Snazz-Up Your Website With Free Graphics and Sound Effects

What is a website without nice graphics? Bland. Not other word for it. Don’t look at my site, JX is intentionally simple but the design goes through different incarnations as I learn new tricks.

This is a good collection of places on the web where you can get images, make images and easily construct CSS3 directives for your website designs.

The Tool I use Most

The web app I use most is css3generator.com. With CSS3 generator I can quickly build the styles for my site designs. The downside is that legacy browsers like IE7 and IE8 do not support CSS3 well and so Javascripts need to be used to modernise those browsers. Not a problem on my own sites because I don’t care much for supporting IE browsers when alternatives like Firefox and Chrome exist. All the other tools listed below here produce non CSS3 based graphics for use in web designs.

CSS3Generator.com

CSS3 Generator
CSS3 Generator

Background Images

Patterncooler.com

Easy to use. Free to use. Great collection of editable background graphics.

Seamless Website Pattern Background Designs
Seamless Website Pattern Background Designs

Stripe Generator

This one of the easiest and quickest to use background image creators I’ve seen. It has a simple to use application interface and provides attractive tileable graphics. I first wrote this article in August 2009 and I still use online graphics app to make background images.

Web 2.0 Stripe Generator Screenshot

BG Maker

Different to regular background image makers, this one provides a grid of squares that represent screen pixels. You can adjust the size of the grid and the color of each pixel to make a custom (repeatable) background image. The page background live-updates as you create your masterpiece.

Background Maker Screenshot

Rounded Corner Generators

Border Radius

Make CSS3, Gecko and WebKit rounded corners with ease. CSS controlled rounded corners will work in most modern browsers and some older ones. They do not work in IE8 but do in IE9 and above.

Screenshot from Border Radius CSS Rounded Corners Generator

Spiffy Box

This web app makes 4 rounded corner graphics for decorating HTML boxes. It’s easy to use and even provides the HTML and CSS components required to embed the images in your HTML. These rounded corners are compatible in most (if not all) browsers.

Spiffy Box Rounded Corner Generator.

Cornershop

Cornershop is the simplest to use non CSS3 rounded corner generator. The interface doesn’t look so nice and it doesn’t provide so many options as Spiffy Box but it does more-or-less the same job.
Cornershop Rounded Corners for CSS backgrounds

Button Makers

My Cool Button

Good collection of very nice button creation tools that add that glossy web 2.0 effect so many webmasters aim to reach. A key feature is its iPhone icon generator.

My Cool Button Web-2-0 and grudge free buttons generator

Buttonator

Buttonator provides a large selection of definable buttons and icons in both old-style and Web 2.0 formats. Easy to use and highly configurable button maker.
Create buttons and icons for your website with Buttonator

Decoration and Call to Action Graphics

Quickribbon

Make Javascript diagonal corner decorations with customizable text for webpages. Useful for attractive and non intrusive advertising.

Make page ribbons for you site's corners.

Web 2.0 Badges

Need an intuitive interface that lets you configure predefined badge shapes?

Web 2.0 badges lets you create your own snazzy “Look at me, I’m Special” badges with ease.

Web 2.0 Badges and creator

Fresh Badge

Another simple to use badge creator. The app’s simple and clean layout provides a lot of fine control for the badge’s production.

Generate Web 2.0 badges with Fresh Badges. Free of charge.

Logo Creation

Web 2.0 Logo Creator

This one makes very sleek looking website logos. I prefer to use GIMP but for quick and simple logos I use something like Logo Creator.

Web 2.0 Logo Creatr Logo Generator.

Web 2.0 Logo Creator

This a little more configurable than Logo Creatr. It’s worth a look.

Create and Design Web 2.0 Logos Free

Cool Text

Another simple to use free logo maker. The interface style is different to the two detailed above as are the style of graphics created. Not necessarily complete with web 2.0 effects but useful non-the-less.
Cool Text Image and Logo Maker

Navigation Menus

Tabs Generator

Probably the only free tab creation product you’ll need for developing stylish webpage navigation bars. It has an intuitive design that isn’t bloated with lots of ads.

