Learn Photo Editing: Tutorials for Designers and Photographers

Photoshop provides designers and photographers with the opportunity professionally edit photos for the best results. While there are almost endless possibilities for photo editing with Photoshop, there can be a lot to learn.

Here we will present links to various tutorials on a wide range of topics related to photo editing. If you’re looking to learn more about a specific type of editing or technique, or if you are just getting started with photo editing, this post should serve as an excellent resource for you. The tutorials listed below are separated into categories to make it easier to find what you’re looking for.

Eyes:

Changing Eye Color in an Image

25 Beautiful Church Websites – Part IV

Over the past two years we have published three collections of the best church web designs for your own design inspiration, and today we are continuing with the fourth post in this series. This includes another 25 well-designed church websites.

If you’re interested in the previous posts:

• 50 of the Best Church Website Designs
• 35 Excellent Church Websites – Part II
• 25 Outstanding Church Websites – Part III

St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church

Is Freelancing Right for You?

Web designers face the difficult decision of whether they should work as an employee, freelance, or both. While it can be a tough decision, the good news is that they are all viable options and you just need to find the best fit for your own situation. There is no right or wrong answer and in this article we’ll take a look at some of the common purposes of freelancing and the keys to determining if it is right for you.

Common Goals and Purposes of Freelancing:

Everyone has their own unique circumstances in life and career, and not every freelancer has the same reasons for working as a freelancer. Whether or not freelancing is right for you will be impacted by a number of factors regarding your personal situation. Here is a quick look at some of the most common purposes of freelancing, along with a description of when it may be a good fit.

1. Work on the Side – One of the great things about freelancing is that it can be whatever you want or need it to be. Many freelancers have other full-time or part-time jobs and their freelance work is just a gig on the side, at least for the time being.

It may be right for you if…

• You are looking to turn your skills or hobbies into some extra cash.
• You want to expand your horizons and learn new things.
• You want to move towards full-time freelancing but with reduced financial risk.
• You are a student and looking to gain real-world experience before graduating.
• You are a full-time designer for an agency and you’re interested in building your profile and name recognition.

35 Outstanding GIMP Tutorials

For those who do not have Photoshop, GIMP is an excellent (and free) alternative. While there are not as many online resources and tutorials as there are for Photoshop users, GIMP users do have a number of quality tutorials to help in their own learning. In this post we’ll showcase 35 of the best tutorials for GIMP. Some of them are adaptations of popular Photoshop tutorials that show how to replicate the process in GIMP.

Splattered Vector in GIMP

45 Amazing and Free Photoshop Actions

Photoshop actions allow designers and photographers to automate common sequences for increased efficiency. There are countless actions available that can be downloaded for free, and in this post we’ll feature 45 of them. Some of these are individual actions and others are sets that include multiple actions.

Photoshop Action 15

27 of the Best Real Estate Websites

Every now and then we like to publish a showcase of well-designed websites from a particular industry, and today we’re focusing on sites that are related to real estate. The showcase includes sites of real estate companies, rental properties, housing communities, office complexes, and more.

MacAllan Ridge

33 Excellent Business Card Templates for Your Own Use

Business cards are a necessity for freelance designers. If you need to save some time or don’t have the experience to design your own cards, templates can be a great option. many printing companies offer templates to choose from, and you can also find others available from different sources. In this post we’ll feature 33 templates, 11 are free and 22 are premium. The premium templates generally only cost a few dollars and can be well worth the expense.

Free Business Card Templates:

5 Business Card Templates Pack (Photoshop)

Tutorial: How to Make a Photoshop Brush Set

Photoshop brushes are used all the time by designers to create stunning graphics quickly and easily. While there are plenty of free and premium Photoshop brushes available for download, there are times when you can’t find an existing brush or brush pack that meets your needs. Or maybe you’ve found one that would be perfect, but it’s not licensed for use on commercial projects. In these situations you can create your own custom brushes and use them however you choose.

In this tutorial we will be going through the process of creating a Photoshop brush that resembles a realistic paint brush stroke. Although there are already a number of brush packs of this kind available, being able to create your own will give you more flexibility. Here’s a preview of what we will be creating.

Pros and Cons of Package-Based Pricing for Web Design

Pricing services is one of the most challenging parts of being a designer. Most designers have an opinion of what their time is worth and what they want to make on an hourly basis, but accurately estimating everything that will be involved with a project and how much time it will take can be very difficult.

In attempt to simplify pricing for both the designer and the client, some designers and agencies use package-based pricing with prices listed on their website. While offering proposals or quotes for each project is more common, package-based pricing is used frequently enought that it warrants consideration from the designer or agency.

In this post we’ll take a detailed look at both the pros and cons of listing your prices publicly. It may be worth noting that Vandelay Design does not use package-based pricing, although this has not always been the case. A few years ago packages were listed on the site before deciding to price projects on a case-by-case basis.

Pros of Package-Based Pricing:

1. Gives Visitors a Clear Picture of What to Expect

Many visitors and potential clients really have no idea what to expect in terms of how much they will need to spend for web design and development services. In some cases this is a result of a lack of experience in dealing with the subject, but another contributing factor is that prices can vary so drastically. If a client is looking simply for a low-cost provider, regardless of the type of project there will always be someone who is willing to take on the work (not necesarilly qualified) for a fraction of what most of the competition would charge. This variance in pricing can make it difficult for clients to know what is included at that price, what quality of work and customer service they will receive, and how this compares to their other options.

Clients like to know what to expect, and package-based pricing can give them the general information before they even contact the designer. If the pricing is out of their budget they can move on to another designer, or they can re-consider what they are willing to spend. Clients can make comparisons much easier with package-based pricing, assuming the details and any potential add-ons are clearly provided.

Adobe Illustrator Brushes: Best of

Photoshop brushes get a lot of attention from designers and bloggers, but quality Illustrator brushes are a little bit harder to come by. In this post we’ll feature more than 40 of the best sets of free Illustrator brushes, totaling over 1,700 brushes.

Brush Strokes:

Multi-Colored Paint Brushes (57 brushes)