November 20, 2024

Fonts That Speak: Typography as a Storytelling Tool in Modern Design

Typography plays a pivotal role in every design and it has the power to make or break a creation or sometimes even an entire business.

While good typography has helped businesses boost revenue bad typography has cost brands millions, mainly as a result of disregard for the psychological effects and the user experience of typography design.

The style and design of the fonts you use are just as important as the wording you choose for the messages in a design. As the German typographer Hans Peter Willberg once said, “typefaces are not only there to be read, you also see them.”

Let’s dive into the world of typography design and explore how it relates to storytelling to figure out how you can leverage it.

Importance of Typography in Storytelling

For centuries, typography has been more of an art form than just text. The history of calligraphy dates all the way back to 200 BCE. In every ancient culture, from China to Greece and Rome, the inscriptionists and writers always put an emphasis on making letters look beautiful.

Even today, great designers go the extra mile to make typography look exceptional and stand out, not just to make text and titles beautiful but also to improve readability and user experience. And it’s especially a key aspect in storytelling.

Take a wedding invitation, for example. A handpicked script handwritten or calligraphy-style font goes a long way to make the entire invitation look romantic and create a meaningful connection with the reader.

On the other hand, a bad choice of fonts can completely ruin the entire purpose of the design as well as the reputation of the brand.

Or it could even ruin an important awards ceremony, like the Oscars 2017.

To tell a great story, you need good copy. A brilliantly worded story can deliver a message much more effectively than a statement. But, you also need the right font to create a meaningful and emotional connection through that story.

How Typography Evokes Emotions

There’s a psychological impact behind the different styles of fonts you use in design. Have you noticed how brands from certain industries always prefer to use serif fonts while businesses in the creative industry stick to sans-serif fonts?

Even when creating designs related to certain topics, you will choose fonts appropriately. For a nature-themed design, you will use a brush font. Or for an urban-themed design, you will prefer a graffiti-style font.

No matter which style of font you use, typography has the ability to evoke emotions. Sometimes, seeing a classic retro-style font in an advertisement will take you back to your childhood. Or a handwritten text will remind you of a note from your mother.

Typography also plays a role in conveying the overall mood of the design. Depending on the context, it could make you hungry, thirsty, happy, sad, or even disgusted at times.

Typography as a Visual Voice

Typography is a defining factor of the visual voice and tone of your brand’s messaging. With the correct font, you can choose to make your message formal or playful.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but more often than not, you’d be lost without the words. The example above shows the power of the word and the importance of the font choices.

Fonts are often used to give designs a personality. There’s a reason why you almost always see handwritten script fonts in Christmas-themed designs. Or serif fonts in luxury branding designs. It’s all part of creating an overall visual voice and tone for the design.

Guiding Readers on a Journey

Take a closer look at this article you’re reading. You’ll notice how easy it is to scan through this post, thanks to the subheadings we use throughout the article. In the section below, you’ll see how we create another level to this hierarchy with numbered subheadings to make things even simpler for you to read.

Without the subheadings, bullet points, and numbered lists, this article will be a plain wall of text. You will feel overwhelmed and bored to even attempt to read it.

But, through this typography hierarchy, we are able to take you, the reader, on a journey. Sometimes we’ll use bolded text to emphasize key points or italics to bring more attention to things.

The scale, weight, style, and spacing in typography all play a role in reinforcing narratives and guiding the reader by maintaining their attention. That’s the power of typography!

5 Tips for Typographic Storytelling

There are many factors to consider in typographic storytelling. The following are some of the most important things you should consider for creating effective stories.

1. Consistency and Relevance

When choosing a font, always consider its relevancy to the subject matter as well as the brand messaging. Even though sometimes clients come to you with their own list of font choices, it’s your job as the designer to educate them on the importance of typography design.

Creating a relevant and consistent look for typography should be your number one priority.

2. Importance of Font Pairing

Choosing the right font to accompany your main font is another important part of typographic storytelling. It’s with a good combination of fonts for titles and body text you can create good contrast and hierarchy in designs.

Using flexible fonts with multiple font weights and styles is a great way to make sure your designs can shine on every medium and platform.

3. Ensure Readability

Some fonts will look great on digital designs but come out distorted in prints. Other fonts will often look amazing in large sizes but completely unreadable in small text.

