Themes & Releases | Tom Slayer's blog

Archive for the ‘Themes & Releases’ Category

28 Feb 2009

10 days of awsome releases(plugins,themes,ebook)

Here’s the deal: 10 days, 10 releases. We’re talking about Wordpress Themes, Wordpress Plugins, and an ebook. If everything goes better as planned we might even release the most awsome mybb(mybb is a forum software) theme you’ve ever seen!

Me and mbogdan(he’s betng4u and yes yes he finally bought himself a domain, suggested by me of course ) decided to take a challenge and release 10 goodies every day for the next 10 days, it will be hard, but hopefully we’ll manage it next to college and other projects.

Here’s what we’ve prepared for you:

The order of the releases might change without prior notice, we’ll try our best to keep the order though.

Custom Widgets v 2.0 – fully upgraded to flawlessly work with Wordpress 2.7 and packed with all the requested features including naming for the text widgets and the possibility to assign widgets to static pages set as homepage(can’t guarantee anything!)

Ad integration v2.0 – The release of the first version of this ad-management plugin was in august last year. We decided to upgrade it to 2.0 and to make it fully compatible with the wp 2.7 legacy along with some very very nice tweaks.

Post Quote v1.0 – This will be a brand new plugin, something you’ve never seen before! Basically you will be able to include as many posts you want to refer to in your current post. A bar will be shown which will be expandable. After expansion the post you referred to will be grabbed(ajax baby!) and displayed. The best thing is that we already started working on this. Sweet huh?

Siggie 1.0 – TS Siggie will generate an image which will contain your blog title, the latest post and 3 statistics(for example: total posts, comments and tags). The image will auto-update and by this way you will be able to show off your blog stats in your signature on forums you use.

Folio – The theme is already done, we need to make a few revisions on it. It’s a theme specially made for freelancers to showcase their work. It features ajax sliding for recent work, custom lightbox, automatic thumbnail generation and a very very sleek look. The best thing is that its load time is lightning fast! Ehh what the hell, you can preview it at http://mbogdan.com/playground/wp1/?p=29

Comment Ranks – This plugin will make your blog readers want to comment even more. Basically as the number of their comments will rise they will gain rewards like different color name, rel=”nofollow” removal from links and many other features.

7. All of the old themes will be updated to be fully compatible with Wordpress 2.7 legacy.

Clouds theme - this will be a fast loadingsleek looking theme. It will have a right sidebar and the main colors will be grey/light brown/white.

Royale theme - a magazine alike theme packed with lots of amazing features and loaded with ajax features. Fluid width, featured posts, featured post switch and many many other features(curreently the index page has to be done, the comments page is ready)

Install scripts without fantastico - ebook will contain all the tutorials i’ve published on my blog. This way anyone will be able to access it anywhere and share the tutorials with friends.

Contribute to new theme & plugin releases

We work our asses off to release new plugins and themes for free. Working for free isn’t very motivating as you might know. If you wish to make a small contribution(you will be redirected to a paypal secure page) please use the widget below(greatly appreciated).

Thanks!

19 Feb 2009

5 Awesome fresh free wordpress themes

Nowadays its getting harder and harder to find some decent free themes, but luckaly there are still some designers which release free high-quality themes. After 1 hours of research i gathered 5 awsome themes which were recently released.

Comfy News theme arrives from the creator of Guzel Magazine theme, Gabfire. As usual the theme design is extraordinary and makes some premium theme designers feel ashamed.

“Comfy comes with many features, some of them are basic magazine features such as dropdown navigation, feedburner subscription, advertisement spots, featured entries, ajax tabs, widget-ready, gravatars built-in, and more. [...] utilized jQuery to make the widgets fully controllable, you can minimize, maximize, or close any widget from homepage.“

As the author states the theme has some awsome features and its definitely worth checking out.

Theme Name: Comfy News theme
Theme Demo: Testrun Comfy
Theme Release Post: Comfy WordPress News Theme is released

Compositio was designed by Elena of Design Disease and as usual released by smashing magazine . Its a cool theme but a bit too clean, lets be serious now, besides the comment section and box there’s nothing special in it. It has the same old structure as the other free design disease themes do.

Theme Name: Compositio
Theme Demo: Testrun Compositio
Theme Release Post: Compositio: Clean, Beautiful and Free WordPress Theme

The Emplode wordpress theme is based on the Emplode website template by the same author. It was a good move to release it for the wordpress platform also. There aren’t many special features i could mention besides the clean look of the theme and how appealing it is.

Theme Name: Emplode
Theme Demo: Testrun Emplode
Theme Release Post: Wordpress Theme: Emplode

I can watch movies(long name) theme was made by ACosmin who’s themes were featured quite a few times in my theme relases. It’s a cool theme but still i have a hard time deciding if it’s a retro or a 3d theme. It has a more out-of the ordinary look, and i’m sure many of you will find it appealing.

