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Adobe Photoshop Tutorials - Best Of

When it comes to graphic design, Adobe Photoshop is usually the first option to consider. However, the software itself is a quite tough nut to crack — and definitely extremely hard to master. For instance, the concepts are not always intuitive and it’s not always clear when to use what tool and how to use it effectively. In fact, in Photoshop it usually takes pretty much time to achieve something you have never done before.

However, you don’t need to muddle through numerous Photoshop features and extensions for every design problem. You can use professional suggestions instead, e.g. professional step-by-step tutorials which provide excellent results and thus can save you a lot of time.

One year ago we’ve presented a hand-picked collection of Photoshop tutorials. Now it’s time for a fresh portion of healthy Photoshop learning material. This article provides professional Adobe Photoshop tutorials which can enrich your design skills and improve the quality of your works. Although the authors of the tutorials rarely provide the information about the used version, we tried to pick only those tutorials that can be used with both CS 3 and older versions of Adobe Photoshop.

When it comes to graphic design, Adobe Photoshop is usually the first option to consider. However, the software itself is a quite tough nut to crack — and definitely extremely hard to master. For instance, the concepts are not always intuitive and it’s not always clear when to use what tool and how to use it effectively. In fact, in Photoshop it usually takes pretty much time to achieve something you have never done before.

However, you don’t need to muddle through numerous Photoshop features and extensions for every design problem. You can use professional suggestions instead, e.g. professional step-by-step tutorials which provide excellent results and thus can save you a lot of time.

One year ago we’ve presented a hand-picked collection of Photoshop tutorials. Now it’s time for a fresh portion of healthy Photoshop learning material. This article provides professional Adobe Photoshop tutorials which can enrich your design skills and improve the quality of your works. Although the authors of the tutorials rarely provide the information about the used version, we tried to pick only those tutorials that can be used with both CS 3 and older versions of Adobe Photoshop.

Photo- and Picture Editing and Processing

• MP3 Player Design
  In this tutorial you will learn how to design a product in Photoshop. The product is a RCA Lyra X3030 portable media player. Although the chances are, you are thinking “why would I need to make it?”, the reason for this tutorial is to teach people the techniques used for mocking up a product design.

  

• Magic Lighting Effect
  How to create a nice light and magic effect.

  

• Beautiful Lady Effect
  Learn how to combine some brushes and color adjustment to make a beautiful lady effect.

  

• Selecting & Extracting Hair - Masking Tutorial - Extraction Tips
  One of the most challenging montage or masking jobs in the profession of post-production editing is the hair lift. When the model has long flowing hair and the subject needs to change location many post-production artists call in sick.

  

• Add a Dreamy or Misty Effect To Your Photos
  This quick tutorial will show how to add a really cool dreamy or misty effect to your photos. This tutorial works best with nature related images.

  

• Improving the Quality of Photos
  Improve the look of your photos by playing with some simple Photoshop techniques.

  

• Fake Model Photography
  With a very little effort, you can take existing photographs of everyday scenes and make it look like they’re actually of miniature models.

  

• Displacement Water
  Creating a realistic water surface in Photoshop is quite a challenge because it is the distorted reflection of the surroundings that makes the water look liquid. The displace filter is an excellent tool for making this distortion.

  

• Making Skin Beautiful
  Not everyone has a beautiful skin. This tutorial will help the photographer put their models in the best light so to speak.

  

• Photoshop tutorial and Post-producted glasses
  To save your time think to photo retouch especially frosted glasses.

  

• Professional “glamour style” photo retouch
  This is the first chapter of a main tutorial divided in six parts. In this one you will learn how to photo retouch the skin of a model in a few steps. Better results can be obtained by using a graphic tablet instead of a mouse.

  

• iMouse — creating Apple mouse
  Simple and elegant. Apple mouse. Is there anyone, who doesn’t want graphic like that? Let’s have a look at creating this mouse in Adobe Photoshop. 3 pages.

  

• Give Your Photos a Retro Comic Book Effect
  How about a fun effect for your incredibly boring photo albums? Creating a old comic book effect for your photos is easy and the results are visually appealing. More fun is achieved when adding captions to your photos using comic book fonts and design elements.