Readability is paramount in every design. You should take time to test every font in different sizes and formats to ensure they look great no matter how and where you use them.

4. Print vs Digital

Understanding the differences between the print and digital mediums is crucial to creating typography designs that resonate with the target audience. People interact with these two platforms very differently. Some users will zoom in and out of a digital design to take a closer look while others read the same text on a giant billboard.

Pay close attention to these requirements and details for more effective typographic storytelling.

5. Follow the Trends

Typography continues to evolve with new and unique trends. Whether it’s variable fonts or 3D color fonts, it’s your job to stay up-to-date on the latest trends and adopt them for appropriate projects. These trends will help elevate your storytelling in modern design.

Conclusion

When talking about typography, we can’t forget about emojis. Like it or not, they are now part of storytelling and how we write and express our emotions. Even the Oxford Dictionary has recognized emojis as words.

Much like the calligraphy letters from ancient times, there will come a day in the distant future when researchers will analyze the meaning behind emojis. That will be our proud contribution to the history of typography.

Nevertheless, you can’t ignore the importance of typography and its impact on storytelling, especially as a designer. So, continue to learn and explore new ways to utilize it to your advantage. You can start by reading up on our top typography trends guide.

November 20, 2024

Invoker Commands: Additional Ways to Work With Dialog, Popover… and More?

The Popover API and <dialog> element are two of my favorite new platform features. In fact, I recently [wrote a detailed overview of their use cases] and the sorts of things you can do with them, even learning a few tricks in the process that I couldn’t find documented anywhere else.

I’ll admit that one thing that I really dislike about popovers and dialogs is that they could’ve easily been combined into a single API. They cover different use cases (notably, dialogs are typically modal) but are quite similar in practice, and yet their implementations are different.

Well, web browsers are now experimenting with two HTML attributes — technically, they’re called “invoker commands” — that are designed to invoke popovers, dialogs, and further down the line, all kinds of actions without writing JavaScript. Although, if you do reach for JavaScript, the new attributes — command and commandfor — come with some new events that we can listen for.

Invoker commands? I’m sure you have questions, so let’s dive in.

We’re in experimental territory

Before we get into the weeds, we’re dealing with experimental features. To use invoker commands today in November 2024 you’ll need Chrome Canary 134+ with the enable-experimental-web-platform-features flag set to Enabled, Firefox Nightly 135+ with the dom.element.invokers.enabled flag set to true, or Safari Technology Preview with the InvokerAttributesEnabled flag set to true.

I’m optimistic we’ll get baseline coverage for command and commandfor in due time considering how nicely they abstract the kind of work that currently takes a hefty amount of scripting.

Basic `command` and `commandfor` usage

First, you’ll need a <button> or a button-esque <input> along the lines of <input type="button"> or <input type="reset">. Next, tack on the command attribute. The command value should be the command name that you want the button to invoke (e.g., show-modal). After that, drop the commandfor attribute in there referencing the dialog or popover you’re targeting by its id.

<button command="show-modal" commandfor="dialogA">Show dialogA</button>

<dialog id="dialogA">...</dialog>

In this example, I have a <button> element with a command attribute set to show-modal and a commandfor attribute set to dialogA, which matches the id of a <dialog> element we’re targeting:

Let’s get into the possible values for these invoker commands and dissect what they’re doing.

Looking closer at the attribute values

The show-modal value is the command that I just showed you in that last example. Specifically, it’s the HTML-invoked equivalent of JavaScript’s showModal() method.

The main benefit is that show-modal enables us to, well… show a modal without reaching directly for JavaScript. Yes, this is almost identical to how HTML-invoked popovers already work with the popovertarget and popovertargetaction attributes, so it’s cool that the “balance is being redressed” as the Open UI explainer describes it, even more so because you can use the command and commandfor invoker commands for popovers too.

There isn’t a show command to invoke show() for creating non-modal dialogs. I’ve mentioned before that non-modal dialogs are redundant now that we have the Popover API, especially since popovers have ::backdrops and other dialog-like features. My bold prediction is that non-modal dialogs will be quietly phased out over time.

The close command is the HTML-invoked equivalent of JavaScript’s close() method used for closing the dialog. You probably could have guessed that based on the name alone!