Theme Name: I can watch movies
Theme Demo: Testrun I can watch movies
Theme Release Post: Free wordpress theme – I can watch movies

Magasin Tres is an awsome magaizne theme. It would have been even more awsome if it’s width would have been 90% fluid, but eh, the fixed version looks good also. Its main features are: Featured Post, Feedburner Email Subscription, Twitter Account integration, Flirck Thumbnails, Automatic Thumbnail Resizer, Adsense ready with advertising blocks easily customizible via an Option Page.

Theme Name: Magasin Tres
Theme Demo: Testrun Magasin Tres
Theme Release Post: WordPress Theme: Magasin Tres

That’s it for this week. See you in next week’s post.

10 Nov 2008

8 Free Outstanding Wordpress theme releases in October 2008

After doing the selection from 299 theme releases at DigitalPoint Forums and about 120 theme releases at WeblogToolsCollection I initially gathered about 23 themes,but after a more extensive selection only 8 made it to this post(10 made it but the previes/download links are down at 2). The reason why i dropped the rest is that either they had more than 3 links in the footer or they were hardcoded with huge load times.

This reminds me of that line in Men in Black:

“Best of the best of the best, Sir!”

October’s Showcase

1) Color Paper

This theme is really really slekk looking and appealing. No wonder it was featured on smashing magazine and got sponsored by SM also. I recommended this theme to Freeky8 until i make him a custom theme.

The theme is really clean looking and nice, and can suit any type of blog like a glove.

Theme Demo: Launch Color Paper Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Release Post
Download: Download Color Paper

2) Crybook

CryBook is a 3 Column simple wordpress theme based on the popular Facebook. It contains 2 widget-ready sidebars, live theme swistcher and Custom options.

This is one of the very few high-quality “image-free” themes that i’ve ever seen, but it has huge dissadvantage: looks great in firefox and not too great in ie.

Theme Demo: Launch Crybook Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Release Post
Download: Download Crybook

3) Chrome Tweaks

The best theme which is based on Google’s Chrome browser. Compared to the other themes based on Chrome this one with no doubt is the best! It features a 3columned look with 2 sidebars on the right which are AD-ready. If your a chrome fan this theme is for you.

An other good thing about this theme is that ACosmin(yes yes,his themes are showcased every month in my posts, which is great) offers support for the theme, so if you encounter any issues you have a place where you can ask for help.

Theme Demo: Launch Chrome Tweaks Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Release Post
Download: Download Chrome Tweaks

4) Retromania

This isn’t your ordinary retro theme. Yes, it has a retro design but with appealing elements menaing that if you change some of the items in the header image and the pattern used in the sidebar boxes no one will notice that in fact it’s a retro styled theme.

Theme Demo: Launch Retromania Live Demo
Theme release post: N/A
Download: Download Retromania

5) Plain Warrior

The two keywords that define this them are: simple and effective. Themewarrior made a high-quality wordpress theme with very few images used. This proves that when designing a theme it’s all about the concept. The top pattern and the combination of different variations of grey turned this theme in an outstanding theme.

Theme Demo: Launch Plain Warrior Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Release Post
Download: Download Plain Warrior

6) Acosmin v4

Oh no! It’s Acosmin again!, who is back with a brand new theme. It’s structure is simmilar to the previous versions of the theme, but still it is a high-quality theme which can make your day if your unsatisfied with your current tech theme.

Acosmin used trebuchet MS in the header image. Just a quick suggestion for Acosmin: you could have used plain text with a bit of smoothening instead of embedding the text in the logo. MANY wordpress users have no idea how to open or edit a psd file, so next time try to put yourself in their shoes also.

Theme Demo: Launch Acosmin v 4 Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Release Post
Download: Download Acosmin v 4

7) SilverPress

Grey is very appealing to me and it’s a fact taht light grey looks sick(which is good) on white. Dark grey background + White container + light grey text and gradient = a great theme.

A HUGE minus is that the theme lacks some key addons like:hovers for the titles, the rss and there are some minor bugs which won’t be noticed by your visitors unless they are web designers/developers.

Theme Demo: Launch Silverpress Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Release Post
Download: Download Silverpress

8 ) Mahinahon

A great theme, until you look at the sidebar. Brown does NOT look good on purple! The good thing is that the color can be easily changed with a bit of photoshop magic. At this theme i really like the hover effect for the menu, and the sidebar icons. Within 2-5minutes of smoothening and doing minor changes you can make this theme look like a premium one.

Theme Demo: Launch Mahinahon Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Release Post
Download: Download Mahinahon

With Mahinahon I end this month’s showcase. Pick the design which fits your blog the best! See you in December

4 Oct 2008

11 High-Quality Wordpress themes released in September 2008

September was just as productive as August when it comes to free high-quality wordpress theme releases, from the last month’s releases i’ve collected 11 high-quality free themes from a total of 337 themes from Digitalpoint Forums and WeblogToolsCollection

September’s Showcase

1) Star Mag

I really like the sleek blue color and gradient combination in this theme. The different blue variations give a great look, and the bright white color gives contrast to the widely used blue, by this way drawing the visitor’s attention.

