ArtyBlogs

These themes are based on the default 2 column "Kubrick" theme for WordPress by Michael Heilemann. They are, therefore, fully compatible with WordPress versions 1.5, 2.0, 2.1, 2.5, 2.6 and onwards. If your particular WordPress installation works with the default theme then you should have no problems with this theme either, as most of the coding is exactly the same. The only real changes are some name changes and the new "retrofitted" graphics.

CUSTOMIZING OR ADDING OUR GRAPHICAL SIDEBAR WIDGETS TO OTHER WORDPRESS THEMES...

Rather than use the default ArtyBlogs Graphical Sidebar Widget, you can just pick and choose each individual widget you may wish to use and then upload those to your blog and enable them. That way you can skip the search box or the archives, links or anything else you might not want to add.

Keep in mind that for these widgets to work you MUST have all the necessary images in your theme's image folder. Normally it's not an issue because all of the images are located within the images folder that resides in each of our own themes, however if you want to have Graphical Sidebar images in other WordPress themes that aren't created by us then you need to do a little ground work first. Fortunately there are a couple of ways that you can try.

The easy way is to just download one of our themes which has a complimentary color scheme to the one you are currently using. Then all you need to do is add the sidebar images you want to have into the image folder of your theme. Enable our individual widgets and the new graphics should work (I stress "should". I haven't tested this yet but I will do so soon).

The second way is a little more involved -- but not that much.

1 - Download one of our themes as above.

2 - Unzip and open the images folder and take note of the file name of the images you want to use. Also take note of the dimensions of the images.

3 - Use a graphics program like Photoshop, Photoshop Elements or Paintshop to create your own images, with your own custom text using the same dimensions and file names that we use.

NOTE: You really need to make sure that the file names are right, but the actual text you use in the graphics can be anything you want. If the file names are not the same then the widgets won't work.

4 - Upload your new graphics and enable the corresponding widgets. That's it!

MORE THINGS TO TRY WITH GRAPHICS...

On the subject of graphics, if you want to include your own typeface in the header (as part of the actual image) and you need to get rid of your blog title and byline, then it's quite easy to do. Edit your "style.css" file and find:

h1 {
font-size: 3.8em;
text-align: center;
}

#header-image .description {
font-size: 1.2em;
text-align: center;
}

Change it to something like:

h1 {
position: absolute;
font-size: 3.8em;
left: -4400px;
}

#header-image .description {
position: absolute;
font-size: 1.2em;
left: -4400px;
}

This way your blog will still have all the relevant information but it's all hidden away from view. This is a much better solution than just removing info from your header.php file.

Likewise if you want to move the positioning of your blog title and byline, change the above code to something like:

h1 {
font-size: 3.8em;
position: relative; left: 200px; top: -50px; width: 450px;
}

#header-image .description {
font-size: 1.2em;
position: relative; left: 200px; top: -50px; width: 450px;
}

Play around with the values a little bit to get your positioning just right. The "width" is there so that the text will only be a certain width across. This is useful if you have an image to the left or right that you don't want obscured by the title. If there's no image then you can discard the "width: 450px;" part.