Free sample template

Web site templates are pre-made web designs which can be easily customized to reflect your company's branding. Templates are available in Photoshop and HTML format.

Download this sample template to try your skills before purchasing.

Click to download (4MB)

You will need WinZip to open archive.

In the archive you'll find:

  • FONTS folder that contains fonts that you will need to edit the .psd source file but might not have installed in your system;
  • HTML folder with "index.htm" file and IMG folder - you can preview the page in a browser. You can use this folder if you wish to just customize HTML. Advanced users prefer to customize Photoshop file and make HTML out of it. HTML version of template contains buttons and other elements without text. This allows you to add custom text to empty cells;
  • JPEG folder with "TEMPLATE.jpg" file, which is a compressed image of your template;
  • PSD folder with "TEMPLATE.PSD" file that allows you making ANY modifications to design of your web site. You can customize fonts, colors and do just anything to make your website really unique. Later you will need to make HTML out of it and.... see next steps :);
  • LIBRARY folder contains advanced clipart library that you can use to give your template unique look.

What if I need more clipart?

To complete your project you might need few extra images or clipart. We arranged a special deal with Ultravertex. With purchase you get a FREE 6 month membership at Ultravertex which allows you to download and use more than 8000 professional photos, 3500 clipart items and 900 fonts for FREE! Click here, try Ultravertex. From $10/mo! Get 1 month of hosting free.

What is Clipart Library?

It is a selection of elements that may become helpful during creation of websites using our templates. clipart_sample.jpg, 39.4k

Elements included (quantity is aproximate):

  • Arrows: 25 items;
  • Bullets: 10 items;
  • Buttons: 15 items;
  • Icons: 15 items;
  • Logos: 25 items;
  • Windows for content (ie. News box. etc.): 3 items;
  • Other elements: 100 items.

All this elements are provided in Photoshop files in external layers. This makes easy to insert clipart library images in to your designs based on website templates.

This library comes in ZIP file with each website template.

What is 100+ Free Font Library?

You will get a link to 100+ royalty free windows fonts with each email purchase notification. fonts_sample.jpg, 35.7k

Customizing Template

Once downloaded you can customize template by:

  • Preparing to edit text by installing new fonts to your system.
  • Editing the company name.
  • Editing colors.
  • Replacing an image.
  • Inserting additional image.
  • Hiding extra navigation buttons.
  • Hiding a portion of a layer.
  • Slicing and exporting HTML.

To put your new website on the web:

  • Open a browser and type ftp://domain_name in address line.
  • In Internet Explorer, choose File>Enter as... to display authentication dialog. Enter your login and password and click OK.
  • Copy your web pages and folders to your site root directory as you would to any other folder on your computer.
  • View your site online.

Installing fonts to your system

Please, follow the instructions in this step in order to be able to edit text in your .psd template.

  1. Select Start>Settings>Control Panel>Fonts to open the needed system folder.
  2. Select File->Install Font to open a browse dialog.
  3. In the dialog, locate your downloaded FONTS folder.
  4. Click Select All button and then OK.
  5. Close the window displaying ...\WINDOWS\FONTS folder.

Editing the company name

In this step you will learn what layers are and how to find the one that you need. You will edit text on the layer and change it's position.

