I was just playing around with Blender, and I came up with a really cool effect. I thought to myself, “Hey, that looks pretty cool! Now what can I turn it into? Well, what does it look like? I know - it looks like the head to a sparkler!” And so, I played around a little more, and came up with a pretty neat sparkler.
Since it was such a cool effect, I thought I’d share it with you guys, and tell you how I made it. So without further ado…How to Create a Sparkler in Blender.
Note: I am using Blender 2.47, which is the newest version of Blender at the time of this tutorial’s writing. If you don’t have the newest version of Blender yet, go over to their website and get it now!
Final Result
The finished Sparkler:
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Just the other day, I came across a website that has loads and loads of free Blender materials. I couldn’t believe it! Here, all this time, I had been breaking my back (or should I say, my fingers) over creating just the right materials when you could have just downloaded them for free off of this website!
The website that I’m talking about is blender-materials.org, where you can find materials for everything from metals, dirt, and wood to fire, water, and sky. They also have materials for fibre/fur, electric bolts, barbed wire, alien skin, and much, much, much more.
Don’t believe me? just head over to blender-materials.org and start saving time on materials!
As you may have noticed, the current Wordpress theme that I have on this website (the 3D Vista Style one) was not created by myself (hence the footer). I am only using it temporarily until I can create and code my own template. Just today, I finished creating in Photoshop that new template, and all I have to do now is to code it. So I thought I would give everyone a sneak preview as to what it will look like.
Header
First thing’s first - the header. This is my favorite part of the template, and I think you’ll see why. I used a glow technique to make the “globe” in the logo, and the same effect on the navigation link “Home”. When the user hovers their mouse over one of the links in the navigation, the link will glow, and if they click on the link, it will stay glowing. Take a look for yourself:
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Today, I will show you how to make a glossy cutout orb. You can put any design on the orb that you like, such as a website logo, text, or just a cool shape. Let’s get started!
Final Result
Here is what the finished product will look like:
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Just last Tuesday (July 15th), Wordpress released version 2.6 of their blogging platform. If you have a Wordpress blog, but you aren’t sure if you want to upgrade it or not, then I hope that I can help you with your decision. Below, I have compiled a list of the new features that this version has to offer, so that you can make your own decision of if you want to update or not. Read the rest of this entry »
This week I decided to add a new feature to the site. Now you can make tutorial suggestions and ask questions about any design-related topic that you need help on. Just head over to the Suggestions page in the top menu, and post a comment there asking your question, or suggesting something new.
I hope that this new feature will help everyone to learn more, and that if you have a question, that you will not hesitate to post it.
On a different note, I will be going on vacation until July 12th, and I won’t be able to post anything from now until then. So all posting will stop until July 12th or sometime soon after that (unless I post some more today - by some miracle).
In this tutorial, we will create a sleek blue glossy button in Photoshop. Though I will be using Photoshop CS3, any version will work. Let’s get started!
Finished Product
Here is what we will be making today:
Final
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I’ve just been tagged by Jeremy Keith (Adactio) for Blog Tag. So here are eight random things about me:
- I love playing the guitar. I have two guitars - an acoustic and an electric - but I play my acoustic more. (I don’t know any drummers. ;) )
- I have five computers in my house. (unfortunately, they aren’t all mine…)
- I went to the Bahamas on vacation last year.
- Pizza is my favorite food. (Welcome to America!)
- I just got a new screen for my computer - it’s an HP w2207 display, with a 1680×1050 resolution. It’s nice!
- I have a pet leopard gecko and a pet dog, an Irish Doodle, which is a cross between an Irish Setter and a Poodle.
- I love Pixar. I also love Dreamworks, though I haven’t seen their new movie yet (Kung Fu Panda).
- Web 2.0 is my favorite style of web designing, then hand-drawn, then metal interface style, then finally grunge.
And that’s it! So now I tag you!
In this tutorial, as the title suggests, we will be making some glowing glossy glass text (try saying that five times fast!). I’m using Photoshop CS3, but this tutorial will work on any version, as far as I know. Enough talking - let’s get to the good stuff!
Finished Product
Here’s a picture of what we’ll be making:
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Over the past few years, I have learned many different programming languages. Having typed program after program (”Hello World” after “Hello World”), I have come up with a very specific programming style for formatting my code. Instead of just throwing a bunch of code into a text editor - hoping that I can decipher it when I look at it again in a few months - I carefully indent all of my code to the correct width, and use a lot of comments. Below, I have put together some of my most-used practices so that you can (hopefully) benefit from and build off of them. Read the rest of this entry »
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