The web is full of amazingly useful tools and resources for graphic designers. These are a few of my favorites, in no particular order:
1. Blue Vertigo
For the last 5 years, Blue Vertigo has amassed one of the single largest useful links list anywhere. You’ll find both free and pay fonts, stock photos, vector art, photoshop brushes, and a whole range of other useable items that would take a whole page to talk about.
2. Brands of the World
Download vector logos from well-known companies from around the world at Brands of the World. Their database is searchable, enormous, free, and is indispensable for when you’re creating presentation materials for your big pitch.
3. Identifont
Need to figure out the name of a font from a sample? Identifont makes it simple. Just click on Identify a font, answer some questions, and in a few minutes, you’ll get your answer. (Note: Because of the constantly increasing amount of fonts out there, and the nature of licensing and proprietary media, Identifont isn’t a complete solution by a longshot. It is, however, very reliable, and the first place I turn to when needing to identify a font.)
4. 37signals
Some of my favorite project collaboration tools, collaborative writing tools, and information organization tools– all extremely robust, web-based applications for business and personal use. 37signals makes all their apps (free and pay) simple to understand and a breeze to use.
5. Browsershots
Browsershots is a web-based tool that allows you to test your website in several browsers and platforms, all from your desktop. Wait times in the queue are right around 3 hours at the moment, but it’s free, simple to use, and a great alternative to buying several different machines for design testing. If you’re a serious web designer, don’t want to wait, and don’t mind paying $60 a month, try BrowserCam.
6. Protolize.org
This site describes itself as housing “essential web tools in one place.” It’s true, and it has saved my ass on a few occasions.
7. Lynda.com
I attended my first Lynda Weinman seminar in 1999 and became an immediate believer. For over 10 years, Lynda and her crew have been producing some of the best educational materials for creative professionals anywhere. They offer a wide range of stuff, in several different mediums. My favorite (next to the live events), is the Online Training Library. It costs $25/month or $250/year ($375/year if you want access to the exercise files), and is worth every single penny. I’d go as far as to say that they are undercharging for the sheer volume and quality of educational materials you’ll get as a user.
2 Responses to “Useful Sites and Tools For Designers”
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Good list. I wasn’t familiar with a few of those.
I’m a big 37signals fan as well, and use Basecamp and Ta-da List every day for work and personal projects. For client work, I’ve had a little less success with it in terms of communicating with other people, just because I think it takes both finding the right kind of clients who will embrace web-based collaboration tools, and also properly training them on the system.
You know, there was a small learning curve at the beginning of using BaseCamp with clients… but I found that once several people across several different organizations became active on a collaborative project– folks really embraced it. Communication and task alignment became a complete no-brainer, because everyone was always in the loop and aware of every step.