Hand-Drawn Scrolls (1 pattern)

Antique Engraved (1 pattern)

Stylized Clouds (1 pattern)

Grungy Natural Beige Patterns (6 patterns)

Grungy Natural Beige Patterns 2 (6 patterns)

Floral (1 pattern)

Leafy Set (3 patterns)

Gypsy Garden (1 pattern)

Late Bloomer (3 patterns)

Hexagonal Patterns (72 patterns)

Damask (1 pattern)

Charcoal Damask (1 pattern)

Patterns by onethirtytwo (6 patterns)

Tileable Classic Nebula Space Patterns (8 patterns)

Tileable Starfield Patterns (5 patterns)

Carbon Fiber (10 patterns)

Carbon Fiber (1 pattern)

Spiderman (1 pattern)

Seamless Stripes (13 patterns)

Stripe Patterns 2 (20 patterns)

Basic Elements (50 patterns)

Handmade Paper (8 patterns)

Grunge Patterns (9 patterns)

Victorian Dreams (10 patterns)

Grim Lady Baroque Patterns (4 patterns)

Midnight Blue Patterns (6 patterns)

Carbon (2 patterns)

Skulls and Hearts (3 patterns)

Patterns Pack 4 (3 patterns)

Hearts and Boxes (3 patterns)

Different Texture (1 pattern)

Skull Patterns (2 patterns)

Patterns Pack 04 (10 patterns)

Patterns Pack 05 (15 patterns)

Patterns Pack 21 (15 patterns)

Vintage Pea Green Patterns (6 patterns)

Grungy Vintage Dots (8 patterns)

Tileable Clouds (4 patterns)

Flower Patterns (4 patterns)

Pretty in Pink (2 patterns)

Tech and Screentone Patterns (26 patterns)

Web 2.0 Patterns (139 patterns)

Halftones (28 patterns)

Scanlines (21 patterns)

Terrains (8 patterns)

Wood Patterns (9 patterns)

Concrete Patterns (12 patterns)

Textured Stripes (6 patterns)

Micro Patterns (54 patterns)

Animal Prints (32 patterns)

Honeycomb (5 patterns)

Elegant Floral (1 pattern)

Mono Circles (3 patterns)

Tileable Icy and Watery Seamless Blue Textures (9 patterns)

Grungy Teal Tileable Patterns (6 patterns)

Tileable Basket Weave Textures (4 patterns)

Diagonal Stripes (6 patterns)

Pink Floral (1 pattern)

Abstract Swirls (1 pattern)



The app store is robust with lots of apps available for lots of things. I do think the iPhone has the Droid beat in what apps are currently available to the market right now. It wont be long though before the Android market place tops Apple’s app store.

I have a few apps that I cant live without that I want to share win you today. First up is ActionComplete a project management/to-do list organizer/nagging personal assistant. This thing is heavy duty in being a great assistant to the busy professional. I searched through and tried out about 10 different to-do lists but the thing that they all fell short on was the ability to involve other people into he tasks. ActionComplete can send text messages to remind individuals of tasks they need to complete, which a huge bonus to me and my business partner.

The next is not really an app but more a part of the phone and how it works. The Droid is setup to be linked to a Gmail account and here at PixelGlacier we use Google apps for our business. So upon setting up and activating the phone my business email, calender, and contacts were automatically inserted into the phone. I am never more than 10 seconds from a client now.

Another app that I highly recommended is the Advanced Task Killer, this apparently acts much like the task manager on windows. It allows you to kill certain apps that are running in the background to free up memory and save your battery.
If you have been considering getting a Motorola Droid I highly encourage you to do so. I think this phone will get my life and business back on track!

P.s. – I posted this article using the droid and the wordpress app.

1. He has Photoshop, Dude.

Their nephew has a hacked version of Photoshop 7 that he pulled off of The Pirate Bay. That’s as good as any up to date design program you have, I assure you. He also is amazing at making reflections and stuff in there so, you’re already a step behind.

2. He’s Cheaper and/or Free

Let’s face it, good design costs money. When the clients nephew works for pizza or just a family favor his cost is already way less than you can conceive. He has no overhead because this is just a hobby. It’s also important to note that his quality will be better because he “knows”.

3. He provides unlimited revisions

That’s pretty self explanatory, you can’t even compete with that.

4. He has a longer client relationship than you’ll ever have

Their nephew has known them since he was born and well, you just met them. So, don’t take it to hard when you realize that they already have a lifetime of first hand experience with the client. The client saw their first steps. What did you see? Their poorly designed website and inquired about the re-design?