The theme features 2 columns and ad-optimization, the right sidebar is widget ready. Featured posts function is also implemented.

Theme Demo: Launch Star Mag Live Demo
Theme release post: N/A – Download: Download Star Mag

2) Aquanova

To be honest i have absolutely no idea why this theme got the name “Aquanova”, but what the heck, what matters is that it looks really good although it doesn’t have an excessive graphics use on it.

It features a boxed design with 2 columns. The sidebar is a bit wider than at the usual 2 columned themes, 3 125×125 ads fit in there. The sidebar also has some nice dhtml addons

Theme Demo: N/A
Theme release post: N/A – Download: Download Aquanova

3) MagazinePro

MagazinePro features a cool blue color combination. The header image is a wooden image, did you ever imagine wood to be blue? Well Seeing is believing and it looks great.

A cool feature is the date-stamp and the out of the ordinary apparel which make the theme look really unique.

Theme Demo: Launch MagazinePro Live Demo
Theme release post: N/A – Download: Download MagazinePro

4) True Elegance

What i really like about this theme is that it looks really fresh and revitalizing. It’s really pleasant to surf on a blog which has a soft-colored theme.

The theme is Ad, Video, and Entertainment optimized, so if your planning on having a fun yet professional blog this theme is the right choice.

Theme Demo: Launch True Elegance Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Author’s website
Download: Download True Elegance

5) Puteulanus

I really like the new themes that Lorelei releases. This theme has a really neat and fresh look. The lime green looks sick on the blue.

The theme is ready for Adsense, 125*125 ads, and has a special division for a small paragraph about yourself and a neat, smooth web 2.0 design.

Theme Demo: N/A
Theme release post: N/A - Download: Download Puteulanus

6) BizTheme

This theme would have looked a lot better if the designer would have put a black/dark grey wooden background, not just a simple black background to the HALF of the theme.

IT is a 3 columned theme with 2 widgetized sidebars along with a footer section which is split to 3 parts: Custom links, Recent Blog Posts and Flickr images.

Theme Demo: Launch BizTheme Live Demo
Theme release post: N/A – Download: Download BizTheme

7) Aeros

What mostly got my attention at this theme is the background which is represented by a golfing yard wallpaper.

The elements that overlay on the background have a 30-50% opacity, this meaning that they are transparent.

The theme has a really great concept, too bad that the background image is blurry.

Theme Demo: Launch Aeros Live Demo
Theme release post: N/A – Download: Download Aeros

8 ) Bt Extended

3OneSeven made a great job on this theme also. At this point if we take a look at her portfolio we can easily say that she’s the queen of free typography styled wordpress themes.

BT Ex consists of a fluid five (!) column outfit with a js clock/calendar built in: widgetized sidebar and footer columns, built in are recent comments with gravatars, related posts, social bookmarking enabled.

Theme Demo: Launch Bt Extended Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Author’s website
Download: Download Bt Extended

9) Google Chrome

I expected more from this theme. It has the Chrome touch, but it also has a huge lack of possible features like ajax navigation, structuring,etc.

Anyway, if you want your blog to look like the Chrome browser go ahead and download the theme.

Theme Demo: Launch Google Chrome Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Author’s website
Download: Download Google Chrome Theme

10) Greyville

Lightweight,simple,cool. With this theme you can get a loadtime below 2 seconds at your blog. It has a great css backend and some nifty features like:
Grey minimalistic boxed design
Ajax powered sidebar fully and easily customizable
Additional sidebars (left and right) fully manageable through the widget panel at your wordpress installation
Seo ready titles, descriptions and keywords

Theme Demo: Launch Greyville Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Author’s website
Download: Download Greyville

11) Desk Space

Last but not least, Desk Space. This theme is my favorite from Septemeber’s showcase. It has a really pleasant look which captivates you starting with the point when you enter a blog which uses this theme.

Desk Space is a premium free and feature rich Wordpress theme. It comes with a robust set of built in features and plugins, including the ability to switch out the background wood finish color to one you like.

Theme Demo: Launch Desk Space Live Demo
Theme release post: Click to visit the Author’s website
Download: Download Desk Space

After 3 hours of researching, thumbnail creating, post writing, testing September’s showcase is finally done! See you at next month’s showcase!

31 Aug 2008

11 FREE high-quality wordpress theme releases in August 2008

Hey, and welcome to the montly Wordpress theme releases post, this month wasn’t more productive regarding high-quality wp themes than last month, in this post i’ve included 11 themes, and trust me there are a few themes that will blow your mind .

These 11 themes were selected from a total number of 287 themes from Digitalpoint Forums and WeblogToolsCollection

Here’s August’s Roundup

1) E-storage plus

The theme looks great, I really like the overall concept and mostly the sliding images and the lots and lots of color schemes.

