
One of the questions that comes in fairly often
is "How'd you do that?" and admittedly, it usually gets a rather
rambling answer which usually consists of, "Well, when I did that I sorta
did this, but for that, I kinda did this other thing, and for the other piece, I
sorta just muddled through." In short, clarity has not always been a strong
suit. Soooo, As your handy dandy webmistress, artist, sometimes writer, chief
cook, and bottle washer, I thought I'd try and at least start gathering some
info together to help folks. At some point, I've started a faq (just barely),
and put up a few links to some excellent information that can help anyone put
together their own site. If you have questions or info you're looking for, let
me know at the regular Pink Rabbit addy: pinkrabbit@mailexcite.com
A lot of these references are from
Educating.Net.

| Writer's Guides and
References | Graphics Tips, Tricks, & Libraries
| Web Design & HTML | Software,
Shareware, & Freeware |
WRITER'S
GUIDES AND REFERENCES
GRAPHICS
TIPS/TRICKS AND LIBRARIES
-
INFORMATION SOURCES
-
The HOW'D THEY
DO THAT ZONE FAQ (or at least the very beginnings of one)
-
ADOBE.COM
- Adobe is the leading creator of graphics programs (with many more
than are individually listed here), and their site is always an
excellent source of information, plugins, updates, and other much needed
resources.
-
PIXART
- Offers tutorials to help users of a wide variety of programs,
including Photoshop, Painter, Freehand, Illustrator, and others.
Also has links, plugins, downloads, and a whole lot of information.
-
THE
PIXEL PLACE A great place for downloadable graphics, how to
tips, and an excellent page on software with links.
-
SCREAMDESIGN
- Formerly Andy's Art Attack. Excellent free buttons, backgrounds,
animations, tips and advice. They also have a pay service and a CD of
their button vault. One of my favorite sites on the web.
-
CLIPART
-
BADGER'S
MEDIEVAL CLIPART PAGE - Medieval designs and images.
-
PEGASUS'
FANTASY GIF GALLERY - A wide array of fantasy images and
animated gifs.
-
SCREAMDESIGN
- Formerly Andy's Art Attack. Excellent free buttons, backgrounds,
animations, tips and advice. They also have a pay service and a CD of
their button vault. One of my favorite sites on the web.
-
WEIRDCLIPART.COM
- Definitely weird. Ever wanted the face on Mars, animated pills, or
other assorted weirdness for your site, then this is the place for you.
-
ONLINE SERVICES
-
ADOBE'S
ONLINE TOOLS - Create an animated banner, optimize (shrink for
posting on the web) images, create an image, or save for the web with
Adobe's free online toolbox.
WEB
DESIGN and HTML
SOFTWARE,
SHAREWARE, & FREEWARE
(shareware links for specifically
for PC unless otherwise mentioned, but many of these programs also have
Macintosh versions--if anyone has Mac links to share, please feel free to
forward the info)
- SOFTWARE LIBRARIES
- HTML PROGRAMS
-
FIRST
PAGE - Excellent freeware html coding program. Text based,
rather than WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get), it nonetheless is
easy to use, intuitive, has a lot of extras and is an excellent choice
for a webmaster who likes see their code or who is on a limited budget
- HTML ACCESSORIES, & EXTRAS
-
FTP PROGRAMS (these allow you to
upload your pages to the web if you don't have built in ftp)
-
CUTE
FTP - my favorite shareware ftp program.
-
WSFTP
LE - Simple, easy to use, freeware ftp program
-
PAINT PROGRAMS
-
ADOBE.COM
- Adobe is the leading creator of graphics programs (with many more
than are individually listed here), and their site is always an
excellent source of information, plugins, updates, and other much needed
resources.
-
ADOBE
PHOTOSHOP 5.5/IMAGE READY 2.0 - Photoshop is the industry
standard paint program, and now that Image Ready is included in the full
package, it's a much more versatile web paint program (it can now do
rollovers, slices, and assorted other tricks). It's also about $600 for
the first time buyer. This page also has quite a few links for current
users of Photoshop.