5. He will be praised at Christmas dinner (Where you won’t be)

What better time to haggle and praise him than at Christmas. His parents will be so proud that he is still working on this amazing site that they’ll brag about him to all the family. Heck, even the client will be there. You can’t offer this kind of service so, just hang it up already.

6. He’ll make the logo…well, bigger

He knows everything about the web already. He knows that a logo is better when it’s the biggest possible thing on the screen. Plus, he’s not afraid to make it bigger than you’re ever willing to make it.

7. He has Photoshop, Remember?

Again, Photoshop. He has it.

8. He practically created the interwebs

He’s had all kinds of classes in school like intro to keyboarding. He was basically around when Al Gore created the internet so, he knows all the tricks. He doesn’t even bother with SEO because capital letters are “teh suck“.

9.This Technically accurate list post says so

Because we know, that you know, we know. Ya know?

10. He has a Myspace account

Myspace is social media at its finest. He doesn’t have a twitter account or a website or waste time on analytics. He just puts up on myspace that he is a designer and viola. He is. Because out of all his 62 creepy old guy Myspace friends they’ll give him more traffic than you ever could through campaigns or any other well designed campaign launch.

To help every small business owner build a successful presence on the search engine result pages, I’ve compiled the 25 most influential SEO tactics. Employ them into your website and you should see dramatic improvement in how Google values your site.

1. Keyword use anywhere in title tag – Each page should always have a unique title tag that is descriptive of what the page is all about. The title tag of your website should not only be easy to read, but should also be written to bring in traffic. While you need your title to be optimized for your main keyword for that specific page, it should not be stuffed with keywords. If you are a business catering to local customers, be sure to include locality in the title tag.
2. Keyword use at the beginning of the title tag – Concentrate on a keyword for which you want to rank well in Google and use it at the very beginning of the title tag. Regardless of what you may think, your company name does not belong there and sometimes should not be used in the title at all. You have a limited number of characters that will be indexed by the search engines so use those well.
3. Keyword focused anchor text from external links – Inbound links from other domains are crucial. Inbound links with your keyword as the anchor text are much, much better. They are highly important for SEO.
4. External link popularity/relevancy – Quantity and quality of external links matter greatly. While every link is like a vote and the more links your page gets the more popular Google considers your site to be, quality trumps quantity. It’s much better to have three highly relevant links to you from other popular related websites than 30 links from unrelated low ranked sites.
5. Diversity of link sources – It is better to have inbound links from many unique root domains. Don’t get all your links from one type of source; make sure you have a healthy blend.
6. Unique content – Duplicate content is frown upon by the search engines.
7. Fresh content – Adding a dynamic component to your website that will add or change content regularly is a good way to freshen your page. Search engines are like children ever hungry for new information so fresh and relevant content can be very appealing. Add viral aspect and plenty of quality incoming links and you got yourself an authoritative page and will rank well.
8. Authority of the domain – New content on a domain that already has a strong online presence is valued more by the search engines.
9. Keyword in domain name – Having a keyword in the domain name can give you a great SEO edge over your competition.
10. Keyword use in body text – Repeating your keyword(s) throughout the content of the page tells Google what the page is about and how relevant it is to a particular search term. Don’t overdo it; make sure to write for humans first. Bolding important keywords makes a difference as well.
11. Keyword in H1 header tag - Google knows that the most important information on the page is in the header tag. Make sure there is only one H1 tag and optimize it well.
12. Keyword in anchor text for internal links – Having links to a particular page from other pages on its own domain is important. Those links show the search engines that this page is highly valued. Take that further and link with a keyword as the anchor text to give yourself a nice SEO boost.
13. Keyword in anchor text of outbound links – Linking out should be apart of your SEO strategy. If you are not linking out at all you are sending a signal that you are not part of the Internet as a whole. Make sure to only link out to relevant and quality pages and use keyword-rich anchor text.
14. Keyword at the beginning of the page (50-100 words) – Search engines assume that the top of your page contains the most important and relevant information so make sure that you use important and relevant keywords in the first 50-100 words on your page.
15. Keyword in page URL - Google pays attention to sites with keywords in their permalinks. Make sure that your blog is not setup to use session IDs in the URL. It is always better to use descriptive, easier to read and keyword-rich URLs.
16. Keyword use in other headline tags (H2 – H6) – Although less important then H1, other header tags still carry some SEO weight and should not be overlooked.
17. Keyword in alt text for images – Every relevant image should have an alt tag with your keywords mentioned in the tag.
18. Domain age – This one goes along the authority of the domain (#8). Older domains enjoy more credibility then their younger counterparts simply because they are viewed as more trustworthy. Also, spammers often register domains for very short periods of time so it is always a good idea to register a domain for more then just a couple of years.
19. Existence of meta description tag – Even though having keywords in the meta description doesn’t impact rankings they can play a significant role in the sites click through rate from the SERPs. The description tag is the paragraph that people will see when your page comes up in the search results, so it should be captivating and designed to attract business.
20. HTML to text ratio – Bloated code and poor load time are a really bad thing for the search engines. Be sure to use include files to call your scripts wherever possible, and just clean up or take out all of your unnecessary code. You’d be surprised by what you can live without or how much can be called from an external file.
21. Page that is HTML valid to W3C Standards – HTML Validation is not necessary, but running validation is an easy way to catch broken code that can trap spiders.
22. Use of XML Sitemap – The XML site map has become the de facto standard for ensuring all that of your pages get crawled.
23. Permanent 301 Redirects – If you have to change the filename of an existing page or delete it entirely, you have to make sure to redirect both search engine spiders and humans to another page on your site. There are two main reasons for using a 301 redirect: one is to avoid the 404 (page not found) error (search engines do not like sites with broken links and they may see them as not credible), the other is to retain the value of any inbound links you may have obtained for that page.
24. Canonical Issues: the www.vs non www – Google sees subdomains as separate domain names, and the www prefix is just another subdomain. It is important to decide which version to use. You then need to implement the proper rules on your host server (via .htaccess on Apache and its own method for Windows servers) plus set the record straight in Google Webmaster tools.
25. Neighboring Domains – Having spammers as your IP neighbors can be potentially bad so make sure to buy hosting services from a reputable company.