Of course the structure has its value also, but the thing that takes down A LOT from the theme’s value is the empty header(which can be replaced ofc).

Theme Demo: http://www.zinruss.com/demo234/
Theme release post: N/A – Download: http://www.zinruss.com/themes/download-manager.php?id=253

2) Reformasi

The thing that makes Reformasi a valuable free theme is its structure nad element combination. You can easily ad-optimize your blog with this theme and in the same time make it look fun and appealing.

The image slider is javascript powered and the News in Photo section is just brilliant!

Theme Demo: http://www.blogger-template.info/reformasi
Theme release post: http://www.blogger-template.info/reformasi-theme
Download: http://www.blogger-template.info/wp-content/uploads/reformasi.zip

3) Vibrant

There’s only one main sentence i can say about this theme: Light green looks damn good combined with blue.

The posts are included in rounded cornered boxes, and the color combination is a variation of grey/blue/green which makes the theme look really sleek!

Theme Demo: http://test.webfrap.com/?theme=WordPress%20Vibrant
Theme release post: http://www.webfrap.com/vibrant-wordpress-theme/
Download: http://www.webfrap.com/wp-content/downloads/vibrant.zip

4) Acosmin Tech

I think the main reason why i like this theme is the funky top part and the huge advertising box which makes the theme different from the ordinary ad-optimized themes. 3 columned themes are getting more and more popular nowadays.

The comment page also deserves my appreciation. I really like they way Cosmin integrated Gravatars in the posts, good job!

Theme Demo: http://acosmintech.acosmin.com/
Theme release post: http://www.acosmin.com/acosmintech-v1-free-wordpress-theme/
Download: http://www.acosmin.com/download/29/

5) Guzel Magazine

Okay, now really…this is THE HOTTEST free magazine styled theme i ever saw in my life. This theme makes people who bought premium themes regret their decision.

This theme has lots of cool features like Thumbnail Support for Stories, Video Spot, AJAX tabs, & many more, and is IDEAL for a magazine blog. If i would have to rate this theme i’d give it 11/10!

Theme Demo: http://www.customthemedesign.com/guzel
Theme release post: N/A
Download: http://www.gabfire.com/wp-content/plugins/download-monitor/download.php?id=5

6) Global Mag

Yet an other magazine styled theme. The combination of red and blue on a white background makes the theme very appealing and gives it a fresh look.

The theme features a featured article spot, snippets from recent posts from each category and of course ad-optimization.

Theme Demo: http://test.bloggingzone.info/?preview_theme=meg3
Theme release post: N/A
Download: http://bloggingzone.info/globalmag.zip

7) Wp Coda

This theme is so sexy, it’s almost undescribable. When i first saw the preview i said to myself: HOLY SHIT!

WP Coda has lots and lots of jQuery features implemented like sliding, cool hovers, popup bubbles, fancy box.

Trust me on this: This theme will DAZZLE you!

Theme Demo: http://wordpress.bustatheme.com/coda/
Theme release post: http://bustatheme.com/wordpress/wp-coda/
Download: http://bustatheme.com/download/wp+coda+latest

8 ) Wp Coda Orange

WP CODA ORANGE is based on the fantastic theme by Greg Johnson – WP CODA. WP CODA itself was created to “mimic the functionality of the very popular Coda website – created by .Panic to market their web development tools and services. As Greg states, “Every aspect of the Coda website was duplicated and this theme works in every major browser.”

Theme Demo: http://wpcodaorange.kerrywebster.com/
Theme release post: http://wpcodaorange.kerrywebster.com/
Download: http://kerrywebster.com/?download=WP-Coda-Orange

9) CrzyRedBinks

This is a really simplistic theme, but for some reason it looks damn good. I think the grey/red combination and the sidebar elements arrangement makes it looks so good.

A great plus for this theme is the load time, it completely loads under 2 seconds, also the footer isn’t filled with sponsor links . The theme uses PHP files for ads, so ad management is a bit eased. The bad part of Crzyredbinks is that it doesn’t have an options panel.

Theme Demo: http://demo.slimmity.com/index.php?wptheme=CrzyRedBinks
Theme release post: http://www.slimmity.com/crzyredbinks-v1/
Download: http://www.slimmity.com/download/6/

10) Star Press

There isn’t anything fancy about this theme, i decided to add it because it would fit a teen/gossip blog like a glove. Unlike most themes this theme doesn’t use FAMFAMFAM’s icons which makes it stand out a bit more .

Theme Demo: http://www.onewaylinks.co.uk/themes/star-press/
Theme release post: http://www.onewaylinks.co.uk/star-press-free-wordpress-themes/
Download: http://www.onewaylinks.co.uk/downloads/star-press.zip

11) Web 2.0 Pinky

Definitely for a girl blog. The theme has very few images but the overall concept looks good. The theme could use a bit more elements but even this way it made it to this month’s showcase.

The one thing i really don’t like about this theme is the logo which looks like it was put there because the author didn’t have any other alternatives.

