Archive for June, 2008

Creating HTML Email That Renders Across Email Clients

Wednesday, June 25th, 2008

OoStyling and building layout for HTML email is a challenge mostly due to the multitude of email clients and their varying support for standardized practices. While some webmail clients like Yahoo and AOL display HTML email well; others like Gmail do not. Gmail removes anything before the <body> tag and strips out inline CSS styles.

AolDesktop email clients like Outlook, Mail.app, Entourage, and Eudora display HTML email with widely differing results from app to app. Outlook 2003 actually has more CSS support than Outlook 2007!

EmailstandHow to Code HTML Newsletters by Tim Slavin is a helpful 3-page article chock full of suggestions on proper coding. Leave behind notions of layout using DIVs. HTML email is a table-based world.

New or improved ideas I found in the article:

  • Tim outlines a detailed testing method; first testing the content as it displays in the various webmail clients and desktop clients. Then perform a checklist of such things as the subject line, how the From address displays, and others.
  • Use SpamCheck to check the spaminess of your content. This is a free service that you can use to check your HTML Email, to ensure that it makes it into your subscriber’s INBOX.
  • “If you need a light-colored link against a dark background color, put the font definition in the td cell (so it applies to p and a tags equally) then add a color: style to the a tag.”
  • Links to: templates from MailChimp and Campaign Monitor; Plain Text email formatting tips; Email Standards Project; and a lot more.

PlantextHTML email can be beautiful to behold, but remember that good old plain text email can still get the point across without breaking down in Gmail or Lotus Notes.

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Gigging In The Hot Sun

Monday, June 16th, 2008

In addition to the Pride Celebrations going on at Waterfront Park yesterday, many of the local gay bars held block parties. One such event on SW Stark St was sponsored by Scandals with the $3 entry fee going to a local queer organization. Rose City Swing put together a jazz sextet for Scandal’s stage. It was hot. So were we!

Pride-Gig

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keeping the creative juices flowing

Monday, June 9th, 2008

Shovel72
There is some construction going on in the neighborhood. I sketched the shovel of a truck at rest.
In the same area, this tree provides shade and habitat to many creatures.

Mt-Tabor-Tree

I didn’t notice until after I completed my drawing that it appears there is a face in the tree trunk. I took a photo, too. I get a kick out of comparing the photo and my drawing. Looks like I shortened the trunk a bit.
Mt-Tabor-Tree-Photo

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Rain Rain Makes Great Sky

Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008

I’ve done my share of complaining of late. Well, I’m not really a complainer by character. But I sure have noticed the weather being cooler and rainier than usual. My friends have commented on this too.

Well, here’s the silver lining - great sky! The clouds have been full of texture and shape. Even the rain has added a glistening sheen to the sidewalks, flowers, trees, and streets.

And so, the header of my blog for June is a photo of a recent stormy sky. Yes, it has been modified a bit in Photoshop. I used a Hot Tip from Lynda.com that I read about just this morning. The tip was all about how to adjust skin tones using the Lab Color mode, but I thought I could as easily use the Lab Color mode to adjust the sky tones.

Here’s a before and after:
Sky-C

June2008Header

Can you see that the AFTER image has some more depth by darkening the different channels in Lab Mode? In the original tip, the subject was a man’s face which was adjusted to give him a bit of a tan.

I’m learning to enjoy the energetic skies that the wet weather brings.

Posted in art, astronomy, out and about, photoshop | No Comments »