Website Optimization for Mobile Devices

Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Designrfix/~3/XITF-cywQUc/website-optimization-for-mobile-devices

There are billions of people on Earth and more and more people are using mobile phones. A mobile phone gives you access to the world. If you have a small business, target their phones. That’s where they get all their information about products and services. For that, your website needs to be mobile-friendly. That’s where […]

The post Website Optimization for Mobile Devices appeared first on designrfix.com.

From Toilet Roll To Paper Art: 12 Amazing Examples

Original Source: https://www.hongkiat.com/blog/creative-toilet-paper-rolls/

If your creativity is wild, no medium is a limitation. This fact is exceptionally true with Anastassia Elias, a french artist who collects toilet rolls and turns them into great works of unbelievable…

Visit hongkiat.com for full content.

5 Free Android Apps to Monitor Your Kids’ Smartphones Activities

Original Source: https://www.hongkiat.com/blog/parental-control-apps-android/

Google Play Store may not have tougher restrictions than those found on Apple’s AppStore so if your kids own an Android device (or have access to your device at their liberty), you might want…

Visit hongkiat.com for full content.

800+ Free & Premium Procreate Brushes

Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/1stwebdesigner/~3/sVIpbiCY5Io/

Procreate makes it easy to create stunning designs and pieces of artwork for personal and professional use. However, gathering all the resources you need, like Procreate brushes, can seem like a daunting task when you’re first starting out.

Instead of having to hunt down brushes to use in your art, we’ve put together a resource you can reference whenever you need a new brush. Here, we’ve compiled some premium brushes, free collections, as well as premium (free & premium) collections you can use in your work starting right now.

All The Best Procreate Brushes
Unlimited Downloads: Hundreds of Procreate Brushes For Your Designs

Envato Elements - Procreate Brushes
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Vintage Comic Brushes

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The Vintage Comic Brushes set contains 51 brushes for Procreate that are heavily inspired by the vintage comic halftone look.

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This set of texture brushes offer a variety of sand effects for your Procreate projects. The set comes with 6 sand texture brushes.

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The Fabulous Pencils set comes with 44 different brushes that offer realistic pencil textures for any project that requires a hand drawn look.

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The Graffiti Brush set makes it easy to create analog graffiti looks in your digital artwork.

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The Jungle Brushes is a set of 20 brushes for Procreate that can be used to add an earthy and grungy look to any project.

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This is a lovely collection of free watercolor and paint brushes.

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This is a real treasure trove of free resources! Here, you can find over 250 free brushes that offer you new creative ways to make what you want to make.

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Here’s another lovely set of brushes that you can browse and use for free.

Free Brushes: A Stockpile of all My Freebies

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In this collection, you can browse through all the free brushes a fellow artist has compiled. How generous!

50 of the Best Free Brushes

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Another great list here, this time of 50 fantastic free brushes.

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This list of 34 all-time favorite brushes can really take you far when it comes to professionalism — plus there are some freebies included here as well.

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Another free and premium list here, chock full of some of the best brushes you could ever ask for.

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Over 300 brushes are listed at this resource. Odds say you’ll find what you’re looking for here.

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Last on our list is this collection of over 100 brushes that includes free and premium selections, all of which are great for working artists.

Use These Procreate Brushes to Create Your Next Stunning Work

Don’t let a lack of on-hand resources stunt your next project. Instead, see what’s available to you for or for a nominal fee. What’s available might really surprise you. And hopefully, this collection of Procreate brushes will send you well on your way toward putting together something truly eye-catching. Be sure to check out our other brush resources here.


How to Get More Google Now Custom Voice Commands

Original Source: https://www.hongkiat.com/blog/google-now-custom-voice-commands/

Google Now, the smart voice assistant from the search giant, allows you to accomplish many tasks using nothing but your voice. You can use voice control on your device with this application, but…

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Beautiful Liquify Logo Animation in After Effects

Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/abduzeedo/~3/W0uqFEhNjQw/beautiful-liquify-logo-animation-after-effects

Beautiful Liquify Logo Animation in After Effects
Beautiful Liquify Logo Animation in After Effects

abduzeedoJan 24, 2020

I have been going back through old tutorials to fix some of the images that might be broken or with old formatting. The blog has changed quite a lot since we started 12 years ago. It’s incredible to see how many Photoshop tutorials we’ve written and how some of them stood the test of time. One of them was the Beautiful Water Effect in Photoshop. I love that tutorial, and it gave me the motivation that I need to continue studying After Effects. My goal was to try to reproduce the effect with some cool motion to it. With that, I would love to share a little After Effects tutorial on how I achieved the result.