  

• Space and Planet Tutorial
  The techniques below will show you how to create an image similar to the final result I have obtained below although the image below took 3 hours to paint with alot of fine detail work, you will still get the idea.

  

• Faking HDR in Adobe Photoshop
  This HDR tutorial shows quite easy way to fake HDR foto in Photoshop. You don’t need to shoot into RAW or take photos with different exposure - one JPEG is enough. If you can work with masks in Photoshop, you have an advantage. Part of tutorial is HDR action for download.

  

• 11 Super Awesome Photoshop Movie Effects
  11 most-favorite movie-effect tutorials. From Scarface to Sin City to Pirates of the Carribean to 300, we’ve got 11 great ways to go Hollywood on your photos.

  

• A movie-effect with Photoshop
  This tutorial explains how to turn your photo into the movie-like image using Adobe Photoshop.

  

• Visual effects in the style of 300
  Here’s a little Photoshop guide to mimic the 300 style. The effects could also be applied to video in After Effects with a similar setup.

  

• Reflective Bubbles
  For my most recent work I wanted to create bubbles that would reflect my subject in a believable yet magical way.

  

• Bringing a Stone Statue to Life
  Learn how to take a stone statue and alter it to look life-like.

  

• 4 Easy Photoshop Techniques to Make Your Pictures Pop
  “In this tutorial I will be demonstrating some quick, easy methods for adding drama and/or interest to your shots. As far as I know, these methods should work for both Photoshop and Photoshop Elements.”

  

• Devil’s Eye
  Some eyes are just too pretty, but I bet some of you would change that if you could. I am going to try to explain how to make eyes look more sinister, And remember this is coming from a begginer,so bare with me. Photoshop CS2.

  

• Beautiful lighting FX effect in Photoshop
  This tutorial will show you how to make a beautiful lighting effect on scatters by using Photoshop. Keep in mind that I only provide the basic guidelines to creating this type of effect. There are tons of possibilities if you spend time to play with the settings and keep your creativity wide open.

  

• Water Drops
  So simple, and realistic, these water drops (and optional ice drops) are also simple to do anywhere, anytime.

  

• Creating a glass ball
  In this tutorial you will learn how to create a glass ball in photoshop using some simple tools and techniques. Any version of photoshop can be used.

  

• 3D Ice Cube
  In this tutorial we’ll try to build a realistic 3D ice cube. Usually this kind of stuff is done with the help of some 3D software like Maya or 3DMax, still we’ll try to use Photoshop tools to do the work.

  

• Alienize: Transform a person into an alien
  In this tutorial is written how to create a very cool looking alien using Adobe Photoshop. Grab a picture of someone and get ready to alienize it.

  

• Water Spirit - Drawing Fire
  This tutorial will show You how to place a fire on someone’s hands.

  

• Creating a 3D effect with image editing software
  Here’s how to make a neat effect to make it look like the subject of a photo is popping out of the background. This can be done with GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) or Photoshop.

  

• How to use Photoshop to create Product Box?
  How many times you wanted to create cool product box for some of your products? Sure, there are many ways, and with new Photoshop you have even more options to create boxes.

  

• Super Fly Box Maker
  These boxes can be used to advertise almost anything (not just software). This is great if you want to catch a viewers attention, and it also gives your product display a more professional look and feel.

  

• Flaming Hair
  Tutorial with some simple brushing techniques, and a bit of color tweaking, you can spice up your photo.

  

• Create a Realistic Torn Paper Effect
  Torn paper is one of the key elements to achieving the distressed / collage look. This tutorial covers a few simple steps in Adobe Photoshop to create a realistic looking torn paper effect taking you on your way to Destroying the Web 2.0 Look.

  

• Creating a Mac-Type Background in Photoshop
  This tutorial is about making a “mac” style background. You can use these in all sorts of situations, including the obvious – your desktop as well as part of your designs or for corporate work (powerpoint presentations, flash work etc). Naturally you wouldn’t want to use this exact set of steps, but following them will give you a good idea of the technique. Good luck!

  

Drawings, Paintings, Cartoons

• Sexy Girl Comic With Photoshop
  This tutorial describes a way to create a sexy comic girl from a paper sketch.

