Guides for designers & developers
Practical, no-fluff articles on icon and photo licensing, font pairing, Lottie animation, performance and free design resources. Written by a working motion designer, updated as tools change.
Free Icon Licenses Explained: MIT, Apache, CC BY, CC0 and OFL
What MIT, Apache 2.0, ISC, CC BY 4.0, CC0 and OFL actually allow for icons: commercial use, attribution, redistribution, logos. Plain-English guide.
AnimationLottie vs GIF vs SVG vs MP4: Which Animation Format to Use in 2026
File size, quality, interactivity and browser support compared for Lottie, GIF, animated SVG, APNG, WebP and MP4. Decision guide by a motion designer.
IconsThe 12 Best Free Icon Sets for UI Design in 2026 (SVG, MIT-Licensed)
Lucide, Tabler, Phosphor, Heroicons, Material Symbols, Iconoir, Remix, Solar, Fluent, Hugeicons and more compared by size, style, license and React support.
AnimationHow to Add a Lottie Animation to a Website (HTML, React, Vue, Webflow, WordPress)
Step-by-step: embed Lottie JSON with lottie-web, the lottie-player web component, dotLottie, React (lottie-react), Vue, Webflow and WordPress. With performance tips.
AnimationHow to Optimise Lottie File Size: From 2 MB to 50 KB
Practical techniques to shrink Lottie JSON: remove rasters, simplify paths, avoid masks and mattes, trim precision, convert to dotLottie, and settings in After Effects and Bodymovin.
Fonts15 Best Free Google Fonts for Websites and Apps in 2026
Inter, Roboto, Open Sans, Poppins, Montserrat, DM Sans, Manrope, Plus Jakarta Sans, Lora, Playfair Display, JetBrains Mono and more, with when to use each.
FontsFont Pairing Guide: 20 Google Fonts Combinations That Work
How to pair fonts by contrast, x-height and mood, with 20 tested Google Fonts combinations for SaaS, editorial, e-commerce, portfolios and dashboards.
LicensingPexels vs Unsplash vs Pixabay Licenses: What You Can and Cannot Do
A clear comparison of the Pexels, Unsplash and Pixabay licenses for commercial use, attribution, resale, people and trademarks, plus safe-use tips for client work.
IconsHow to Use SVG Icons in React, Next.js and Vue (Iconify, Sprites, Components)
Four ways to ship SVG icons in a modern frontend: Iconify components, unplugin-icons at build time, SVG sprites, and inline components. Bundle size and a11y compared.
FontsHow to Self-Host Google Fonts (Faster, GDPR-Safe) in 5 Minutes
Download woff2 files, write @font-face with font-display and unicode-range, preload the critical weight, and subset fonts. Step-by-step with copy-paste CSS.
VideoWebsite Video Backgrounds: Best Practices for Speed, Mobile and Accessibility
How to add a hero video background without wrecking Core Web Vitals: formats, compression settings, poster images, autoplay rules, reduced motion and when to use animation instead.
AnimationAnimated Icons and Micro-interactions: When They Help Conversion and When They Hurt
Evidence-based guide to UI micro-interactions: feedback, state change, onboarding, empty states. Timing, easing, accessibility and how to build them with Lottie.
Resources60+ Free Design Resources for 2026: Icons, Fonts, Photos, Videos, Lottie, Mockups, Colors
A curated list of free, commercially usable design resources: icon libraries, font foundries, stock photo and video sites, Lottie animations, illustration packs, mockups, color and UI tools.
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