As we bid adieu to the year 2010, it is time to sum up the posts on SaffronStroke.com, based on their popularity. So here is a list of 25 top tutorials and posts of 2010.

Adobe Photoshop Tutorials

1. Transform a Picture into a Watercolor Painting using Photoshop CS5

Cool watercolor effect using Photoshop CS5, in easy steps.

2. Create Water Drops in Photoshop CS5

Create realistic water drops using Photoshop CS5.

3. Create a Page Curl Effect using Photoshop CS5 in 5 easy steps

The tutorial explains the method to create a page curl effect in just 5 easy steps.

4. Simple Lighting Effect in 3 steps using Photoshop CS5

Add simple lighting effect to focus on one point of the picture, using the ‘Render filter’.

5. Layer Styles in Photoshop CS5

Layer Styles are special effects applied to individual layers in Photoshop. Explore Preset Layer Styles and create Custom Later Styles in this tutorial.

Adobe Illustrator Tutorials

6. Create 3D Text using Adobe Illustrator CS5

You do not always need a 3D application to create beautiful 3D text. Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop has tools that can do the needful. This tutorial explores the tools to create a 3D text in Illustrator CS5.

7. Create an Abstract Wallpaper in Adobe Illustrator CS5

You must have seen and used abstract wallpapers on your desktop. Windows Vista comes with such cool abstract background too. I thought of creating one myself. This was my first attempt and I am quite impressed with it (though certainly not my best) You can use your own creativity and art to create such interesting wallpapers using the method given in this tutorial.

8. Tracing Artwork using Adobe Illustrator CS5

You may need to trace an image or a picture to create your own graphic based on it. Adobe Illustrator has a ‘Live Trace’ command that helps you automatically trace the artwork. Or you can always manually trace the artwork by using the base artwork as a ‘template’ and then using the pen or brush tool to draw. In this tutorial, you will learn both these methods.

9. Glossy buttons in Adobe Illustrator CS5

I have come across many clients who want a Web 2.0 style buttons, icons and logos. Though I haven’t found any specific features in a Web 2.0 button or logo but the objects are usually elegant, clean, with lots of gradients, shiny and they stand out. In this tutorial we are creating a Web 2.0 button (if it falls in that category) or should I say a glossy button.

10. Create a 3D Push Pin using Illustrator in 10 simple steps

This is a simple Illustrator tutorial on how to create a 3D push pin in 10 easy steps.

11. 3D Fruit Bowl in Adobe Illustrator CS5

This tutorial explains how to create a 3D Fruit bowl and place 3D fruits in it.

12. Creating Scatter Brushes in Adobe Illustrator CS5

Scatter brushes as the name suggests, scatter a pattern along a path. You may use scatter brushes to create an artistic background. In this tutorial, learn how to create a scatter brush. You may also like Create an Art Brush in Adobe Illustrator CS5 and Make Vector Pattern Brush in Adobe Illustrator CS5.

13. Create a mirror effect using Opacity Mask in Adobe Illustrator CS5

These days graphic designers and other digital artists create classy mirror or reflection effects in their art work. Mirror effect looks pretty nice and elegant for logos. In this tutorial, learn how to add mirror effect to your logo using the Opacity Mask in Adobe Illustrator CS5.

14. Placing Text in Adobe Illustrator CS5 document from other Word Processing Programs

To place text into your Illustrator documents, you can always open the source document, copy and paste the text into Illustrator. Another way to do this without taking the trouble of opening the source document, is by importing the documents in Illustrator. Learn how to import other documents into Illustrator in this tutorial.

Expression Web Tutorials

15. Add templates to Expression Web

Expression Web comes with a set of built-in templates that help you create your own website, without requiring many efforts. Although some tweaking is required! To design professional websites you ought to have plenty of site templates for your use. You can create your own or purchase them from other websites. Add these templates to Expression Web and keep them handy. In this article you will see how to add downloaded templates to Expression Web.

