Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:  
Summary: Great Web Design Resource
Comment: The Principles of Beautiful Web Design is an easy read but is full of ideas that help stimulate your creativity. It delves into many subtle psychological issues in web design that can make the difference between an "ok" website and a "beautiful" website. It is not primarily a technical book, so it can be understood without a knowledge of HTML and CSS.
Perhaps one of the most valuable aspects of this book is being able to see the developement steps Jason Beaird takes when going from concept to a final website. While it may not be a book you would pick up again after the first read, I would certainly recommend the "first read". It has many useful ideas that any web designer can personalize and implement.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Become An Artist
Comment: This book does the incredible, it actually teaches sound artistic principles such as textures and color combinations. If you did not think of yourself as an "artist" before reading this book, you certainly will after.
There are beautiful illustrations within this book so that you can actually see for yourself the artistic principles the author is using words to describe. The old cliche "a picture is worth a thousand words" is certainly true for this masterpiece.
One of the chapters I found most interesting is the one on balance. I remember taking an art appreciation class in college that talked about balance. Here's the difference though. In college it was SOO boring. It was all "pie in the sky" theory. Beaird, on the other hand, not only defines balance, but then goes the extra step of how to use the principle of balance in your own website design and even gives you examples. I like the very practical nature of this book.
As a marketer, I really liked the chapter on color psychology and how you push psychological buttons in people by choosing a combination of certain colors. This is extremely valuable information for the marketer who wants to artistically reinforce his marketing message. For example, emphasizing the bad things that are going to happen if someone doesn't buy your product or service is always stronger than emphasizing the good things that are going to happen if they do. So, if you are using fear in your sales copy to sell your product or service, you can reinforce this marketing message by choosing fear inducing colors. Cool stuff! I also liked the use of color wheels to help you pick complementary and contrasting colors. I'm terrible with matching colors, just ask my wife! So the lesson on how to use color wheels was very helpful.
Again, this book is all about the artistic side of web design and not on how to use php, javascript, or CSS.
This book is truly a work of art.
From the author of Internet Marketing-Profits That Lie Hidden In Your Website: How To Triple Your Web Sales In 25 Days
Customer Rating:
Summary: Useful but not thorough
Comment: I'm a programmer with an artistic side that is waiting to be born.
I didn't realize that web designers are actually artists bringing their talents onto a monitor screen (duh?). They go through formal training and education in graphic designs, theories, etc and they use all of that to get a site looking good. I always thought websites somehow would just look good on the front end if someone just casually work on it and as long as us backend programmers are at work then all is well (too much credit to back enders here huh?)
Anyways, I found a few interesting things in this book. The color wheel was good. I've been wondering why my color combination never work out right. The rule of 3rd is good. The different sample of websites gave me a keener way of categorizing layout types. The stock photo sites are good resources. The steps the author takes towards developing a layout is good - planining, contemplating, matching colors with company's themes/logo...I can see how the designer comes up with a layout, which is of much use.
The book feels a bit too general, however. I give it 3 stars. The first couple chapters of the book was best for me. The chapter on typeography was the least enjoyed. Some of the photoshop's "how to's" steps by step were oddly given since the book isn't about how to use photoshop. It felt like these were "fillers" of the book.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Terrific Book
Comment: Beautiful Web Design gives the user an insight look into what to think about when laying out your web site. Typography, color theory, composition and more all come into play. The author of this book is great!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great book!
Comment: I love this clearly-written well illustrated book. It's well paced, increasing in complexity as it goes along. I have stickies all over and keep going through it again and again, each time finding new and useful suggestions. I have several web design and CSS books, but this one is my favorite.
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