<dialog id="dialogA">
  <!-- Close #dialogA -->
  <button command="close" commandfor="dialogA">Close dialogA</button>
</dialog>

The `show-popover`, `hide-popover`, and `toggle-popover` values

<button command="show-popover" commandfor="id">

…invokes showPopover(), and is the same thing as:

<button popovertargetaction="show" popovertarget="id">

Similarly:

<button command="hide-popover" commandfor="id">

…invokes hidePopover(), and is the same thing as:

<button popovertargetaction="hide" popovertarget="id">

Finally:

<button command="toggle-popover" commandfor="id">

…invokes togglePopover(), and is the same thing as:

<button popovertargetaction="toggle" popovertarget="id">
<!--  or <button popovertarget="id">, since ‘toggle’ is the default action anyway. -->

I know all of this can be tough to organize in your mind’s eye, so perhaps a table will help tie things together:

`command`	Invokes	`popovertargetaction` equivalent
`show-popover`	`showPopover()`	`show`
`hide-popover`	`hidePopover()`	`hide`
`toggle-popover`	`togglePopover()`	`toggle`

So… yeah, popovers can already be invoked using HTML attributes, making command and commandfor not all that useful in this context. But like I said, invoker commands also come with some useful JavaScript stuff, so let’s dive into all of that.

Listening to commands with JavaScript

Invoker commands dispatch a command event to the target whenever their source button is clicked on, which we can listen for and work with in JavaScript. This isn’t required for a <dialog> element’s close event, or a popover attribute’s toggle or beforetoggle event, because we can already listen for those, right?

For example, the Dialog API doesn’t dispatch an event when a <dialog> is shown. So, let’s use invoker commands to listen for the command event instead, and then read event.command to take the appropriate action.

// Select all dialogs
const dialogs = document.querySelectorAll("dialog");

// Loop all dialogs
dialogs.forEach(dialog => {

  // Listen for close (as normal)
  dialog.addEventListener("close", () => {
    // Dialog was closed
  });

  // Listen for command
  dialog.addEventListener("command", event => {

    // If command is show-modal
    if (event.command == "show-modal") {
      // Dialog was shown (modally)
    }

    // Another way to listen for close
    else if (event.command == "close") {
      // Dialog was closed
    }

  });
});

So invoker commands give us additional ways to work with dialogs and popovers, and in some scenarios, they’ll be less verbose. In other scenarios though, they’ll be more verbose. Your approach should depend on what you need your dialogs and popovers to do.

For the sake of completeness, here’s an example for popovers, even though it’s largely the same:

// Select all popovers
const popovers = document.querySelectorAll("[popover]");

// Loop all popovers
popovers.forEach(popover => {

  // Listen for command
  popover.addEventListener("command", event => {

    // If command is show-popover
    if (event.command == "show-popover") {
      // Popover was shown
    }

    // If command is hide-popover
    else if (event.command == "hide-popover") {
      // Popover was hidden
    }

    // If command is toggle-popover
    else if (event.command == "toggle-popover") {
      // Popover was toggled
    }

  });
});

Being able to listen for show-popover and hide-popover is useful as we otherwise have to write a sort of “if opened, do this, else do that” logic from within a toggle or beforetoggle event listener or toggle-popover conditional. But <dialog> elements? Yeah, those benefit more from the command and commandfor attributes than they do from this command JavaScript event.

Another thing that’s available to us via JavaScript is event.source, which is the button that invokes the popover or <dialog>:

if (event.command == "toggle-popover") {
  // Toggle the invoker’s class
  event.source.classList.toggle("active");
}

You can also set the command and commandfor attributes using JavaScript:

const button = document.querySelector("button");
const dialog = document.querySelector("dialog");

button.command = "show-modal";
button.commandForElement = dialog; /* Not dialog.id */

…which is only slightly less verbose than:

button.command = "show-modal";
button.setAttribute("commandfor", dialog.id);

Creating custom commands

The command attribute also accepts custom commands prefixed with two dashes (--). I suppose this makes them like CSS custom properties but for JavaScript events and event handler HTML attributes. The latter observation is maybe a bit (or definitely a lot) controversial since using event handler HTML attributes is considered bad practice. But let’s take a look at that anyway, shall we?

