Archive for July, 2010
Lately, there has been a lot of buzz on the web about HTML5, so we started wondering about the actual cases of its implementation. We already know that HTML5 markup language, with its new and powerful features for both developers and end users, is already used to code websites around the world (check out the previous blog entry about 70 Spectacular HTML5 Websites). Now we think you may want to get the learning experience and feedback from those people who have started creating awesome websites using HTML5 and who learned how to harness a great deal of the cutting-edge technology HTML5 has to offer. Read the qualified testimonials we have gathered for you and see what HTML5 website owners have to say about this markup language. They will discuss the fundamental aspects of HTML5 and its real-life use to break down all the prejudices that mastering a language like HTML5 can be intimidating. So here’s what they have to say:
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I’ve been interested in creating semantic markup since I started creating websites about 7 years ago. I became aware of the HTML5 movement and started to understand a bit more through the draft specification. It was quickly obvious that HTML5 was going to be a great leap forward for semantics. The new elements were more relevant to sites that I was creating and made my markup more concise and readable. Like many developers I had been using things like <div id=”nav”> and <div id=”footer”> so it was easy to make the switch to the new HTML5 elements. I’d say for a competent HTML author making the switch to using HTML5 markup is not a big learning curve.
Subsequent to my initial explorations it became clear that HTML5 was not just about semantics. In particular the video, audio, and canvas elements mean that third party plugins like Flash and Silverlight won’t be needed in the future. This is really exciting for anyone interested in open standards. Add in microdata, aria attributes, new form types, and 2D/3D drawing, and there are quite a lot of new toys to explore.
HTML5 is just one part of new possibilities available in the front-end stack though. Browsers are now more capable with both CSS3 and JavaScript APIs, so it is a really exciting time to be a front end developer. Thinking back to when I started out, I’m really excited about what we can do now and how far the standards movement has progressed. It is a good time to be a front end developer!
– George Ornbo
Featured HTML5 project: Shapeshed.github.com
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At GANDR, we like to pretend that we’re a few steps ahead of the game and to do this we have to keep experimenting with new technologies. There’s no better place to experiment than on your own website. We chose HTML5 because we’re obsessive about descriptive HTML tags and really clean markup. HTML5 takes this descriptive HTML obsession to a new level with elements like header, nav, sections, articles, aside, etc. Working with this markup language was fairly easy thanks to resources like HTML5 Doctor, Dive into HTML5, and the scary-but-helpful W3C HTML5 Spec.
– Garrett Winder
Featured HTML5 project: Gandrweb.com
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The new post in this category signifies the new template– Free WordPress 3.0 Theme for StarCraft II – that is presented as our tribute to the launch of the widely popular StarCraft II. This template provides a striking layout that features the most vivid characteristics of the game such as you would hope to receive for such kind of a site.
You can start StarCraft fansite and make a strong and prominent step to the world of StarCraft and all its fans. While creating a website with this template you’ll be able to cover most of the StarCraft II topics that would be considered central and you’ll get a nice place to talk about your favorite game and follow its latest news. We hope that our interest in this game and yours coincide and this theme will become of a great use for you.
We are delighted to present this new Free WordPress 3.0 Theme for StarCraft II!
Note that there are 3 variants of header in this theme, so you can you can switch them from the WordPress 3.0 admin when it is needed.
The template is based on Twenty Ten theme made by WordPress team, you will notice that class names and structure are similar. It comes with 2 plugins: Cufon, the plugin to show titles and menu with StarCraft font and NextGEN, gallery plugin for screenshots page. You may see this free theme in action on our WordPress 3.0 live demo page.
To get this free website template with PSD source files visit the Free WordPress 3.0 Theme for StarCraft II at TemplateMonster and type an email address that you want the free template package to be delivered to. Feel free to use this template for your business, but not for commercial purposes (this means you cannot resell it – either before of after customization). Deep yourself in the fascinating world of StarCraft, get this theme just now!
Download Free WordPress 3.0 Theme for StarCraft II with PSD files (30 MB)
Currently the HTML5 technology has come into the extensive spotlight. Being the most discussed web trend these days, this major revision of HTML is aimed at revolutionizing and streamlining the way web developers create websites. Though there are some ongoing specifications of HTML5, this markup language currently offers diverse great features and benefits to develop brilliant forms, new canvas elements, readable codes, and semantically meaningful layouts. Plus, it is now fully possible to get moving with video which is an absolutely significant option.
In fact, there’s already a widespread use of the ultramodern HTML5. Upon our exploration, we’ve found the awesome variety of working sites using HTML5 markup language and so we’re going to list 70 best ones down in this blog entry to provide the examples of how it is possible to use HTML5 today. Make sure, these websites render correctly all the beneficial properties HTML5 embraces. If you wish to join the ranks of the fortunate HTML5 websites owners, TemplateMonster could substantially help you – just browse the wonderful assortment of our HTML5 Templates and find your very own HTML5 design to develop the clean and elegant website.
Alternatively, you can check out other articles in which we compiled 12 excellent HTML5 eBooks for web professionals and 30 brand new HTML5 tutorials of summer 2011. In addition, our friends from DesignFloat have also published a compilation of 50 HTML5 websites showcasing the HTML5 best capabilities.