Tabs Generator

Open Cube

Not the simplest app to use but one of the most complete WYSIWYG menu makers available. The free version is fully usable for creating advanced menus with either HTML or Javascript effects. The online interface can be reached here.

Loading Gifs

Load Info

Create your own activity indicator or use a predefined gif. Lots of predefined gifs to choose from.

Load Info Activity Gif Indicator Generator

Ajaxload

Creates attractive Ajax loading and activity indicators for free.

Ajaxload Loading Gif Creator

Web Script Lab

Another loading GIF generator that does the same as the two above but provides a slightly different set of predefined graphics.

Web Script Loading Image Gif Generator

Favicons

You can use Gimp to create favicons by reducing an image ‘s size to 50×50 pixels and saving it as an icon file. Otherwise you can use one of these online favicon makers.

De Graeve Favicon Generator

Create favicons by colouring in a pixelated grid. Many other tools available here too.

De Graeve Favicon Generator

Dynamic Drive’s Favicon Maker

This is for lazy designers. Find a graphic, upload it and let this app work its magic.
Favicon Creator at Dynamic Drive

Clipart

Open Clipart

Large collection of downloadable clipart images. Take the lot as a free zip file or just take the ones you need.

Open Clip Art Screen Grab

Open Office

Nice collection of free, public domain clipart.

The Clipart colletion of Open Office

WPClipart

Big collection of public domain clipart.

WP Clipart collection of high quality artwork and photos

Free Clipart Now

Free Clip Art Now. Public Domain and Royalty Free Clipart

Cliker Clipart

Royalty free and public domain vector clipart. Nice big collection.

Clicker Royalty Free and Public Domain Clipart

Vectorish

Another good source for free, public domain vector graphics and clipart.

Background Textures

CGTextures

Thousands of well categorized free textures. If GRSites doesn’t have what you need then CGTextures probably will.

CGTextures - the largest collections of free textures available on the web

Also see GRSites.com in Sound Effects, General Graphics and Image Tools.

Icons

Try these for free to use icons:

Iconspedia

Dry Icons

Icomania

Outlaw Design Blog

Stock Images

The Stock Exchange

Free Foto

PD Photo

Free Images

Barry’s Free Photos

Free Photos

Turbo Photo

Free Photos Bank

Deviant Art

Pixabay

Ad Banner Creators

Create basic ad banners using these free online tools. Personally, I use Gimp and KolourPaint but I have used these ones before and do recommend them.

Banner Creator is much more than a simple banner creator. This site also gives hints and tips for banner placement and offers banner rotation scripts and basic website promotion advice.

Banner Sketch is much easier to use than Banner Creator but offers less customization.

Sound Effects

The Internet Archive

The most massive resource of Creative Commons sound effects, clips and loops that are stored in various formats that can be either downloaded or streamed into webpages .

Free Loops

Free to use sound loops. Primarily aimed at the music industry, this collection is veritable enough for use in other projects too.

The Free Sound Project

Thousands of freely downloadable and reproducible sound effects.

General Apps

GRSites

The Swiss Army Knife of web graphics, sounds and tools. A brilliant collection of textures, graphics, sound effects and tools for creating buttons, logos and other stuff.
GRSites Logo, Button, Texture and Sound Effect Tools and Products

Bonus Tools

Wigflip is a small collection of useful web graphic tools.

Accessify is a small collection of very impressive tools. Create styled lists, check-boxes, forms, jQuery functions etc…

CSS Layout Generator is a useful app for designing the layout of CSS controlled webpages.

At the time of writing, all of the above services are free to use and offer items that are Public Domain and Open Source. Check licenses of stock images, icons, sounds and other media used to ensure commercial usage is permitted without cost and/or attribution.

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