Web Design Studio Secrets

By Deke McClelland

Do you keep an archive of killer Web sites? You're not alone. Fifteen leading Web designers reveal the secrets behind their favorite sites in the updated edition of Web Design Studio Secrets. Featuring interviews with the experts, undocumented tips and techniques, and full-color illustrations in an oversized format, this edition also presents case studies packed with advice. Discover what's in a winning site -- Dynamic HTML, Flash animation, and JavaScript rollovers are among the contenders. The CD-ROM contains demo software from key industry players, artwork from the book, and QuickTime interviews with featured artists. With Web Design Studio Secrets, 2nd Ed., you'll find out what the competition's been up to and how to use it to your advantage.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0764534556
• ISBN13: 9780764534553
• Release Date: May 2000
• Publisher: Wiley
• Length: 416 Pages
• Weight: 2.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 10.0" x 0.7" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Koffee table gloss.

Sometimes it is nice to have a book that points out the obvious. You can be too close to a problem to notice the obvious. Fortunately, this book is too obvious. And it is all fluff with no substance. Wait, you say. This is a design book; what do you want? Code? I really wanted design. So where is it? Between the pages that tell you how to use exotic tools to do what HTML can? Or is it between the lines that keep emphasizing speed? Or is this one big a-d-v-e-r-t-i-s-e-m-e-n-t for the contributors? Oh well, it makes you look scholarly to have this book on the Koffee table.

It was good for me.

A lot of very useful info in a small book. I'm less than half the way through and I've already learned enough to make it worth the investment to me. The chapter on Using Tables was just what I needed. I would recommend this book to other beginners who are still trying to make sense of it all.

Required reading for Web designers

This book presents analysis and how-did-they-do-that descriptions of numerous aspects of Web page design and production. The first two chapters covering general design issues and navigation are exceptionally good and should be read by anyone who makes Web pages. These chapters stress the overall need for usability and speed and discuss why sites that don't take their audience into consideration are unsuccessful. The remaining chapters are each geared to specific aspects of Web design that may be of interest to graphic artists designing for the Web; they cover such topics as Web graphics, fonts, animation, multimedia, and 3D worlds. In fact, some of the chapters are so specific that they may not be comprehensible to readers who don't work with Adobe Photoshop every day. The book includes a CD that has interactive examples and demo software for some of the design products mentioned in the book.While the overall quality of the book is quite good, the technical chapters on HTML and JavaScript are rather weak- -new users of either of these languages won't find these sections very illuminating, and experienced users won't find many new tips either (the example figures showing HTML code are barely legible). The chapter on Web type starts off by considering usability issues, but soon turns to snazzy ways to make an artistic point, seemingly forgetting the needs of users (as well as search engines, which read only real text, not animated gifs or Shockwave). The book is definitely geared towards graphic artists, almost assuming that the readers are working on high-end Macintosh computers. Certainly, any graphic artist designing for the Web will find tremendous value in this book, as well as general readers interested in Web design.

Useful to Learn by Examples

The books explains some basic web design concepts clearly by examples: all are excellent, real-world example. I'm a CS student, not design. the book teach me a new way to think about web design and many useful techniques are included. The brillient examples shock my mind.