Custom commands look like this:

<button command="--spin-me-a-bit" commandfor="record">Spin me a bit</button>
<button command="--spin-me-a-lot" commandfor="record">Spin me a lot</button>
<button command="--spin-me-right-round" commandfor="record">Spin me right round</button>

const record = document.querySelector("#record");

record.addEventListener("command", event => {
  if (event.command == "--spin-me-a-bit") {
    record.style.rotate = "90deg";
  } else if (event.command == "--spin-me-a-lot") {
    record.style.rotate = "180deg";
  } else if (event.command == "--spin-me-right-round") {
    record.style.rotate = "360deg";
  }
});

event.command must match the string with the dashed (--) prefix.

Are `popover` and `<dialog>` the only features that support invoker commands?

According to Open UI, invokers targeting additional elements such as <details> were deferred from the initial release. I think this is because HTML-invoked dialogs and an API that unifies dialogs and popovers is a must-have, whereas other commands (even custom commands) feel more like a nice-to-have deal.

However, based on experimentation (I couldn’t help myself!) web browsers have actually implemented additional invokers to varying degrees. For example, <details> commands work as expected whereas <select> commands match event.command (e.g., show-picker) but fail to actually invoke the method (showPicker()). I missed all of this at first because MDN only mentions dialog and popover.

Open UI also alludes to commands for <input type="file">, <input type="number">, <video>, <audio>, and fullscreen-related methods, but I don’t think that anything is certain at this point.

So, what would be the benefits of invoker commands?

Well, a whole lot less JavaScript for one, especially if more invoker commands are implemented over time. Additionally, we can listen for these commands almost as if they were JavaScript events. But if nothing else, invoker commands simply provide more ways to interact with APIs such as the Dialog and Popover APIs. In a nutshell, it seems like a lot of “dotting i’s” and “crossing-t’s” which is never a bad thing.

Invoker Commands: Additional Ways to Work With Dialog, Popover… and More? originally published on CSS-Tricks, which is part of the DigitalOcean family. You should get the newsletter.

November 20, 2024

55+ Best Free Adobe Illustrator Brushes 2025

If you’re looking for new and creative Illustrator brushes to expand your collection, you’ve come to the right place. In this post, we’re sharing a collection of handpicked and free Adobe Illustrator brushes in various categories.

Whether you’re an artist working on a new drawing or a designer enhancing a digital design, this list has all sorts of Illustrator brushes for everyone. Keep scrolling to explore the collection and be sure to download all the brushes. After all, they are free!

We’ve also created a quick guide on how to add brushes to Illustrator to help you out with installing these.

What Type of Free Illustrator Brush Do You Need?

We’ve broken our collection down into different categories, so you can quickly find just the right Illustrator brush for your project!

Pro Brushes
Watercolor Brushes
Calligraphy Brushes
Paint Brushes
Texture Brushes
Line Art Brushes
Ink Brushes
Abstract Brushes
Hair Brushes

Here are just a few great brushes you can download when you subscribe to Envato Elements.

80+ Watercolor ProBrushes for Illustrator

This is a bundle full of Illustrator brushes with various styles of textures. It includes 83 brushes with watercolor strokes and textures. All of which have been handcrafted by a professional designer. The brushes are available in dry, strokes, thin, and a few other categories and they are compatible with Illustrator CS3 and higher.

28 Shader Brushes for Illustrator

Shading is one of the most time-consuming tasks of digital illustrations. But, with this pack of Illustrator brushes, you’ll be able to cut that work in half. The bundle includes 28 unique shader brushes in 4 categories made just for Illustrator. As an added bonus, it also comes with 12 textures.

Outstanding Oil Paint Brushes for Illustrator

If you’re a fan of oil panting-style drawing, this collection of oil paint brushes will come in handy. It includes 50 different brushes that you can use to draw illustrations with realistic oil painting look and feel. The brushes are compatible with Illustrator CS1 and higher.

Scribble & Scrawl Illustrator Brushes

This is a big collection of scribble brushes that are perfect for your creative and professional art projects. It includes 13 standard scribble brushes and 18 squared scribble brushes as well as lots of long and messy brushes. These are ideal for native, primitive, and child-like art designs.

Fine Liner Brushes & Patterns for Illustrator

This Illustrator brushes pack covers all aspects of line art as it comes with a huge selection of brushes for you to select from. There are outline pattern brushes, stipple brushes, line brushes, and many other types of brushes included in the bundle. They are compatible with Illustrator CS5 and higher.