  

• Skin Painting Tutorial
  Learn how to paint a realistically looking skin with Photoshop.

  

• Making of The Blues Singer Leaves Town
  This picture was done in a hot summer day, in the memory of an old anime series I used to watch as a kid, about Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. Historically, it’s off from that period, but it’s the feeling of summer, childhood fascination and nature that I wanted to re-create. It’s also a tribute to music. 4 pages.

  

• Fox Fire Tutorial
  Converting from hand-sketched picture to a digital masterpiece.

  

• Easy Watercolor Painting Effect
  In this Adobe Photoshop tutorial, we’re going to learn how to easily make a photo look more like a watercolor painting. This photo effect works best on images where maintaining rich colors and strong contrast is more important than keeping any fine details, since you’ll be losing a lot of detail with this effect.

  

• Soft Cell Shading
  Learn how to paint softlry, as a variation of cell shading, eventually going through a total of seven stages.

  

• Sketch to Paint
  Digital artist David Cousens reveals how to develop a sci-fi art sketch in Adobe Photoshop using the airbrush and a few nifty tricks.

  

• Portrait Painting
  Learn how to draw a portrait from a hand-drawn sketch.

  

• Drawing a Cute Boy

  

• Drawing from a reference photo
  The original photo: I locate it on the bottom layer to use for some initial tracing, primarily to save time and get the perspective correct. Some people prefer not to trace.

  

• Comic art style
  This is a method that you can use to produce abstract art using Adobe Photoshop. Randomness, detail, colors and contrast plays of course important roles now.

  

Texteffects

• 3D typographic effects
  Photoshop is an astounding post-production tool – and here Nik Ainley of Shiny Binary shows you how to add the wow factor to 3D text using Photoshop’s art tools.

  

• Slow shutter text effect
  Learn how to create this stunning slow shutter text effect using just Photoshop.

  

• Create a Spectacular Flaming Meteor Effect on Text
  Take typography one step further by having text falling from the sky in a burning inferno. Yes, this is the text-on-fire tutorial to end all tutorials. It uses a little Illustrator for the text and a lot of Photoshop to burn up the screen!

  

• Smooth Glass Type
  Here’s a quick way to create some nice looking translucent glass type that’ll work great on any background, made completely with layer styles.

  

• Recreate the ‘Bee Movie’ Text Effect
  In this quick Photoshop tutorial we’ll be recreating the ‘Bee movie’ text effect, you know, the one you’ve seen all over the place over the last few months?

  

• Plastic Jelly Style
  In this tutorial we’ll be using layer styles to make a plastic-gel type style that you can easily apply to text and shapes. You can download the PSD file from the link at the bottom of the tutorial to just copy+paste the styles.

  

• Combine 2 text layer styles
  Learn how to apply a combination of multiple text effects.

  

Buttons, Logos & Menus

• Create A Leopard ‘X’ in Photoshop
  With the recent release of Mac OS X Leopard, I’ve decided to create a tutorial where you can create your own ‘X’. This tutorial is a great exercise in using the dodge and burn tool as well as working with selections.

  

• Orb Button Effect
  This set of tutorial will show on how to create a very basic mouse over effect in html/css. Therefore this tutorial will spilt into 2 parts:

  

• Interface Orbs
  Shiny glass orbs have been popular fixtures for web interfaces and application skins for quite some time. In this tutorial, we will be going over a technique for making a standard interface orb.

  

• Creating Logos on Glass Surfaces
  In this mini tutorial you will learn how to create a convincing logo that is embossed in the surface of a beer glass.

  

• Photoshop Button Maker
  In this simple tutorial we’re going to create a clever little way of making little buttons using a couple of layers and one interchangeable image layer. As always you can download the sample PSD at the bottom of the tutorial to follow along and copy layer styles out of.

  

• Design Watercolor Effect Menu
  This is a two-part tutorial on how to create an artistic and un-typical CSS list menu as seen on Web Designer Wall.

  

• 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed Seal/Badge Photoshop Tutorial
  In this quick Photoshop tutorial I’m going to show you how to design a sweet-lookin’ a golden badge, pretty much like this one I’ve designed below. For this tutorial I’ve used the example ‘100% satisfaction guaranteed seal/badge.

