Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:  
Summary: Basic, but Solid
Comment: Billed as a book for tech people without a design background, The Principles of Beautiful Web Design provides a high-level overview of basic design principles, from layout and composition to color theory to texture. It is a rather slim volume, clocking at 168 pages, and delivers broad brushstrokes of information and does not get too geeky in any single area. Web technology books, especially those that focus on practical application and/or visual design, tend to go stale quickly; this book might have a longer shelf life because of its focus on principles, which are timeless (at least, most of the time).
I was interested in this book because I enjoy designing more than coding. As I'm self-taught in graphic design, however, I often feel what I create is a result of trial-and-error or gut feelings rather than a knowledgeable application of design fundamentals. I was looking to this book to encapsulate some of the design essentials in a format that would be easy to rely upon as a reference when I embark upon the next web development project. For the most part, my expectations were fulfilled.
I found the sections where the author narrated his design process to be the most useful. He started from pencil sketches on paper and ended the book with a finished website comp ready to be presented to the client. These sections read almost like a transcript from a usability test where the subject verbally narrates what s/he's thinking; the author did a capable job of explaining his design decisions and related the particular stage of the design to the topic at hand. The author also chose good real-world examples to illustrate various principles and was quite descriptive in showing why and how those designs succeed; as someone who learns a lot from "good examples of bad examples," however, I wish the author had included more examples where a designer made a poor decision on a particular design element.
As I do have some background in design, early parts of each chapter were at times too rudimentary for me (e.g., the difference between the RGB and CMYK color models, how to use Brightness/Contrast in Photoshop to adjust images and the like). However, I did appreciate other sections addressing newer strategies for common web design challenges, like how to force particular fonts into a page (using the Scalable Inman Flash Replacement method) and create drop-shadows and rounded corners via CSS and Javascript.
On the whole, I highly recommend this book for coders who have no background in design, but would like to become more informed and/or try their hand at designing. I would also recommend, though slightly less strongly, this book for those like myself who are self-taught on design issues. I wouldn't necessarily recommend this book for those with a strong design background, although those people may find it useful for the examples and as a source of inspiration.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Nicely done but not as good as other recent books on web design
Comment: Jason Beaird's new book on web design is worth a look, but compared to a number of other fairly recent books on web design was disappointing. I downloaded the initial chapter from SitePoint and thought that the book looked like it would be good. When I received the book, however, I found that the first chapter was really the best chapter of the book. In contrast, Andy Clarke's Transcending CSS, while focused extensively on CSS, is a much more complete and beautifully designed book that far surpasses this volume. The Design of Web Sites, Second Edition, is also rich with examples, ideas and straight talk about web design. If Jason Beaird develops a second edition of "Principles" I hope he will expand on many of the concepts only touched upon in this first book. It's a good start but needs significantly more depth to be of significant value.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Design basics, not applied.
Comment: Too basic for educated designers, but good for those who are interested in the theory behind design. May open some eyes to see that design is not just making things "pretty", but is instead a system of qualities that make good user experiences. However, some of the examples in the book are not of a quality I would want to emulate or hold up as "beautiful design". Most of the designs shown are rather pedestrian examples that make me cringe as a UX Designer. Harsh colors, hard-to-read display fonts over images, low contrast fonts on color backgrounds are all no-no's in the realm of site usability. Read this book for the basic design principles, then look elsewhere for examples of design quality.
The back cover screams, "You don't need to go to art school!" Well, no, you don't, but you also can't learn how to be a good designer just by reading a book like this. Take my advice, hire a designer.
Customer Rating:
Summary: This is NOT a book on design principles
Comment: A more appropriate title for this book is `things to think about when making a website and how me and my friends do it - for dummies'. The book does a fine job for such a title.
This book does NOT articulate a set of principles and explain their application; there is little to generalize to other problem solving contexts (or my context at least).
I am new to web development and for other self directed learning (Java, XHTML, AJAX and OO) I have started with a funky Head First book followed by more formal academic books (Booch, Bloch, Dietal, Larman, Jeremy Keith).