Mosaic Tile Illustrator Brushes

This Adobe Illustrator brush set offers a convenient entry point for artists eager to venture into mosaic art. This set, comprising 10 tile brushes, 25 patterns, and 15 seamless textures, enables you to create realistic artworks that effectively imitate physical mosaic art.

164 Cartoon Vector Brushes for Illustrator

This is a vast collection of expertly crafted digital tools that enable artists to infuse their cartoons, doodles, and other works of art with life. This set includes fun squiggles, expressive strokes, and sections like Regular, Triangle, Squeeze, and Faded brushes.

Grit Photoshop and Illustrator Brushes

A creative bundle of Illustrator brushes for adding a rugged texture to your designs with ease. It includes 20 unique grit variations suitable for both Photoshop and Illustrator. Harnessing this tool can give your creations an authentic distressed look. It’s compatible with CS6 to CC versions of the software.

Rebel Ink – Pen Brushes for Illustrator

Rebel Ink is a dynamic set of 26 Adobe Illustrator brushes with unique characteristics for enhanced customization. They are vector based, delivering versatile and high-quality designs. As a third-party offering, this set provides wide-ranging creative options for personalization, pushing your Illustrator use beyond the usual.

Pixel Perfect – 8bit Brush Tool Kit

This is a unique Adobe Illustrator brush set specifically designed for creating pixel art, taking inspiration from iconic 80s and 90s gaming aesthetics. The tool kit includes a range of pixel brushes, shaders, decorative brushes and a pixel pattern library that allows easy creation of 8-bit to 32-bit inspired art.

17 Colorful Brushes for Adobe Illustrator

You don’t have to be a skilled designer to create beautiful artworks with this pack of Illustrator brushes. It includes 17 colorful brushes with paint splatter designs that can be used to create various styles of crafts from modern art to print designs.

Vintage Illustrator Brush-Kit for Designers

This brush kit is designed for artists who work with vintage-themed drawing styles. The bundle includes 54 different vintage brushes with ink and pen styles. You can also adjust the width of the strokes without affecting the quality as well. You’ll need Illustrator CC to use this brush set.

Liquid Style Brushes for Illustrator

Featuring a retro look and vibe, this pack of Illustrator brushes comes with a trendy liquid style strokes and textures. They are perfect for adding textures and stylistic elements to your various print and digital designs. The brushes are compatible with Illustrator CS5 and higher.

Retro Comic Book Tool Kit – Brushes + Patterns

Comic book artists will surely appreciate this bundle of goodies for Illustrator. It comes complete with 84 vector brushes, 4 comic book texture patterns, overlays, layer styles, and everything you need to draw comic-themed illustrations and designs.

Multicolor Mixed Paint Brushes for Illustrator

This is a very unique brush kit for Illustrator that features 21 brush strokes as graphic styles that allows you to paint with 3 different colors at once. It also includes 24 color swatches but of course, you can also add your own colors. If you’re new to graphic styles, there’s a tutorial on how to use them as well.

Stipple Brush Set for Photoshop & Illustrator

Stipple Brush Set for Photoshop and Illustrator

Stipple brushes are mainly used to adding texture and depth to drawings but with this bundle of Illustrator brushes, you’ll be able to do much more. It includes 30 stipple brushes for Illustrator and 32 brushes for Photoshop.

Free Watercolor Illustrator Brushes

Free Japan Watercolor Brushes for Illustrator

This collection of beautiful Illustrator brushes feature a set of watercolor brushes inspired by Japanese designs. It includes both paint and calligraphy brushes that are perfect for creative artists and illustrators. The brushes are compatible with Illustrator CS3 and higher.

Essential Vector Brushes for Illustrator

This is a free sample brush pack from a premium bundle. The free samples include various vector brushes you can use in Illustrator, including watercolor brushes, charcoal brushes, marker brushes, and more.

Free Creative Watercolor Illustrator Brush Set

A bundle of creative watercolor brushes for Illustrator. These brushes feature realistic watercolor texture designs with both strokes and splash designs. They are most suitable for creative designers.

Free Multicolored Illustrator Brushes

This set of free Illustrator brushes feature multicolored brush stroke designs. It includes 57 different designs you can use with your various creative projects.

