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Sometimes you don’t need to build interactive wireframes, or may not feel all that comfortable in Visio or OmniGraffle. I know there are times I just want to open up Photoshop and start laying things out.

This web UI template kit is made completely with shape objects and in some cases converted into SmartObjects. So they’re totally scalable. There are no usage restrictions but if you find them helpful give us a shout. We love hearing from you!

CLICK TO DOWNLOAD

via

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Mike Finch is a firm believer that “UX” is a verb- not a noun. It’s a process, and he believes that if documented and followed correctly, it’s a process that anyone can have a reasonable amount of success with. As professionals, we need to shout these solutions from the rooftops- not keep them as guarded secrets. To that end, Mike has outlined his personal process when designing for user experience and made this awesome poster for your office wall.

File Type: PDF
Number in Set: 1
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Mike Finch

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New Twitter is out now for most all users and we’ve seen the complaint of your BG designs being borked. We had great success with our Free PSD Twitter background template. Good news we’ve kept it simple like the last so, it’s efficient and easy to use.

Note:

Twitter aligns all backgrounds to the left.

Make note of this when designing your background. Also, you can put elements to the far right but be aware that some users will not see them depending on what monitor/resolution they are running. I included the “twitter container” (logo and space where your tweets are housed) it is actual size. So you can move it into different resolutions to keep in mind what other users will see.

File Type: PSD
Number in Set: 1
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Chad Engle

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Freebies and open source content are some of the best things we can run across as creatives. These help out in a pinch, sometimes are great starts to making a document or design and help save time. Some really great and inspiring things are coming from 365PSD, The League of Movable Type and Iconpaper. These three sites are tremendously different but each is unique and shares some amazing content.

365 PSD

Now, if the name alone “365 PSD” hasn’t got you excited it should… 365PSD makes as you would guess a free PSD everyday for an entire year. The quality of free layered files that are being given away is amazing. There are some pixel perfect icons, navigation buttons and full site layouts as well as full iPhone app layouts. This is a site that is fast becoming a daily stop for many creatives. Whether you use the PSD’s to learn how the pro’s make their files or you just want some extra beef to throw into that new design you should go check out 365psd.com

The League of Moveable Type

The League of Movable Type has banned together to once and for all cut through the crap and make free, good, open source fonts for all. The best part about this is that they are @font-face ready. These fonts are must downloads especially if you are trying to trim some cost of a design or just want some amazing rockin’ fonts. If you think that their awesome (which they are) you can join in the collaboration.

Iconpaper

Iconpaper brings you some amazing icons, wallpapers, dock themes, and everything in between. The guys curating iconpaper are all over the place trying to find the best content and update for you daily. They’ve had some amazing background as well as icons that have adorned my computer several times. So, whether you need some inspiration, an awesome new icon for your computer or just something to mull through, check out Iconpaper you’ll be happy you did.

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When we released The Lost Principles of Design we had amazing comments about the artwork that was used. So, we’ve created some backgrounds for a few of them that worked the best. If we didn’t include your favorite let us know and we will add it to the post. These come in various sizes for all your devices & monitors.

File Type: Jpg’s
Number in Set: 9

• 2560×1440
• 1920×1200
• 1680×1050
• 1440×900
• 1280×1024
• 1280×800
• 1024×768
• iPhone (320×480)
• iPad(1024×1024)

License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Chad Engle

File Type: Jpg’s
Number in Set: 9

• 2560×1440
• 1920×1200
• 1680×1050
• 1440×900
• 1280×1024
• 1280×800
• 1024×768
• iPhone (320×480)
• iPad(1024×1024)

License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Chad Engle

File Type: Jpg’s
Number in Set: 9

• 2560×1440
• 1920×1200
• 1680×1050
• 1440×900
• 1280×1024
• 1280×800
• 1024×768
• iPhone (320×480)
• iPad(1024×1024)

License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Chad Engle

File Type: Jpg’s
Number in Set: 9

• 2560×1440
• 1920×1200
• 1680×1050
• 1440×900
• 1280×1024
• 1280×800
• 1024×768
• iPhone (320×480)
• iPad(1024×1024)

License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Chad Engle

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We know starting a project can be a real pain no matter how easy the task may be. We’ve put together the IAB standard size ad templates for you in one little packaged up file. They come in two flavors, Photoshop and Illustrator. We’ve also put together some nice resources and other downloads below that you may find helpful in starting a project. If there is anything you’d like to see us give away in the future, let us know in the comments.