A little disclaimer, I am not a pro with After Effects, on the contrary, I am learning, and my goal is to share the step by step on the things I discover along the way. I am sure there are more natural ways or better ways from other great resources, this one here is just a bit of my way of learning.

After Effects Tutorial

Step 1

The first thing to do is to try to understand how much in common After Effects and Photoshop have. In Photoshop this effect is quite simple, you use a displacement map. For my surprise, After Effects also have one.

So let’s get this started. Create a new project and add a new composition. Composition>New Composition.

Step 2

For my Photoshop image, I used a photo of ocean waves. So now we need to find a video for this project. It’s amazing how similar things feel when I started doing Photoshop tutorials. It was tough to find high-quality resources; we didn’t have Unsplash back in the day.

Now for photography, we have a plethora of excellent places. For video, the story is a bit different. I started this project using a sample for Adobe Stock, however, after searching I found a right place, it’s called Pexel Videos. The clip I am using is from there; it’s titled Close-Up Video Of Water Ripples by Stas Knop.

 

Step 3

Download the video and drag it to your Project panel. In Project pane, select the clip and hit “Enter,” to rename it. I like to keep the names short. I just called mine “Ocean.”

After that, drag the “Ocean” clip to your composition timeline panel. That way it gets centralized automatically.

Step 4

Let’s change opacity to 90%. In the timeline, expand the Ocean object, the expand Transform, and you will see Opacity. Just turn it to 90%

Step 5

Now let’s adjust the colors. Go to Effect>Color Correction>Hue/Saturation. Reduce the Saturation to -100.

Step 6

Let’s tweak the Levels now to remove the greyish look. Go to Effect>Color Correction>Levels. Use the values below.

Step 7

Let’s import the artwork we want to use for the displace effect. I am using the Abduzeedo logo. My logo is in vector format in Illustrator. Importing it to After Effects is straightforward. Again, I don’t know if it’s the right way, but this is how I did.

Select the vector in Illustrator and copy it.
In After Effects add a new solid layer. For the name use Logo and make sure the color of the layer is white.
Paste the logo in the composition as a path mask, and that’s it.
Select the layer in the timeline and go to Layer>Pre-Compose. The reason for this is if you want to replace the paths later you can do it without worrying about the timeline, imagine Smart Objects in Photoshop.

Step 8

Time to add some magic, at least it feels like that for me. One thing that I love about After Effects is that it does have some neat tricks, for example, the Effect & Presets panel has a search box. So you can type Displacement and boom, you will find what you need. In our case the Displacement Map. It can also be found via Effect>Distort>Displacement Map.

Make sure the Logo layer is select and just double-click on the Displacement Map option. You will notice on the left side there’s a new panel called Effect Controls. Let’s tweak these numbers to apply the effect to our layer.

For the Displacement Map Layer select the Ocean layer.
Tweak the Max Horizontal and Vertical Displacement. Depending on the logo and how much distortion you want. The cool thing is that you can animate these values too. I will show you an example at the end.

Step 9

To make it more realistic, duplicate the Ocean layer and reorder, so it’s on top of the Logo layer. After that change the Blend Mode to Multiply. After that change the opacity to 70%.

Step 10

The effect is pretty much done, but you can also try to add a little radial gradient to focus everything on the center of the composition. I haven’t found an easy way to add one, but here’s my hacky way.

Create a new composition. Make sure the background is black
Add a new solid layer with white color.
With the Ellipse Tool Q add a Circle in the center. It will mask the white layer.
Go to Effect>Blur & Sharpen>Gaussian Blur. Apply a significant value according to the gradient you want.

Step 11

Back to the main composition. Drag the Gradient composition to the timeline, below the logo but above the Ocean layer. Change the Blend Mode to Overlay.

Step 12

That’s it. The necessary effect is done. What you can do now is try to animate the in and out of the composition. You can do that by tweaking some of the values of the displacement, for example:

Select the Logo and go to Effect Controls>Displacement Filter.
Make sure the timeline is in the 0s. And click on the little Clock/Time watch icon next to Max Horizontal Displacement and Max Vertical Displacement.
Move the timeline to 3s and add keyframes. It’s the little diamond icon on the left side
Move to 7s and add more keyframes
Move to the end of the timeline and add two more keyframes. For these, change the values of the displacement to 300.
Move to the beginning and change the displacement values to 300 as well.
Select all keyframes, then with the right-click select Keyframe Assistant and then select Ease Ease.