Free Calligraphy Illustrator Brushes

Free 10 Calligraphy Illustrator Art Brushes

If you’re looking for brushes for your calligraphy artworks, this brush pack is perfect for you. It includes 10 free calligraphy brushes for Illustrator featuring hand-crafted designs.

Free Artistic Sketch and Calligraphy Brushes

This set features a collection of simple and free Illustrator brushes you can use with both your sketch artworks as well as calligraphy designs. The brushes are free to use with your creative projects.

Free Paint Illustrator Brushes

Free Painted Canvas Brushes for Illustrator

This pack includes more than 60 different painted canvas brushes inspired by canvas paintings. Each brush in this pack has a unique design that will allow you to craft amazing illustrations with Adobe Illustrator.

12 Free Wax Crayon Effect Brushes for Illustrator

A collection of bright and colorful brushes for Illustrator. This bundle includes 12 wax crayon brushes you can use to paint, draw, and add texture. These are pattern brushes and they will repeat along the path you draw.

12 Free Brush Stroke Illustrator Brushes

A bundle of free Illustrator brushes featuring watercolor and paint-style brush stroke designs. This pack is completely free to download and use with your creative projects.

Preppy Art – Free Illustrator Brushes

Made from real paint strokes, this free pack of paint brushes for Illustrator is a must-have for every designer and artist. It includes 29 brushes in vector format with textures inspired by designs from the 1960s.

Marker Pen Strokes Free Illustrator Brushes

This set of free brush pack comes with a set of Illustrator brushes that feature marker pen stroke designs. It includes 64 different brush designs you can use to add texture and draw stylish illustrations.

Patts Brush Collection Free Sample

Patts Brush collection is a premium Illustrator brush pack. The artist was kind enough to include a free sample set of brushes for you to try and use with your personal projects. You can download them for free.

Free Texture Illustrator Brushes

Day 1 – Free Illustrator Texture Brushes

This bundle includes a set of 5 free texture brushes you can use in your art and graphic designs. These scatter brushes are just as good as a premium brush set. They are available in Procreate and Affinity formats too.

Retro Strokes Free Illustrator Brushes

This free Illustrator brush pack includes 9 unique vector brushes inspired by retro art. Each brush in this pack has a different stroke design, which will allow you to use them for outlines, shading, and many other types of work.

Free Spray Paint Stipple Brushes for Illustrator

This is a collection of spray paint-inspired brushes for Illustrator. These brushes have been made using real spray paint designs and they allow you to create authentic textures and artworks for various illustrations.

Free Spray & Hatch Illustrator Brushes

This is a collection of creative Illustrator brushes you can use to add texture to your designs. It includes two different styles of brushes featuring 10 spray painting brushes and 10 hatch texture brushes. All free to download.

30 Free Vintage Shading Brushes for Illustrator

Use this big bundle of shading brushes to give a vintage look and feel to your various graphic designs. It includes 30 brushes with various styles of designs. You can download them all for free.

55 Free Illustrator Vector Brushes Collection

This is actually a premium brush pack that includes 55 high-quality texture brushes for Illustrator. Somehow the brush pack is still free to download. You better grab it while it lasts.

Free Wax Crayon Texture Illustrator Brushes

This free bundle features a set of 40 unique Illustrator brushes that feature creative wax crayon style textures. These are perfect for adding depth and textures to your drawings. The brushes are compatible with both Illustrator and Affinity Designer.

Small Wonders – Free Texture Illustrator Brushes

Small Wonders is a bundle of premium Illustrator brushes. But it also includes a free sample of the brush pack that includes a few texture brushes you can use in your personal design projects for free.

Free Line Art Illustrator Brushes

Free Outline Brushes for Illustrator

This set of free outline brushes for Illustrator will surely come in handy when you’re working with line art designs. This brush set features 60 different brushes including dashed, rounded, abstract, and various other brush styles.

Free Handmade Pencil Brushes for Illustrator

This is a bundle of free goodies for Illustrator that includes free pencil brushes, text effects, texture patterns, and much more. It’s a must-have for artists and designers who create hand-drawn artworks.

Free Natural Line Art Illustrator Brushes

A set of line art Illustrator brushes featuring natural flowing designs. These brushes are free to download and use with your personal projects.

