I use templates for all of my websites, but I am very interested in creating these professional designs, like you see on templatemonster.com and 4templates.com. How do these guys make such clean and professional looking templates? What programs do they use? And are there any tutorials/books out there that can help me? I know it must be alot of creativity, which I dont have, but I am sure there is something else to it that can help me make a good looking site... Like this one http://www.4templates.com/view/web/0/AX0064GR. Thanks for any help

learn more about PhotoShop, Dreamweaver, etc.
i wish i were that good

Photoshop has a steep learning curve, but it's worth the time. There are so many photoshop tutorials and books, so I'll just mention a few I really like:

Colin Smith from photoshopcafe has some nice CDs that teach you how to do some futuristic backgrounds, hightech effects etc.:

- photoshopcafe live

- special fx


DesignsByMark also has a good CD with special effects:

- Mark's Advanced Photoshop CS f/x


Photoshop CS Down & Dirty Tricks as well as Photoshop Most Wanted 2 are 2 good books.

For some free online tutorials have a look at
- photoshopcafe
- eyesondesign
- eyball-design

They make the layout in photoshop then slice it up.

Beisdes Photoshop, many of these sites also use Flash headers, so you might have a look into Flash, too.

You mean Macromedia Flash? Flash is very differet from photoshop and they do not come under the same category.
But fireworks and photoshop do althought has nothing to do with what you said.

Scott mentioned templatemonster and many templates there use Macromedia Flash in addition to Photoshop. Of course, both programs are completely different.

Here is an example where both Photososhop and Flash have been used: http://www.templatemonster.com/websi...ates/6026.html

Yea I know a lot about Flash, but I just mean the nice high quality images... Thanks guys for all the help! I will look into getting a book on PhotoShop. I guess it really is better than Fireworks, which I use.

yes I know what Flash is. But you said they use flash. Yes they do but not to make the whole thing and flash is not really a necassity.

It comes with time and experience Scott. No tutorial can magically let you create those amazing templates. The guys doing them are probably graphic designers, some of the best around.

Maybe, you misunderstood what I meant, sorry!

I never talked about Flash-only sites, I only said that many of these popular templates are being created using Photoshop as well as Flash.

No, the whole page is not Flash - and this is good regarding Search Engine Optimizing or accessibility.

But Flash can add some eyecandy to a site (if done correctly). That is why many popular templates are made with Photoshop (90%) and then a Flash header (10%) is added for example.

To come back to the original question: Photoshop is the program to learn in order to create sites like these, and after that you can add some Flash to add even more interest to your site.

Is Flash needed? - No!
Is Phtotoshop needed? - No!

You can also create great sites using Fireworks or Paint Shop Pro or PhotoImpact or Deneba Canvas - it just does not matter for webdesign - these are just tools.

But if you have a look at the sites Scott is intersted in - then they have been created using Photoshop and Flash.

Scott, Egor is really right here!

Decide which program you would like to use (most of them have trial versions), then take time to do a lot of tutorials and play with the program as much as you can. Experience is the key, not the program you use.

Another thing Scott,

While these templates look awesome, they take hours to load up on slow (56K minus) connections. I also don't consider templates professional. In my opinion a professional web site is one that totally reflects the clients business. "Custom made" in other words.

I agree totally with mstwntd on this one. Those templates are nice but they will be geared towards high speed connections and last time I checked there was still a lot of users on 56k modems. What is the sense of having all the fancy flash/graphics if you are alienating 50% of the visitors of your site? A nice professional design is certainly a plus but content is still king and even if you have the most impressive graphics in the world, if you don't have clear navigation and good content, the user will leave and not come back.

Another tool that you might pick up is the Illustrator. Sometimes, illustrator will help you create a cleaner page design

Yup. Illustrator is my new-found love.