Design Shack

Inspiration / 23 Jul 2019

40+ Best Free Keynote Templates

Today we’re bringing you a collection of the best free Keynote templates for making all kinds of presentation slideshows, including business, creative, agency, and startup pitch decks.

Keynote is a great tool for making effective presentations. But, let’s face it, when it comes to the default templates included, your options are limited. Luckily you can still download and use Keynote templates made by other designers. For this collection, we handpicked some of the best free Keynote templates just for you.

Sure, these templates might not have the polish of premium Keynote templates you can spend a few dollars on. But, for the very low price of free, these will give you more than enough to design a stand-out slideshow.

CSS / 23 Jul 2019

Mobile First Design: Why It’s Great and Why It Sucks

Historically, most web designers and their clients have approached the desktop side of any project first, while leaving the mobile part as a secondary goal that gets accomplished later. Even with the rise of responsive design, many of us begin with the “full size” site and work our way down.

There’s a growing trend in the industry though to flip this workflow on its head and actually begin with mobile considerations and then work up to a larger desktop version.

Why would you ever approach a project this way? What are some of the pros and cons of this strategy? Read on to find out!

Inspiration / 23 Jul 2019

30+ Best Premiere Pro Animated Title Templates

Making a professional-looking title scene for your video often takes a lot of work. When it comes to creating animated titles in Premiere Pro, it could take hours to figure out the right settings and design. These Premiere Pro animated title templates are a life-saver!

The opening title scene is arguably the most important part of any video. But this fact puts more responsibility on you to craft the perfect title scene that fits the video, and grabs your viewer’s attention. Thankfully, you don’t have to waste your time worrying about the design or animation of your video title anymore.

Using these easy to use Premiere Pro animated title templates, you’ll be able to create unique and professional title scenes for all kinds of videos without any effort. Have a look.

Inspiration / 22 Jul 2019

70+ Modern Corporate Brochure Templates

Brochures are an incredibly important part of identity and branding for any type of business. Whether you’re keeping customers informed, marketing a new product, or selling your services. A beautiful, modern brochure template can be a great starting point.

We’ve tracked down some of the most beautiful, creative brochure designs to help you quickly get started with a professional template. They’re modern and stylish, and can help your business stand out from the crowd.

All these brochure designs come in the form of a ready-to-go template, fully print ready, and most just cost a few dollars.

Let’s dive in!

Trends / 22 Jul 2019

10 Photography Trends in 2019

Photography trends can be a major influence on how print and digital designs come together. From filters to styles to photo angles that are trending, this part of the visual aesthetic can greatly impact how a project comes together.

Photography trends are dictated by a few things: Visual style of photographers, techniques that are gaining popularity in projects, the ability for images to work with other design elements, and even things such as social media filters.

The same photography trends that you might see in stock images (which we use as examples here) parallels to custom photos as well. Understanding photography trends is important for any designer because you’ll want to discuss photo options (and looks) before you begin a photoshoot for any design project to ensure that your visions are on the same page.

Software / 21 Jul 2019

How to Add Music & Audio to PowerPoint

You can add a little something special to your PowerPoint presentation with music or audio. While this can be a little tricky – and requires you to know the environment where your presentation will be given – it can add a special element to the information on display.

Whether you’re wanting to add background music, sound effects, narration, or something else, it doesn’t need to be difficult at all.

Here’s how you add music/audio to PowerPoint in a few simple steps!

Inspiration / 19 Jul 2019

30+ Best Gothic Fonts

There’s something unusually attractive about a gothic font design. It can make any typographical layout look magnificent and majestic, and it’s probably why gothic fonts are widely used in branding and logo design.

If you’ve been looking for a unique gothic font for a new project, you’re in luck. We’ve handpicked the best gothic fonts for this collection, with various design styles that you can use to design logos, book covers, posters, website headers, t-shirt designs, and much more. Explore the collection and start downloading!

Inspiration / 19 Jul 2019

25+ Best Newborn Lightroom Presets for Baby Photography

Every parent wants to take beautiful photos of their newborn baby to create precious memories. Wouldn’t it be great if you could make those photos look professional with just one-click? That’s exactly what you can do with these newborn and baby Lightroom presets

Photos you take with your digital camera or your iPhone don’t always look all that professional. But there’s no need to hire a professional photographer to capture beautiful photos of your newborn baby. Using this collection of Lightroom presets, you can instantly make your photos look more adorable than ever with a few simple clicks.

