most inspired - blog

These days everyone and their mother seems to have a blog. A popular choice to run a blog is Wordpress, it powers this blog and a few others that I run.

A good way to make your blog stand out from the crowd is with a custom theme. Developing themes for Wordpress is pretty simple, if you know HTML/CSS and PHP, but nobody wants to start from scratch each time they develop a theme, these Starter Themes provide a simple canvas on which you can create your custom themes.

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1. 
   http://www.thefarmerandthechef.com

   A culinary event with a rustic wooden plank background design.

2. 
   http://www.intridea.com

   KISS principles are hard at work here… simple gets it done! Looking a little harder though and this site has quite a few added innovative goodies, like tooltip bubbles and a ratings/improvement box. The site has enlisted in the Save The Developers campaign for certain low-level browsers, which don’t support the above mentioned goodies.

3. 
   http://www.dogfish.co.uk

   KISS again… this one-page flyer layout design is poppin’ clean and uses a fresh & vibrant color palette.

4. 
   http://fall.tnvacation.com

   The TNvacation seasonal family of sites is now standard fare on most CSS gallery menus. This nostalgic Fall season portal is no different! They do just an excellent job of revitalizing these sites, year-in and year-out, while also linking to many regional city and county visitors bureau and tourist attraction sites. TNvacation rocks once again…

5. 
   http://www.seoweb.co.uk

   Pretty cool portfolio site, the interface on the work page is buttah… The main site navigation could use some hover effects though, plenty of attention to detail otherwise.

6. 
   http://www.floggedmagazine.com

   Poor flogged little puppy has lost his way.
   A continued influx of flogged designer work and creative points of view, should make this site-magazine an interesting place to visit occasionally and possibily gain some recognition for your own designs.

   Don’t feel sorry for me, any of my designs that got flogged were a valuable experience, for better-or-worse, the client had to live with the design choices as well. It’s good to be open minded about these things, eventually you develop a knack for selling a design concept, while taking criticism more professionally. After the cursing is over, it doesn’t hurt so bad anyways. Learn to be a flexible design ninja …just like Mr. Bill.

   Maybe you’ld prefer to try selling your design spec work, so rudely written-off by a client that didn’t quite get it. Check out Mubs’ post this week for tips on Where To Sell Designs, if you’ld rather go that route.

7. 
   http://www.tvrdek.cz/en

   I’ve never really cared for narrow-width site layouts, this one is something completely different, even though it’s largely very narrow, oxymoronically speaking. Interesting concept, I can see this creating some visual trends as well.

8. 
   http://tastyplanner.com

   Besides tasty recipes this site has some divine web 2.0 interactive goodies, like Recipe Box, Meal Planner, Grocery List and desktop widgets. Yum-ee-ee!

9. 
   http://wpcoder.com

   An imaginative layout, with subsequent pages all done as pop-overs using the jQuery Thickbox.

10. 
    http://honker.evaneckard.com

    Another free WordPress theme brought to you by SmashingMagazine, this one called Simply Ornate was designed by Evan Eckard. Featuring a transparent foreground, so all things are possible for the background image -think upgrade, Prototype.js /Script.aculo.us enhancements, and some pretty cool StereoTabs (wow… that’s a great blog and a new one on me, I need to venture away from the jQuery camp a little more often) in the sidebar.

    They are offering the theme with 5 different color scheme backgrounds, with the transparent foreground, many things are possible, maybe even a flash animated background, looking for a good tutorial link for that suggestion?

Technorati : Web Design Journal, Websites Gallery, Weekly Top Standards
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We all know the horrors of spec work, but even without doing spec work we all probably still have some work lying around gathering dust.

Maybe you did some work on a personal project and decided not to finish it up, or perhaps you where learning a new technique and did some test designs.

Rather than letting your work gather dust, why not sell it and pad that emergency fund, but where can you sell it?

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It is no secret I’m a fan of aggregators, having built a number of them in niches from Design Galleries, Sports, Movies, Online Sales, Jobs, and Parenting.

Outside of the niches anyone looking for general links and interesting news there are a number of options…

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1. 
   http://islandphotobooth.com

   This retro layout is quite well done, with all of the fun stuff a vintage-retro layout should have. It’s a pretty good fit for the subject matter of the website.

2. 
   http://www.onefastbuffalo.com

   Another vintage website, this one with an overall antique vibe to it, you’ll want to ignore the validator on this one, that and the all caps in the description meta tags and blinking navigation elements that results from not using a sliding-doors CSS technique. I do like this website though, with it’s slide-in vertical navigation and various antique ornamentation, including a menu for changing the wallpaper background of the page. Catch OneFastBuffalo before this traveling wild west medicine show moves on to the next stop on the stage coach line.

3. 
   http://thefirsttwenty.com

   A really tidy and complete 1-page grid layout, using a lightbox to load content above the current page, resulting in showing the user many pages within a one-page layout. This non-profit site is somewhat a tribute to the fireman, while rasing money and awareness for a great cause highlighting the everyday heroic efforts of firemen, and creating needed resources.

4. 
   http://www.usataxdollars.com

   A nice little interface to give you an idea where your federal tax dollars are going in the USA, via a pie chart and detailed breakdown. Kind of cool actually.