Guerrilla marketing is a great way to showcase your freelance business to potential clients without using much cash, thus keeping your business costs low and your ability to pick up and move onto another idea seem almost seamless in transition. So below are 15 killer guerrilla marketing tactics you can start using today.

1. Custom designed bookmarks ↓

I’ve said before that business cards inside bookmarks are a great way to showcase your business to people who are looking for books in your target market, but what about taking it a step further and designing some bookmarks that showcase a cool design and also give some information on your business? Then it doesn’t look like a marketing campaign at all and the reader of the books will likely keep the bookmark a lot longer, increasing your chances to make a sale with them.

2. Write tutorials on how to do what it is you do ↓

If there’s one thing that will showcase your skills, writing tutorials will probably be #1 on most peoples list. The benefits for writing tutorials are that you get to show potential clients you know so much about your business that you can write step by step tutorials for someone like them to understand it, even if they have zero previous knowledge about it. It’s ok to boast your knowledge a little bit – and best of all, it only costs you some time (you could even shop the tutorial around and see if a bigger site would pick it up and pay you for it).

3. 1,000 free business cards with every web design ↓

Do you design websites for small business owners, or someone who may benefit from business cards? Why not offer 1,000 free business cards to them when they purchase a web design from you – you could even build the price of the cards into your pricing if you want to offset the cost of them. Zoo Printing has 1,000 business cards (business account required, FREE to sign up) for around $30.00.

4. Partner with a company outside of your niche ↓

There’s a lot of talk about building relationships within your niche on social media sites and shaking hands, making friends, ect – but why not step out of your niche and find friends elsewhere? The benefits of this is that you can help them help you and you’re not competing with them for clients. If you’re a web designer who creates website designs for musicians, why not team up with a cd publishing company and co-promote each others services? Think outside the box and get some business cards from people you normally wouldn’t talk to – it’ll definitely pay off!

5. Write your domain on dollars ↓

No, it’s not illegal – writing on bills is ok as long as it doesn’t affect the ability for the bill to be used in sales. So all you need to do is write your url right on the bottom of the bill without writing over top of anything else and you’re good to go. Do this on every bill that comes across your hands and you’re sure to get 1,000+ bills out there in no time. And they’re circulating in areas you normally wouldn’t even be in, so the reach is large.

6. Go overboard on the stamps ↓

Sending your business package to potential clients in the mail can have you end up in the bin of other businesses trying to pitch their ideas, but what if you used more stamps? If you have 39 of the 1 penny stamps on the envelope, what are the chances that it catches the potential clients eye when they’re shuffling through their mail?

7. Start your own blog directly on your site ↓

This ties into the tutorial idea above, but why not start a blog about the type of topics that your potential clients would benefit from reading? Explain how you handle business transactions, show the productivity tools you use, showcase pictures of your office, discuss the benefits of hiring a _________ (insert designer, photographer, copywriter, programmer, ect). The traffic will build and the exposure could turn into some very big clients coming across your work.

