Color and texture

The more I read The Principles of Beautiful Web Design, the more I like it. It seems to have a lot of information that is interesting in and of itself, not just the way it relates to web design. The chapter on color is particularly interesting. I liked learning about color psychology and the color wheels. I had heard about such things before, but didn't really understand them. (The Blogger site right here is a good example of color contrast between orange and blue, no less!) Same, with the next chapter on texture, and its discussion of shapes, patterns and light and shadow, all important things to keep in mind when designing anything.

Unfortunately, this text is still limited to what it can offer a web designer. Its content is helpful only when you start the design process, it won't show you how to begin. For that, you'll a technical manual like Creating a Web Site or Learning Web Design. I plan to keep all these texts and use them as I dabble in web design in the future.