Tutorial: Signature Design BasicsHere's a great place to start.
By way of programs, you really want to be looking at Photoshop CS3 4 or 5. Now I don't know how adept you are at 'sourcing' these things without necessarily paying for them, but its very much possible if you know where to look. Unfortunately, we obviously can't be seen here to be advocating anything illegal but if you're really struggling I can drop you some pointers via PM or email. If you're overly moral or just don't want the download, a program called GIMP is also an option, but is limited and you'll find far fewer decent tutorials on it.
Your basic ports of call should be:
- Experiment - once you've got your program installed and set up, just have a look round, see which features you can work out and have a bit of a fiddle.
- Tutorials - find some well-written tutorials with an outcome you like. You can find loads HERE (also includes resources like stocks/renders) which can get you started, but as I said, start with the Signature Design Basics thread. Its written by a skilled, respected regular and will do you a lot of good as a starting point. There's more theory to these things than you might think.
- Practice - do be practising these tutorials as much as you can. It might be frustrating for a while, but you should see some improvement if you follow as much as you can. There's no need to post after every single one, try and build up as many as ten practices or when you really do feel you've nailed the signature design basics. If you can face it, get a second opinion from a partner or housemate - if it looks good in real life, it should look good on the internet, but the reverse is very much not always true.
- CNC - stands for Constructive Criticism. This is where you post in the Graphic Design section work you've done and ask for tips and comments to improve. Don't come here after every signature you make, especially in the early days, only when you feel you've really improved on your last few. Make sure you always keep in mind that you are posting so you can improve, and take the advice you get, for the most part, as seriously as you can and try and work on it. There is no point in showing off work you think is great and not believing established artists when they say its not. You wont improve and you wont make any friends. I do, however, apologize in advance for any useless or troll responses you get. The section seems to get a lot of them at the moment, so just try and ignore them and pick out useful information from regulars. If you listen and respond well theyll be more inclined to help you in the future.
Good Luck, sorry for the lengthy response, but at least some of it should help!