8. Hold a free presentation about your business ↓

Mason from Small Fuel could explain to you better as to why this is a great idea and why the 15-30 minutes of talking it takes to hold a presentation could turn into cold hard cash. You can read his article here.

9. Hold a contest and offer your services as the prize ↓

If you’re wanting to get more eyes to your website, this is a good idea as long as you’re offering quality services/products. You can actually see how this works here on Spyre Studios by checking out the Giveaways category. It’s definitely a great way to gain momentum for a newly launched website and company.

10. Give a gift for the holidays ↓

It’s Christmas time, so why not send potential clients a gift basket? It’s a nice gesture and will definitely show them that you’re not just a paper and pen type of company – you have a beating heart and you’re a real person. That is one of the main things companies look for, so doing this puts you at the front of the race.

11. Cross promote on 404 pages ↓

If someone finds a broken link or tries to view a page that just isn’t there, why not showcase some information about your business on it? It’s extra ad space that is often underused and is visible to a good amount of people – you’d be amazed at how many people get 404 errors on your website/blog.

12. Pay for word of mouth ↓

Spend a bit of cash, hire some people to help promote your business and let them hit the pavement (so to speak). When someone has a cash incentive to talk about a company, they are much more open to promoting them to their friends. When someone refers a company to their friend, the friend is much more likely to use that company. It’s a win/win for you and the person doing the promotion for you. A lot of bands have street teams, why can’t you?

13. Enter business awards and CSS galleries ↓

I put the two together here, even though they’re a bit different. Entering your company into business awards can be a great way to showcase your talent to your peers and also gain attention of competition as well as business who could benefit from your services. Entering the CSS galleries like CSS Mania and CSS Remix is a great way to showcase your site as well as drive a ton of traffic to your website.

14. Hold a benefit dinner ↓

Doing this shouldn’t be about you – it should be about a special cause that you’d like to raise some money for. Although, the promotion from having your name side by side with the benefit could do really well for your business and also show your local community that you’re a business that cares about others. I’m planning on doing a couple of these this summer.

15. Get active on social media sites ↓

WAIT! Before you skip over this one, hear me out. You need to be active on social media sites, but utilize them in ways that others haven’t yet. Engaging your potential clients is one thing, but turning your twitter account into one that just randomly tweets about your business is a completely different idea. Me, I’d stick more to the first method. If a social media site doesn’t seem beneficial to your business, don’t be mad. Find the one that your client base is hanging out on and utilize that instead.

1. Inappropriate domain name: Pick a domain name that is memorable and relates to your business. Since people are likely to forget very long names, shorter domain names are typically better, but not always. For example, a name like Peter.com can be too vague and says nothing about the content of the Web site.

2. Poor design and functionality: Why have a Web site with content if no one can access it? Good design is largely based on consistency. Menus should appear in the same place on every page, links should all be the same color/typeface, and a logo of some sort should be clearly visible at all times.

3. Too complicated or too slow: Although flash animation may look amazing, it may be too complex for casual Internet users. Though aesthetics certainly matter, it must be in balance with functionality and ease of use for the typical user. Also, a more complex design takes longer to load on many computers.

4. Stagnant site: Not only is content time-sensitive, so is format and design. There will always be new tools available to make Web sites better looking and better performing. It is not cost-effective to create a Web site and let it sit. Update content regularly and take advantage of (appropriate) new technologies to make the site look better.

5. Broken links and 404 error messages: Make sure every link on your site works. You’ll lose users quickly if they see a “404 file not found” error message or find broken or incorrectly labeled links. If you have a large site, consider adding a form so users can submit a broken link, which lets users know you are on top of any problems they discover.

6. No contact info: Users need to be able to contact you with questions, complaints, and suggestions. A Contact Us page, like an Internet business card, should be available from any part of your site. Also, be sure to actually answer these messages either personally or through an auto-reply.

7. Ignoring statistics: Detailed reports of visitor traffic are available for your Web site. This service may be offered by your hosting provider or obtained through a third party. By monitoring your statistics (such as visitors-turned-customers, users on broadband, etc.) you can tailor your marketing and design toward those who visit most or find weak spots based on who you are not attracting.

8. Free or cheap hosting: As attractive as some of these services are, realize that the reliability of your business depends on the reliability of your hosting. A good host service should have minimal downtime, offer services such as shopping cart systems, and have good customer support. Be sure to read reviews and apply for free trials (if possible) before you commit to anything.