Step 13

Let’s make the ocean fade in and fade out. To do that is quite simple.

Select the Ocean Layer and go to the 0s of the timeline. Expand the layer and select Transform>Opacity.
Click on the little stopwatch icon to add a keyframe.
Move to the 2s time and click on the “add keyframe” diamond icon.
Move to 8s and add another keyframe.
Move to the end of the timeline and change the opacity to 0%. It will automatically add a keyframe.
Select all keyframes, then with the right-click select Keyframe Assistant and then select Ease Ease.
With the keyframes selected, copy them. Select the Logo layer, go to Opacity and paste them to replicate the keyframes on that layer.

Conclusion

The effect is pretty much done. You can adjust the timing and add more finesse. That for me is the most challenging part, so have fun and let us know if you have any questions.

Download After Effects File

 

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Apple sale: Cheap iPad deal is flying off the shelves

Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CreativeBloq/~3/CzVIukEsIpc/apple-sale-cheap-ipad-deal-is-flying-off-the-shelves

Looking for a hot iPad deal this January? Then you won't want to miss out on these amazing Amazon deals. You can get your hands on a 32GB 10.2-inch iPad for just $249.99, and the larger 128GB 10.2-inch iPad for an impressive $329.99 – the cheapest we've seen it! That's a saving of $79 on the 32GB model and $100 on the 128GB model.

The 10.2-inch iPad is Apple's latest entry-level tablet and offers a crisp Retina display, brilliant battery life (expect nearly 12 hours) and support for the Apple Pencil and Apple's keyboard cover. Check out our Apple Pencil deals and the best iPad apps for designers to help you get the most from your shiny new purchase. 

Across the pond, there are some equally impressive iPad deals worth checking out…

Impressive discounts (like the ones above) on the iPad don't come around too often, so you really need to take advantage while you can. And, why not choose yourself something from the impressive range of iPad accessories available to keep your iPad Pro shiny and new.

If these deals aren't available to you, here are some of the best iPad prices wherever you are in the world. You can also check our roundup of the best cheap iPad deals right now.


Motion Design Monday – Rise

Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/abduzeedo/~3/bJh8rfVWGAE/motion-design-monday-rise

Motion Design Monday – Rise
Motion Design Monday - Rise

abduzeedoJan 27, 2020

Monday is our motion design day. Why? Well, just because it’s fun to say motion Monday? Honestly there’s no reason but the Aamir Khan totally deserved to be feature and shared here on Abduzeedo. It is a mix of beautiful 3D work with super smooth animations using Cinema 4D, Adobe After Effects and Adobe Photoshop. It’s also a personal project of Aamir. “I tried to create Rich Ancient look.” – Aamir adds.

3D and Motion Design 

Image may contain: screenshotImage may contain: indoor


How to Create Procedural Clouds Using Three.js Sprites

Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/tympanus/~3/N0pbA9bsrOY/

Today we are going to create an animated cloud using a custom shader material, extending the built-in Sprite material of Three.js.

We’ll assume that you are familiar with React (including Hooks), Three.js and React-Three-Fiber. If not, you might find this article that I wrote as a beginner’s intro to the library helpful as a quick start.

The technique that we’ll explain was used in two recent projects made at Low:

1955-Horsebit: a website for the campaign launch of the Gucci’s bag.

Let girls dream: a project to support a gender-equal future

We won’t cover the other elements, like the background, and we also won’t create the most performant cloud because it would get a bit too complex and the purpose of this article is to get you familiar with the technique while keeping it simple.

Note that the use of React it’s not obligatory here but I started using React-Three-Fiber for all my demos and projects, so I’ve opted to use it here, too.

We will cover two main points in this article:

How to extend a SpriteMaterialHow to write the shader of the cloud

Extending the sprite material

Since the goal is not to create a volumetric cloud (a real 3D cloud), I decided to extend a Three.js SpriteMaterial. We can instead leverage the fact that using a Sprite, the cloud will always be facing the camera, independently of the camera position or orientation. So if you move the cloud or move the camera you’ll always see it and it helps to fake the missing of 3D volume (check out the debug mode to get the idea).

Note: If you head to the demo and add /?debug=true to the URL it will enable the Orbit Controls which will give you some visual insight into why I decided to use the Sprite material.

