Maybe we heard “don’t just sit there, do something!” a few too many times growing up. While we’re big fans of the browser theme, we also want something more than just a nice paint job for the otherwise drab gray browser experience. That’s why our list of five favorite browser themes each has a unique spin making it visually appealing and interactively engaging.

1. Weather – The only browser theme that changes with the weather

The Weather Browser Theme is a full integration using WeatherBug’s API plus background imagery capturing various weather conditions to create a browser theme that pulls in weather forecasts, local conditions, alerts, weather maps and more. The theme itself changes based on your local weather conditions, so it epitomizes the concept of interactive browser theme and remains a showcase of a dynamically changing browser theme.

2. The Daily Beast – The browser theme for news junkies

The Daily Beast is a leading news site and their theme pulls an image from the latest feature story directly into the browser theme. The user can hover over it to get the story headline or click through to read the full story. The sidebar keeps users connected to the latest news via special views of the Cheat Sheet, Buzz Board, Blogs & Stories and Video sections of The Daily Beast. The Daily Beast Browser Theme demonstrates several methods to keep their users connected to the breaking news of the day. For people that want to keep up with the latest and hottest stories, regardless of where they are on the web – The Daily Beast browser theme is a perfect fit.

3. Movie Premier – A movie lovers browser theme

The Movie Premier Browser Theme is a fun and functional theme for movie fans. Like the Daily Beast theme, Movie Premier has a feature block that updates regularly with movie posters of current and opening movies. Clicking on the poster takes you to an overview page of the movie with reviews, synopsis and more. The theme is also tightly integrated with Fandango for instant access to reviews, show times, tickets and even trailers and other videos in the sidebar. It’s a great example of how content and commerce fuse together in an interactive browser theme.

4. Looking for Group – An evil browser theme

Looking for Group is a leading web comic and its artists designed the LFG Browser Theme. If you’re a fan, it’s a must have. If you like RPG, irreverent humor or evil wizards named Richard, there’s something for you. The links back to the strip’s archive makes it easy to catch up to the storyline.

5. Canvas – Paint your browser theme any way you want

The Canvas Browser Theme gives you the power to make your theme very personal by adding any image from your computer right into the browser. Whether you want photos of family, friends or pets, it’s your choice and it’s easy to switch between any themes you create. That’s only the beginning. Once the browser theme is installed, you can add any image from a web page directly to your theme with a right-click of your mouse. This allows you to add any of the free textures that are abundant on the web or even something more lively like an animated gif. It’s all up to you. It’s your Canvas.

Patrick Murphy is the founder and CEO of BrandThunder (BT). With its extreme makeovers for Internet browsers, BT creates persistent engagement between major brands and their online consumers. BrandThunder specializes in Internet Explorer themes, Mozilla Firefox themes and Chrome themes.

With over 2 billion views a day and 24 hours of video uploaded every minute Youtube has become one of the biggest and most used websites in the world. Taking advantage of Youtubes popularity, individuals and companies are spreading their identity through viral videos not only brining traffic to their site but also making them money. With the use of a creative channel background people are advertising and providing information to all their visitors. In this post, Inspiration Pad looks at a number of Creative Youtube Backgrounds and provides you with a number of links on how to create your own.

Nike Football

Mystery Guitar Man

Pepsi

Only Use Me Blade

FPS Russia

Top Gear

Charlie Is So Cool Like

UKF Dubstep

KipKay

Optic Nation

Fifa Goal Of The Day

Husky Starcraft

HowCast

Zerkaa HD

Break

Free Background Websites

Ytlayouts

Background Tube

My Tube Design

Free YT Layouts

Tutorials & PSD’s

Line 25 : How To Design A Custom Youtube Background

Pixel Clouds: Youtube 2.0 Template

Video :  How To Make A Youtube Background With CS5

Roberts Production : Free Youtube Background Template

Making a professional and good first impression as a web designer is a tricky job but with the help of a portfolio potential clients can see previous work and quickly get in contact with you. Having a portfolio is simply not enough, the need to stand out from the crowd of ever growing web designers is increasing so in this post Inspiration Pad have hand chosen inspiring portfolios for you to gain inspiration from.

13 Creative

Ten24 Media

Brad Candullo

CSS Jockey

Dean Oakley

Dizi Designs

Elliot Jay Stocks

Gareth Dickey

Jason Reed

Josh Tilton

Kitfolio

Sam Brown

Simple Art

Claire Baxter

eAnka

Alberto Design

Giancarlo Fajardo

Accent Creative

Dreamer Lines

OH! Media

Juan Diego Velasco

Marck McGall

Senso

Two24 Studios

Design Junction

Very Creative

Studio 7 Designs

Kosh Creative

Sawyer Hollenshead

Brad Colbow

Spoon Graphics

Anderbose

Ximena Ruiz

ilove2design

Tim Potter

AdaptD

Branded07

Blog Theme Machine

Thomas Hardy

Lyndon Wade

Jesse Willmon

Marc Anton Dahmen

Rob Young

Contrast

Marius Roosendaal

Formrausch

Frisk Web

Tracy Apps Design

Simone Maranzana

Viljiami Salminen

Mathias Leihu

Dave Werner

Steve Mullen

Noel Design

Daniel Gutierrez

Alexarts

Also

Macro photography is close-up photography. The classical definition is that the image projected is close to the same size as the subject.Whats great about macro photography is the detail it provides which cannot be seen with the naked eye. This is achieved by using a special lens (macro lenses) which only focuses on a specific area.

In this post, InspirationPad looks at a showcase of 35 fantastic macro photographs from various sources. If you enjoyed any of the photographs displayed below, please visit the original photographer and leave a comment.

Dew Drop

Peacock

Banded Demoiselle

Protected

Ice

Grass Drops

Spiral Time

Fly Bubble Gum

Gears

Face To Face

Sea Mist

Hoverfly

Her Majesty

Explosion

Spider

Anacridium aegyptium-larva

Mask Rider

Hover

-

Finally Droplet

Insect

Ripples Of Colour

Lost

Dignified

Jenn’s Eye

Good Morning

Butterfly

Coccinella undecimpunctata

Rain Tears

The Last Warrior

Wish You Were Here

Anolida Lizard

Dragonfly

Mr. Attitude!

Magdalena

With the release of Apples Ipad comes a whole new world of applications. From games to education to productivity, there are thousands of new apps made just for iPad you can discover now on the App Store. In this post, InspirationPad looks at 30 Astonishing Ipad Application Websites that are sure to inspire you to create your own or draw you into purchasing it.

Twitterrific

Masque

Syncode

ComicZeal

Papers Touch

Layers

StudioTrack

Digits Calculator

iDraw

Things

June Cloud

iTeleport

HelvetiNote

Toopia

Square

Evernote

TabToolKit

SketchyPad

Acqualia

TweetDeck

Jubilee

Instapaper

Ego

Game Table

Gusto

 

Digital Post

Ipad DJ

Globe Converter

Sorted

Taska

Keeping up with the latest posts within the design community has now become a tedious task for the average RSS reader. With some design blogs publishing more than one post a day its easy to fall behind and have your reader clogged up. By following these blogs on Twitter you can get to reading as soon as they publish a post.

InspirationPad recommends the following 100 design blogs to follow on twitter. Simply click on each icon which links directly to their twitter accounts and start following!