Theme Demo: http://ourfather.co.cc/index.php?wptheme=Web+2.0+Pinky
Theme release post: http://www.teckitech.com/08/wordpress-theme-web-20-pinky/
Download:http://www.teckitech.com/08/wordpress-theme-web-20-pinky/

Okay, i wrapped up August also(2 minutes before the feedburner email delivery, Woot! ), c ya next month

5 Aug 2008

Free Wordpress Theme – Maro

Maro theme is the first of this month’s theme series. The theme features a 3 columned design and has a sleek brown background which is pretty pleasant to the eye.

Lets take a closer look at its features

The header image just as at the Chameleon theme is automatically generated, but this time it doesn’t matter what php version you are running. This was BETng4U’s idea, i wanted to include the psd in the package but he kept insisting we do it like this, so here we are.

To change the text simply go to your settings page and change your Blog Title and Tagline.

Maro has 3 columns. I decided to make a 3 columned theme because that is what all people want: mroe space for them to put widgets,gadgets,banners and other stuff. Both sidebars are widgetized so you won’t have trouble filling them up .

All latest wordpress theme features are built in including tag cloud, tags display in post, etc.

As usual the theme is XHTML and CSS valid(although the XHTML validation will be ruined once you start posting, happens at each and every blog)

The theme is fully compatible with Wordpress version above Wordpress 2.2.

Because the Wordpress.org theme viewer doesn’t support the upload of themes which have plugins in sepparate folder we integrated Brian’s threaded comments in the theme. They will be automatically activated once you activate the theme.

NO SPONSORED LINKS! As usual you will NEVER find sponsored links on my themes, just a small link back to my blog .

Maro theme has a Theme settings page. Once you activate the theme you will find the Maro Theme Options at the Design section. There you will be able to edit the links displayed on the right top part of the page. On the settings page you will find a Dinate section, so if you enjoy the theme feel free to donate a few bucks .

Download and Live Demo

Live demo: Launch Maro v1.2 Live Demo
Download Link: Download Maro v1.2 Theme

Installation Instructions

Simply extract the maro.zip archive to your computer, upload the “maro” folder to /wp-content/themes/ folder after which head over to your admin panel and activate the theme. That’s it. No more long install instructions like at the other themes .

Other Mumbo Jumbo

If you wish to further develop the theme or add new features to it feel free to contact me at tom@thaslayer.com

If you find any bugs/problems please post a comment here and they will be solved in the next release!

2 Aug 2008

11 FREE high-quality wordpress theme releases in July 2008

Here’s the now becoming usual montly theme releases post for July. This month i had a huge lack of quality themes to select from Digitalpoint Forums, so i checked out all theme releases posted on WeblogToolsCollection .

I checked out a total number of 347 themes, 257 being from DigitalPoint Forums and 90 from WeblogToolsCollection. “Luckaly” the selection was easy, because damn!, there were lots of crappy themes… i can’t figure out how can people release such ugly themes and still put 3-4 sponsored links on them. The good thing is that this month there is 1 more theme included in the showcase than in last month’s roundup!

Let the showcase begin!

1) Gablog Magazine theme

The thing that i like about this theme is that its very tech looking, and perfectly fits a tech/gadget blog.

It features an advanced menu system, Ad optimization, pagination and auto-excerpt along with a great spot for a youtube/metacafe video.

Theme Demo: http://www.gabfire.com/demo/index.php?wptheme=GabLog
Theme release post: N/A – Download: http://www.gabfire.com/downloads/Gablog.zip

2) RemixMag

This theme looks GREAT! The wood background gives it an extra touch of smoothness and expresses the smoothness of the theme.

As you can see on the preview image this theme is also a magazine style theme. It has ad spots and featured post section. You can presonalise it by writing a little about yourself on the sticky note(you will find some great handwriting fonts at Dafont.com).

Theme Demo: N/A
Theme release post: N/A – Download: http://stylishlabs.com/wp-content/uploads/remixmag_premium_theme.zip

3) Luvin’ Grunge

Luvin’ Grunge is most probably the most beautiful grunge styled wordpress theme that i’ve ever seen. Although the base background and many elements are grunge styled the fonts give a clean look to the theme.

The big RSS button also looks great, and jumps in your eye starting from the point when you enter a blog using this theme(great way to get more subscribers).

This theme would look great for a personal blog(maybe an emo blog?).

Theme Demo: http://www.paddsolutions.com/wpthemes/switch.php?template=luvingrunge
Theme release post: http://www.paddsolutions.com/wordpress-theme-luvin-grunge/

4) Softpresence

Softpresence is this month’s sleekest blue wordpress theme. The combination between the different blue variations along with the yellow and white combination make the theme looks extremely appealable and pleasant to the eye.

Theme Demo: http://freewordpresslayouts.com/index.php?wptheme=Softpresence
Theme release post: http://freewordpresslayouts.com/?p=94

5) Probama

If you live in the US and you are a Barack Obama supporter than this theme may be for you.

