Using Photoshop To Mock A Web Design… then code it!

The .PSD file is the greatest tool and resource to any web designer. Sure, you could create a design from scratch, coding by hand with no help from The trusted and handy photoshop… and that’s even how I started… but I bet once you get the chance to learn the tips and tricks that I will point out

In this article, you will wonder how NOT using .PSD’s for your design is even possible.

Here is the sample design we are going to make:

You can download the Website Layout psd: Download psd Weblayout

First things first. Open your version of photoshop (I’m using CS3 here but CS2 is perfectly fine). Now to begin, lets first do something of personal Preference. This isn’t necessary but it may help you with the layout and arrangement of photoshops tools and menus… by changing your “Workspace.”

Photoshop to mock a website

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You can download the Website Layout psd: Download psd Weblayout

To do this, go to : Window -> Workspace and select “Web Design.” Now you see the Adobe Teams idea of a Photoshop workspace for Web Designers. It highlights Important menu items and arranges the tools that most web designers will use.

Now lets begin to create a layout, in which later you will code into CSS and XHTML.

In CS3 (and CS2 I believe) you can select resolution presets for the web. So hit CTRL + N to open a new document. Under “preset” select “Web.”

Now select “1024 x 768.” I choose that over 800 x 600 because the majority of visitors will be seeing your webpage in that resolution- you can

Code it to shrink to an 800 width later on.

Now with your document open in 1024 x 768, we are going to begin the creative process. We will start from the top down. So begin with the header.

Start a new layer (ctrl + shift + N). Select your marquee tool (M) and draw a region from the top left to the top right with the height of about 85px… or whatever You think looks nice.

Now fill in that layer with any color you prefer. To make this look more modern and trendy you can fill it in with a gradient. Try one of the “Web 2.0 Gradients”

On this website. To do this, right clik the layer and select ‘Blending Options’ then on the left side menu select ‘Gradient.’ You can choose which gradient You feel works for a header. Sample them all.

Once the header block is complete, create a new layer again (ctrl + shift + N) and, just under the header block, use your marquee tool (M) to create a new block For your navigation. Try a height around 30 – 35px. Then, repeat the steps above- filling in the color and selecting a gradient.

Now this is a good time to mention organization of .PSD files. In photoshop you have the option of creating folders for sets of layers or elements. To do this, find the small folder icon under the layers palette at the bottom right of of the photoshop window. Name these folders (and color code them if desired) with

a description of the type of elements they will contain, such as “header” or “navigation.” Then drag those layers into the corresponding folders.

This will keep you from having to scroll through the entire layer pallete to find that one layer that needs adjustments. It is also good for moving entire blocks Of layers and for hiding them temporarily.

Moving on with the design we are now going to draw a simple css box with an image. In the .PSD or screenshot above you will see this used as an “intro box.” Most websites or blogs use these to introduce the readers to their website or to update readers with important news and info.

So create a new layer (and folder if you are an organization freak like I am) and draw using your marquee tool the selected width/height and position Of the intro box. Now fill it in with your desired color. Once complete, right click the layer and go to ‘Blending Options.’ Find and click the ‘Stroke’ Option. Turn down the size of the stroke to 1px and change the color to something in the same color range as the background of this box- darker works Better.

For the image its just a matter of copy + paste into the right position.

Do the same for the sidebar. This is called “blocking out a design.” This will help you when coding the design. Also fill in a headline and mock up post under that.

This is just a sample and of course you can adjust and optimize this more and more… the real reason for this article is to go over those basics above and more importantly, Show you how to take a design and turn it into a working webpage with CSS and XHTML… WITHOUT “slicing.” I’m not a fan of slicing- and it’s pretty obvious why… simply Using your marquee tool with the layers makes much more sense.

Now go onto your webserver and set up a directory to test this out. I use the backend of wordpress to code almost everything since it is so versatile but You can use notepad/textpad or any text editor you feel comfortable with (if you’re really hardcore use ‘vi’).

Now how do we code this? Simple really. Like I said, all you need is your marquee tool and every element in its own layer in photoshop. So now with your

Text editor open lets make the header you mocked up above.

Select the height of your header to the exact pixel with your marquee tool. Select edit and “Copy Merged.” Now hit ctrl + n for a new image. Paste the background

Of the header that should be in your clipboard right now. Most likely your pasted image is a bit too wide. Lets select the entire image (ctrl + click the layer) and zoom In a couple times. Now using your arrow keys, hit left as many times until you cant see the blinking outline of the marquee tool- then hit your right arrow once.

Now you should just barely see it. Crop it. What you just did is select only 1px width of the hearder background image. You wont need any more then this- css Will do the rest.

Now save and/or upload this image to your webserver (you can do this locally first). Go back to your text editor.

