For me, it seems like December started just the other day. In all actuality, Christmas is right around the corner. My how the time flies! Whatever happen to the days as a kid where it seemed like the end of December couldn’t come fast enough? For this weeks round up I did a small collection of Christmas artwork I discovered on DeviantArt. I hope you enjoy them and they help get you in the festive mood of the holidays!
As a web designer, I am constantly on the look out for good designs, trends, and all around pretty looking web elements. Back in the day, I used to just bookmark good designs I cam across. Now, thanks to some more savvy web experiences and some great tools and apps, I have a much more sophisticated system for finding and store web design inspiration. Below are my favorite websites for finding web design inspiration. Yes, two of them are Envato websites, but that’s just the way it goes. These are sites I constantly find myself going to for ideas/
What are your favorite inspiration sites?
1. Ember
The Ember website has been my “go to” website for design inspiration since I first discovered it. I love that that there are a tone of new images added daily. CSS galleries are great, but many only add a few new sites a day. I also use the Little Snapper app which syncs seamlessly with the Ember website. In fact, the Ember app works much better for organizing your inspiration collections much better than the LittleSnapper app. The site also makes it easy to “favorite” designs that others have uploaded. This way you can keep all your design inspirations online, rather than bookmarked to a single computer or browser. There are free and paid accounts available. (more…)
I know the web is littler with roundup posts these days. This post isn’t meant to be a cheap version of one. This post is aimed at hopefully inspiring the GraphicRiver authors. It seems to me that sets of web elements seem to do really well on the marketplaces. Being that I mostly design blogs, I think having a variety of list sets like the ones in the examples below would be awesome to have on hand. If I could find a set that had 10 to 15 lightly styled lists in a variety of layouts, I would be all about buying it.
Short has a way with his illustration work that makes illustrations one wuld normally find lame and childish pretty darn cool. I think a lot of that has to do his “Rat Fink” style of illustration. I mean who else could make a picture of a soccer loving hog look cool? Not a lot of people, that is for sure. Check out some more of his and let me know what you think!
Check out Shorts Blog to see more of his work.
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I don’t even really know where to start when trying describe the work of Lois van Baarle. Its like a modern version of vintage childrens books. At least that is the best way I can think of how to describe the majority of her work. What is cool though, is she has a style that can transfer over into various mediums and within other styles. that isn’t something a lot of artists can do. But, I will let her work speak for its self. Many of these images are for sale as prints, so be sure to support the artists if you like her work!
Joseba Elorza is a freelance illustrator whos specialty is to create some outstanding collage style works. He has certainly made a very unique style for himself. The works he creates all seem to have a retro and dream like feel to them. They seem nostalgic and fresh all at the same time. Joseba is based out of Spain and has a portfolio site here.
In my opinion, it is nice to see a Photoshop artist create a style for themselves, rather than just follow along with design trends and the most recent tutorials. What do you guys think about Joseba’s work?
If you like pretty colors and super slick CG images, then you will love the work of Lee Davies. If you’re into music and pop culture icons, then you will really really loves his work. With his Maya work, we has taken celebrity characture to a whole new level and made it uniquely his own. The second half of this post showcases his Photoshop painting skills which are almost as amazing as his rendering skills.
What do you think? Which one is your favorite?
I like the CG Mr. T!
No matter how experienced you are in your field of creative expertise, you always have room for improvement. Consider this post your “continuing education” program, as it includes a list of books for both beginners and advanced users. I have compiled ten of the best books that cover all five of the marketplaces. Check them out, learn a few things, and create some new files for the marketplaces!
I am a huge fan of when people remake modern day movie posters with a retro look and feel to them. Eric Tan has an uncanny ability to do just that, but with his own unique vector style to them. It is that style that no doubt got him noticed by Disney, for which he has done quite a bit of work with. Aside from his Disney work, he also has a variety of other movie posters he has created. Unfortunately I don’t know where you can buy any of his work, other wise I would link you to it. I do know that he was at ComicCon last year selling and signing posters. Maybe he will make it to DragonCon next year?!?
If you want to check out more of Eric works, you can visit his blog here.
As you may have noticed, I am super pumped for Halloween. While really cool costumes like those in my post titled “Your Halloween Costume Sucks” are really cool, I am always impressed when people come up with more creative costumes. Im not sure you would consider some of the costumes on this list “creative” but they are original ideas none the less. Leave it to the gees to come up with some of the most creative costumes.
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