16. Free Expression Web Template for Small Business

The ‘Small Business’ template as I call it, is a simple website template, built using CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) and DWT (Dynamic Web Template). The template suits best for a small business firm as well as for personal use. The template is completely customizable, so you can change the appearance as you like.

17. Get rid of the dotted border from a focused hyperlink

You must have observed this behavior that when you click on a hyperlink it is surrounded with a dotted border. But you can get rid of this temporary border with a very small piece of code. Learn about it in the article.

18. Publishing Settings in Expression Web

Microsoft Expression Web supports different publishing settings. You can choose to work on your own computer and then publish your site/changes to your site onto the remote production web server or you can work on a remote staging server and publish on the production web server or work directly on the remote production web server. .Learn about it in the article.

19. Add or remove metadata in Expression Web

Microsoft Expression Web requires metadata to maintain a whole bunch of cross-page dependencies features like hyperlinks, DWTs and some site reports. Learn how to add or remove metadata in Expression Web in this article.

Other Tutorials

20. 7 jQuery Books for HTML, ASP.NET, PHP Developers and Designers

This is a collection of jQuery books that I am sharing with you, have good reviews and are amongst the best jQuery books available in the market. Choose your book.

21. 21 Decorative Free Photoshop Brushes You Can Use to Create Your Twitter Background

This article contains 21 Decorative Free Photoshop brushes that you can use to create your twitter background. Use one or more of these decorative brushes to customize your twitter background, create wallpapers or any other artwork.

22. 10 Stylish Grayscale Free Icon Sets

The article features 10 grayscale icon sets collected from different sources. These are FREE Icon sets, so you can go ahead and download them and use them wherever you may like. But do read the license document carefully, if any (may ask attribution), since they are subject to change.

23. Free Funky Icon Sets

Icons make blogs and websites interesting and attractive. There are plenty of formal icon sets available, and we always tend to use them in our blogs. But wouldn’t it be a good idea to use icons that fit into the theme and subject of the blog or even make them look cool. In this article, I am sharing 10 free funky icon sets that I liked, which I collected from various online resources.

24. How to create your own font using a Tablet

I always fall short on fonts while designing logos and other web graphics. Wished I could create my own font. And guess now I do that. Well it’s a simple job. Learn how to create your own font in this tutorial.

25. Backup Websites on Bluehost

We all back up our sites regularly to avoid loss of data due to various reasons. Have I assumed all of us do that? Well if you don’t then you are in for a shock any time. So get into a habit of backing up your data regularly. The Backups feature in Bluehost allows you to download a compressed file of the backup on your local computer. It is quite simple and easy to use. This tutorial explains in steps how to backup your websites on Bluehost.

Which is your favorite post of 2010? Do write to us in the comments.

Wish you all a very Happy New Year!

I always fall short on fonts while designing logos and other web graphics. Wished I could create my own font. And guess now I do that. Well it’s a simple job. There are different softwares available to do this using your tablet. If you do not have a tablet; you can use your very old companion, ‘mouse’ to do the same job! Yeah, but a tablet gives you more control than your mouse.

While there are numerous products in the market that let you create your own font, I use ‘My Font Tool for Tablet PC’ by Microsoft to create my font. Download the My Font tool from Microsoft and install it on your machine.

Then follow these steps:

1. Click on Start (Windows) and open My Font Tool for Tablet PC.

Your screen would look similar to the image given above.

2. Now use your pen to write characters on your tablet in the boxes given below the letters, numbers and characters. You can also provide a signature.

3. Next switch to the Adjust Spacing tab. Here with a preview of sample text, you would be able to control the spaces between characters and words plus Line spacing. See image below:

4. Then switch to Compile Font tab. A preview memo is typed in a standard Windows font. In the Font Name text box, enter a name for your font and click Compile My Font. Wait for some time, before you see the compiled results of the memo displayed in your font.

5. Click on Save Font To File… and save the font in ‘.ttf’ (True Type Font) format.

You can also choose to Install Font On This Computer to automatically add your font in all the Windows programs that allow font selection.

Wasn’t that simple! And it takes only few minutes. All you need to do is experiment with your ideas and practice to get your hands on it.