The blank text document in your editor will be the .css sheet so lets save it as “style.css”. Open it back up and lets start the coding. Oh and by the way- keep That header background image open in photoshop.

Now first your going to want to do the basics of your css file like body { background:#FFF; } or anything else you may want to do- for this example it’s not necessary So lets skip it.

Create a css element called “#header” like so:

#header {

}

Now maximize photoshop again, and with that head background image open, select “Image” and then “Image Size” – take note of the height.

Use that height in the #header css element like so:

#header {

Width:100%; height:115px;

}

Also set the width to 100%. Now lets put in that background image and repeat it across the width of the page:

#header {

Width:100%; height:115px;

Background:url(img/header_bg.gif) repeat-x;

}

Save that and open another text document for our .html page. Save it as index.html when you are finished. In the index.html file set up your basic html tags:

<html>

<head><title>My Design</title></head>

<body>

Now add this division tag under that:

<div id=”header”>

</div>

Save and open index.html in your web browser to view the changes.

Notice you have the header…. Why that was easy wasn’t it?

Do the same for the nav… put the division (i.e.: <div id=”nav”></div>) right under the header nav. Repeat these steps until each box is on your webpage… And really you could close this article right now as you’ve learned how simple it is to make a web page using photoshop and css xhtml by just repeating these steps.

Next you’re going to want to learn about margins and padding, positions, floats and so on. Don’t worry- its not at all difficult. Practice this for awhile.

Try to create the .PSD you downloaded into a whole web-page… can you do it? Show us! Post it in the comments if you think you have the right skills… If not, don’t worry- repeat these steps with each element and you’ll get it sooner or later.

Next time we will go even further…

]]> http://www.billbailey.co.nz/photoshop-to-mock-a-web-design-then-code-it/feed/ 0 http://www.billbailey.co.nz/web-design-html-css-fluid-form-layout/ http://www.billbailey.co.nz/web-design-html-css-fluid-form-layout/#comments Sat, 14 Jul 2007 13:56:00 +0000 http://www.euphorish.com/2007/07/web-design-html-css-fluid-form-layout/ Well I’m back.., Its Been a hell of a rough ride down here in New Zealand lately, Storms, Floods, Tornadoes, boy that Winter season does come around Fast! some say global warming, I say WINTER!! , But all that Weather drove me indoors to a labor of love this Web and Graphic design blog, so I sat here and wondered whats a good article to write which led me to a wee problem, I need a poll so until I sort that out Ill choose for you as long as there are free give aways at the end, looks like its CSS again!

lets start with one of the most important parts of your site, the contact form or Registration form. Generally people don’t put a lot of web design effort in this area, Ive always had trouble with forms and trying to make them work and look a little different or even tie them into my web site theme design, things are getting easier now with all these cool people who give away their knowledge and code to help us all break away from those all to easy tables. You have to start thinking what do the blind hear when they go to a table Tag ridden site using their screen reader, well its going to get mighty confused, lets think about it for a second, is your form really that user friendly, probably not! “God…, the net must be a boring place with all those tables Tags to read and yes people with disabilities also want the freedom of the net power to the People.

Help the internet community and start designing for the future, CSS is the way to great end results for all parties

Below is a nice form that I designed with curved corners the box around the inner Box is showing off (also a great hack called the Box model Hack browser compatible )this can be set to show or not, every part of this form is versatile.

A great way to Change your CSS ON THE FLY with your Mozilla Browser is to use the Web Developer plug in for Mozilla firefox Download Mozilla Plugin and your tool bar will now show a new tool bar at the top above the google tool bar, “What no google tool bar.., for Mozilla Download google toolbar then click on the >> CSS OPTION >> Ctrl+ Shift+E I have included the same form also with no style sheet well a very basic one still fluid though

A text editor will now be available at the bottom of the browser pull it up with you mouse and start changing the style sheet if you break the style just refresh the page and all is back to normal when you get it how you like save the style code and paste it into your site CSS template nothing better then seeing the changes occur right there be careful though IE Browser being what it is make sure you check the changes in that browser A lot of People use it but that will change

>>> Below is a Basic CSS HTML fluid 2 Column form very little styling but still tidy

XHTML Code for form above is Below

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<head>

<title>Table-free form layout</title>

<meta http-equiv="content-type"

content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" />

<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="basic_CSS.css" />

</head>

<body>

<h1>Example User Form</h1>

<form method="post" action="your processing script here">

<p>

<label for="name">Full Name:</label>    <input type="text" name="name" id="name" class="txt" />