Paper Tooth Free Illustrator Line Brushes

This is a bundle of high-quality Illustrator brushes designed for creating vector line artworks. The pack includes multiple brushes with various stroke designs with jagged edges.

Free Floral Pattern Brushes For Illustrator

Even though this isn’t technically line art, we wanted to include this beautiful floral pattern brush set on our list. It includes 25 floral pattern brushes as well as 25 vector illustrations that work with Illustrator CS6 and higher.

Free Ink Illustrator Brushes

Free 24 Marker Pen Brushes for Illustrator

A set of marker pen brushes for creative projects. This pack comes with a set of 24 brushes in 6 different styles featuring outline, thick, scribble, messy, and many other styles of marker pen brush designs.

31 Free Hand Crafted Grunge Marker Brushes

Another collection of marker brushes featuring hand-crafted brush designs. This bundle includes 31 different brushes with classic grunge designs. You can use them to draw art and craft backgrounds as well.

Free Dry Ink Illustrator Brushes

This free bundle includes a set of creative Illustrator brushes featuring dry ink designs. These brushes are ideal for creative projects and artworks.

Free Adobe Illustrator Grunge Brushes

Another free Illustrator brush pack that comes with a set of ink-like brushes with various grunge designs. These are most suitable for digital drawings.

Free Abstract Illustrator Brushes

Free Vintage Banner Brushes for Illustrator

This is a very unique abstract Illustrator brush pack that features a collection of banner brushes. These are perfect adding small banner icons and graphics to your artworks and designs.

Free Rope Brush for Illustrator

A creative Illustrator brush featuring a rope-style texture design. This brush is perfect for adding borders and texture to different types of art and graphics.

Free Vintage Illustrator Border Brushes

If you want to add elegant vintage-style decorative borders to your designs, this Illustrator brush set will come in handy. It includes 5 stylish border brushes with vintage patterns for free.

Free Tribal Illustrator Brushes

This free Illustrator brush set features creative tribal-style brushes. You can use them to add decorative elements to your designs as well as to add creative borders to illustrations.

Free Illustrator Border Brushes Collection

Another collection of free border brushes for Illustrator. This brush set includes various styles of geometric brushes you can use in your designs. There are 15 different brushes in this pack.

Free Nature Border Brushes for Illustrator

You can download this brush pack for free to add beautiful nature-themed borders to your artwork. These brushes come in 7 different styles for you to choose from.

Free Hand-Drawn Arrow Brushes for Illustrator

A collection of free arrow brushes for Illustrator. If you want to draw an arrow for your new banner ad or illustration, look no further. This pack includes 13 different arrow brushes for you to grab for free.

Free Lipstick Vector Brushes for Illustrator

An Illustrator brush with a lipstick stamp may seem quite odd at first, but it will serve as a great source when designing patterns and backgrounds for creative projects such as greeting cards and banners.

4 Free Doodle Brushes for Illustrator

This is a small collection of simple Illustrator brushes you can use to draw doodles with hand-drawn look and feel. It’s also perfect for drawing borders and frames as well.

Free Hair Illustrator Brushes

The Hairbrush Kit – Free Illustrator Brushes

A must-have brush pack for drawing hair. This set of free Illustrator brushes are ideal for artists and illustrators who work with character illustrations.

How to Add Brushes to Illustrator

Adding brush packs in Illustrator is quite easy. Simply follow the steps below.

First, make sure to extract all the files in the downloaded ZIP file
Then locate the .AI file that contains all the brushes
Open the Illustrator app and go to the Window menu and to Brush Libraries >> Other Library
Now browse to the folder where your downloaded .AI brush library file is located and open it
That’s it!

For more professional and high-quality brushes, be sure to check out our best Photoshop and Illustrator brushes collection.

November 20, 2024

30+ Clever and Funny Christmas Print Ads

Christmas is nigh upon us. You’re likely rushing around like a crazy person this week trying to get all your work done, finish up your shopping, preparing to travel, etc. Let’s take a minute to slow down and absorb some solid Christmas-themed design inspiration.

In this post, we’ll take a look at some of the clever and/or funny Christmas ads. Some will make you laugh, others might earn an approving nod or even a roll of the eyes. All are definitely worth a look and are sure to get your brain in a creative mode.

