Creating WordPress Themes

I’m going to pretend that my (three year old!) tutorial on creating WordPress themes doesn’t exist anymore. As I mentioned in the intro to this series, a lot of it still holds true, but enough has changed that it’s probably better to just start from scratch. And so I am.

First, you should know a few things that will be indispensable. One such thing is the WordPress Codex – almost everything you need to know is in this bible for WordPress. It’s always the first place I look when I have a question on anything, and 8 times out of 10, I find the answer within it’s pages. Read more about WordPress theme development…

FLARVision: Augmented Reality and Papervision

The basic explanation of Augmented Reality is to superimpose graphics over real-world environments in realtime. In Flash, this is usually done with a webcam and a marker card. When you hold the card up to the webcam, Flash is able to detect the orientation of the marker and superimpose, in this case, a 3d model on top of it.

This technology has been around for a while now and having access to it in Flash is really exciting. Although it is still in its infancy, over time the speed and power of AR will improve to hopefully play an important role in how we view the web. Now is a great time to get your feet wet in order to get a better understanding on how it works. Read more about augmented reality…

First Look: Object Oriented CSS

In October, I’ll speak at Web Directions South 2009 in Sydney about CSS Frameworks. One of the main questions I will answer in my talk is whether or not you should use a CSS Framework in any given project. Since the alternative is writing your own CSS styles from scratch, I’m researching some of the latest thinking on hand-coded CSS.

One prominent voice in this arena is Nicole Sullivan, who has developed a methodology called Object Oriented CSS (OOCSS). She outlined this approach to writing CSS at Web Directions North 2009, and the 48-minute video is available.

Sullivan is a talented and engaging presenter, but I found the video a lot to take in all at once. Since watching it, I have applied the principles of OOCSS to an internal project here at SitePoint, and I feel like I have a better grasp on what it’s all about.
Read more about CSS…

VizualPV3D: Papervision3D Software

VizualPV3D is a free Flash application that provides a GUI interface to create and manipulate objects in 3D scenes using Papervision3D.

A Juxt Interactive project, designed and developed by Gary Stasiuk, VizualPV3D provides a visual interface to Papervision3D … Read more about this awesome Papervision3D program…

Vizual PV3D from Juxt Interactive on Vimeo.

Google Earth Featured Modeler

Source: Google SketchUp Blog

Welcome to a new feature of our blog: Google Earth Featured Modeler profiles! Thousands of beautiful buildings, bridges, monuments, and statues have been added to Google Earth by individuals around the world. We’re planning to share their stories with our blog readers on a recurring basis. If you’re interested in becoming the next Featured Modeler, upload your collection to the Google 3D Warehouse and we’ll take a look. Read more about Google Earth Featured Modeler profiles…

Google Debuts DoubleClick Studio

Source: InformationWeek.com

On Friday, Google unveiled DoubleClick Studio, a platform for designing rich media ads using Flash and Web technology. It includes a rewrite of the DoubleClick ActionScript API, an interface for verifying ad-related events, media previewing, reporting, and ad distribution.

Rich media ads make use of motion graphics, audio, and interactivity. This is what sets them apart from display ads — banners, for example — and text ads that can only be interacted with through a click. If well-designed, they’re more engaging to viewers and lead to better results than their less-flashy brethren. Read more about DoubleClick Studio…

3D Flash Sites Win Awards

Papervision3D, the latest Flash-based technology, is taking the Internet world by storm. It promises to grant access to animated 3D graphics in a bold new way. In fact, the official Papervision3D blog notes that a few sites that use this mind-blowing technology recently won awards. Read more about award-winning Papervision3D sites…

Build Your Own WordPress Themes the Easy Way

Source: SitePoint.com

WordPress is by far one of the most favored blogging tools, and WordPress themes are certainly popular. A custom theme is a handy service to sell to a client, while creating your own theme for your blog is a fantastic way to let your personality and skills shine through — much more so than downloading some run-of-the-mill theme already being used by five hundred other blogs.

Creating an entirely new theme from scratch is complex and time-consuming — explaining how to write your own is a job too large for one little blog post! Fortunately, WordPress’s parent and child theme feature is a fast and easy way to start using themes. Simply grab a parent theme framework that suits your needs, add a child theme with your own CSS and tweaks, and you’ll be on your way to theme domination. Read more about building WordPress themes…

Landing Pages That Convert

As all adult webmasters know, it’s a huge challenge to create web pages that generate sales. The website tour is the primary sales tool used by these webmasters for adult subscriber websites, but a landing page can generate much more revenue than a tour.

The landing page can be described as an interactive sales letter that compresses the entire sales process into one web page. This page functions as a mini-website and should contain eleven components to successfully sell a product: product name, photo, description, features, benefits, product tour, how-to-buy tour, security and privacy guarantee, customer testimonials, product reviews, and an e-mail newsletter form.  Read more about landing pages…

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