The theme features Subcategory dropdown menus, Custom archives page, Control panel options for Flickr, Youtube and Feedburner, and many more nifty features.

Theme Demo: http://www.category4.com/wpthemes/probama/
Theme release post:http://www.category4.com/2008/03/11/probama-theme-for-wordpress-released/

6) Positivenoize

This theme got my attention thanks to its simplicity. It doesn’t have many images and lots of extras, but the layout gives the user a clean and easy to navigate layout.

Theme Demo: http://wordpress.positivenoize.com/index.php?wptheme=PositiveNoize
Theme release post: http://www.positivenoize.com/positivenoize-wordpress-theme/

7) Scruffy

If your a teenager in high school/college and have a personal blog this theme will fit like a glove to your blog.

The theme isn’t very complex, but i really like the color combination and the arrangement of the elements which make the theme fun, but still keep the notebook feeling.

Theme Demo: http://fresh01.co.za/preview/index.php?wptheme=Scruffy
Theme release post: N/A Download: http://fresh01.co.za/downloads/scruffy/

8 ) Typography

This theme exceeds expectations. It’s a high-quality newspaper theme which has comment subscription built-in,built in smart archives,news slider along with a theme options panel.

The design is really clean and fast loading, there’s a lot of css work on the back end, but it surely was worth it because this is just an amazing theme.

Theme Demo: http://wp.3oneseven.com/index.php?wptheme=typo
Theme release post: http://3oneseven.com/12/typography-wordpress-theme-2/

9) SuperFresh

Superfresh is a 3 columned theme with a sleek green color. It features 2 widget-ready sidebar along with a spot for a featured post.

The layout of the post itself is really cool with the gravatar incorporated and the author and comment data acting as a sidebar for each post. The author most probably got inspired from wpdesigner.com’s layoyut.

Theme Demo: http://themetation.com/demo/superfresh/
Theme release post: http://themetation.com/superfresh/

10) BlueSensation

Enough talk about green themes. Let’s get down to serious colors like blue! Blue is one of my favorite colors, and the blue used in this theme makes the theme look really sleek.

The top and the footer of the theme are great, but the middle section is a bit rushed: elements are disorganized, there are lots of graphical elements that could have been added, but there’s nothing that can’t be fixed with a little work.

Theme Demo: http://www.dailyblogtips.com/demos/index.php?wptheme=Blue+Sensation
Theme release post: http://www.dailyblogtips.com/bluesensation-wordpress-theme-released/

11) Portfolio

This month’s post features once again a theme made by Sorel Mihai From dailywp.com. This theme is unique and one of a kind. It’s ideal for web designers or showcase artists.

The main color is brown, and it can be characterized by sleekness and to the point objectivity. The theme features a theme settings page where the user can edit all the data displayed on the theme(it’s like filling out a resume form)

Theme Demo: http://www.sponsoredwp.info/portfolio/
Theme release post: http://www.dailywp.com/portfolio-wordpress-theme/

Alright, this about wraps it up for July, see you next month

21 Jun 2008

10 FREE high-quality wordpress theme releases in June

In a previous post back in april or may i promised that i will present themes made and released by other designers. So here i am doing it.I know that it isn’t the end of june yet, but i feel like its time to present the themes for this month. The themes were selected from theme releases on Digitalpoint.

From about 273 themes i only found 10 themes that suited my exigences. The rest 263 themes are crap and just made to sell some links.

1) Brightness News

This theme absolutely fascinated me. Its with no doubt a premium quality theme. Just as a paid theme it comes with a fully featured admin page so you can do quick editing with absolutely no coding knowledge.

The colors are blended in a great way and the theme is extremely pleasant to the eye. Take this paid themes!

Theme Demo: http://sponsoredwp.info/brightness/
Theme release post: http://www.dailywp.com/brightness-wordpress-theme/

2) Meethere

This theme got my attention thanks to its simplicity and to the way the items are ordered creating a more pleasant browsing experience to the user who will very shortly notice that the bit out of common ordered elements grab his attention.

Theme Demo: N/A
Theme release post: http://themes.blogflux.com/theme/4083.html

3) Zinmag

Yet an other high-quality magazine styled theme. The theme has grey and red combined with white and light-grey gradients. The order of the elements is almost flawless.

Jinsona could have worked a bit more on the overall design, but even this way it earned my respect.

Theme Demo: http://web2feel.com/demosite1/?wptheme=zinmag
Theme release post: N/A – Download: http://web2feel.com/downloads/zinmag.zip

4) BilZone theme

I like this theme because it inspires professionalism and is a great theme for a gadget/mobile phones blog. The theme was made by a friend of mine BilZone, who decided its time to release his first wordpress theme which turned out formidable.

The theme features some great ajax features and a well organized sidebar which will also help you monetize your blog.

