WPF and Expression Resource

Please see the part II of this post here, which includes resources for Silverlight.

Where can I learn more about Windows Presentation Foundation and Expression Studio? How can I build rich user experience in Expression Studio based on WPF? While I was learning Microsoft’s new presentation platform (WPF) and creative design tools (Expression), I collected the following list of resources I'd like to share with you. I’ll update this list as my journey continues.

Getting started

• .Net Framework WPF site which includes a nice introduction of WPF.
• Expression Product Site: you can get a quick overview on the products and download trials for all four tools.
  • Expression Launch 07 Webcast is available. 
• Microsoft Design: a central place to communicate about Microsoft’s design culture, mission, experiences, people, and much more.

Blogs

• Expression Team Blog: provides updated Expression product news, links to samples and tutorials. There are links to individual team member’s blogs on the site as well.
• IRhetoric - Karsten Januszewski : full of great examples of WPF applications.
• Tim Sneath's Blog: contains a series of posts tilted “great WPF applications.” He also has a post on great WPF blogs, which includes an extensive list of blogs focused on WPF and Expression Studio.
• Lester’s WPF Blog: example based blog posts focused on XAML and WPF, WPF/E applications.
• The WPF Blog by Lee Brimelow: tons of hands-on examples offered by Lee (even with WPF/E and Flash integration example.) He also archives his video tutorials under the ContentPresenter site.
• Expression Web blog by Andrew Jewsbury: focuses on Expression Web. There is a recent post about the white paper published by the Expression Web team to help FrontPage users make the transition to Expression Web and the world of Web standards.
• Design Thinking Digest by Chris Bernard: thoughts on design and innovation. There is a great post on challenges and opportunities for Expression Blend.

Training

• Channel 9 Expression videos: a four part video on Expression including Blend, Web, and Design.
• Lynda.com
  • Expression Web Essential Training with Joe Marini: “From understanding the concept of smart web design, to creating, editing, and maintaining a web site, instructor Joe Marini, Group Product Manager at Microsoft, gives his insider tips for real-world web site design using Expression Web.”
  • Expression Blend Beta Preview with Lee Brimelow: “Instructor Lee Brimelow explores all of the application's features and capabilities, from the user interface panels to creating and importing assets. He also covers integrating 3D content, using WPF text controls, layout controls, and user input controls, and creating animated effects.”
• Expression Web Total Training
• XAML Tutorial
  • XAML express
  • 3D XAML by electricrain

Forums

You can get fast response to your detailed technical questions by WPF and Expression team members in these discussion lists.

• MSDN WPF forum
• Expression Discussion
• Expression Blend Discussion
• Expression Design Discussion
• Expression Web Discussion

Dedicated sites:

• MIX University: a site dedicated to the next generation of web experience. On the site, you can find demos for ASP.NET AJAX, gadgets, WPF/E, hands-on labs for Expression and much more.
• ExpressionBlend.com by Brennon Williams: “the primary aim of this site is to assist developers and designers in how to use the exciting new user interface (UI)/ user experience (UE)development tool from Microsoft, Expression Blend.”
• By-Expression by Cheyl D. Wise: a great place to learn about Expression Web. Cheyl is the author of Foundations of Expression Web: The Basics and Beyond.
• Learn Expression offers free video tutorials for learning Expression tools.

Bonus: Microsoft blog directory

Comments

• Anonymous
  April 09, 2007
  Hi Guys In some quiet time at work, I started to look into WPF/XAML and so on. I have written up my experiences (including a few tips on some UI issues I worked round) at my blog site. The biggest problem I had was I'm no graphical designer, but I've had some success using Expression to design my app. I had followed a few Photoshop tutorials to create my controls and then tried to apply the same procedures to do them in Expression. Photoshop and Expression Design are eerily similar. There are a few differences however so I guess what I'd most like to see are Expession tutorials (e.g How to create a glass effect button). I think these will come in time. I think yours is the first time I've seen a one-stop shop for WPF links. Great job!

• Anonymous
  April 15, 2007
  Thanks for your comment, Derek. Here is a tutorial on creating a glass button in Blend. http://blogs.msdn.com/mgrayson/archive/2007/02/16/creating-a-glass-button-the-complete-tutorial.aspx

• Anonymous
  April 24, 2007
  In an eariler post , I aggregated a list of WPF and Expression resource. The list is in plain test with

• Anonymous
  May 28, 2007
  There are so many great resources on WPF/Silverlight and Expression Studio available after MIX. It's

• Anonymous
  June 17, 2007
  It was my first EnergizeIT experience yesterday. What a fun day it was! I like how the event unite all