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15 exceptional education sites

Boston University

We start with Boston University’s website, which seems to be pretty traditional, but the more you poke your nose around, the more you realize they have done a great job at incorporating some of the modern web design standards. It’s a really, super clean approach to an education website, that still keeps it’s roots in what makes a traditional university site.

School of Visual Arts

Obviously, a school that specializes in visual arts cannot have a website that’s a complete eyesore. SVA does a great job of creating a site that first creates some excitement. The colors, the graphics, and photographs are all great, but what’s of great importance is the SVA layout. They don’t get right into how people should come to SVA, but they have a bunch of trending news articles on the visual arts and design community within SVA. That connection building is ideal for websites.

New York University

University websites are typically really busy and you have a lot of things pulling for your attention. NYU is another example of a university that decided to go really simple with their web design. The colors are cool and inviting and don’t seem to be extremely aggressive. They also do a good job of breaking up lots of long copy to make it easier to read and understand.

Biola Undergrad

This is completely unorthodox for a university website. As a matter of fact, it kind of feels like a museum or something. But what’s great is that the graphics speak tons for the creativity and exploration that you can get at Biola. The aesthetics of the site are so high so they’ve done a good job of balancing that with nice, small and easy to digest chunks of text as well. This is really another level of web design, let alone college web design.

Bates

What makes this website good is that the homepage is a slider for photographs. Of course, this links to different pages throughout the site. This is great because again, many traditional sites have so many things that are trying to get your attention that it’s just nice to go to a site and have control over what you see and what you don’t see. Also, the typography throughout the website is nothing to sneeze at!

Regent College

Simply put, this web design is beautiful. It’s captivating, interesting and absolutely makes me want to get a passport and travel to the campus in Canada. In all actuality, the layout isn’t too far from what you’d see anywhere else, but the graphics and aesthetic quality is just so high. The use of color and shapes plays a huge part in making Regent College’s web design so exceptional.

Drexel University

Drexel rather surprised me because in my familiarity with the school, it’s nothing to really write home about. But they did something really creative with their web design. It almost kind of reminds you of an agency’s website with the full image backgrounds. They do a great job of keeping it simple and streamlined, while heavily representing their schools’colors.

Langara

I saw this web design and almost lost my mind. This is a completely different approach to web design in general, but it absolutely works. There are so many small elements that you could easily look over, but would be missed if they weren’t there. This design exceptional and should be used for inspiration in all web design. I think they know what they’re doing up in Canada.

UCLA Architecture and Urban Design

Sometimes we use different design techniques because they’re trendy and other times we use them because they just make sense. In this case, everything on the UCLA AUD website makes sense. They have a grid-based system, which not only helps organize their work, but also kind of alludes to building stuff–like architects do! The use of color also helps organize things. Overall, you can just tell there was a lot of thinking and planning that went into this website for people who have to think and plan.

Rochester Institute of Technology – Visual Communication Design

Just like Drexel’s web design, this one puts you in the mind of a creative agency’s. And much like a creative agency, RIT used an extremely clean and simple approach to their design. If you browse through the site, there are different elements introduced that continue to keep your attention. This is absolutely important because they are trying to sell their visual communication to prospective students.

Strelka Institute

Strelka is not your typical undergrad or graduation institute of higher-learning. They are a non-profit organization aimed at educating students who want to use their talents and use them for the greater good. They deal with mainly creative students and get them to think about what’s next rather than what’s right now. Their website is bold yet simple in it’s approach, creating a genuine interest in the work they produce.

VCU Brandcenter

The Brandcenter is one of the top advertising graduate schools in the United States. They boast connections with some of the top agencies around today. Because of this, they have to make sure their image is in line with that. They have a really interesting visual brand that generates excitement and promotes creativity. Much like SVA’s site, they don’t concern you with why you should attend the Brandcenter. Instead, they focus on helpful videos and pieces of news for the community.

Williams College

According to Forbes, Williams College is the #2 College or University in the nation, right behind Princeton. Why is that important? Take a look at Princeton’s website, then take a look at Williams College’s. There’s a great difference in the role of design on these sites. Williams College actually seems like it might be fun to attend, and not your typical, boring private school. Kudos to them for stepping out the box a little!