Meaningful Christmas

It’s important to remember that Christmas is all about giving and sharing your joy with others. These emotional Christmas ads from non-profit organizations highlight that in clever ways. The creativity in these ads help bring attention to important causes and make someone else’s Christmas a joyful one.

This Is Not Christmas

Waiting for Christmas

This is no place to call home

Redirected Letters to Santa

ADOPT A GIFT

Calling All Santas

While the Grinch might be a familiar theme this season, the most popular character in Christmas ads is Santa Claus. The jolly old elf – and derivatives – easily evokes holiday emotions.

Santa’s Secret

Stylish Santa for Jupiter Gentleman’s Threads

Giver Viacci Travel

McDonald’s Santa

Cairo Festival

Construction Santa

Omino Bianco Laundry Santa

Feeling Grinchy

The Grinch has been a character of the holiday season since the original animated film, “Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas!” came out in 1966. The character is known for his antics and hate for the holiday at the start of the movie. This season the character is being revived in a new film and is a mainstay in Christmas advertising.

The Grinch for Wonderful Pistachios

Grinch Billboards

Window World

Christmas Trees and Decorations

Sometimes the most clever print ad designs from the holiday season focus on elements that everyone recognizes, such as Christmas trees and decorations. These ads bring together a different spin on holiday traditions and gift-giving.

Black and Decker Christmas Tree

Carla Christmas Tree

Red Cross Stocking

Stihl Christmas Tree

Christmas Pencil

Christmas Pets

Animals are a common character in Christmas print promotions – maybe it is the cute factor. These animals are sure to grab your attention and pull your giving spirit.

Shave-a-Thon Christmas

Champion Pet Food Christmas Adoption

Christmas Songs

Simple Christmas Connections

Sometimes the smallest hint of the holidays in concert with brand identity can be the perfect marriage of elements. Creating a holiday theme that’s not so overtly holiday is a craft in itself. (And it seems like beer brands have this technique mastered.)

Heineken Mistletoe

AB InBev Merry Christmas

Interesting Artwork

Combining elements and imagery that’s a little unexpected is a common advertising tactic. That is just as applicable in the holiday season.

Reinbeer

CADD Don’t Drink and Drive

Dylon Clothes Dye

BMW Jingle Bells

Kmart Jingle Joes

Pirates of Christmas

Have a Good Holiday!

Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah or Festivus, we here at Design Shack would like to wish you a very happy holiday season. Let us know what you think of the ads featured and tell us if you’ve seen any others worth sharing.

November 20, 2024

Swagger Meets Laravel: An In-Depth Integration Tutorial

Swagger, also known as OpenAPI, offers a powerful way to document and test APIs interactively. Integrating Swagger with Laravel helps create a comprehensive and user-friendly API documentation experience. This tutorial will guide you through integrating Swagger with your Laravel application, focusing on the key steps without delving into code. 1. Setting Up Your Laravel Project …

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The post Swagger Meets Laravel: An In-Depth Integration Tutorial first appeared on Lucid Softech.

Importance of Typography in Storytelling

How Typography Evokes Emotions

Typography as a Visual Voice

Guiding Readers on a Journey

5 Tips for Typographic Storytelling

1. Consistency and Relevance

2. Importance of Font Pairing

3. Ensure Readability

4. Print vs Digital

5. Follow the Trends

Conclusion

We’re in experimental territory

Basic command and commandfor usage

Looking closer at the attribute values

The show-popover, hide-popover, and toggle-popover values

Listening to commands with JavaScript

Creating custom commands

Are popover and <dialog> the only features that support invoker commands?

So, what would be the benefits of invoker commands?

What Type of Free Illustrator Brush Do You Need?

Free Watercolor Illustrator Brushes

Free Calligraphy Illustrator Brushes

Free Paint Illustrator Brushes

Free Texture Illustrator Brushes

Free Line Art Illustrator Brushes

Free Ink Illustrator Brushes

Free Abstract Illustrator Brushes

Free Hair Illustrator Brushes

How to Add Brushes to Illustrator

Meaningful Christmas

Calling All Santas

Feeling Grinchy

Christmas Trees and Decorations

Christmas Pets

Simple Christmas Connections

Interesting Artwork

Have a Good Holiday!

Basic `command` and `commandfor` usage

The `show-popover`, `hide-popover`, and `toggle-popover` values

Are `popover` and `<dialog>` the only features that support invoker commands?