Theme Demo: http://bilzone.net/
Theme release post: http://bilzone.net/blogging/bilzone-theme-for-wordpress/

5) SP 142

In my opinion this theme is absolutely ideal for a valentines day blog or a more girlish blog, but it suits any personal blog. The design is a really sleek design and out of common.

Theme Demo: http://www.skinpress.com/demo/index.php?wptheme=SP142
Theme release post: http://www.skinpress.com/sp142-theme/

6) Small Magazine

If i would decide to build a blog around this theme my blogs niche would most probably be movie presentation or politics. The theme’s front end looks great, but the comments page looks like it’s unfinished, because i feel like some key elements are missing which could make the comment page as pleasant as the main page

Theme Demo: http://sm.gabfire.com/
Theme release post: N/A – Download: http://www.gabfire.com/downloads/small-magazine.zip

7) Personal Mag

The thing that i like about this theme is the simplicity itself. With no doubt its a lightweight theme, and although it doesn’t have fancy web 2.0 gradients it inspires a modern look.

Theme Demo: http://ythv.info/personalmag/
Theme release post: http://freewordpressthemes.com/themes/3133/

8 ) BlueSleeky

Sleek indeed! You will find this theme a very sleek theme, it’s pretty lightweight and you will simply love using it especially if you like bright blue. The guys at skinpress could have added a bit of ajax to the sidebar, but what the heck it looks great even without it.

Theme Demo: http://www.skinpress.com/demo/index.php?wptheme=BlueSleeky
Theme release post: http://www.skinpress.com/bluesleeky-theme/

9) BlueSleeky

This is an other not too complex but good looking theme. I really like how the top of the sidebar elements have their right corners bended. Also it’s ad optimized, i don’t really like the default ad block images, but an average wordpress user can change them easily

Theme Demo: http://themes.mygreencorner.com/demo/themedemo.php?d=Cozan&td=1303
Theme release post: http://themes.mygreencorner.com/1303/cozan/2-column/

10) BlueGreyWhite

Last but not least i present to you an other theme from Skinpress. I’m telling you this theme is a wonderful theme, and to be hones till now this is the theme that i like the most from all the themes released by Skinpress. Keep it up guys!

Theme Demo: http://www.skinpress.com/demo/index.php?wptheme=BlueGreyWhite
Theme release post: http://www.skinpress.com/bluegreywhite-theme/

Phew…i finally got to the end of this post. I’m sure you will find a theme that will suit your needs, or grab your attention.

If you wish to add your theme to a month’s release post all you have to do is mail me a preview of the theme and a download link. Note that i will post up only quality themes.

19 Feb 2008

LoveBlog – A great FREE wordpress theme made with love

It’s been quite a while since i last released a wordpress theme so i decided it would be appropriate to launch a brand new cool theme. Although valentine day has passed you can use this theme for general usage, but i also included a valentine logo with the theme.

As you can see i am also using this theme(well till my custom theme will be coded…which might take a while due to health issues of BetNg4U, and i’m not planning on letting anyone else do the job because it will have lots of features that are not so easy to do).

Some of you might say that it’s a bit girl-is because of all the red and pink. Well it’s not. It’s main purpose was to be a valentine day theme yet a theme for general usage with a sleek professional look.

Because of the health issues of BetNg4U and the studying issues of Cypherhackz ( he is graduating this year, and he needs to study, study,study) Naif coded the theme for me. I worked with him last year on a phpLD theme that i made. I was looking for a professional coder when i remembered him, and PM-ed him on DP. He did the job within 24hours and fixed the bugs that popped up, i checked and rechecked it and everything seems to be working fine.

LoveBlog’s Features(you will love this part):

Fluid width! – The theme has a fluid width, meaning that it will stretch out in all browsers giving your blog great appearance.

2 columned theme ( 1 right sidebar column and 1 content column)

Advertisement ready! – No no no, i am not referring to adsense or widgetbucks!, i am refering to affiliate ads. If you have a running blog you can start selling ad space on your blog right away! you can add as many 125×125px ads to the sidebar as you like.

I hooked you up with a “Advertise here” banner, you can just replace it with affiliate banners, or just keep it there and link it to your advertisement page to find advertisers.

To add the advertisement banners you need to open up sidebar.php and add your html code there in the <div id=”advertisements”> section.

Here’s an example:
<a href=”http://www.thaslayer.com”><img style=”border:0″ src=”http://themes.thaslayer.com/4/wp-content/themes/LoveBlog/images/ad.jpg” width=”125″ height=”125″ ></a>

Widget ready sidebar – the sidebar below the Advertisements section is widget ready, you can add widgets from your wordpress admin panel.

A cool blue talk-bubble favicon(which is hosted on my server, so you don’t need to worry about loosing it )

2 logos to choose from – in the package i included both the psd of the general logo and the psd of the valentine logo along with the font used

If you want to use a bigger logo than 250×75px you will have to edit in style.css the #header h1 part:

#header h1 {
margin: 0; padding: 0;
width: 250px; height: 75px;
font-size: 1px; font-weight: normal;
text-indent: -999em;

The theme is using Brian’s Threaded Comments version 1.5.9 to give your visitors a bit of extra flexibility.