Institute of Design at Stanford

The D School at Stanford has been making a little bit of noise lately with their academics and connections. They should also be recognized for this wonderful design they have. Everything is spot on from the graphical elements to the use of typography. This is another, all around solid web design.

Stanford Arts

Stanford twice? Well, they really know what they’re doing when it comes to design. In particular, on this site for the arts, they do a great job of fusing a traditional or typical university site design with some very new elements. In addition, when you browse around, they’ve done a great job of not making it salesy at all. As a matter of fact, looking at content on different pages is very similar to reading a blog or online magazine.

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Design Trend: Long Shadows

A new trend is making its way through cyberspace – long shadow design.

The concept, which borrows themes from flat design, is popping up in a big way in recent weeks. The trend is impacting user interface elements and icons the strongest, but is starting to creep into other parts of website design.

What is Long Shadow Design?

Long shadows extend far past the object in which they mirror.

“Long shadow” is not a new term. It is actually borrowed from lighting and photography. Photographers often show long shadows in images to create a high-drama effect. In natural light, long shadows are cast when the sun ins near the horizon, occurring both at dusk and dawn.

In design, long shadows have become a quick trend. In design, long shadows are being added to objects in flat design schemes. The shadows, which often rest at a 45-degree angle, mirror an object and add a lot of emphasis and drama.

What’s different about these shadows are that, they too, are flat. Designers are creating long shadows using a tint of the color with no fading, shading or graduation of color.

It seems like many designers hopped on long shadows almost all at once and are using the same basic idea. Even as far as the direction and angle of each shadow. (Most shadows fall to the lower right corner of the object at a 45-degree angle, although some designers are using 120 degrees.) Shadow edges are sharp and add an extra element of depth to the overall design.

Long shadow design is more limited than other concepts, because it is intended only for small elements. It is not something that designers are using for an entire project and is almost exclusively limited to icons or buttons.

So far, long shadow design is used primarily for smaller objects and elements such as icons. Shadows live within the element and often extend beyond an object to the surrounding frame. Many of the long shadow concepts we are seeing come from projects where designers are looking for creative ways to build icons for the upcomingApple iOS 7.

Borrowing from Flat

Long shadow design is borrowing a lot of the principles of flat design. It could even be considered a form of flat design (or you might call it “almost flat”).

Long shadow design is based on simple shapes and clean lines, as is flat design. It also uses a color palette that is bright and vibrant. Color is also used for shadows, which may just be a shade darker than the hue it mirrors, rather than black or gray.

By picking up and mirroring flat design concepts, long shadow design is meant to be used in conjunction with a flat design scheme. Elements employing long shadow design can be used with elements that are completely flat to create an interesting overall design scheme.

Where long shadow design removes itself from flat design is with the idea that elements take on more of a three-dimensional effect. While it works for long shadow design, some purists may argue that any effect designed to create that extra layer of dimension is not entirely flat.

Gallery of Long Shadow Design

Long shadow design is popular in mockups right now, although not as many projects have made it to publication yet. (But expect to see quite a few of them soon.)

The most notable example of long shadow design right now comes from American retailer JC Penney, which is running a television and internet ad campaign that uses long shadows.

Dribbble is a great place to look for flat and long shadow design inspiration. Here’s a gallery of some great examples of long shadows.

Long Shadow Design Resources

Long Shadow Generator

Long Shadows in CSS3

Google Fonts CSS longshade Icon

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20 Dextrous Adobe Illustrator Logo Design Tutorials

Your logo or brand is your visual identity it gives you an individualism. We can easily recollect a name of a Brand just by looking at the logo. Logos are mostly created in Illustrator.

We have placed few Tutorials based on Logo Designing in Adobe Illustrator that will not only give you the details of the Illustrator process but few of them even give you the insight of Logo Design. We would be happy to see if you also designed a logo by taking an inspiration from any of these tutorials or even if you have used your own creative instincts.