  

• A Little Window…

  

• Glossy-Style Carbon Fibre Navigation Set
  This is a kind of glossy, carbon fiber navigation set.

  

• How to Design Mini Icons
  Numbers of people have asked me how to design my popular Mini Pixel Icon pack. In fact, they are relatively easy. All you need is just some basic Photoshop skills.

  

• Designing a Safety Icon

  

• Eye-Popping Banner Ad Tutorial
  Nobody clicks on them, but they still exist. This tutorials shows how you can create iPod nano Ads with Photoshop.

  

Adobe Photoshop Techniques

• Color adjustment tutorial
  This tutorial shows how to get more mood into your pictures via Adjustment Layers and some other effects.

  

• Vector Polishing Techniques
  This tutorial includes 9 Photoshop techniques that will show you how to add more depth, color, contrast, and texture into your vector art.

  

• Advanced Black and White Conversion
  In this tutorial, we will convert an RGB image to Black and White using Photoshop CS3’s new improved Black and White features.

  

• Actions Tutorial
  Toning With Duotones, Tritones And Quadtones
• 101 Hidden Tips & Secrets
  An overview of professional suggestions, tips and tricks for Adobe Photoshop users.
• Using Actions to Automate Tasks
  While Adobe Photoshop has a host of automation tools, one of the most versatile and powerful of them is called an action. In fact, some of the other automation commands, such as batches and droplets, derive their functionality from actions.

Further Resources

You can find even more Adobe Photoshop tutorials in the articles and resouces we’ve listed below.

• PSDTuts
  Probably the most smashing collection of Adobe Photoshop tutorials available on the Web.
• Tutorialfeed.com
  An aggregator of tutorials.
• 51 Text Effect Tutorials Every Designer Should See
• Photoshop Buttons Tutorials
• 2 Minute Photoshop Tricks
• Top 5 Photoshop Tutorials
• The Best 80 Photoshop Text Effects on the Web
  A thorough guide to the impressive 80 text effects available on the Web.
• Top Best 55 Photoshop Tutorials For Professional Photographers

Smart Grids Can Cut Home Energy Costs
Interesting news from a new study of 112 homes in the Seattle area that shows a 10% reduction in home energy bills through the use of “smart grid” technology. The study, conducted by the U.S. Department of Energy, and reported on CNet News this morning, says its GridWise Project not only saves consumers money - - about 10% on average, according to the report, but it eases the strain on local power grids, as well. Smart Grids can automatically lower the settings on home appliances like heaters and washers and dryers, triggered by signals sent by utility companies over the power grid. For…

WordPress Plugin Releases for 1/8
Comment URL Control will allow you to remove unwanted author-URIs entered by a commenter with one single click of your mouse. WP-Crontrol lets you take control over what’s happening in the WP-Cron system. Language Linker allows you to link sister pages that are written in multiple languages. RelatedPosts provides a variety of options for displaying posts that are […]

Comment URL Control will allow you to remove unwanted author-URIs entered by a commenter with one single click of your mouse.

WP-Crontrol lets you take control over what’s happening in the WP-Cron system.

Language Linker allows you to link sister pages that are written in multiple languages.

RelatedPosts provides a variety of options for displaying posts that are related through tags.

Monday Inspiration: Innovative Designs and Devices

Steve Jobs stated once that the “design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” While this statement has proven to be crucial over thousands of years, one shouldn’t misinterpret it by emphasizing the functionality despite the design. When it comes to product design, the significance of aesthetics of a given device, the way its design looks and feels, determines the choice of the customer once the functionalities of multiple devices are more or less similar. If supported by sound user interface and a well-tested, clean implementation, innovative design solutions can drastically enhance the user experience.

This article presents innovative, futuristic gadgets, devices, designs and concepts. Unless explicitly specified, none of these cut-edge concepts is currently being manufactured. None of them is available for end-users which is why neither the price nor links to the stores are mentioned.

Please keep in mind that the main idea of this article is not to do the sell-talk for trendy products, but to showcase innovative design solutions and futuristic devices which can become reality in 2008 or over the next few years.

