Design your way

Thursday, April 19, 2018

Cool textures see a lot of use in web design, usually as backgrounds.

They add appeal and depth to the design, making it more memorable.

Sometimes all your site design needs is the perfect textured background to make the design come together. Cool background textures are incredibly valuable, especially if they’re free.

You can find many free cool textures on the internet. A lot of them have made by your fellow designers, sometimes even by student designers as small projects they use to learn their stuff.

Cool colorful textures can be hard to come up with on your own, so using the resources provided by others as a base for your own modifications can help you cut down on the time and effort you need to put in to complete a site design.

What is textured design? Texture is the feel of an object or its surface quality. Texture creates many of the most familiar and evocative sensations, like the softness of a blanket, the warm feeling of soapy bubbles in the bath, or the pleasant smoothness of a shirt.

In graphic design, of course, this kind of elegant and cool texture is only visual. However, it creates an illusion of texture and can still generate the same emotions and ideas.

Texture is used often on the web because they are so easy to integrate into almost any web design. It’s a relatively easy process and one with almost endless possibilities.

Thanks to designers and even photographers that are willing to share their work, there are a large number of free textures available out there.

How to Use Cool Textures in your design

Backgrounds are very important in web design. They help frame your content, make it stand out, and set the tone of your site. Using graphic design textures as backgrounds are a huge help in accomplishing these goals.

Competition for visitors is fierce in the online world and only getting fiercer. Having a cool texture as your background is almost a necessity for a web designer to make the site stand out.

The key thing about a textured background is that the texture you use needs to be attractive and entertaining. Some designers opt to use illustrations, while others go to gradients.

Whatever you choose, it needs to help accent the other graphic elements of your web design. Textured design should never distract from your design. It should have a good effect on the text and images you use in the foreground.

Always check to see if your font is readable on the free texture you’ve chosen. You also need to see if the color works well. Certain colors will make a texture hard to look at or even bring to mind unpleasant things.

Make sure the cool texture fits in with the navigational layout and structure of your website. If it doesn’t, don’t worry! There are plenty of free cool HD textures out there. If one doesn’t work well, there are plenty more.

Remember not to use textures that are too busy. White space, also called negative space, is space that isn’t doing anything. It’s very important for keeping a site visually appealing.

It helps to highlight what you want site visitors to actually look at. Having too little of it creates a site that is hard to look at and navigate. Textures can and often are used in white space, but they are often subtle. If you really want to use busier textures, figure out ways to moderate the amount of white space it eats up.

Types of Cool Textures and How to Use Them

Use Natural Textures to Add in Some Organic Life

Natural textures are something you should look into adding. These cool textures help create emotion and a sense of welcome. Depending on the purpose of your site, textures like crisp fresh grass or fluffy clouds can create a sense of relaxation.

Wooden textures are comforting, bringing to mind cozy cabins and happy camping trips. If you are designing a website with a connection to the outdoors, natural textures are a great way to go.

Artificial Textures are Great for Experimental Designs

Artificial textures are very diverse. They range from surrealistic imagery to human-made items. These are also some of the most common free textures. Some are made by photographers, while others come from designers. The sources are very diverse, ranging from crumpled paper to artificial geodes to strange fractal-like images made on a computer.

These cool textures open a lot of room for experimentation and fun. They are not always cold, washed-out, or futuristic colors, but can be bright and playful as well. They can set wild, fun tones or provide interesting yet pleasant backgrounds for professional information.

Tactile Texture Can Create Visual Interest

Tactile textures are the textures we see and feel all around us, like denim and stone. We have a sense of how something will feel based on its look. This is helpful in creating tone and interest in web design.

While no one can feel the texture of the brick used as a background, they will likely know how it would feel to touch, as well as what emotions that feeling creates. This is a great way to add a physical sense to your website design.

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