  1. Double-click on TEMPLATE.PSD to open it with Photoshop.
  2. Make sure the toolbox and tool options bar are visible. If not, select Window > Tools and Window > Options respectively to display them.
  3. The image might appear too big or too small. To adjust magnification select Zoom Tool zoom.gif, .6k from the toolbox. The options bar changes to reflect zooming options. Turn on Resize Windows To Fit checkbox and click Actual Pixels button.
  4. Make sure the Layers Tab is visible. If not, select Windows>Layers to display it.
  5. Select Move Tool move.gif, .7k and right-click the word "company" in the upper left corner. In the drop-down menu of layer names choose COMPANY. This layer will get selected in the Layers Tab. You may think of layers as of transparent films with images and text placed on them. You can edit the contents of films independently, change the order in which they are stacked, and lots of other things.
  6. To make sure you selected correct layer try making it invisible for a while by clicking an eye icon from the left of the layer name in the Layers Tab. The text should disappear.
  7. Double-click "capital T" in the Layers Tab. This switches you to Type Tool type.gif, .4k and highlights the text. Go ahead and replace "company" with "AcmeSoftware" or your company name if you are not just doing tutorial.
  8. Highlight the text you just typed in order to edit font, size, style, and color. Use drop-down boxes in the options bar to change font to Arial, size to 24pt, and style to Bold Italic. Then press green rectangle in the options bar to display color dialog. Your mouse pointer turns into a snippet. There are many ways in Photoshop to specify color but for now just pick white color from the upper left corner of colors field and click OK.
  9. Drag the layer with edited text a little more to the left with a Move Tool move.gif, .7k. You will notice that other layers move as well. This is because the layers are linked. You can tell which layers are linked to the currently selected one by a link icon linklyr.gif, .6k from the left of layer names. Turn off linking by clicking the icons and move "AcmeSoftware" text independently. You may want to restore linking in order to handle company name and logo as a whole some time later.

Congratulations! This is by far the most challenging step in the process of customization. Its all downhill from here.

Editing colors

  1. Select a layer named "news bar" with a green horizontal stripe on it.
  2. Select the Paint Bucket paintbkt.gif, .7k tool. This tool repaints all pixels of similar color on a layer to match foreground color.
  3. Set the foreground color by clicking the upper color selection box in the toolbox and picking color from the orange square near company name.
  4. With Paint Bucket paintbkt.gif, .7k tool selected, click the news bar and watch it turn orange.

Replacing an image

  1. Select File>Open to display an Open dialog and browse to the "portrait.jpg" file in your downloaded "RESOURCE" folder.
  2. Select Image>Image Size to display Image Size dialog.
  3. Make sure the checkboxes Constrain Proportions and Resample Image are on, resample mode is set to Bicubic, and sizes in Pixel Dimensions box display in pixels.
  4. Enter "120" in the Width field and click OK.
  5. Use Select>All and Edit>Copy to place the entire image in buffer.
  6. Close "portrait.jpg" window. You do not need to save the changes.
  7. Select Edit>Paste to insert image in the template. A new layer is automatically created and given default name.
  8. Right click the new layer in the Layers Tab and choose Layer Properties... from context menu. Enter "portrait" in the Name field for future reference. Click OK.
  9. With "portrait" layer selected use the Move Tool move.gif, .7k to place the image on the left of welcome text.
  10. Find "man" and "man shadow" layers and make them invisible by clicking the eye eye.gif, .5k icons.

Inserting additional image

  1. Select File>Open to display an open dialog and browse to the "stripe.gif" file in your downloaded "RESOURCE" folder.
  2. When the image opens use Select>All and Edit>Copy to place the entire image in buffer.
  3. Close "stripe.gif" window.
  4. Select Edit>Paste to insert image in the template. A new layer is automatically created and given default name.
  5. Right click the new layer in the Layers Tab and choose Layer Properties... from context menu. Enter "stripe" in the Name field for future reference. Click OK.
  6. With "stripe" layer selected use the Move Tool move.gif, .7k to place the stripe just under company name in place of "logotype".
  7. Find "LOGOTYPE" layer and make it invisible by clicking the eye eye.gif, .5k icon.

Hiding extra navigation buttons

Our templates were designed to suit a number of purposes. It may happen so that you don't need all the elements. In this step you will remove "SOLUTIONS" button from the template's navigation bar.

  1. Locate "SOLUTIONS" layer and make it invisible by clicking the eye eye.gif, .5k icon. Now there is empty space in place of unwanted button. It is better to shift remaining buttons from the right by one position to the left side.
  2. Select "SERVICES" layer and unlink it from "COMPANY" and "PRODUCTS" layers by clicking link  linklyr.gif, .6kicons . Note that "SUPPORT" and "CONTACT" layers get unlinked as well.
  3. Use Move Tool move.gif, .7k to shift buttons to the left. You can enlarge the image with Zoom Tool zoom.gif, .6k and watch button separators match to make sure you are doing right.
  4. Restore links to "COMPANY" and "PRODUCTS" layers for "SERVICES" layer. Note that links for "SUPPORT" and "CONTACT" get restored as well.