• You can also take a look at our article User Experience Of The Future which covers recent developments in the field of user interface design.

Steve Jobs stated once that the “design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” While this statement has proven to be crucial over thousands of years, one shouldn’t misinterpret it by emphasizing the functionality despite the design. When it comes to product design, the significance of aesthetics of a given device, the way its design looks and feels, determines the choice of the customer once the functionalities of multiple devices are more or less similar. If supported by sound user interface and a well-tested, clean implementation, innovative design solutions can drastically enhance the user experience.

This article presents innovative, futuristic gadgets, devices, designs and concepts. Unless explicitly specified, none of these cut-edge concepts is currently being manufactured. None of them is available for end-users which is why neither the price nor links to the stores are mentioned.

Please keep in mind that the main idea of this article is not to do the sell-talk for trendy products, but to showcase innovative design solutions and futuristic devices which can become reality in 2008 or over the next few years.

• You can also take a look at our article User Experience Of The Future which covers recent developments in the field of user interface design.

Sony’s Apple Remote Control

Sony’s Apple Remote Control
Is there any place for innovation when it comes to the design of remote controls? Apparently, there is. This Sony’s”apple” allows users to perform basic functions like changing channels, volume etc. with simple motion gestures (see image below). Once “apples” are placed on the bowl, the remote control is being recharged. Neither price nor production dates are known.

Optimus Tactus & Optimus Maximus

Artemy Lebedev’s Optimus keyboards offer an unusual approach for a traditional input device. A small OLED-display (Organic Display) is placed beneath every key to enable users to define displayed characters and the keys’ functionality manually. In other words, with Optimus the placement of labels on the keyboard can be varied at any time.

Optimus Tactus does not have physical keys, which means there are no restrictions on their shape and size. Any part of the keyboard surface can be programmed to perform any function or to display any images. Production date and price: unknown.

Optimus Maximus (Demo). Each of the 113 keys is a stand-alone display that shows the function currently assigned to it. Optimus’s customizable layout allows convenient use of any language — Cyrillic, Ancient Greek, Georgian, Arabic, Quenya, hiragana, etc. — as well as of any other character sets: notes, numerals, special symbols, HTML codes, math functions and so on to infinity. Production date: the end of January 2008, price: 460$.

The Keyboard Configurator. You can assign any images and characters to display on your Optimus keyboard.

Nonobject Behind the Scenes Camera

The Nonobject Behind the Scenes Camera (Video) has “lenses and displays on both sides for simultaneously recording what you’re aiming at, and what you’re not.” Behind the Scenes Camera is designed to capture what’s going on behind our back, beyond our control, while simultaneously capturing the scene in front of us.

Duofone

The main idea behind Duofone is the possibility to put multiple devices together to combine their screen real estate. The battery power can be shared, and a movie can be watched on a larger screen.

Toast Messenger

Toast Messenger incorporates a little message board where one can write quick notes and then instantly print them on the toaster. Simple, yet innovative.

Dual Music Player

Compared to traditional music players, this Dual Music Player is different. It is a portable solution that supports both CDs and Flash-memory. You can listen to MP3s stored on your Flash-drive and copy music via USB while once you need to play your old CDs you can simply open both sides and let the player do the rest.

Vaio Zoom

The Vaio Zoom notebook takes everything we know about holographic technology and squeezes it inside a thin glass form factor. When off, the screen is completely transparent and the keyboard goes opaque. Turn it on and the touchscreen holographic festivities begin. Even the mouse buttons are holographic! [via Gizmodo]

Visual Desktop Charger

Quite often the details are not the details. They make the design. Saying that, Charles Eames was right: the beauty of Visual Desktop Charger lies in its close attention to small details. The device is a visual indicator of the charge status of a mobile phone. It is supposed to like like a “bird bath-like charger, complete with radiating rings of light to indicate charge status and to top it all off, thirsty birds that glow once the rings of light hit ‘em.” [via YankoDesign]

Bluetooth Laser Virtual Keyboard

This is reality. This BlueTooth Laser Virtual Keyboard, a laser projection keyboard, allows you to type on any flat surface. You can use it to compose an e-mail on your Bluetooth enabled PDA or Cell Phone. With 63 keys and and full size QWERTY layout the Laser Virtual Keyboard can approach the typing speed of a standard keyboard. Size: a little larger than a matchbook. Already released. Price: $150.