There are multiple ways to extend a built-in material of Three.js, and you can find a good explanation in this article by Dusan Bosnjak.

import {ShaderMaterial, UniformsUtils, ShaderLib} from ‘three’
import fragment from ‘~shaders/cloud.frag’
import vertex from ‘~shaders/cloud.vert’

/**
* We are going to take the uniforms of the Sprite material
* and we’ll merge with our uniforms
*/
const myUniforms = useMemo(() => ({
…….
}), [])

const material = useMemo(() => {
const mat = new ShaderMaterial({
uniforms: {…UniformsUtils.clone(ShaderLib.sprite.uniforms), …myUniforms},
vertexShader: vertex,
fragmentShader: fragment,
transparent: true,
})
return mat
}, [])

We need to compose our vertex shader, adding the necessary #include code snippets. If you are interested in how materials are built in Three.js you can have a look at the source code.

uniform float rotation;
uniform vec2 center;
#include <common>
#include <uv_pars_vertex>
#include <fog_pars_vertex>
#include <logdepthbuf_pars_vertex>
#include <clipping_planes_pars_vertex>

varying vec2 vUv;

void main() {
vUv = uv;

vec4 mvPosition = modelViewMatrix * vec4( 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0 );
vec2 scale;
scale.x = length( vec3( modelMatrix[ 0 ].x, modelMatrix[ 0 ].y, modelMatrix[ 0 ].z ) );
scale.y = length( vec3( modelMatrix[ 1 ].x, modelMatrix[ 1 ].y, modelMatrix[ 1 ].z ) );

vec2 alignedPosition = ( position.xy – ( center – vec2( 0.5 ) ) ) * scale;
vec2 rotatedPosition;
rotatedPosition.x = cos( rotation ) * alignedPosition.x – sin( rotation ) * alignedPosition.y;
rotatedPosition.y = sin( rotation ) * alignedPosition.x + cos( rotation ) * alignedPosition.y;
mvPosition.xy += rotatedPosition;

gl_Position = projectionMatrix * mvPosition;

#include <logdepthbuf_vertex>
#include <clipping_planes_vertex>
#include <fog_vertex>
}

In this way we created a custom Sprite material. We can achieve the same effect in other ways for sure, but I decided to extend a built-in material because it could be useful in the future to add a custom logic. It’s now time to dig into the fragment.

Cloud’s fragment

To create the cloud we need two assets. One is the rough starting shape of the cloud, the other one is the starting point of the texture/pattern.
Keep in mind that both of the textures can be created directly in the shader but it will take some GPU calculations. That is fine, but if you can avoid it it’s a good practice to optimise the shader, too.

Using some images instead of creating them with code could save you some computational power.

Sliding textures

First of all let’s create two sliding textures, using the texture image above (uTxtCloudNoise), that we will use later to handle the alpha channel of the output. These are sliding textures that helps us to create a “fake” noise effect by concatenate, adding and multiply them.

vec4 txtNoise1 = texture2D(uTxtCloudNoise, vec2(vUv.x + uTime * 0.0001, vUv.y – uTime * 0.00014));
vec4 txtNoise2 = texture2D(uTxtCloudNoise, vec2(vUv.x – uTime * 0.00002, vUv.y + uTime * 0.000017 + 0.2));

Noise

We now need some GLSL noise: the Simpex noise and the Fractional Brownian motion (FBM) that allows us to morph the shape and create the vaporous border effect.

Let’s first create the Simplex and FBM noise to distort our UV.
We will use the FBM to achieve the effect for the border of the cloud, to make it like smoke, and we will use the Simplex to do the shape morphing of the cloud.

The distorted UV, now called newUv, will be used during the declaration of the txtShape:

#pragma glslify: fbm3d = require(‘glsl-fractal-brownian-noise/3d’)
#pragma glslify: snoise3 = require(glsl-noise/simplex/3d)

// FBM
float noiseBig = fbm3d(vec3(vUv, uTime), 4)+ 1.0 * 0.5;
newUv += noiseBig * uDisplStrenght1;

//SIMPLEX
float noiseSmall = snoise3(vec3(newUv, uTime)) + 1.0 * 0.5;
newUv += noiseSmall * uDisplStrenght2;

……
vec4 txtShape = texture2D(uTxtShape, newUv);

And this is how the noise looks like:

Mask & Alpha

To create the mask for the cloud we will use the shape texture (uTxtShape) we saw at the beginning and the result of the sliding textures we mentioned earlier.

