
Well I knew it couldn’t stay a secret forever. Today, after writing a 6 hour, 2,000 word Photoshop tutorial, I went ahead and did an early-open for Web Design Tuts. I rolled out a couple of Twitter updates to get a few people’s reactions to the site. Some loved it. Some hated it.
@BuildInternet was the first to actually look up Web Design Tuts on Who Is and noticed that the nameservers were pointed to Elite By Design. And the secret was out!
So yes, I am launching Web Design Tuts as a companion site to Elite By Design. I’ve written some posts in the past here on EBD about web design, but there was something within me that wanted to take it further and really push myself to teach other people what I know, and grow as a designer in the process. I plan on writing one post per week at first on both Web Design Tuts and Elite By Design. As the sites gain more momentum, I’ll be more comfortable increasing the posting rate and even hiring some guest posters down the road.
Until then, feel free to check out Web Design Tuts and read How To Design The PSD Tuts Website In Photoshop. Please be sure to subscribe to the feed so you can get updated when our next post rolls out.
On a side note, I’ve received a few emails, direct messages, and comments calling me out on copying PSD Tuts in naming the site Web Design Tuts. In fact, just a few minutes after launch I already had someone hating the blog.
Let me assure you a couple of things:
- I didn’t name the website to try and emulate or impersonate Collis and his wonderful websites.
- I am not affiliated with the Envato network.
- I support Collis and the Envato network and I am in no way trying to push my site by ‘playing their name.’
If you have anything you’d like to talk to me about in regards to Elite By Design, Web Design Tuts, or if you’d just like to leave your opinion, don’t hesitate to comment on this post or get in touch with me.
I look forward to hearing your thoughts and opinions on the new site.

Zach Dunn
January 5, 2009 at 5:03 pm
Best shoutout for a whois look up? Best of luck!
Angie Bowen
January 5, 2009 at 5:03 pm
I’m really excited about the new site, I can’t wait to see what you do with it!
Andrew Houle
January 5, 2009 at 5:17 pm
I gave you a bit of a hard time about the first tut on twitter. But after looking it over and reading this post, I’m real excited for you and the site. I apologize that I may have jumped to quickly into an opinion. All the best with your new site!!!
Brian
January 5, 2009 at 6:27 pm
@Zach Dunn:
Ha, so true! Thanks Zach.
@Angie Bowen:
Thanks Angie, I can’t wait to see where it goes!
@Andrew Houle:
No don’t worry about it Andrew, it was really refreshing to get some honest feedback. I’m glad you like the site, and thanks for the good wishes, but by all means I don’t mind if you disagree with something I have done or am doing! All the best to you as well
Brandon Cox
January 5, 2009 at 10:40 pm
Cool stuff – can’t wait to see all that comes out of it. And what’s the problem with having a sure-to-be-successful domain name anyway? Kudos for being smart!
David
January 5, 2009 at 11:04 pm
I’m still not sure if this was the best move you could make. I’m fine with choosing the domain from a marketeer’s point of view, but writing your first tutorial about actually recreating a Tuts-website? It’s a bit over the top, a bit arrogant actually.
But I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt, it’s a daring move. Just know that a lot of people will be judging you by how you progress with the website. Best of luck!
Brian
January 5, 2009 at 11:25 pm
@Brandon Cox:
Thanks Brandon, glad to have you as a follower now!
@David:
David, you make a very valid point, and I’m not disagreeing. I actually didn’t make the connection about the whole ‘Tuts’ site and writing a ‘Tuts’ tutorial until I started getting feedback. I’ll be sure to be more open in my next tutorials to different websites and different styles of design.
I am aware that this will be a very pressured site in terms of quality and content control, but I am ready to work my hardest to bring this to everyone. Thanks for your best wishes, and for your honest comment!
Razvan Pavel
January 6, 2009 at 2:31 am
hmm. i think you are gonna have copyright issues because the tuts thing is part of envato and they won’t like that
Thomas
January 6, 2009 at 6:45 am
Good Luck Brian, If you want you can submit your tutorials on TutorialKing.eu
Brian
January 6, 2009 at 7:18 am
@Razvan Pavel:
Well all I can say is that I certainly hope not, but I guess we’ll be seeing in the short future.
@Thomas:
Thank you very much Thomas, I will keep your site in mind for future tuts!
Matt
January 6, 2009 at 9:41 am
No offense intended, but WDT does look eerily similar to Envato’s sites, and you did describe how to design one of their sites in your first tutorial post. I would be a little surprised if you didn’t get any static from them, since it does look like you are trying to ride their coattails at least a little.
At the very least you could’ve done a better job of differentiating yourself from their work.
Brian
January 6, 2009 at 9:47 am
@Matt:
Well Matt, I’m not going to disagree, but in my defense I am simply using a premium WP theme. It isn’t really anything special and I wasn’t trying to emulate the Envato look.
Keep watching for more original content from the site, and I’ll be sure to stay away from Envato tuts for a while
Matt
January 6, 2009 at 12:09 pm
@Brian:
That’s good to hear. I look forward to seeing what sort of content you’ll put out.
Goran Web
January 15, 2009 at 3:40 am
I’ll check out the site and post my opinion here as soon as I’ve given it a thorough check-up. But from this article, it sounds really great.
B. Moore
January 24, 2009 at 12:58 am
So whats the word now on your 1st post a webdesigntuts now? i subcribed to thats site feed a few weeks ago and today i decided to read that feed all 4 post and your first one with the tutorial now all the images say stealing is bad and the post has been removed from the site.
B. Moore
January 24, 2009 at 1:00 am
are you going to bring it back or what?
Brian
January 24, 2009 at 2:48 pm
@B. Moore:
Yes, I took the article down upon request from PSD Tuts. The reason that the images were replaced can be found here: http://elitebydesign.com/and-this-is-why-you-dont-steal-online-content/
The post won’t be coming back up, unfortunately. It was a great intro post to WDT that brought plenty of traffic, comments, and links, but we took it down out of respect to Collis and all his hard work at PSD Tuts.
insic
February 18, 2009 at 3:25 am
nice site and useful resources.
Roxx
March 4, 2009 at 5:22 am
Nice site! i think the complain about you copying psdtuts is real big bullsh*t.
“tuts” or “tut” is a normal synonym for “tutorial”, it’s no copyrighted name for psd tuts…helll, there are hundreds of TUTS
if you started a site like pstuts or something it would be different, but only for the word tuts…well… you get my point
Nice site! planning to visit it more often!
succes!
Cancer Specialist FL
March 6, 2009 at 5:50 am
Nice Look. I like color combination and designing.
keidi
July 22, 2009 at 3:22 am
I like psdtuts and your site.
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September 1, 2009 at 8:24 am
I just checked out the site and it looks pretty good! One thing I noticed is that there are already a lot of 30+ webdesign this, 50+ blablabla that posts on it. I don’t really like them. There’s too much of them I think.
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October 9, 2009 at 6:41 am
Good work keep it up
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