-
ADOBE
PHOTOSHOP LE (Limited Edition) - Clocking in at roughly
$100, this is a full featured paint program. It doesn't have the full
array of web oriented extras that 5.5 has, but it's an excellent program
for someone who wants to paint, or who wants a really solid hobby level
program.
-
COREL.COM
- Makers of Wordperfect, CorelDraw, PhotoPaint, and has recently
acquired, the complete line of Metacreations software (including Bryce,
Kai's Power Tools, and others).
-
COREL
PHOTOPAINT 9.0 - Photopaint is another solid paint program. It
comes with more freebies, filters, and such, than Photoshop and is, in
some ways a better layout program. For simply painting, though, I must
admit, I prefer the Adobe.
-
CORELDRAW
9.0 LE FOR MACINTOSH - Download the beta for free for a limited
time. This is a vector based image program, not a bitmap (paint
program), but any Mac users who work in vectors should take a look.
CorelDraw has some very nice functions.
-
DEEP
PAINT - Technically, they've been calling this a plug in and you
can use it that way, but it's also a fully featured standalone paint
program which allows you to create what looks like the depth and texture
of real paint on real canvas. You can download the free trial if you
want to give it a whirl.
-
IMAGE
FORGE 2.7 - Very simple, basic image editing program. It can't
do a whole lot, but it's got some nice features, can do text and titles,
and it's freeware.
-
JASC
PAINT SHOP PRO - PSP has grown into a fully featured, very
capable paint program (and now includes an animation program), and at
$100 for the registered version, very reasonably priced. You can
download the shareware version to take a look.
-
PAINTER
- A full featured paint program. I haven't used it in several
years, so I don't have any strong opinions on the current incarnation,
but it was pretty impressive when I used it before.
-
SINGLE PURPOSE ART PROGRAMS
-
BUTTONZ
& TILEZ - Freeware program for making 3D buttons and
tileable backgrounds for webpages.
-
GIF
CONSTRUCTION SET - Simple, easy to use program for assembling
animated gifs. Shareware.
-
ICON
EASEL - Create and edit icons for Windows.
-
MICROANGELO
& GIFTED - Downloadable shareware programs for creating
icons, and animated gifs.
-
REPTILE
- A wonderful little freeware program specifically for creating
tileable background images. Anybody can use this one, and it's not only
really cool, but fun too.
-
3D ART PROGRAMS
-
BRYCE
- A simply wonderful 3D program for creating some of the most
incredible landscapes. It's easy to use as such things go, and the
results can be spectacular.
-
POSER
- Excellent 3D program for the human figure. If you're interested in
working with the human body, this one is for you. Set body type
variable, change positions, add clothes, facial expressions, even
animate the figures you design. The newest version also includes several
animal figures.
-
PLUGINS
-
KRUSTY'S
PLUGINS - A really nice collection of free plugins for Adobe
Photoshop. I haven't checked its compatibility with PhotoPaint and Paint
Shop Pro, but they claim they're compatible with Photoshop plugins.
-
EXTENSIS
PHOTO BEVEL SOLO & PHOTO TEXT SOLO - Freeware
standalone plugins from Extensis available as introductions to their
larger packages for sale.
-
KAI'S
POWER TOOLS - Excellent plugin package for Adobe Photoshop (I
haven't checked the compatibility with PhotoPaint or Paint Shop Pro, but
they claim to be completely compatible with all Photoshop Plugins).
-
UNPLUGGED
- A nice set of totally free Photoshop, PhotoPaint, & Paint Shop Pro
Plugins.
-
MISCELLANEOUS, ODDBALL, AND FUNSTUFF
-
SETI@HOME
- From Berkeyly U (of course), this little freeware screensaver lets
you participate in the Search for Intelligent Life on your home
computer.
-
SOPHOCLES
- Nice shareware screenwriting program. Simple and easy to use. The
registered version allows you to export scripts to html.
-
QUICKNOTES
- Freeware program which allows you to create sticky notes on your
desktop.
|