5. 
   http://billyhughes.oph.gov.au

   Considering some of the government websites out there, this site should rate very highly! The site put up as a support site for an exhibition of past Australian prime minister Billy Hughes, who held the office from 1915 to 1923, when the country was enduring the horrors of the first world war. Marvelous little site, especially if you don’t know much about Australian history.

6. 
   http://www.headconference.com

   Another web developer event to add to your calendar, October 24-26, 2008. This one is global and all you need is web access and $99 bucks. With some big names and major players, it looks like a pretty big deal. Check it out, the site credits are in the footer on the homepage.

Technorati : Website Gallery, Weekly Top Standards
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We’ve previously listed websites that allow you rate websites, letting you decide which ones are hot or not.

The Internet is a very democratic place and there are many other rating sites, allowing you rate just about anything.

After the jump you’ll find a list of some the best…

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1. 
   http://www.carhartt-streetwear.com
   –
2. 
   http://www.abc-baseball.com
   From the good and oftentimes imitated folks at TaprootCreative.com. The distressed looking photograph in the header loads randomly on every page, as usual I can’t quite dissect exactly how they did the scripting …anyone? They have optimized and compressed all the css and javascripting, making it harder for a web layman to study, kudos to the Taproot web ninjas.
   –
3. 
   http://www.miamiangelproperties.com
   This Miami real-estate website, is a double-edged Samurai sword (sticking with a theme) for me. On one hand what I love about the site, is the beautifully illustrated header. On the other hand, the header is a bit large-ish for the inside pages and is constant and unchanging on all the pages of the site. Variety is the spice of life and some header variations could make this site even more unique. They’ve done a great job overall on the design, and integrating the WordPress blogging/CMS platform.
   –
4. 
   http://simonemaranzana.com
   Excellent Typography, Lighting Effects and 3D-style graphics are the specialty du jour, bon appetit!
   –
5. 
   http://www.darrenhoyt.com/demo/agregado
   Freebie of the week this WordPress theme featured on Smashing Magazine and created by a couple of the guys from Category4.com, namely Darren Hoyt and Matt Dawson.

Technorati : CSS, Web Standards Gallery, Weekly Top Standards
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1. 
   http://www.cesserdigital.net
   I recognized the work of Miguel Ripoll (link to an English translation via google), almost instantly! I don’t think there are any other designers or firms that I can so positively identify. This design enterprise agency is one to watch for sure.

2. 
   http://jobs.webdesignerwall.com/
   Looking for a new design gig, or just more opportunity to spread your designer wings? Check out Nick La’s new design jobs board, you gotta love Nick’s work!

3. 
   http://www.kindledinme.com/
   Love the hierarchical use of colors in this design and the slow scrolling javascript slider on the homepage. The rainbow colors look splendid on the dark earth tone background.

4. 
   http://www.august.com.au
   Another spectacular use of fade-in flash backgrounds. S;otting flash backgrounds a while back, I’ve forgotten to try and incorporate the technique into my own website designs and redesigns. The idea of flash backgrounds really resonates with me, I’m not big on flash as an interface and full-site means of navigation usually.

5. 
   http://www.almalatina.info
   I don’t speak the language, but this looks to be a great ballroom dancing site maybe, and you know what they say about ballrooms, especially in Italy?

6. 
   http://www.thelippincott.net
   The mixed nostalgic, newsprint, and grungy graphic elements of this design, along with outstanding typography and a loose grid layout combine to create an old world flavor that makes me hungry for more, marvelous site.

7. 
   http://www.classicwfl.com

8. 
   http://www.mukustudios.com
   Amusing Flash interactive portfolio, some talented illustration works.

Technorati : CSS Gallery Blog, Web Standards Websites, Weekly Web Standards
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Celebrities are often used as role models, affecting how we dress, what we eat, places we go and how we behave. What can we learn from celebrity in regards to our web sites?

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1. 
   http://futureofwebdesign.com
   Part of a family of design event conference websites, they are all looking particularly great. Other sites in the event series’ include; http://futureofwebapps.com, http://future-of-mobile.com, http://futureofonlineadvertising.com… behind this successful series of internet design and marketing technology events you will find Ryan Carson of Carsonified playing a lead role.

2. 
   http://www.spoongraphics.co.uk
   This article on Designing for Print - Setting Up Crops and Bleed, had me adding this resource to my feed reader lickety-split!

3. 
   http://www.ubhip.com

4. 
   http://smallmanrecords.com

5. 
   http://amphibian.info

6. 
   http://www.impdesigns.com

7. 
   http://www.contrast.ie

8. 
   http://www.homeskilletrecords.com
   A George Huff creation.

9. 
   http://www.flyheli.co.uk
   Astute in the usability category, helicopter fans will love this keen and clean website.

10. 
    http://www.robertrandolph.net
    Poppin’ the faves this week! IndigenousRocks.com another great band, the website is currently a little rough, they’ve got a hot new recording out though, entitled “Broken Lands”.

Script Resources

1. 
   http://scriptandstyle.com

2. 
   http://webdev.stephband.info/parallax.html
   Another most effective jQuery parallax scrolling plugin, check out the demos for this one!

Getting back in the groove this week after a two week hiatus/vacation, I’ve got some ideas for a few other posts up my sleeve, namely record company and college radio websites. Keep the peace and the faith, best wishes to all the good folks in Delta region where hurricane Gustav wreaked a little havoc this week.

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