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Cumbriaglassfusing.co.uk
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Cameronchamberlain.com
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Some of you may remember that some time ago our blog has published a lot of jQuery-related content (such as for example 15 jQuery Plugins for WordPress, jQuery Navigation Solutions and jQuery Portfolio Solutions) that still remains very popular judging from the constant traffic. But since that time a lot of new interesting jQuery stuff appeared out there and we couldn’t resist the temptation to share these new goodies with you. Not to mention that sometimes it is hard to find that exact jQuery plugin that you need because of a huge number of those plugins, and hopefully our new list will help you in this.
For those of you that don’t know much about this technology we’ll just mention that jQuery plugins will not just help you enhance the functionality of your website but will also enable you to easily create some stunning effects on your website. Besides, you may want to know that TemplateMonster has a huge product category of jQuery templates equipped with tons of jQuery tricks – all spectacular and dynamic as hell! 
Don’t forget that to properly view these jQuery plugins you will need to install JavaScript plugin to some browser versions. Well, enough of talking – time to get to these awesome plugins!
1. Dual Slider
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2. Footer Plugin
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You might know already that TemplateMonster has launched a brand new After Effects Logo Reveals product line. Currently, we start receiving various massages to our support and marketing departments asking how these templates could be actually applied to video projects.This proceeding, we decided to make a showcase illustrating the use of spectacular Logo Reveals for miscellaneous world-known brands and campaigns. We hope this engaging round-up will give you some ideas when you have a go yourself.
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BlackBerry “Love What You Do”
(view full video presentation)
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Sony Handycam Comcoder
(view full video presentation)
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We’ve started posting our small tutorials for Adobe After Effects beginners – that in turn was inspired by the launch of After Effects Logo Reveal animations. Judging from the first post success you really like those tutorials so today we’re rolling out a new portion of them (not to mention the fact we’ve been planning to publish a second part from the very beginning).
And of course today we’re also sharing a nice little freebie in the end of the post. So make sure you stay with us and read the tutorials to get to the freebie. Here go the tutorials:
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Picture Breaking Into Pieces
(based on animation from Dynamic Flash Photo Galleries presentation)
- Create new composition 730х411, 5 sec, 30 fps, Square pixels
- Create a new layer
- Apply Trapcode Particular
- Place a picture that will be breaking into the composition and make this picture’s layer 3D. In the Particular settings set this layer as an Emitter
- Apply settings as shown below
(click the image to see in full size)
Being one of the most advanced CMS software for the years, Joomla! keeps holding first positions in this race competing mostly with WordPress and less with Drupal. There’re many people among our visitors and customers who just start their way with Joomla-powered site and they often ask us how to do the basic things with this CMS. That’s why we’ve decided to made a list of 12 Joomla 1.5 tutorials for newbies and hopefully the experienced users will find them interesting too.
1. Joomla 1.5 Tutorial – Adding Articles and Menu Items
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2. How To Install VirtueMart On Joomla!
You may have heard we’ve recently launched these beautiful After Effects Logo Reveals – the most dynamic way for you to display your corporate logo in any kind of video or animation. So we assume not all of you know exactly just how awesome Adobe After Effects is as a software. That is why our video professionals have prepared a couple of basic After Effects tutorials on how to work with After Effects so you could see how simple and efficient it is.
Now please welcome the first of two portions of basic Adobe After Effects tutorials, plus a bonus in the end of the post.
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Particles Flowing Around the Sphere
In these tutorials we use third-party plugin Trapcode Particular 2.
- Create a new composition 512х288, 4 sec, 30 fps, Square pixels
- Create a new layer
- Apply Trapcode Particular
- Apply settings like this:
To find good stuff for your online project is not a complicated task, especially when you visit our blog frequently. Today we have decided to encourage web designers for new innovations by presenting all of you Monday’s freebie – Free Website Template for Business Company.
The success of a project can be attributed to the good starting point – catchy website template that can present the idea of the project in the clear and comprehensible way. It is quite obvious that a good website template is half the way in this case. This Free Website Template for Business Company suggests thought-out design and professional layout and can be of the immense value for the online business project that you are going to start.
Let’s check it! Free Website Template for Business Company:
As you remember, you can get this free website template in two ways: with PSD source files included and without them. If you need only HTML source files, download them from this post (just click on the image above and save the ZIP file). To get PSD source files visit the TemplateMonster free website template download page and type an email address that you want the free template package to be delivered to. Feel free to use this template for your business, but not for commercial purposes. Don’t wait until inspiration comes, download this Free Website Template for Business Company just now!
Download free business website template with PSD files (22,9 MB)
Download free business website template without PSD (290KB)
You all know TemplateMonster is always on the edge of the coolest things available on the Internet, right? Well, we’ve just got even better with the next coolest thing – please welcome our new Video Templates family!
The first part of this awesome new product family is familiar to some of you – we’re talking about the After Effects intros that previously were available under the Flash Intro type. But since they’re just too cool for Flash (not to mention they’re not quite Flash) we decided to move them into a type more appropriate and relevant.
And luckily for us, our video professionals have started producing another awesome video product – the After Effects Logo reveals which present company logos in the most spectacular and dynamic way possible. So having a whole lot of two video products it became so much obvious for us that we can now start a new product family. That’s pretty much how our Video Templates were born.
So about this new product again – After Effects logo reveals are basically animated logos. We’re sure you have seen something like this in fancy ads or presentations when a big company’s logo appears out of nowhere and the crowd goes like “WOW!” and all that. Well, no one can stop the progress and with this new product from TemplateMonster your company can also have this sort of animated logo for whatever media purposes you can imagine – whether video ads, company presentations, website intros etc.
What do you guys think of this new product? Would you like to have your intro animated this way?
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