The following output is the result of the masking only. The border and the shape effect is fine but the internal pattern/color is not:

Now we calculate the alpha used on the sliding textures from before. We’ll use the levels function, that was taken from here, which is more or less like the Photoshop levels function.

Concatenating the distorted shape (uTxtShape) and the red channel of the sliding textures will give us the external shape and even the internal “cloud pattern” to create a more real look and feel:

vec4 txtShape = texture2D(uTxtShape, newUv);

float alpha = levels((txtNoise1 + txtNoise2) * 0.6, 0.2, 0.4, 0.7).r;
alpha *= txtShape.r;

gl_FragColor = vec4(vec3(0.95,0.95,0.95), alpha);

Concatenating everything

It’s time now to wrap everything up to display the final output:

void main() {
vec2 newUv = vUv;

// Sliding textures
vec4 txtNoise1 = texture2D(uTxtCloudNoise, vec2(vUv.x + uTime * 0.0001, vUv.y – uTime * 0.00014)); // noise txt
vec4 txtNoise2 = texture2D(uTxtCloudNoise, vec2(vUv.x – uTime * 0.00002, vUv.y + uTime * 0.000017 + 0.2)); // noise txt

// Calculate the FBM and distort the UV
float noiseBig = fbm3d(vec3(vUv * uFac1, uTime * uTimeFactor1), 4)+ 1.0 * 0.5;
newUv += noiseBig * uDisplStrenght1;

// Calculate the Simplex and distort the UV
float noiseSmall = snoise3(vec3(newUv * uFac2, uTime * uTimeFactor2)) + 1.0 * 0.5;

newUv += noiseSmall * uDisplStrenght2;

// Create the shape (mask)
vec4 txtShape = texture2D(uTxtShape, newUv);

// Alpha
float alpha = levels((txtNoise1 + txtNoise2) * 0.6, 0.2, 0.4, 0.7).r;
alpha *= txtShape.r;

gl_FragColor = vec4(vec3(0.95,0.95,0.95), alpha);
}

Final thoughts

Keep in mind that this is not the most performant way to create a cloud, but it’s a simple one. Using noise functions is expensive, but for the sake of this tutorial it should suffice.

If you have any thoughts, improvements or doubts, please feel free to write to me in Twitter, I’ll be happy to help.

How to Create Procedural Clouds Using Three.js Sprites was written by Robert Borghesi and published on Codrops.

Apple iMac could be getting a VERY futuristic new look

Original Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CreativeBloq/~3/sV_KW8NwxlE/apple-imac-could-be-getting-a-very-futuristic-new-look

Apple has filed a patent that suggests future iMacs could have a radically different design. The patent details a slick, mostly glass, all-in-one (AIO) design with a distinctly futuristic vibe. There are some similarities to the current aesthetic – the curvy junction between the screen and its stand; the generally minimalist, sleek approach – but other than that it's a whole new ball game. 

Below is the current Apple iMac (incidentally, our pick of the best computer for graphic design, and the best computer for video editing right now).

Apple iMac

This brushed aluminium look has been around for a while now 

Below, you can see the diagrams of the potential new design included in the newly published patent. The distinct screen, housing and separate keyboard encased in brushed aluminium have been replaced by an AIO made mostly of glass. 

The accompanying text details "a glass housing member that includes an upper portion defining a display area, a lower portion defining an input area… a continuous, curved surface between the upper portion and lower portion."

Apple iMac patent application

A new patent shows a mostly glass all-in-one design

The patent also includes a support structure on the rear, which TechRadar suggests could contain the machine's computing power, with the glass section being fitted solely with sensors for the inputs, display and camera. See the full patent here. 

Apple has gained plenty of news inches for its design decisions over the years – even something relatively minor, such as the replacement of Forest Green for Navy Blue in the iPhone 12 lineup – has people talking. So we're doubly excited at the prospect of something potentially radical to follow in the footsteps of the Mac Pro 'dustbin' and 'cheese grater' designs, for example. 

When, or even if, this spacey new look will become reality is quite another thing. At the moment, it's still in its research phase, so it's certainly not on the cards any time soon. Although it's worth noting that while the patent was published on 23 January 2020, it was filed last May, which means Apple has been exploring this direction for a little while now. 

Read more: 

The best Apple Watch apps in 2020Apple Pencil vs Apple Pencil 2: which should you buy?The best cheap Apple laptop deals