Hiding a portion of a layer

Sometimes you may want to hide some elements but keep others within the same layer. In this step you will learn how to accomplish this via using layer masks. You will hide the end of "Welcome to Company website!" leaving just "Welcome to Company". Of course it is much easier to edit text, but this is just an exercise.

  1. Choose Edit>Deselect to turn off any current selection.
  2. Select the Rectangular Marquee marquee1.gif, .4k tool and draw a box around "website!".
  3. Choose Select>Inverse to invert your selection.
  4. Press Layer Mask layrmask.gif, .6k button in the bottom of the Layers Tab to hide all parts of the layer that aren't selected, i.e. the end of caption that you selected in (2).
  5. If you ever want to get back what you just hid choose Layer>Remove Layer Mask>Discard to delete the mask or Layer>Disable Layer Mask for just turning it off.

Slicing and exporting HTML

Unlike images, which come in one piece, web pages consist of a large number of elements assembled together using HyperText Markup Language. Every image on a page is stored in a separate file. These files can have different formats but when displayed in a browser create an impression of a whole picture. Take advantage of Photoshop features to achieve such an effect. HTML code will be generated automatically. You only need to specify which portions of the template should be converted into separate images, in other words create slices.

  1. Select the Slice Tool slice.gif, .6k and draw a box around the "company" button. You can resize it after creation - just use Slice Select slicslct.gif, .7k tool to pick the needed slice and drag handles.
  2. Right click the newly created slice and choose Edit Slice Options... from context menu. URL field designates the address of a web page that opens when the button is clicked. Since your Company subpage is not ready yet leave the field empty or type some address (e.g. http://www.templatemonster.com) to make sure the button works. You will be able to edit the URL later.
  3. Make another slice around the text beneath the welcome caption. You will replace the image in this slice with formatted text to make the page download faster.
  4. Select File>Save For Web... to display Save For Web dialog. This dialog allows to set optimization options for each slice. Just click OK and specify a save path.

Now you will need to work on the generated .html file. The following steps assume that you are using Macromedia Dreamweaver 4.0 HTML editor. In other editors the locations of controls may vary.

  1. Open the exported .html with Dreamweaver. Make sure the Properties window displays. If not, select Window>Properties to display it.
  2. Click on Company button in your page and examine the contents of Properties window. You can edit the Link field to change URL.
  3. Select the text slice beneath welcome caption. Select Window>Code Inspector to edit HTML code. The <img...> tag is automatically highlighted (it looks something like <IMG SRC="images/edited_TEMPLATE_07.jpg" WIDTH=424 HEIGHT=161 ALT="">). Replace this tag with your custom text. Close the code editing window and highlight newly created text in the editor window. Make use of text formatting options in the Properties window to match initial text appearance as good as you can.
  4. You can use "back.gif" from RESOURCE folder as a background for this cell. Just enter the path to this file in the Bg field of Properties window (you may need to expand it first with an arrow in the bottom right corner).
  5. Save your work and preview the customized page by selecting File → Preview in Browser →.

Flash animated files, step by step

step1.jpg, 39.4k
Open .fla file with Macromedia Flash 6/MX


step2.jpg, 39.4k
To find the button or the writing of company name. To do so, move the Playhead frame by frame till the button is exposed.


step3.jpg, 39.4k
Select the button or writing layer


step4.jpg, 39.4k
Open the Actions panel by clicking on the title of Actions - Button


step5.jpg, 39.4k
Click Actions and then Browser Network


step6.jpg, 39.4k
Double click on getURL


step7.jpg, 39.4k
Type your URL in the URL line


step8.jpg, 39.4k
Save changes you just made by secting the File / Publish menu(Shift+F12)


Wed, 20 Aug 2008 09:20:42 -0400