This book is neither funky or formal. Where the Head First series successfully uses cultural references and idioms to engage the reader in learning complex concepts and principles, this book uses similar devices with no obvious intent other than being familiar. Where the formal books locate material by referencing a broader academic context, this author references the somewhat creative work of his own and that of his friends. There is no bibliography and this is not a primer to the broader discipline.
The author admits difficulty in `verbalizing the procedures' because much of his design is `subconscious' (p24), he follows with four pages of stream of consciousness explanation on the realization of a design that includes over sixty `I' references - and scant reference to design principles. There is NO discussion of the design principles underpinning well-known successful sites, nor how principles unfold in various contexts such as corporate sites, e-commerce sites, blog sites, sales sites, Gothic music and games sites, and so forth.
For example, fixed versus liquid layouts is addressed with pros and cons listed. The author concludes that 'the decision [is]...determined by the target audience and accessibility goals of each individual web site' (p29). However, principles for determining audience needs and their accessibility goals for different contexts is NOT really covered.
There seems disdain for academic rigor and technical knowledge: `the rule of thirds or...rule of turds' (p10). `besides, my maths is a little rusty' (p9) `Describing ...emotional connections ... with colors can be a hippy-esque topic' (p39). There is no sense that the author is in command of the discipline, instead he appears embarrassed by its technical aspects.
Color blindness and accessibility are NOT covered. `Principle/s' is NOT listed in the index.
I give two stars as it may be useful for some, as demonstrated by other reviews; and the book is well presented. However, I will fulfill my needs by looking for more substantial and perhaps non web directed books on color and graphic design.
[addendum 24 Nov 07 - See my review on "The Complete Color Harmony" by Sutton and Whelan The Complete Color Harmony: Expert Color Information for Professional Color Results (Color Harmony)for a book I used for principles of color]
Customer Rating:
Summary: The Best Book on Web Design
Comment: Being a programmer and not designer I have always found it difficult to understand design topics like color, layout, composition and so forth when it comes to designing websites. I have purchased books in the past but they always assume the reader has a design background of some sort. I thought I'd never find a book that assumed no design knowledge but was not a "dummies" book. Well my search is finally over.
This great book by Jason Beaird covers everything in web design from web page anatomy to color theory to texture and typography. The thing about this book is that the author explains everything in simple explanations that are clear and concise with beautiful screenshots and illustrations.
The book starts off with layout and composition which entails: Grid Theory, The Rule of Thirds, Symmetrical and Asymmetrical Balance, Unity, Proximity, Emphasis, Contrast, etc. Lots of good stuff that makes for relaxed easy reading that really makes you understand how to place images and text on a web page. He also covers the basic web layouts such as left and right column and three column. Other layouts such as fixed and liquid and hybrid are also discussed with nice examples. A great chapter that is better than anything I have ever read before in other books.
The next chapter is a very complete discussion on colors. Jason goes into detail about the main colors and what they are usually associated with. For example, the color orange is thought to promote happiness represent sunshine, enthusiasm and creativity. The color blue has been found to calm people and conveys a sense of stability and clarity. Is that why Microsoft's website uses it so much? Also covered is the color wheel, color schemes (triadic, split-complementary, and tetradic). A lot of fancy words that I never understood until reading this chapter. An eye opener for me about colors.
Texture is covered next and how web designers can give a web site a distinctive appearance beyond just picking colors for it. Shapes, volume and depth, light and shadow, patterns all are apart of making a web site "feel" something to the visitor and should not be overlooked. Of course this requires a little graphic skills but nothing too complex.
Typography is then covered and everything you ever wanted to know about fonts is explained. From text replacement (sIFR) to web safe fonts to spacing and alignment to all kinds of examples of different types of fonts.
The final chapter is on imagery where the author explains to the reader the real power of how images can make or break a web deign. Ask yourself these questions about images you want to use on your web page: Is it relevant? Is it interesting? Is it appealing? The author also goes through sites where you can get free and commercial stock images and the downfalls of each.
A great book for anybody who really wants to learn more about design. This book has been sold out for a few weeks and has been one of the most popular books from Sitepoint in quite a while.
A must buy!!
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