LoveBlog Theme is fully compatible with latest wordpress release!

Page commenting system – Your visitors have the possibility to comment your pages, not just posts! example: http://themes.thaslayer.com/4/?page_id=10

Works flawlessly in all browsers(Firefox 1.x/2.x, Opera, IE 6, IE 7)

The top right menu items ( Homepage | Sitemap | Contact ) can easily be edited from header.php

You will not have any sponsored links in the footer, only a link-back to my blog which i kindly ask you to keep.

Installation of the theme:

The installation of the theme is extremely easy and consists in 7 simple steps:

1) Download the zip archive and extract it.

2) Upload the contents of the “upload” folder to “wp-content” folder on your server.

3) Go to your admin panel and at “Presentation” activate the theme.

4) In admin panel at plugins activate Brian’s Threaded Comments.

5) Add your widgets and enjoy the theme!

6) Bugs are constantly fixed and as bugs are fixed the changelog and the archive is updated.

7) If you want to receive bug fixes and notifications about the the theme check out the sidebar Get Theme Updates! element and enter your email address and subscribe.

I respect your privacy, i won’t share your email address with anyone and you will have the possibility to unsubscribe at any time.

The newsletters will contain information ONLY about theme releases and bug fixes.

Download links and Live demo:

Live demo: Launch LoveBlog v1.2 Live Demo

Download Link: Download LoveBlog v1.2 Theme

Feedback and suggestions:

If you discovered any bugs in the theme or if you have any suggestions feel free to send me an email to tom@thaslayer.com

Changelog:

19th February 2008 – The official release of LoveBlog wordpress theme

Donate to development:

Creating quality wordpress themes takes time and money so if you wish to support me feel free to use the button below and donate a few bucks, any amount is welcome. Donations will help me pay fees for coding and development and releases of new great looking templates!

The donations are 100% secure, you can donate using your credit card or your paypal account.

28 Dec 2007

Chameleon Wordpress theme – the great launch!

Before everything i want to wish all of you Merry Christmas with lots of joy(i know its a bit late), gifts and happiness and a happy new year!

On saturday you most probably taught that again problems occurred with the theme and i didn’t notify you about the delay, well nothing serious happened(we got drunk like pigs) , yesterday we fixed a few bugs and i was keeping the release for 25th december as a Christmas Present.

Well, all the drinking caused the delay and a bug that occurred in the last minute which was fixed today.

We worked a LOT on this theme, the basic idea of the theme is to offer bloggers a clean and sleek web 2.0 styled theme with unique and great features.

Please Digg this if you like the theme

Check out its features:

IMPORTANT! Make sure you add a title to the text widgets!

2 columned theme with a right sidebar

Avatar system powered by Mybloglog avatars or Gravatars , you have the possibility to choose which service you want to use in admin cp @ sexy comments options

Cool animated favicon

Dragable and expandable sidebar boxes

Shadow effect on text on navbar and sidebar box titles

The sidebar is 100% widget ready

TO INSERT A NEW SIDEBAR WIDGET MANUALY, USE THIS TEMPLATE

<fieldset class=”sidebarwidget_reg_holder”><div class=”side_bar_widget”>
<div id=”sidebarwidget_title” class=”sidebar_title”>
<!– PUT YOUR WIDGET TITLE HERE –!>
</div>
<div id=”sidebarwidget_content” class=”side_bar_content”>
<!– PUT YOUR WIDGET CONTENT HERE –!>
</div>
</div></fieldset>
<script type=”text/javascript”>registerSidebarWidget()</script>

AJAX powered search and comment posting

9 colors for you and your visitor to choose from

TO CHANGE THE DEFAULT COLOR OF YOUR THEME GO TO FUNCTIONS.PHP
CHANGE THE $default_theme = “color number“ VARIABLE WITH ONE OF THE FOLLOWING VALUES

0 – green
1 – grey
2 – blue
3 – purple
4 – navy blue
5 – gold
6 – light brown
7 – teal
8 – red

Post tags and tag cloud option

Great looking links(the visitor will notice the link more easily and in a more enjoyable format.

Recent comments display and the possibility to display any widget in the sidebar in a dragable box.

XHTML & CSS valid!

Works flawlessly in all browsers(Firefox 1.x/2.x, Opera, IE 6, IE 7)

You will not have any sponsored links in the footer, only a link-back to my blog which i kidnly ask you to keep.

The font i used is a commercial font so i couldn’t include it in the pack, so we made a great tweak: the header image is automatically generated, so no image editing is required, just enter your blog’s title and tagline in your admin control panel.

The comment system is powered by sexy comments along with Karma Addon

The theme is using the Silk Icons Collection

The Theme is 100% compatible with Wordpress v 2.3.1!