Omaura HTPC

Omaura Home Theater Personal PC is a new face in HTPCs. “When we first opened the PDF containing the concept images of Omaura’s concept TT chassis, we thought for a second it was a large, TV-stand-ready all-in-one PC whose display had a seriously distorted aspect ratio. We’ll confess to a little disappointment once we realized it was simply an upright case, but that shot of its interior got us excited again. Imagine sticking the TT on a low-profile table under your wall-mounted LCD or plasma screen.” [via CNet]

Hi-Tech Office: Eclipse Partitioning System

Eclipse Partitioning System (Video) includes a desk, task chair, expandable hood, integrated speakers, and power all set on casters for true mobility. The central idea behind this hi-tech office is versatility. Its retractable hood allows for various levels of privacy and access to accommodate to the changing work flow of one’s daily job. You should really take a look at the video. Neither price nor production dates are known.

EmTrace’s PS100 Photoskin Frames

EmTrace PS100 offers one single dock station for all your personal needs and interests. Looking like a digital photo frame, it fits into a wallet and syncs data for stocks, weather and other information via Internet. You can load whatever information you’d like on your personal dock station and take it with you — in your wallet. Neither price nor production dates are known.

iRing

iRing is a control playback for your Apple media devices. As a simple ring which fits on a finger, it has a wireless Bluetooth connectivity with iPod and iPhone. “iRing features a bright OLED status display with touch-sensitive function strip, and a rechargeable battery life of up to 2 days. Conveniently recharge your iRing using the included cradle.” Neither price nor production dates are known.

Pock-It

So simple, yet so effective. Pock-It is a simple design concepts that allows you to use a little pocket instead of usual stick-it-notes.

Bonus: “sQuba” Diving Car

Rinspeed’s sQuba Diving Car is the “first real diving car designed to autonomously turn into an amphibious vehicle at the push of a button — can submerge up to 10m (33ft) under water.” Powering the concept is an electric motor mated to the rear wheels.

The propulsion on the water is ensured by two propellers in the stern and two powerful jet drives in the bow to propel the vehicle under water. The body is constructed from light weight components made of Carbon Nano Tubes and contains an on-board air-filling system. Neither price nor production dates are known.

Resources

• YankoDesign.com
  Form Beyond Function. A weblog dedicated to introducing the best modern international design, covering from industrial design, concepts, technology, interior design, architecture, exhibition and fashion.
• ProductDose.com
  Style, technology, design, substance
• Techeblog: Concepts
  A number of recent technology concepts, designs and unusual approaches in the “Concepts” category on Techeblog.com.

Just how tough is the world’s toughest cellphone
A press release landed on my computer today, claiming that Samsung has launched the world’s toughest cellphone. The Samsung Solid, so the release assures me, has “strengths that make it stand out from other mobiles” which include built in anti-shock and water and dust resistance. The release goes on to claim that “encased in a thick rubber body this phone lives up to its name to withstand the tough treatment, making it ideal for any trades man, extreme sports enthusiasts or those who simply need a durable phone.” Well, maybe. Let’s look at the features. You might expect a truly tough…

Frameworks Round-Up: When To Use, How To Choose?

by Chris Poteet

Software frameworks provide developers with powerful tools to develop more flexible and less error-prone applications in a more effective way. Software frameworks often help expedite the development process by providing necessary functionality “out of the box”. Such things include user/role management, data access, caching, and much more. These frameworks aid in helping you focus on the more important details of design and even project management by alleviating the need to reinvent the wheel for common development needs.

There are frameworks that cover specific areas of application development such as JavaScript/CSS frameworks that target the presentation (view) layer of the application, and there are others that handle more of the dynamic aspects of the application. Some include both!

In the following we present an overview of most popular web application frameworks; we cover both server-side (PHP, Java, C#, Ruby) and client-side approaches (JavaScript, CSS).

