designing web graphics.4: the definitive guide to web design & development

FROM OUR EDITORS

The Barnes & Noble Review
Web designers have learned plenty in recent years -- much of it because Lynda Weinman's been there to teach them. Way back in '95, her Designing Web Graphics virtually defined the field. She actually invented -- or more precisely, discovered -- the web-safe color palette.

Since then, she's updated Designing Web Graphics three times. With each update, she moved to the forefront of web design and covered exactly what designers needed to know right now. It's been four years since the last update, and we're truly excited to tell you about her new Designing Web Graphics.4.

This is great stuff. Whatever material survived from Designing Web Graphics.3 has been thoroughly revamped, based on what Weinman's learned in four more years working with thousands of web designers at Lynda.com and her live seminars.

Weinman's always been great on the mechanics of web design, and this edition builds on that excellence. But this book is a breakthrough in helping designers cover the really sophisticated issues of aesthetics, information architecture, and usability they're increasingly up against.

To begin with, Weinman offers the best and most useful discussion of web aesthetics we've ever read.

She starts with color aesthetics, simplifying color theory so it can be understood by just about anyone, even folks with little or no design training. Drawing in part on ideas developed by world-renowned painter and illustrator Bruce Heavin (her husband), she offers easy principles and techniques for picking harmonious color combinations. (Already previsualize your sites in Photoshop? "Try filling the layers with shades of gray, instead of color, to make the information you want to 'pop' work correctly. After you've designed the page using grays, replace the grays with colors." You'll be amazed at how much easier it'll be to get your color values, saturations, and relationships right.)

Weinman next shows how to use color to draw your readers to the areas and messages that are most important to you. (We won't give away all her great ideas, but she's got a wonderful practical tip for this one, too: "Before you develop your opening page...identify what the first, second, third, and fourth reads should be.")

Next, she moves on to type -- covering all the basics and focusing on some Windows/Mac cross-platform annoyances that shouldn't be frustrating designers in 2003, but still are. (It doesn't help that Arial, Helvetica, and Times are history's most worn-out fonts.) How do you improve legibility? Handle body copy and headlines? Design printable pages?

Weinman offers invaluable advice for creating layouts that avoid the predictability of "rectangle-itis," which often results from working with tables, frames, grids, and even browser screens.

You'll find new coverage of planning and goal setting, as well as an excellent new chapter on comping and prototyping. Here, Weinman covers everything from brainstorming, sketching, and wireframing through choosing target browser resolutions and making the most of Fireworks and Photoshop's layers. She also helps you avoid the pitfalls of prototyping, such as inadvertently creating layouts you can't implement in conventional HTML.

Next, there's simple, practical coverage of organizing your site to reflect your content, message, and users, and a new 20-page chapter on the realities of designing for accessibility (covering everything from tables to context and navigation).

Most of the coverage designers have come to rely on in Designing Web Graphics is still here, only better: detailed reference material on web file formats and optimization; CSS, HTML, and XHTML; backgrounds and tiling; alignment, tables, and frames; rules and bullets; JavaScript rollovers and other dynamic content; browser standards; and a whole lot more.

Needless to say, the whole book is in full color. And, unlike some books we've seen, the site examples she uses are elegant, beautiful, and powerfully effective. The L.A. County Arts Commission's use of color. National Geographic's linear navigation system, and Smithsonian's deep architecture. Beringer Wine Company's effective, flexible use of grids. The University of Illinois' effective use of white space. Glorious to look at, masterfully written, Designing Web Graphics.4 is the best web design book we've read in a very long time. Bill Camarda

Bill Camarda is a consultant, writer, and web/multimedia content developer. His 15 books include Special Edition Using Word 2000 and Upgrading & Fixing Networks For Dummies®, Second Edition.

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