9. Avoiding spiders: Spiders are what search engines use to find your page. You want to make sure your pages are designed so that you show up high on search engine rankings. This process is called search engine optimization. There are, however, ethics and strategies to SEO. Some practices (such as hidden text, redirects, etc.) will result in you being banned from search engines.

10. Not hiring a professional: Search engine optimization is complex. To move up in the listings on Google and other search engines, you may want to hire a professional, especially if your business relies heavily on generating business from the Web.

Contact us today and see how we can help with your next project.

The Footer

Here’s the footer we’ll be creating, click on the shot below to see the full size version:

Step 1

Along with liquid headers and footers, gradients are a common hallmark of Web 2.0 style design. For our tutorial we will be using a neat package of gradients that simular 3d / materials that you can get from the excellent Deziner Folio site. Click Here to Download the Gradient Package

Step 2

Open your new Photoshop file. I’ve created mine with large dimensions – 1440 px x 900px (to fit my 17inch notebook screen). Of course your actual footer shouldn’t be this large, however it’s good to simulate what happens when your browser window is stretched.

Choose a background color, in my case the choice for background is a simple gradient with #b0b0b0 and #e1e1e1. Move your cursor on the screen holding SHIFT to create a vertical gradient down the page.

Step 3

In web design it’s very important to decide what kind of layout you are going to be creating. That is to decide between a liquid layout (one that stretches out across your browser) or fixed (in many Web 2.0 style sites fixed layouts are usually centralized). In our footer, we will work with a fixed layout measured out to 760px x 420px. These measurements will ensure that even on an 800px x 600px screen, our footer will still appear properly.

Use guides to delineate the size of your website as shown below. Note that if you want create a layout that is optimized for 1024px x 768px setups, then define your guides to delineate a 955px x 600px area.

Step 4

Although our footer is a fixed width, we still want the footer to stretch out across the page and fill out the remaining area. To do this we will use a pattern made by me in photoshop to simulate a metal plate. To download the pattern click here. Open this image in photoshop and go to Edit > Define Pattern and choose a name for the pattern.

Now open a new file with 1440px for width and 86px for height, and go to Edit > Fill and pick the pattern we just created. Select all (CTRL+A for PC and APPLE+A for Mac), then cut and paste the image into the bottom of our first document. You will get the result shown below.

Step 5

Now it’s time to user our beautiful gradient package from Step 1. Create a new layer and create a rectangle using Marquee Tool (M) with 100% of document width and 21px of height. Now select Gradient Tool (G) and select a cool gradient. I selected “Black 5 – Gloss” from the gradient package. Now move the gradient tool vertically over the marquee holding down “SHIFT” to ensure it’s exactly vertical.

Move the resulting shape to the top of the shape created in step 4. You should have something that looks similar to the screenshot below.

Step 6

Now we add a drop shadow effect to the layer we created in Step 5.

Step 7

Now set your Foreground Color to #545557 and Background Color to #1e211f. Create new layer below the step 4 layer. Use the Marquee Tool (M) to select the content of the step 4 layer. Select Gradient Tool (G), choose the first gradient (combination of back and foreground colors). Draw a gradient over the marque holding shift to get the vertical gradient. Now go to the step 4 layer and set this layer’s blending mode to Multiply.

Step 8

Now create a new layer above all the other layers and draw a rounded rectangle in the middle of our guides, choosing the color to be #dfdfdf. Right click the layer, click on Blending Options and then create a Drop Shadow effect for the rectangle. Then right-click on the effect layer and choose “create layer”. This will split the drop shadow on to its own layer.

Now you have the rectangle layer and shadow layer, move and resize the shadow to get the result below. You may wish to press CTRL-T to get the transform tool up, then right-click and choose Perspective, then drag the top two handles in towards each other. Alternately you can move the shadow down and use a soft eraser brush to brush out the top edges.

Step 9

To finish the design add some text, copyright information and your logo to the bottom.

Step 10

To get the footer ready for use in your HTML file, simply remove the text (the text will be added in HTML), flatten the whole file and cut the background of footer as shown below, then paste it in to a new file. As we did in Photoshop, the pattern can be produced using a background property in your CSS document. This is the reason why we have cut the image so small as this leads to better performance with the smaller file size.

To cut the center of footer just select the content inside guides and cut-it and paste into another file.

Save both files using Save > Save For Web & Devices and select JPG with an appropriate quality setting. JPGs and PNGs are good for images like the one shown where there are a lot of graduations of color. GIF images are better for areas of flat color. This is due to the algorithms each uses.

The Footer

And you’re done, a lovely footer element! For more great footer ideas, check out Thiuven’s 35 Beautiful Footer Designs.

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