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Carrie Cousins

Carrie Cousins

Carrie is a freelance writer with years of experience in web and graphic design. Sports fanatic. Information junkie. Designer. True-believer in karma.

What Are Lightroom Presets? (+ 10 Useful Examples)

Lightroom Presets / 2 Sep 2019

What Are Lightroom Presets? (+ 10 Useful Examples)

If you’re looking for a shortcut to help speed up your photo editing workflows, Adobe Lightroom presets could be the answer. We’re covering what a Lightroom preset is, how they work, and featuring some of our favorite examples!

Adobe Lightroom Presets can help you perform certain effects and edits with one click. It can be a great way to apply the same edits repeatedly and save time with mundane editing tasks.

Here’s everything you need to know about Lightroom presets work with some cool examples you can download and use.

How to Make a Brochure Quickly & Easily

Brochure Templates / 29 Aug 2019

How to Make a Brochure Quickly & Easily

Creating a simple brochure can be a quick and easy design project once you have the assets and content you need ready to go. Today we’re walking you through how to make a brochure quickly, and easily!

While brochures can get complicated with fancy folds, cuts, or finishes, most beginners can make a brochure that looks good and can be printed in house or from an online printer.

The trick to making the process as simple as possible is to create a brochure-making routine and follow the steps in a logical order. It also helps to have all the right tools.

Here’s how to make a brochure.

How to Export Actions in Photoshop

Photoshop Actions / 28 Aug 2019

How to Export Actions in Photoshop

Photoshop actions are a great tool for creating and recreating sequences of edits or tasks. You can save actions to reuse later and even “export” actions to use on another computer. Here’s how!

If you have tasks that you perform regularly, such as edits to images or cropping and saving to a certain location, actions can be a lifesaver.

Here, we’ll look at how to create an export actions in Photoshop with a step-by-step guide. This is a great way to move Photoshop actions between computers, or for sharing them with other people online.

What Is a Logo Template? (And Should I Use One?)

Logo Templates / 26 Aug 2019

What Is a Logo Template? (And Should I Use One?)

If you’ve ever needed a logo in a pinch, you know how stressful that can be! For a quick design, a logo template can be just the tool to help you develop a logo fast and even show potential ideas off before a design gets too far along.

If you’ve never used a logo template before, a good template comes in vector form with everything you need to tweak and play to get the right logo design fast.

Here’s how it works, and a few tips on whether it is the right choice for you.

How to Embed a YouTube Video in Keynote

Keynote Templates / 21 Aug 2019

How to Embed a YouTube Video in Keynote

If you’ve ever wanted to embed a YouTube video in Keynote to create a more engaging slideshow for in-person or recorded presentations, don’t worry. It’s not complicated at all.

We’re going to take you through how to embed a YouTube video in Keynote step-by-step, and share a few tips for how to use video to supercharge your presentations.

You don’t need any special software, and you’ll be all set with a video-packed presentation in minutes!

10 Tips for Designing for Wearables and Watches

Graphics / 20 Aug 2019

10 Tips for Designing for Wearables and Watches

Every day, we see more and more people sporting an Apple Watch or similar. These devices are constantly changing the way we think about wearable technology and how to design websites and apps for unique interfaces.

Wearables present challenges unlike other design projects. Function is a primary concern, as is the size, with what will be one of the smallest screens designers have ever worked with.

The key is creating a design that is visually pleasing but is user-friendly and provides a functional experience.

Here are 10 things to consider as you design for a wearable interface (with examples other designers are already imagining).

What Is Adobe After Effects (And What Is It Used For?)

After Effects Templates / 19 Aug 2019

What Is Adobe After Effects (And What Is It Used For?)

Adobe After Effects is a video and animation-based tool that’s used to add elements to moving pictures and animations. Most designers use it to create titles, intros, and transition between clips for more seamless video production.

After Effects is part of the Adobe Creative Suite of products and is included in cloud plans. Full suite users already have access to this tool, or you can get it on its own if that’s all you need.

As with other Adobe tools, the great thing about using this set of tools is that functions and interacts have a look and feel that you are probably already used to, making it easier to learn on the fly.

Here’s a look at Adobe After Effects, what it is, and how to know if you should use it for projects.

10 Ways to Use Mapping in Web or App Design

Layouts / 14 Aug 2019

10 Ways to Use Mapping in Web or App Design

Almost everywhere you look these days, you find a map or location-based nugget of information. Almost every app asks for a location, and their presence is becoming more and more common on desktop websites as well.

But if you have not branched out into the world of mapping or location data, it may seem a little intimidating.

How can you effectively use mapping services for your website or app? We’ll take a look at ten ways you can integrate a map today.

What Is Adobe Premiere Pro? (And What Is It Used For?)

Premiere Pro Templates / 14 Aug 2019

What Is Adobe Premiere Pro? (And What Is It Used For?)

Adobe Premiere Pro is one of the go-to editing tools for video, including film, TV, and clips for the web and social media. If you are an Adobe CC subscriber and have seen this tool but haven’t given it a whirl, what are you waiting for?

While Premiere Pro can look a little intimidating at first, functionality is rooted in the same principles as other Adobe products and with a little tinkering, you should figure it out pretty quick (and there’s plenty of documentation and online help available).

So, what is Adobe Premiere Pro and how can you make this most of this video-editing tool? Let’s take a look.

What Are Photoshop Actions? (+ 15 Useful Examples)

Photoshop Actions / 7 Aug 2019

What Are Photoshop Actions? (+ 15 Useful Examples)

Photoshop Actions might be one of the best tools you aren’t taking advantage of. Simply, a Photoshop Action is a sequence of things done to an image in the editing process that you can save and use repeatedly. Actions can be great for batch editing, saving bulk files, and almost any process that could be made faster by recording and repeating.

So, what are Photoshop Actions and how do you make the most of them? Their use case can be so varied and extensive, it’s often hard to know where to start.

Read on to learn more about what Photoshop Actions are, where they’re stored on your computer, and where to download them from.

How to Add Slide Numbers in PowerPoint

PowerPoint Templates / 7 Aug 2019

How to Add Slide Numbers in PowerPoint

It’s often a good idea to organize your PowerPoint presentation with slide numbers. Numbering can help you keep track of slides and provide additional information on notes pages to make following a presentation that much easier.

The best part about adding slide numbers in PowerPoint is that you don’t have to do it manually. Insert slide numbers the right way and they will automatically update and change as you add slides to your presentation.

Here’s how to add slide numbers in PowerPoint, quickly and easily.

How to Design a Poster for an Event: 7 Key Tips

Poster Design / 5 Aug 2019

How to Design a Poster for an Event: 7 Key Tips

Event poster design is a lot of fun. For most poster projects, you really get to express creativity with a one-off design for a single event. While you may still have constraints such as brand typography or color palette, there’s often lots of leeway to create something visually impressive.

With a goal of enticing people to show up or buy tickets, you have to design with impact for these kinds of project. But you also need to convey quite a bit of information in a concise way.

Here’s how to design a poster for an event.