Ever wondered where that big Pantone swatch book that designers tote around came from? Throughout history man has studied color and how it relates to our environment. Jude Stewart at Imprint explores the history of The Wonderful Color Wheel.

"How many ways can you reshuffle the rainbow? Three, as a matter of fact, if modern color theory is to be believed: Pantone numbers for print designers and brand managers; hex, RGB, and CMYK values for web designers; and CIELAB and CIECAM02 color models for the scientific community. But while the science of color models is largely settled, all that rigorous theory still doesn’t quite squeeze out the sense of fallible humanity underpinning the history of the color wheel..."

Read more: Imprint-The Online Community for Graphic Designers | The Wondrous Color Wheel

Here are some great ideas for colorful summer weddings...

What are the top trends for 2010 weddings? Find out from TheKnot.com:

Trend 1: Retro-Chic Weddings

Trend 2: Dinner-Focused Receptions

Trend 3: Innovative Ceremony Setups

Trend 4: Shorter, Tea-Length Dresses

Trend 5: Classic White Wedding Cakes

Trend 6: Textural Flower Arrangements

Trend 7: Turn Table DJs/Specialty Music

Trend 8: Supped-Up Photo Booths

Trend 9: Themed Engagement Photo Shoots

Trend 10: Wedding Videos (They're Back!)

According to AboutWeddings.com times are changing. There is a huge focus on nature and the environment. From eco-friendly and green weddings to earthy design elements, things are going natural. Pull your inspiration from the surroundings. Look at your locale to establish your color scheme and even the materials used for your paper goods. Items like leaves, twigs and grasses can be incorporated into everything from your program to the centerpieces. For more read the full article. The beautiful example from Twig and Fig clearly shows this trend...

Graphic Design USA in conjunction with PANTONE announced the hottest new colors. "Color is among the most powerful ways to communicate messages about products, services, causes and ideas. And color forecasts are where theory and practice come together, where the rubber meets the road. Color choice is influenced by social, political and economic events—as you will see the recession, the environment and globalism are among this year’s lightning rods — but the process is so complex and evolutionary that no simple explanation fits." Graphic Design USA.

These colors should be abundant for fall 2009 and spring 2010 weddings so keep your eyes peeled. For more information download the full report from Graphic Design USA.

So often, brides are disapointed when they get their photos back from their wedding photographer only to realize that there's no photo of their wedding invitation. Today's weddings are works of art. Brides and grooms spend months and even years planning the special day, so they want to make sure that it has been completely documented. Make sure you let your photographer know you would like a photo of it to match the other wedding photography.

Give the copy to your wedding coordinator at your final planning session and let her/him manage getting it to the photographer.

Happy Planning!

If you see this post it means that BlogEngine.NET 1.5.0 is running and the hard part of creating your own blog is done. There is only a few things left to do.

Write Permissions

To be able to log in to the blog and writing posts, you need to enable write permissions on the App_Data folder. If you’re blog is hosted at a hosting provider, you can either log into your account’s admin page or call the support. You need write permissions on the App_Data folder because all posts, comments, and blog attachments are saved as XML files and placed in the App_Data folder. 

If you wish to use a database to to store your blog data, we still encourage you to enable this write access for an images you may wish to store for your blog posts.  If you are interested in using Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, VistaDB, or other databases, please see the BlogEngine wiki to get started.

Security

When you've got write permissions to the App_Data folder, you need to change the username and password. Find the sign-in link located either at the bottom or top of the page depending on your current theme and click it. Now enter "admin" in both the username and password fields and click the button. You will now see an admin menu appear. It has a link to the "Users" admin page. From there you can change the username and password.  Passwords are hashed by default so if you lose your password, please see the BlogEngine wiki for information on recovery.

Configuration and Profile

Now that you have your blog secured, take a look through the settings and give your new blog a title.  BlogEngine.NET 1.4 is set up to take full advantage of of many semantic formats and technologies such as FOAF, SIOC and APML. It means that the content stored in your BlogEngine.NET installation will be fully portable and auto-discoverable.  Be sure to fill in your author profile to take better advantage of this.

Themes and Widgets

One last thing to consider is customizing the look of your blog.  We have a few themes available right out of the box including two fully setup to use our new widget framework.  The widget framework allows drop and drag placement on your side bar as well as editing and configuration right in the widget while you are logged in.  Be sure to check out our home page for more theme choices and downloadable widgets to add to your blog.

On the web

You can find BlogEngine.NET on the official website. Here you'll find tutorials, documentation, tips and tricks and much more. The ongoing development of BlogEngine.NET can be followed at CodePlex where the daily builds will be published for anyone to download.

Good luck and happy writing.

The BlogEngine.NET team