  </p>

  <p>

    <label for="username">User Name:</label>

    <input type="text" name="username" id="username" class="txt" />

  </p>

  <p>

    <label for="email">Email Address:</label>

<input type="text" name="email" id="email" class="txt" />

  </p>

  <p>

    <label for="paswd0">Password:</label>

    <input type="password" name="paswd0" id="paswd0" class="txt" />

  </p>

  <p>

    <label for="paswd1">Confirm Password:</label>

<input type="password" name="paswd1" id="paswd1" class="txt" />

  </p>

  <p>

    <label for="Comments">About your self:</label>

   <textarea  cols="30" rows="8" name="Comments" id="Comments" class="txt"></textarea>

     </p>

  <p>

    <label for="level">News Letter:</label>

<select name="choice">

      <option value="Yes">Yes</option>

      <option value="No">No</option>

    </select>

  </p>

  <p>

    <input type="submit" name="btnSubmit" id="btnSubmit" value="REGISTER!" class="btn" />

  </p>

</form>

</body>

</html>

>>> Below is a the same basic form from above the XHTML has few simple lines of code but the style sheet is a little more complex I have included a zipped folder with both sets of Style sheets and XHTML pages Muck around and see where you can take it

XHTML Code for form above is Below

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<head>

<title>Rounded Corners</title>

<meta http-equiv="content-type"

content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" />

<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="CSS_form.css" />

</head>

<body>

<div id="box">

<div class="roundborder c1"></div>

<div class="roundborder c2"></div>

<div class="roundborder c3"></div>

<div class="roundborder c4"></div>

<div class="roundborder c5"></div>

<div class="roundborder c6"></div>

<div class="roundborder c7"></div>

<div class="roundborder c8"></div>

<div class="roundborder c9"></div>

<div class="roundborder content">

<h1>Example User Form</h1><form method="post" action="your processing script here">

<p>

<label for="name">Full Name:</label>

<input type="text" name="name" id="name" class="txt" />

</p>

<p>

<label for="username">User Name:</label>

<input type="text" name="username" id="username" class="txt" />

</p>

<p>

<label for="email">Email Address:</label>

<input type="text" name="email" id="email" class="txt" />

</p>

<p>

<label for="paswd0">Password:</label>

<input type="password" name="paswd0" id="paswd0" class="txt" />

</p>

<p>

<label for="paswd1">Confirm Password:</label>

<input type="password" name="paswd1" id="paswd1" class="txt" />

</p>

<p>

<label for="Comments">About your self:</label>

<textarea  cols="30" rows="8" name="Comments" id="Comments" class="txt"></textarea>

</p>

<p>

<label for="level">News Letter:</label>

<select name="choice">

<option value="Yes">Yes</option>

<option value="No">No</option>

</select>

</p>

<p>

<input type="submit" name="btnSubmit" id="btnSubmit" value="REGISTER NOW!" class="btn" />

</p>

</form></div>

<div class="roundborder c9"></div>

<div class="roundborder c8"></div>

<div class="roundborder c7"></div>

<div class="roundborder c6"></div>

<div class="roundborder c5"></div>

<div class="roundborder c4"></div>

<div class="roundborder c3"></div>

<div class="roundborder c2"></div>

<div class="roundborder c1"></div>

</div>

</body>

</html>

So without Making this page any longer here is that zipped folder I promised with the two forms and accompanying Style code sheets, I hope somebody actually downloads this It will save a lot of work!

>> Download zip file Examples for XHTML Forms with CSS style sheets

I will add more to this Post if you need some Help to understand things leave a comment

Regards Admin

The problem With HTML is that presentational elements will be removed in future specifications and so will not be able to be used under the STRICT DOCTYPE such as HTML 4.01 strict or the XHTML 1.0 strict. Don’t be alarmed though your page will still be valid, if you use a transitional DOCTYPE, although it is a good idea to start making the change away from these deprecated presentation elements. Another major drawback is all the tags involved just to get the font type and color right throughout the page and then add in the table tags UUUGGHH messy and boring, and what happens when you want to change the font style you have to go thru some mammoth effort, say good by to any plans you had for the next 2 days. So its XHTML all the way and it is now time to move on.

For the non believers this example below is a full XHTML / CSS WEB PAGE as is this site your now using

This New Plymouth accommodation site Below is controlled thru CSS

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)

The basic purpose of CSS is to allow the website designer to define a style and apply it to one or more portions of the XHTML web page. Sounds Scary but in reality is not, it will become the industry Standard and one of the best tools available to serious standards orientated web-designers. CSS is a language used to define the formatting applied to a Website including Color, Background images, Type faces, Margins, and indentation.

There are many benefits such as easy to manage site wide Changes(huge benefit) as well as reduced file size resulting in faster Page load times, but to my mind the optimization of the page is as equal a prize, take for instance a Google robot or spider reads the page from the top left of the web-page to the right just Like a human so, by minimizing the code tags this allow us to put key words nearer the top of the page allowing for quicker indexing of keywords and content, believe it or not Robot and spider software is designed to move on if its having to bash thru endless HTML presentation tags so reduced indexing time for the search engines is massive plus, I use meta tags they do work and all of those additional keywords in the head has to be a plus!

