Month: July 2012

5 Development Tips for You

Posted on by djbrensinger

Computer CodingAs a developer, I look for tips that can help with problem-solving to picking a language for my next project. Here are 5 development tips to help you be a better developer:

  1. The “Just look at it” hack to problem solving When you have difficult problems, sometime you want to just sleep on it. Dave Lee suggests that you “Just look at it”. Don’t try to solve it. Stare at it for a while and see what ideas you come up with. He lists the steps that you can use to try this type of problem-solving.
  2. Productive Procrastination When you just can’t focus and need a break, you can either force yourself to finish a demanding task or take a break. Productive Procrastination shows you how to switch to less demanding tasks like checking out what people are saying about your company on Twitter or reading a blog related to your industry.
  3. 10 things web developers must know to become truly amazing To be a great developer, you need to know more than code. Here’s Dan Frost’s list of things you need to know.
  4. How to pick the right programming language A programming language is like a tool. Not every tool is suited to complete the project or problem that you want to solve. Mashable lists which languages are better suited to a particular industry.
  5. Don’t be afraid of imperfection Perfection can be stifling. It can cause you to procrastinate or never complete a project. When you create an app, users don’t care if the code is perfect. They just want it to work. Amber shares why you shouldn’t be afraid of weird looking code in your next project.

Creating a web button using vintage design

Posted on by djbrensinger

For Burlington Footwear’s website, the client wanted an old-fashioned or vintage look. I applied this design style to a button that opens the shoe club page. Vintage Design uses dark or muted colors, descriptive or cursive fonts, textures and graphics specific to your selected time period. BFW Shoe Club

To create this look, I made the following choices:

  1. I created a background with a vintage paper look. It combines the colors yellow and green to make it look aged. Then, I added a paper texture to complete the look. I used this Fireworks tutorial to create a vintage (old) paper look.
  2. Vintage Design uses descriptive or cursive fonts. Burlington Footwear already uses a script or cursive font in its header. For consistency, I chose to reuse the font.
  3. Burlington Footwear’s website uses red and green. I choose a dark green and red because Vintage Design uses dark, muted colors. These darker colors were applied to the font and outline of the button.
  4. Vintage Design also includes using images specific to a selected time. I used the old-fashioned shoe from the logo. Since the shoe image is specific to an older time, it made sense to add it to the button. I just blended it into the background and repeated the shoe for balance.

By combining these elements together, they help to achieve the vintage look that the client was looking for.