Links Shout out - Pattern Tap

"Pattern Tap is here to satisfy and encourage the inspiration needs of my interface design peers and peeps. We aspire to be the one stop pattern shop for your next inspiration need." (from the website)

Split by functionality, this is like a scrap book of design elements. Navigation, backgrounds, buttons, lists, icons, headers, tables etc, there are about 45 categories to browse through. Great for when you are trawling for inpiration, trends, or just really awesome designs to ooh and ahhh over! 

http://patterntap.com/

Links Shout out - Phoenix online graphics editor

Anyway, always the hoarder of cool links, there has been an increase in the number of online image editors available and this is one of them. It can be integrated to some online image galleries like Flickr, Facebook and Picasa, plus there are a stack of tutorials. It has a number of advanced features like layers and cloning tools. Of course it's no Photoshop, but if you're on the road and don't have access to anything but the internet, this kind of tool could be invaluable.

Phoenix online graphics editor

As always, make sure you read the terms and conditions on the site.

EMG Zine posts

I'm expanding my blog to EMG Zine which is run by the multi-tasking artist/ writer/ entrepreneur Ellen Million. This has been in the works for a while so it's exciting to finally be apart of Ellen's team. I'll still be writing here, but my extended articles will be posted at EMG Zine first, then posted here at the end of the month.

http://emg-zine.com/item.php?id=486 - is a post on Being lazy and getting stuff done (if you can't wait for me to post it here). I'm under the monthly column 'Part Time Painter'.

As a side note, while I work through my website redesign, I thought I'd post a link to a website which is something many people wouldn't consider. http://www.vischeck.com/ checks your website or images for usability for people who are Colourblind. I use it mainly for checking that text can still be read more than what the images will look like.

Website design - what you should consider

When you're building a website, there are a number of design elements that you should consider and plan for. It's all well and good to have a beautiful website, but if visitors can't find their way around or the pages take forever to load your website may not be successful.

Check out this post which covers a broad range of design issues and what you should be looking at when developing a website. : 15 top website elements

Links Shout out - BG Patterns

http://www.bgpatterns.com/ is a background generator that allows you to use a range of images, colours, textures and rotation. It's simple to use and features a range of already created patterns for you to browse.

SitePoint free Photoshop ebook

If anyone is interested, SitePoint are giving away a free photoshop ebook for a few days (The Photoshop Anthology: 101 Web Design Tips, Tricks & Techniques ). It's geared towards web design elements, but a few people might find it interesting. You don't have to sign up for anything however it will email you to send you the direct links. They regularly provide sample chapters of books and have some really good articles on web development.

http://photoshop.aws.sitepoint.com/