Well, it's been another exciting month here on Colorburned. In terms of traffic, October 2008 was the best month ever receiving over 35,000 visits and 85,000 page views. The site has come a long way in the last 5 months or so and it's really developing into a really nice resource for graphic designers.

Every month I try to post a review of everything that has happened on this site and elsewhere.  I've been really busy this month producing resources for you guys to use in your work but I have also published some great interviews, articles and even sponsored some great contests on some other sites.

In the first of an upcoming series of free vector downloads, Vectortuts released a set of exclusive water color Illustrator brushes on their site today. This is very exciting for a number of reasons. First, Vectortuts is one of the best vector design websites on the net; it is very cool that they are offering free high quality vectors for us to use. Secondly, out of all the designers out there, they chose to partner with me to release their first set.

So browse on over to Vectortuts and try out these free brushes for yourself, they similar to the water color brushes that I have made in the past. The main difference is that in this set, I used one color per brush stroke instead of many colors like the previous sets. This should give you some more flexibility in your designs.

I don't know about you guys, but I love argyle!  I love argyle sweaters, scarves, hats and socks; if I could find argyle pants, I'd probably wear them too.  So last weekend I decided to create a set of argyle pattern swatches for Illustrator and of course, give them away on my website.

I absolutely love creating pattern swatches, they are so fun to create and so useful as well.  You can use them in any number of ways including fashion design, textiles, package design and of course, graphic and web design.  Pattern swatches in Illustrator are so flexible in how they can be displayed.  You can scale them, rotate them, nudge them over pixel by pixel; all without having to changing the shape of your original object.  You can find a detailed tutorial on how to install and work with pattern swatches in Illustrator here.

Recently, I've become very interested in graphic design for the fashion industry. You may have seen a fashion sketch that I designed in Illustrator a while back. Most typical graphic designers probably don't think of the fashion industry when they are thinking about where they might find a job but what many of us don't realize is that the fashion industry employs many graphic designers as well as fashion designers.

While researching graphic design for the fashion industry I came across this amazing set of videos by Professor Elaine Polvinen who teaches Fashion Textile Technology at Buffalo State University. In her videos, she shows many techniques that graphic designers for the fashion industry use. You should also take a look at her blog. She has quite a few useful tips for fashion designers and people looking to enhance their design skills.

This week I had the pleasure of interviewing Jay Hilgert from Bittbox.com.  On his website, Jay offers some of the highest quality design resources on the net.  Jay describes himself as a "designer, blogger, web enthusiast, and Apple geek" but you could also describe him as a design philanthropist.  His resources have saved us thousands of hours and his design tips have helped many of us to improve our skills.  In this interview, Jay offers many insights into how to develop a successful design blog.  I hope you enjoy this interview and when you're done, I hope you will take the time to view Jay's website and follow him on Twitter.

Last weekend I went to the pumpkin patch with my family. While I was there, I decided to snap a couple shots of some pumpkins so I could give them away on my site, just in time for Halloween. Hope you guys enjoy them!

Last week I was working on a design project for a website I was working on and created a nice set of water color Photoshop brushes in the process. I've been swamped with freelance projects lately so I decided to give this set of brushes away because I haven't had as much time to work on freebies as I usually do.

After I created the set of Photoshop brushes, I decided to go ahead and create another identical set of brushes for Illustrator as well.  Anyhow, I hope you enjoy these sets and I look forward to seeing what you guys make with them!

This week I interviewed designer, blogger and devoted Twitterer Adelle Charles. Adelle, is the founder of Fuel Your Creativity and co-founder of Just Tweet It. She is also a very talented designer with an amazing portfolio. View her sites, read the interview and when you're done, add her as a friend on Twitter, Digg, Flickr, Stumble Upon and more!

Earlier this week I posted a set of 50 Plaid Pattern Swatches. As I explained in that post, plaid patterns have countless uses for fashion design or textiles, graphic or web design, package design and more. What makes this set different from the last set however is the simulated twill texture that I applied to it. Applying that texture took a little extra time so instead of creating 50 swatches like I did last time, this time, I only created 25. What makes swatches so great is the flexibility that they provide. You can perform a number of transformations on them including scale and rotate without affecting the shape of the object they are applied to. You can find a detailed tutorial on how to install and work with pattern swatches here.

I have always been fascinated with plaid patterns, so last week I decided to create a set of 50 plaid pattern swatches to give away on my site. Plaid patterns have countless uses for fashion design or textiles, graphic or web design, package design and more. What makes this set so great is that each seamless vector pattern has been converted to a swatch. Swatches are great because of the flexibility that they provide. You can perform a number of transformations on them including scale and rotate without affecting the shape of the object they are applied to. You can find a detailed tutorial on how to install and work with pattern swatches here.

Photo by Richard Drew / The Associated Press

I'm an optimist.  I always try to see the good in every situation.  When some people see spoiled milk, I see cottage cheese.  The economic crisis that we're in right now is a serious issue.  With banks failing and stocks crashing, we're witnessing events that no one has experienced since World War II.  People are losing their jobs, their homes and seeing their savings evaporate. 

With all these unfortunate events happening all over the world, most of us are worried about what the next few months or years will bring.  I am no different; I too worry about where my next paycheck will come from but like I said, I'm an optimist.  When life gives me lemons, I make lemon meringues; so when I see all this turmoil around me, I try not to focus on the negative things, instead, I try to see opportunities.  Hopefully, this article can arouse your spirits and help you to navigate through this economic crisis and maybe even come out ahead.

Today, I am showcasing just a few premium textures from the Colorburned Shop and am offering them to my readers for free. The Colorburned Shop hosts over 300 high resolution, premium textures for a very reasonable price. For a limited time you can purchase all 300 textures for 50% off their original price. That means you'll receive all 300 images for just over $35 USD.

The Swatches Palette in Illustrator can be a very powerful tool for someone who knows how to use it. Most of us already know that the Swatches Palette stores colors for us to use in our designs, but did you also know that the swatches palette can store vector data and that those vectors can then be applied as fills or strokes? If not, I hope that this short tutorial will help you fully understand the power of using seamless patterns in the Swatches Palette.

There's nothing funnier for an artist than watching a business man trying to emphasize his point by scribbling a stick man or graph on a whiteboard during a meeting. These drawings are famous for being bad and as artists, we usually cringe when we see them.  Whiteboard drawings, however, have a certain style and texture that can be tough to create digitally.  It was with that in mind that I decided to put together a set of 104 Dry Erase Marker-style Illustrator brushes.

Not too long ago I had a contest on my website sponsored by UPrinting.com.  The winner of the contest received 250 free business cards.  I love contests and love to have them on my site, but I am always skeptical of putting my name behind a product that I've never used so I decided to place an order of my own for 500 business cards.  This post is a review of that experience.