Sizes:

The Details

File Type: Psd & Ai
Number in Set: 15
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Chad Engle

Ai – Illustrator Download

Compatible with CS1+ and comes with 15 presized Ai’s ready for you to design.

Psd – Photoshop Download

Compatible with CS1+ and comes with 15 presized Psd’s ready for you to design.

Other High Quality Freebies:

Fuel Your Creativity

• Facebook fanpage PSD
• Twitter Background PSD

teehan + lax

• iPad GUI PSD
• iPhone GUI PSD

NaldzGraphics

• Free E-Commerce Icon Sets

GO Media

• Vector Freebie: Hand Drawn Wings

WebDesignLedger

• Beautiful Patterns and Textures for Ornate Backgrounds

WeFunction

• WooFunction Free Icon Set goes Live

Tutorial9

• Mono Icons: Huge Set of Minimal Icons

Daniel Mall

• Youtube & Vimeo Photoshop Templates

Other Information

Please consult these additional creative guidelines for more information:

IAB Ad Unit Guidelines 2009 Update (PDF Download)

IAB Ad Units

IAB Digital Video Creative Guidelines

IAB Pop-Up Guidelines

IAB Rich Media Guidelines

IAB Universal Ad Package

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Our own Javier Rivero made a FYC themed background for your viewing pleasure. This will give you a nice fresh background so you can go ahead and get on with creating and stop worrying about what cool background to pick. It’s available in several sizes and would look good at any resolution.

Sizes:

The Details

File Type: PSD
Number in Set: 1
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Javier Rivero

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Lets face it, designers sometimes need to make a mock-up that doesn’t actually exist which sometimes can be time consuming and extremely irritating. Facebook fanpages have been a very hot topic for clients recently. They are wanting to break into the social media scene. FYC is releasing a mock-up Facebook Fanpage with editable text, posting times and anything else you can think of. Our Twitter PSD Freebie generated such a good response that we decided to give this away as well. Hopefully this will save you some time and help you create and effective facebook mock-up for a potential or current client.

Previews

The Details

File Type: PSD
Number in Set: 1
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Chad Engle

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For those of you who spend hours at your computer (who reading this blog doesn’t?), you probably remember the time you thought your desktop looked awesome. Maybe you found a cool wallpaper or a neat icon. But it’s time to take it to the next level. NerdTool is a nice little enhancement for Mac users who want to move past a static desktop. Sure, we know VLC can play a video as your desktop background… You might even know about GeekTool, which is kind of the grandfather of NerdTool. Cool thing about this one is that it has a pretty good following. You can display the results of a shell script on your desktop, and refresh by the second. Check out the Github wiki tips and tricks, or if you’re one of those guys who knows terminal better than correct English grammar, jump in and experiment. Also, all of the GeekTool scripts will naturally work, so digging through forums will provide for pretty easy copy-and-paste scripting to get cool results like these:


(Check out the cool iTunes progress bar on the one above)




Thanks to this blog post full of awesome scripts for Geektool and a quick Flickr search for the first several of those shots, and my friend @JamBoud for the last one.

There’s a ton of these little applications floating around to change up your desktop. Check out Bowtie for iTunes, TinkerTool for a bunch of cool hidden preference tweaking for things like shifting your dock around from it’s normal centered position.

This doesn’t even touch the surface, but I found this stuff over the course of the past few days and thought it way too interesting to not share.

A cool idea

Nerdtool actually allows you to use a snippet of a website as part of your background. As I was looking through the program, I thought of a cool idea for those of you who have a domain and hosting; with a little bit of time and work, you could set up your own little networking, blogging, or RSS home right in your “wallpaper”.

So what have you done with your desktop? Show us by posting in the FYI Flickr group!

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It’s Thanksgiving. A day to eat turkey and pie. A day to watch a parade, and then football. A day to think about the Mayflower, if you feel like it. A day to… give thanks. And I, as editor, am very thankful for the readers of FYI. That’s why I am giving out four Google Wave invitations to four of you.

