The Complete Knowledge Transfer of PSD to HTML Conversion

The PSD to HTML conversion is as easy as it was around 5 years ago, due to standards, responsiveness, updated code requirements, and mobile evolution. HTMLPLUSCSS has veteran PSD to HTML developers with hands-on experience who have successfully converted thousands of designs to pixel-perfect markup in last two years. Some tips from their own experience to convert PSD design to front-end development code are mentioned in this post.

Although it is fact that Photoshop is not a single design file required for the front-end development project, but you can create a rough wireframe of the layout and content you need for your web pages. We can help you represent your idea. In this tutorial guide, we are discussing Photoshop design to HTML conversion.

PSD to HTML converter tool: Is It Worth or Not?

It is natural to be excited while using software or tools. They can take you in a favor of automation process. Do they really work? Yes, they do but with no guarantee to meet your requirements to the fullest. Several websites offering automation app to convert the design to HTML/CSS could be useful, but for the sake of custom code, using such software/app/tool is not a right choice. You cannot blindly rely on these tools that don’t provide you optimal results of pixel-perfectness, custom code, and many more. Unless you know bug fixing and have a good understanding of writing markup, such conversion tools could be a bane of your life than it is worth to your business.

This does not mean that there is no place for the automated tools. They really do exist. But, choosing them is not always good when you need coding standards to be followed, you have custom business needs, and responsiveness with pixel-perfect code is your target.

In case your aim is to simply sit on the template site, conversion tool could be significant. But, for other development needs, you have to give a personal touch in design and code depending on business and customer needs. Here are some automated conversion tools:

• CSS3Ps
• PSD 2 CSS Online
• PSD 2 HTML Converter
• Jadii
• PSD Breaker

Opt for software to design or don’t!

If you are doing conversion from the scratch, you would be needed software to create your design file and then a  framework for the perfect layout. Or, you can hire a PSD to HTML conversion company to get it done starting from design to code. Luckily, several tools are out there to make your job of developing design file easy, a few of them are listed below:

Adobe Photoshop: You can buy this originator of the .psd file at the flat cost which is available as minimum as $19 per month. This is quite affordable for designers compared to what was years back.

CSS Hat: It is a Photoshop add-on and often used by the designers. This tool turns the Photoshop layers into CSS code instantly and saves your precious time.

PNG Hat: For gaming designers, it is beneficial to work with. It could be used for slicing assets and compressing images for the gaming design. Through this you can compress images while exporting, to get faster loading. Also, it does not cause the quality of your design.

Sublime Text: It is a cross-platform text editor originated from the Notepad++, for coding and markup. It helps you code your text serving with numerous extraordinary features. This tool provides you results with the amazing performance but all depend on the language used for the code.

Select a CSS Framework or Not

Many frameworks are out there to shorten your time frame of development. They do not reinforce you to start coding from the scratch but focus on basic three areas of front-end development: JavaScript, CSS, and HTML. Working without a framework is completely acceptable if you do not have a familiarity of how to deal with the functionality and features of a framework. In fact, you do not even need to stick around a particular framework for each project.

Pros and Cons of Choosing a Framework

Pros:

• Going for a framework can reduce the timeframe, amount and complexity of the code used to develop a site only if you have enough understanding of using it.
• Indeed, the perfectly used framework on the page boosts the level of efficiency and improvises the overall design of the site.

Cons:

• When lots of choices are available on your plate, it is obvious to get confused and sometimes you are forced to retain at least one of them that does not often produce optimal markup.
• The framework you are opting for must have a wide community support otherwise, it could be a problem for you when you got stuck somewhere and the framework provide neither support nor an upgrade.

Foundation and Bootstrap are two hot frameworks right now that cannot let you go wrong. Both provide with grid systems and responsive support, which is a basic need of the current web development.

PSD to HTML Conversion: A Complete Guide

Start Designing a Layout Type

Depending on your business requirement, develop a layout type to your website before proceeding with the conversion. Here are common layout types used around the world for designing the website layout:

• Mobile Only: Apps that do not mean to fit on desktop support mobile only layout. This layout works on mobile devices, such as tablet, smartphone, iPad, etc.

• Fluid: This layout supports both mobile and desktop devices, and elements used for this layout adjust according to the user action like minimizing the size of the browser, using small screens, and more.

• Responsive: Nowadays you cannot avoid this layout being a part of the designing industry. This layout adjusts according to the size of the screen and no matter whether it is a small mobile screen or desktop screen.

• Fixed: Such layouts are usually designed for the desktop sites and have static height and width. This is why container elements do not shift as per the screen or when the window screen is minimized.

Slice the PSD images

Take the PSD file and then slice the images, such as background image you need for your website header and/or other images that cannot be created by using the CSS. Gather the sliced images and export them to JPEG, PNG or other file formats whichever is necessary. Cut the shadows and then put them cautiously next to the exported images. The CSS3 will take care of the rest shadowing.

Create Directory

Now, it’s time to create three directories on your device to organize things so that it is easy to separate them out:

• Keep one main folder as the website name so that it could simply be recognized at a later stage.
• Keep one folder under which you can store all the images you will be using for your site, and name it as images.
• Keep one folder within the main folder to store CSS files and name this as styles.

Write HTML code

You should divide the page into multiple sections and to maintain uniformity across the design, you need to write HTML code for each section starting from top to bottom. To make the sectioning easier, go with the HTML5 which is an efficient hypertext markup language than any other. Write HTML code for the following sections of the webpage:

• Header
• Hero
• Shadows
• Content
• Footer

Review whatever you have written for the HTML sections and make sure you are not leaving any loophole at all. Sometimes, a missing syntax or closing tag can take several hours/minutes to troubleshoot but don’t be panic and complete it carefully. Give time to review your code and find errors if anything is there.

Include Styling along with CSS

An HTML shell is ready with you. Now add styling to your site with CSS. Bootstrap and other related frameworks provide some of their stylings by default set up. So, if you are using any framework, it can make your task easier and save your time. Only you need to give some personal touch to the HTML code to enhance its efficiency.

Add JavaScript for interaction

After HTML as well as CSS styling, get started working with the JavaScript to provide interaction to your site. In case you do not know anything about jQuery and how does it work, then stop this process here. If you know it better, choose either of the following:

• vue.js
• react.js

Both of them frameworks are popular and used to stick the HTML element with JS functions and data.

Summary

In so many PSD to HTML conversion service providers, it is definitely hard to make a choice which is best than others. Apparently, the conversion is not a child’s play; it needs efforts and technical knowledge to generate a seamless responsive result. We hope this post will help beginners and intermediate level of designers understand the process of conversion in detail.

Read more at: HTMLPLUSCSS Blog