You can also take a look at

• an extensive comparison of web application frameworks on Wikipedia. The article provides a growing list of various frameworks and features they have to offer;
• the review of existing CSS Frameworks we’ve presented few months ago.

by Chris Poteet

Software frameworks provide developers with powerful tools to develop more flexible and less error-prone applications in a more effective way. Software frameworks often help expedite the development process by providing necessary functionality “out of the box”. Such things include user/role management, data access, caching, and much more. These frameworks aid in helping you focus on the more important details of design and even project management by alleviating the need to reinvent the wheel for common development needs.

There are frameworks that cover specific areas of application development such as JavaScript/CSS frameworks that target the presentation (view) layer of the application, and there are others that handle more of the dynamic aspects of the application. Some include both!

In the following we present an overview of most popular web application frameworks; we cover both server-side (PHP, Java, C#, Ruby) and client-side approaches (JavaScript, CSS).

You can also take a look at

• an extensive comparison of web application frameworks on Wikipedia. The article provides a growing list of various frameworks and features they have to offer;
• the review of existing CSS Frameworks we’ve presented few months ago.

Before diving in, it’s necessary to first grasp the idea behind one of the fundamental concepts for web-applications. In the context of frameworks the model-view-controller architecture is particularly important, as this model is typical for most web-applications and is the definitive approach to choose once developing a new web-project.

Model-View-Controller (MVC) Architecture

CodeIgniter has probably the best definition of each the model, view, and controller.

MVC is a software approach that separates application logic from presentation. In practice, it permits your web pages to contain minimal scripting since the presentation is separate from the PHP scripting.

• The Model represents your data structures. Typically your model classes will contain functions that help you retrieve, insert, and update information in your your database.
• The View is the information that is being presented to a user.
• The Controller serves as an intermediary between the Model, the View, and any other resources needed to process the HTTP request and generate a web page.

The Model-View-Controller Architecture.

There is also the Model-View-Presenter (MVP) model, and also the N-Tier Architecture approach amongst others. The difference between MVC and MVP in particular revolve around how data is passed from the model back to the view. In MVC it goes from the model to the view while MVP goes back through the presenter when handing data back to the view.

PHP

• CakePHP is a PHP framework that works on the MVC architecture and offers caching, application scaffolding, validation of model data and even a presentation API. One of the most popular PHP frameworks.

  

• CodeIgniter is a PHP framework that also uses the MVC platform, has classes for data access, e-mail, FTP, and XML-RPC. Also, CodeIgniter has an exciting community and thorough documentation to get you started.

  

• The Zend Framework is the self-proclaimed “leading open-source PHP framework.” Services included in the API include Ajax (JSON), search, syndication, web services, and a fully object oriented PHP class library.

  

Further PHP Frameworks

• Symfony - A feature packed framework, but has a reputation for being server-intensive.
• Prado - A component framework for PHP5 that has similar event based web apps similar to ASP.NET.
• BareBones - a one-file, no-configuration, MVC framework for PHP5.

Java

• Spring Framework is a MVC Java framework that can run on any J2EE server. The framework has a multi-layered architecture with an extensive API and supporting documentation.

  

• The Google Web Toolkit comes from the granddaddy of all Java development shops-Google. They have released their framework as open-source software. Functionality includes extensive interaction with Ajax, and you can simply write your front end in Java and the GWT compiler converts your Java classes to browser-compliant JavaScript and HTML. Also includes interaction with the newly released Google Gears for creating applications available offline.

  

• Apache Cocoon framework is a Java framework built around the concepts of separation of concerns and component-based development. There is a strong emphasis on working with XML and serializing into other portable formats.

  

Further Java Frameworks

• Aranea - a MVC framework that includes a web integration layer.
• AppFuse - a framework that is a self-described “project skeleton” similar to new projects created in an IDE.

C#

• The .NET Framework is an application framework taking application development by storm with its impressive collection of functionality. The great thing about the .NET framework is that you can build it around the MVC framework if you wish (there is an official Microsoft implementation coming out), or you can create your own architecture.

  The .NET framework is available out of the box for C# and Visual Basic, but there are extensions available to allow languages like PHP to access and utilize the framework. Look out for some new features including the Windows Workflow Foundation for building powerful business solutions and Silverlight which is set up to be a direct competitor to Flash.