In this collection, we’re sharing a set of Lightroom presets specially designed for improving baby photos. With the help of these presets, you’ll be able to capture every adorable moment of your newborn just like a professional photographer.

Inspiration / 18 Jul 2019

30+ Best Free Photoshop Actions 2019

Photoshop actions are quite useful when optimizing photos, applying effects, and editing graphics. For this collection, we’ve handpicked some of the best free Photoshop actions you can download and use with no price to pay!

Whether you’re a professional designer or a complete beginner, Photoshop actions can help you save a lot of time. Simply put, Photoshop actions pack hours worth of design work into a single-click so that you can achieve professional-level effects without an effort.

In this post, we’re featuring several different types of free Photoshop actions. You’ll find them categorized into different effects and styles below. Have a look and start downloading.

Articles / 18 Jul 2019

50 Shades of Black: Effective Use of No Color

A few years ago, there was a debate stirring on the web about black. Ian Storm Taylor’s “Never Use Black” was shared and tweeted and read by designers all over the world.

You can debate whether you should use black or not all day long. But the reality is that you will use black. Every designer does – by choosing or not.

So it’s best to understand the color and how to use it properly in a variety of design projects.

Inspiration / 18 Jul 2019

30+ Best Hand Lettering Fonts

Hand lettering fonts can add a unique flourish to your design. They’re full of fun, character, and style. Whether you’re looking for a realistic calligraphy effect, or something more abstract, our collection of the best hand lettering fonts is a great starting point!

Hand lettering fonts span a huge range of styles. They range from bold and masculine block-style typefaces, through to stylistic and feminine freehand. All of these have their place, but in completely different types of project! Whether you’re designing a poster, crafting a logo, or putting together a wedding invitation, this selection of our favourite picks covers a huge range of styles.

Features / 17 Jul 2019

PowerPoint Templates

Microsoft PowerPoint (PPT) is the go-to choice for creating presentations. This series shares tips and ideas for working with PowerPoint, as well as beautiful PowerPoint templates and themes to make your presentations look stunning.

Microsoft PowerPoint is the most popular presentation software on the market. Everyone from school kids to CEOs uses it to create all kinds of presentations to share with others.

A PowerPoint template is a design tool to help you jumpstart that process and create a presentation with a more custom look and feel. While there are a handful of templates that come with the software, most designers avoid them because they are commonly used, making third-party free and premium PowerPoint templates a solid option.

Trends / 17 Jul 2019

8 Packaging and Label Design Trends

Have you taken notice of that beer car or shampoo bottle lately? How about the wrapper on a snack bar or package that comes in the mail? Packaging and label design trends can be some of the most practical influencers in graphic design.

While we put a lot of focus on website design and digital trends, packaging and labels can impact everything. From whether you make a purchase off the shelf, to how you feel about a product when you open or use it.

Design is a major influencer in purchasing decisions.

Here, we are looking at eight key packaging and label design trends of 2019, and how they aren’t just for physical elements. Many of these same design trends are making an impact in the digital space as well. And while we know packaging trends tend to have more shelf life, literally, how do digital and physical design trends impact one another?

Inspiration / 17 Jul 2019

30+ Best Line Patterns & Textures

Whether you’re working on a product packaging design, a greeting card, or even a website background, incorporating one of these line patterns and textures can help you achieve a pro result.

No need to spend hours of your valuable time searching for beautiful line patterns. We scoured the web to find the best line patterns and textures to help you get a headstart with your design process.

This collection includes both free patterns and premium items from Envato Elements (where you get unlimited downloads for a single price). Have a look and see if you can find a pattern suitable for your project.

Font Collections

This is our series of beautiful, inspiring collections of fonts and typefaces. These articles feature bold poster fonts, decorative scripts, and everything in-between! Find the perfect font for your next design project with one of these collections.

How to Design a Logo

Everyone wants their logo to stand out, and represent their brand perfectly. But it's no easy task! Our helpful feature will walk you through how to design a logo. From brainstorming logo ideas to practical logo design tips, you'll be in a great position to create the perfect logo for your business.

Photoshop Actions

Photoshop Actions are the perfect timesaver to save you doing the same processing on multiple images. Using other people's actions can help you tap into creative techniques, cutting edge post-processing styles, and beautiful effects. In this series, you'll learn how to use Photoshop Actions and find professional examples to use in your own design work.

PowerPoint Templates

Microsoft PowerPoint (PPT) is the go-to choice for creating presentations. This series shares tips and ideas for working with PowerPoint, as well as beautiful PowerPoint templates and themes to make your presentations look stunning.