By following simple instructions given in the next three steps you will customize our SAMPLE TEMPLATE (click to download) to produce a site for fictitious "AcmeSoftware" company.

The three steps - overview:

>> Step1: Selecting a Template
In the first step you will learn how to search our site in order to chose a template that suits the type of your business best. Instructions on purchasing and unzipping the downloaded archive are included.

>> Step 2: Editing your template
This step of tutorial will give you an idea how to customize your template so that it suits specific needs of your unique business.

>> Step3: Putting your new site on the web
With all pages ready, its time to choose a hosting company and purchase a domain name from them. After the pages are uploaded to your hosting company's server anyone can view them by typing your domain name in address line.

Step 1: Selecting a Template
This step depicts how to search for templates using a keyword, how to purchase and download them. You are not required to fulfill these actions but will be offered to download a .zip archive instead. You can handle it using WinZip from www.winzip.com.

1. Search for a template here

2. Buttons the right of each template image are used for buying the template. You will need to use your Credit Card or Paypal account in order to make a purchase. After making a purchase an email will come to you in 2-20 minutes after your credit card or Paypal account is charged. Follow a link in the email to download zipped files for the template of your choice. For now, you can download our SAMPLE TEMPLATE.

4. Unzip the archive with WinZip.

5. Browse the unzipped files to find the following:
- 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 the Photoshop file and generate the HTML pages from it. The HTML version of template contains buttons and other elements without text. This allows you to add custom text to empty images;
- 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 pages from it;
- RESOURCE folder contains files that you'll use during the course of this tutorial.

Step 2: Editing your template.

In this step you will customize SAMPLE TEMPLATE in order to make it look as a site for fictitious "AcmeSoftware" company. The list of template editing steps follows. Please use Photoshop 7.0 or higher to gain access to all features described in this step.

Step 2.1: Preparing to edit text by installing new fonts to your system

• Please, follow the instructions in this step prior to editing text in your .psd template.
• Select Start > Settings > Control Panel > Fonts to open the needed system folder.
• Select File > Install Font to open a browse dialog.
• In the dialog, locate your downloaded FONTS folder.
• Click Select All button and then OK.
• Close the window displaying ...\WINDOWS\FONTS folder.

Step2.2: 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.

• Double-click on TEMPLATE.PSD to open it with Photoshop.
  
• Make sure the toolbox and tool options bar are visible. If not, select Window > Tools and Window > Options respectively to display them.
  
• The image might appear too big or too small. To adjust magnification select Zoom Tool from the toolbox. The options bar changes to reflect zooming options. Turn on Resize Windows To Fit checkbox and click Actual Pixels button.
  
• Make sure the Layers Tab is visible. If not, select Windows>Layers to display it.
  
• Select Move Tool 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.
  
• 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.
  
• Double-click "capital T" in the Layers Tab. This switches you to Type Tool and highlights the text. Go ahead and replace "company" with "AcmeSoftware" or your company name if you are not just doing the tutorial.
  
• 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.
  
• Drag the layer with edited text a little more to the left with a Move Tool . 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 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.

Step2.3: Editing colors

In the previous step you edited text color. Now you will change color of a graphical element on the template.

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

Step2.4: Replacing an image

In this step you will hide some of the template layers and insert additional one with a different image in it.

• Select File > Open to display an Open dialog and browse to the "portrait.jpg" file in your downloaded "RESOURCE" folder.
  
• Select Image >Image Size to display Image Size dialog.
  
• 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. Enter "120" in the Width field and click OK.
  
• Use Select > All and Edit > Copy to place the entire image in buffer.
  
• Close "portrait.jpg" window. You do not need to save the changes.
  
• Select Edit > Paste to insert image in the template. A new layer is automatically created and given default name.
  
• 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.
  
• With "portrait" layer selected use the Move Tool to place the image on the left of welcome text.
  
• Find "man" and "man shadow" layers and make them invisible by clicking the eye icons.

Step 2.5: Inserting additional images

In this step you will insert additional graphics in the template by creating a new layer.

• Select File > Open to display an open dialog and browse to the "stripe.gif" file in your downloaded "RESOURCE" folder.
  
• When the image opens use Select > All and Edit > Copy to place the entire image in buffer.
  
• Close "stripe.gif" window.
  
• Select Edit > Paste to insert image in the template. A new layer is automatically created and given default name.
  
• 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.
  
• With "stripe" layer selected use the Move Tool to place the stripe just under company name in place of "logotype".
  
• Find "LOGOTYPE" layer and make it invisible by clicking the eye icon.

Step 2.6: 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.

• Locate "SOLUTIONS" layer and make it invisible by clicking the eye 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.
  
• Select "SERVICES" layer and unlink it from "COMPANY" and "PRODUCTS" layers by clicking link icons . Note that "SUPPORT" and "CONTACT" layers get unlinked as well.
  
• Use Move Tool to shift buttons to the left. You can enlarge the image with Zoom Tool and watch button separators match to make sure you are doing right.
  
• Restore links to "COMPANY" and "PRODUCTS" layers for "SERVICES" layer. Note that links for "SUPPORT" and "CONTACT" get restored as well.

Step 2.7: Hiding a portion of a layer

In the previous step you changed visibility of a layer to get rid of extra graphical elements. 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.

• Choose Edit > Deselect to turn off any current selection.
  
• Select the Rectangular Marquee tool and draw a box around "website!".
  
• Choose Select > Inverse to invert your selection.
  
• Press Layer Mask 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 previously.
  
• 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.

Step 2.8: Slicing and exporting HTML

In this step you will learn what slices are and how to create and edit them. You will slice the .psd image to produce an HTML page that can be viewed in a browser.

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.

• Select the Slice Tool and draw a box around the "company" button. You can resize it after creation - just use Slice Select tool to pick the needed slice and drag handles.
  
• 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.yourwebsite.com) to make sure the button works. You will be able to edit the URL later.
  
• 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.
  
• 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 HTML editor. In other editors the locations of controls may vary.

• Open the exported .html with Dreamweaver. Make sure the Properties window displays. If not, select Window>Properties to display it.
  
• Click on Company button in your page and examine the contents of Properties window. You can edit the Link field to change URL.
  
• 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.
  
• 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).
  
• Save your work and preview the customized page by selecting File>Preview in Browser>.

Step3: Putting your new site on the web

In this step you will be given instructions for uploading your pages to a web server. After this you will be able to review your site online in a browser. We leave it up to you what sort of hosting company and domain name to choose because these depend strongly on the specifics of your business. In the instructions that follow it is assumed that you have a logon/password combination available from your hosting provider. You will need an FTP client in order to upload files to your web server. Cute FTP www.cuteftp.com or WSFTP www.ipswitch.com are highly recommended.

• Open your FTP client and follow the instructions.
• 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.
  

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