  

• MonoRail is a MVC framework where the controllers handle solely application flow, the models represent the data, and the view is just about presentation logic. If your project depends too much on third party Web controls or if your IT team skill set is totally centered around WebForms, MonoRail would not be a good choice.

  

Ruby

• Ruby on Rails has taken the programming world by storm by popularizing the MVC approach to application development. The framework came out the work of 37Signals on their popular Basecamp application. There is also a great emphasis on agile development to “release early and release often.

  

Further Ruby Frameworks

• Nitro - a Ruby framework, but at the current time it lacks substantial documentation for their API.
• Camping is a micro-framework weighing 4Kb.
• Ramaze has principles on keeping things simple, modular design, and minimal dependencies with an impressive source browser for documentation.

Python

• Gluon comes from the billows of DePaul University designed for agile development and secure database-driven web-based applications.
• Django is the ever popular Python framework that has an impressive template system, caching, dynamic database access API, and more. Many high-profile sites use it including The Washington Post and Pownce.

  

• TurboGears is a framework that includes a templating system, access the database with obscuring the database, and it uses MochiKit to provide a JavaScript API.

  

Client-Side Frameworks

Client-side frameworks are frameworks that specifically target the user interface/view/presentation layer. Recently both JavaScript and CSS frameworks have started to enter the mainstream.

While these frameworks might provide the Ajax-functionality, they are not meant to actually complete the data transaction and manipulation. A client-side framework is usually a smaller subset in a larger application framework.

JavaScript

• Prototype is a JavaScript framework that serves as a foundation for other JavaScript frameworks. Don’t be fooled however, as Prototype can stand on its own.

  

• script.aculo.us is built on the Prototype framework and has found its way into many high-profile sites including Digg, Apple, and Basecamp. The documentation is clear, and has an easy learning curve. However, compared to other JavaScript frameworks it is larger in size.

  

• Mootools is a compact, modular, object-oriented JavaScript framework with impressive effects and Ajax handling. The framework is for advanced users as the learning curve is rather steep.

  

• jQuery continues to rise in popularity due to its extensive API and active development. jQuery is a great balance of complexity and functionality.

  

• For ASP.NET developers you can’t beat the ASP.NET AJAX framework which is built into the .NET Framework as of 3.5, but you can also download it for previous versions. The amount of documentation, examples, and community continues to increase. There are controls that you can simply drag-and-drop an update panel on an ASPX page and process Ajax!

  

Further JavaScript Frameworks

• The Yahoo! User Interface Library - Yahoo! released its impressed JavaScript library with incredible amounts of documentation.
• Ext JS - Originally built as an add-on to the YUI it can now extend Prototype and jQuery. Includes an impress interface.
• Dojo is a small library focused on interpreter independence and small core size.
• MochiKit - A framework that has focus on scripting language standards including ECMAScript and the W3C DOM.

CSS

CSS frameworks have grown in popularity recently, but there are many developers [ 1, 2 ] who do not think it is an ideal solution for presentation design but not without a rebuttal.

• Yet Another Multicolumn Layout (YAML) is a XHTML/CSS framework for created modern and flexible floated layouts. It even includes a generator!

  

• Blueprint is one of the more mature CSS frameworks with a focus on layout, typography, and even including a print stylesheet.

  

• Content with Style - a CSS framework to aid in layouts and basic CSS design elements, but its development has slowed down.

  

• Yahoo! UI Library: Grids CSS - Yahoo!’s CSS library for layouts.

Considerations When Choosing

There are a couple of things to keep in mind when choosing a framework.

• Pick a framework that has extensive and accurate documentation. It is invaluable as you attempt to implement the technology.
• The framework should provide just that — a framework — that can fit your particular design methodology.
• Be sure to ask other developers about their experiences with frameworks in your chosen programming language.
• The larger the community the larger the odds that you will be able to find help when you need it, and it will continue to be improved and developed.

Chris Poteet is a WordPress/Web Designer consultant specializing in user interface, accessibility, usability, web standards, and content management. His main site is Siolon.com.