The selection process will be random as always, but to be eligible, you must either add @fuelinterface on Twitter and tweet an @reply with the following message: “@fuelinterface A Thanksgiving Google Wave invite would be awesome!” (or something along those lines), or comment here on this post.

Thank you all for reading, commenting, and tweeting around with us!

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File Type: JPG
Number in Set: 8
Sizes: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 320×480 (iPhone)
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Tim Smith

Tim Smith (or @timothybsmith, if you know him on Twitter) is a creative graphic designer and blogging dynamo who was hand picked to head up the Fuel Your Blogging site as editor. Taking his love of community and graphic design and merging the two together, Tim devised and designed the Think wallpaper for the FYC readers. We know Tim shares our sentiments in hoping that you all enjoy the new background! Thanks again, Tim.

Preview

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Chances are, if you are into the awesomeness that are vectors, then you are already familiar with the Go Media Arsenal. And furthermore, chances are that if you are familiar with Go Media, then you, like us, get excited whenever the Go Media crew releases a new set of vectors into the community. Well, then get excited, friends, because the time is upon us! And the exciting news doesn’t stop there…

The team over at Go Media contacted us, asking if we wanted to give away a couple of the vectors from the new set, and we jumped at the opportunity to share them with you all. Below is a summary of the latest vector set from the Arsenal and a special bonus announcement for the readers of our blog.

There are quite a few (4 of 7) packs featuring brilliant Technicolor in Vector Set 16, but none quite as bold as “Color Radials”. We wanted to follow up our original “Radials” pack with a younger, hipper sibling. Now that we have all the wavelengths of the rainbow with which to work, things get interesting! Inside the full pack you’ll find color wheels, sunbursts, ornate circles, and pigment bombs. I think Adelle chose two of the coolest images in the pack to share with you for free, so thank her for her good taste!

They have also created a product-specific discount coupon for Color Radials.

Code: fuelyourcolor

This code gets our readers 15% off of the Color Radials vector pack.

And Now, The Freebie

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File Type: JPG
Number in Set: 8
Sizes: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1200, 320×480 (iPhone)
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Matt Mehlhope

We here at FYC are all about getting that flame of inspiration burning brightly within each of our readers, and so today we have a very special treat. Today, we have the opportunity to not only see the end result of some of that inspiration at work, but we get to present it to all of the community through the site. Thanks to Matt Mehlhope (@mmehlhope) who was inspired enough, and kind enough, to create and offer a Fuel inspired wallpaper. Matt is a passionate web developer, marketer, gamer and photoshop guru that loves to make ideas come to life.

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File Type: JPG
Number in Set: 8
Sizes: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1680×1260, 1920×1200
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Rob Bowen

Minimalism has always proven somewhat of a problem area for me as a designer. To me, white space was always just more blank canvas that was begging to be covered. But I have been trying to step up, not only my ability to create in this arena, but to develop more of an appreciation for it. Having come a long way on both sides of the coin, I put together my first minimalist wallpaper for free download, and wanted to offer it here to our Fuel readers. Using a typography focus, I came up with a freebie that was up to snuff. Through Angie’s appreciation of minimalism, I have been able to grow my own, and in turn, grow as a designer. So I owe this wallpaper to her…but I am giving it to you, so if you see her around the web, do us a favor, and keep this ‘Where Am I?’ wallpaper on the D.L., will ya? Wait, I didn’t think that through…damn.

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File Type: JPG
Number in Set: 9
Sizes: 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×960, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1680×1260, 1920×1200, 320×480 (iPhone)
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Rob Bowen

In the spirit of community and giving, the freebies continue here on Fuel Your Creativity. After Angie put together the last brilliant wallpaper to give away, the Explosive Typography wallpaper, I wanted to take a turn at not only showing my appreciation, but also paying homage to the new positions we have here as editors of FYC. So I put together the FYC Ultra Grunge Wallpaper for free download from the blog. It was inspired by a combination of designs by Adelle Charles, actually. The FYC Wallpaper she created for the blog here, and the new Twitter pages she designed for the FUEL team. This new grunge ridden wallpaper is free for all to use, and we hope you are going to enjoy it as much as we enjoyed putting this together for you.

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