I want to start designing themes , But i don't know where to start ?

Hi all developers !
I want to start designing HTML & Wordpress themes , but i don’t know where to start from .
i’m a good editor , but i haven’t design a theme from scratch .
i’ve learned html,Css and wordpress tags .
please someone help me , please explain what did you do for the first time ? how did you start designing themes ?
what about now ? how do you design themes now ? which software do you use for designing ? dreamweaver ? or something else ? please help me to get started .

Okay ….. Let me explain. There are two categories.. Suppose you just want to be a developer of HTML templates then 1) Learn Photoshop basics 2) Master HTML 3) master CSS

And if you want to earn lot and want to be a CMS developer then you also have to learn the following things : 4) Java Script or jQuery (I recommend jQuery) 5)PHP basics (Just simple basics) 5) MySQL basics 6) Wordpress Functions, hooks and actions (Assuming that you wanna be a WP developer)

For your answer professional designers always use Photoshop for designing. It is the best best best and the best. Learn to PHP basics, MySQL basics and WP functions, hooks and acttions won’t take more than 2 months for a new comer. But if you are good enough then it may take a week or less. And to master jQuery will take not more than a month. Beside these there are some theory to complete a nice design. You have to have clear idea about Hierarchy, Color Theory and Design layouts. That’s all. Learning webdesign is not so hard but it is a very creative job. If you have creativity then you are welcome in this world otherwise it is not the right place for you. From my experience I have no educational background on designing or programming I learned them all by myself , reading books, online tutorials etc. And my first design was accepted by Themeforest without any rejection. As it was my first work I was not sure if it was enough good to take place on Envato’s market place but luckily I succeed. I remember that I took more that 2.5 months to complete my work. Ya it is a long time but as time gone i became experienced now I can design and complete coding a whole design within 9/10 days by working 5/6 hrs per day. So please try hard and you will succeed. Never give up.

Since you’ve never done one on your own you’re going to want to practice a lot as ThemeForest is very serious about the marketplaces keeping quality content. If you do know how to edit other themes than you are capable of coding a custom theme. However be sure to read ThemeForest’s Author rules about using things from other themes.

As for you asking about DreamWeaver I don’t recommend it, but that’s just my personal opinion. For editors it all depends on your operating system if you let us know that we’ll be able to help you further in picking a software.

Okay ….. Let me explain. There are two categories.. Suppose you just want to be a developer of HTML templates then 1) Learn Photoshop basics 2) Master HTML 3 ) master CSS

And if you want to earn lot and want to be a CMS developer then you also have to learn the following things : 4) Java Script or jQuery (I recommend jQuery) 5)PHP basics (Just simple basics) 5) MySQL basics 6) Wordpress Functions, hooks and actions (Assuming that you wanna be a WP developer)

For your answer professional designers always use Photoshop for designing. It is the best best best and the best. Learn to PHP basics, MySQL basics and WP functions, hooks and acttions won’t take more than 2 months for a new comer. But if you are good enough then it may take a week or less. And to master jQuery will take not more than a month. Beside these there are some theory to complete a nice design. You have to have clear idea about Hierarchy, Color Theory and Design layouts. That’s all. Learning webdesign is not so hard but it is a very creative job. If you have creativity then you are welcome in this world otherwise it is not the right place for you. From my experience I have no educational background on designing or programming I learned them all by myself , reading books, online tutorials etc. And my first design was accepted by Themeforest without any rejection. As it was my first work I was not sure if it was enough good to take place on Envato’s market place but luckily I succeed. I remember that I took more that 2.5 months to complete my work. Ya it is a long time but as time gone i became experienced now I can design and complete coding a whole design within 9/10 days by working 5/6 hrs per day. So please try hard and you will succeed. Never give up.

Since you’ve never done one on your own you’re going to want to practice a lot as ThemeForest is very serious about the marketplaces keeping quality content. If you do know how to edit other themes than you are capable of coding a custom theme. However be sure to read ThemeForest’s Author rules about using things from other themes.

As for you asking about DreamWeaver I don’t recommend it, but that’s just my personal opinion. For editors it all depends on your operating system if you let us know that we’ll be able to help you further in picking a software.

Hey moccc, many thanks for starting this post.

And thank you guys who replied.

I’m in the exact same situation with moccc, quite a newbie. I’m quite familiar with the visual design and layout process and also with basic HTML and CSS . And i think i can learn some several necessery skills like jquery on my way to my first WP theme.

However where to start is still a mystery to me, because as far as i can see creating a solid WP theme takes more than these basic skills.

There are many great themes here and many great authors. I would like to ask you guys a couple of questions, and i appreciate any little bit of information or references:

- Do you start creating a theme from scratch? Or do you use a framework and modify it? If it is a framework, which one do you prefer?

- What a beginner should consider if he/she doesn’t want to be rejected by a TF reviewer?

Thank you