A great book on CSS is

Now Who wants free Web-standard XHTML 2 column with footer Web page….!

>> Download zip file Example for XHTML page with CSS style sheet

Muck around with the code and the style Sheets see how the style sheet is called to duty Via the <div id =”example”> tag. you can also EDIT CSS on the fly with webdeveloper tools in Mozila Firefox , that is really a cool feature of the Mozila browser Do your self a favour and use this Web Browser.I’ll be back soon to add some more CSS / XHTML Web-page templates, and some really cool CSS tips and tricks

Articles on HTML | CSS | Graphic Design & Development

Cameron Moll: Portfolio of Cameron Moll

Section SevenEmotions: Portfolio of “Mike”

38oneAndre Morbeck

Bad Boy MediaSebdesign

New Media Design: Portfolio of Justin Schrader

Web Design Portfolio: 939 Designs

DynaMix: DynaMix New Media Design

Mario Campello

.:Unai Garmendia:.

Download Fusion WP Theme

Regards Euphorish

Download .PNG Files

Download .PSD (Photoshop) Files

How To Incorporate Into WordPress

To incorporate this into your current wordpress theme you are going to have to do a slight bit of image editing and css as well as xhtml… but don’t worry, we’ve done most of it for you!

Editing In Photoshop (if needed)

First download and unzip the archive. Then pick out your favorite color and open it in photoshop. You will now “save as…” the file into a .gif to be titled “dateicon.gif”…. why are we doing this? Because your visitors using the unholy Internet Explorer 5 or 6 cannot view semi-transparent .png’s.

When you save the gif a dialog will appear. Select the dropdown box next to “Palette” and select “Local (Selective)”. Make sure the check box next to “Transparency” is ticked (checked). Now select the “Matte” drop box and select “White.” and click OK. Now you have a IE friendly transparent .gif. Upload it into your wp-themes/YOURTHEMEHERE/images directory.

Adding the CSS/XHTML To WordPress

Log into your WordPress Admin Panel and go to “Presentation.” Now click on “Theme Editor” and select “style.css” on the right side (this is usually brought up automatically).

Add this code:

.the_date {
display:block;
text-align: center;
float:left;
font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
background: url(/images/dateicons/dateicon.) no-repeat;
width:60px;
}

.date_m {
display:block;
font-size: .9em;
margin:0;
padding:0;
font-weight: bold;
text-align:center;
}

.date_d {
display:block;
font-size:1.4em;
margin:0;
padding:0.7em 0 1.3em 0;
text-align: center;
}

(thanks david!).

Also note your images directory might be named something other then “images” and your path will differ so keep that in mind.

After you’ve added the code above, click on “Main Index Template” in your theme editor and find a line containing the following partial code:

<a href=”<?php the_permalink() ?>

You are going to add this above or before that line:

<div class=”the_date”>
<div class=”date_m”><?php the_time(‘F’) ?></div>
<div class=”date_d”><?php the_time(‘jS’) ?></div>
</div>

Now view your page and configure any changes you see fit.

And thats as far as i can take you! Enjoy. Some resources below if you are stuck…

Create a ‘Calendar style’ WordPress date format
WP Date Image Hack

Gradients may very well be the most abundant and apparent feature used in web 2.0 websites, graphics, and logos. Here is my pack of Web 2.0 Gradients. I’ve had these to myself for sometime but it never occured to me to release them for public use until i saw this resource. Which is also a very good pack of web 2.0 gradients as well. I thought i’d go ahead and share mine. So enjoy, and hopefully they will come in handy and maybe save some of you some time!

Click to download…
To install:

• Simply save file into your photoshop/presets/gradients folder
• Open preset manager in Photoshop (EDIT -> PRESET MANAGER)
• Select Gradients from the dropdown list
• Select “Load” and load: euphorish_WEB20_gradients.grd

And your done!

other resources:
Some Nice Colour Gradients
Web 2.0 Gradient Download

Description: Introducing “Vector Storm” a small brush pack for Photoshop 7+. Includes clouds, lightning, rain drops and lines, rainbow etc. etc.

Terms of Use: None required but a comment or link back would very well appreciated.

Installation: Download File to your ‘…photoshop/presets/brushes’ folder and load from the brush menu in PS.

Enjoy!

And now for the list…

Mini:

• FamFamFam Icons
• mIcons (german)
• 2pt3 twotone
• nDesign Icons
• ASP Icons
• Sweetie Set
• Tiny Icon Factory

Large:

• The Yellow Icon
• Fast Icon
• PixelGirl
• Iconahloic

Site Related:

• Feed Icons (rss icons)
• Social Bookmaring Icons
• Ajax Loading Icons

(Note: Click download link on left menu)