designing than I did writing up new content for the blog, but I figured that both activities lend to the overall success of the GMB Network. I received a heads up from my boy Cuzzy that Kellex (The Sports Dollar) was starting a new blog (Blaze of Love) and wanted a killer header designed by yours truly. I immediately contacted Kellex to discuss the project and after receiving some preliminary ideas from him I went straight to work.
The overall look for the header and the logo was based on the logo from the VH1 Series “The Rock of Love“. I did a little research and jotted down some ideas, and within an hour or two came up with the final product you see above. I wasn’t too big on the idea of hearts in the image, but roses had to be in the design since Portland is the “City of Roses” and the arena is called the Rose Garden. The scroll/banner is actually a free download from the T-Shirt Factory vector sets, and I think it fit in perfectly with the design. I was also able to find suitable pieces to use from the Go Media Arsenal as well for this project.
I want to thank Kellex for giving me the opportunity to design this header for his new site, and thanks to Cuzzy for spreading the word about GrandmasterB’s Design Services. Be sure to check out the site in the weeks to come as I’ve got some hot new content in development that you won’t want to miss.
~ GrandmasterB
Another week is in the books, can you believe that it’s almost mid-October already? Last week I put the finishing touches on the first project that Jeff and I collaborated on. Mike Hayes commissioned Jeff and I to create a custom designed theme for WordPress and migrate his existing Blogger site over to the new domain: SteadyBurn dot net. The design process was interesting, because Jeff and I didn’t know a whole lot about Mike or hist existing blog. Through some research and tweaking we were able to come up with a unique look that Mike was very happy with.
The theme has some cool design elements that were implemented to improve the visitors experience as well. I had read a tutorial on CSS-Tricks awhile back that would allow you to add some flare to your date badges, and implement a comment bubble to the top corner that displays the total comments on the post. It’s a very easy trick to implement into your design. I did change up the date badge a bit to make it fit the color scheme of the site. The original tutorial uses a different color for each month, but it looked a bit cartoony for this design.
Another cool element of the design are the transparent content boxes. If you look closely you can see the background carries into the left column box. It took some tweaking to get it to look right and not take away from the content, but it turned out great! Overall, this project was a lot of fun to do and in the end Mike was very happy with the design…which is what matters the most.
Go Media - Create a Dream Design with 3D Typography
VECTUTS - Inking and Coloring the Comic Strip “The Brads”
CSS-Tricks - What Do You Think is the Best Online WYSIWYG Editor
Smashing Magazine - 50 Beautiful Movie Posters
Spoon Graphics - Create a Vibrant Modern Blog Design in Photoshop
Photoshop Lady - Amazing Colorful Swirl
Cuzoogle - 25 Reasons Why Cuzoogle is Thankful
Go Media - How to Create a Vector Harley Davidson Pinup T-Shirt
Spoon Graphics - Mega Roundup of 60 Cool Custom Designer Toys
Smashing Magazine - Retro and Vintage in Modern Web Design
PSDTUTS - Designing a Typographic Concept Poster
VECTUTS - Create a Swirly Type Treatment
Cuzoogle - NBA Motivational Posters: Eastern Conference
John Cow - Three Types of Blog Writing Styles to Get You Started
