Context

I didn’t develop my design taste in isolation.

It was shaped by builders people who cared deeply about craft, standards, motion, and the tiny details most developers overlook. Over the past few years, certain creators fundamentally changed how I think about building for the web.

This post isn’t just a list of inspirations. It’s a reflection on how their work influenced mine especially the way I built Eldora UI and my portfolio.

SHADCN — Standards Over Abstraction

Before discovering shadcn/ui, I never thought seriously about distributing components.

I used the library to move faster. But what truly inspired me wasn’t just the components. it was the philosophy behind them:

• Distribution through CLI
• Copy-paste ownership model
• Clear structure and standards
• Developer-first thinking

When shadcn released CLI 3.0 and began distributing ecosystem components through it, something clicked.

If components could be shared this cleanly… why not share mine?

That question changed everything.

That thinking directly led to Eldora UI a motion-first component library now used by 10k+ developers with 1.8k+ GitHub stars.

If not for shadcn, I probably wouldn’t have considered releasing my components publicly with proper standards. He didn’t just influence my tooling — he influenced my mindset.

RAUNO — Devouring the Details

Rauno changed how I see interfaces.

Through his course Devouring Details, I realized how many micro-decisions I used to ignore:

• Spacing rhythm
• Hover timing
• Alignment precision
• Typography weight
• Interaction feedback

As a developer, I focused on functionality. Rauno made me understand something deeper:

Interfaces are felt, not just used.

There’s a line from him that stayed with me:

Good things take time

That sentence reshaped how I approach my own work.

My latest portfolio carries many ideas inspired by Devouring Details. Not copied but studied, interpreted, and experimented with.

He taught me patience.
And more importantly, intentionality.

MANU ARORA — Creativity in Components

I’ve been using Aceternity UI since 2023.

What inspired me most wasn’t just the components. it was the creativity behind them.

Manu’s approach to building UI feels expressive:

• Unexpected motion
• Experimental interactions
• SVG path animations
• Playful but purposeful design

His YouTube playlist on motion especially stood out. Watching him animate SVG paths frame by frame opened a new way of thinking for me.

He doesn’t just show techniques.he shares mindset.

That influence is clearly visible in my own motion components.

NANDA SYAHRASYAD — Understanding SVG at the Core

I enrolled in the Interactive SVG Animations course by Nanda Syahrasyad.

This is where my understanding became technical.

Not just: Animate this

But:

• How Bézier curves are constructed
• How exact coordinates shape perception
• How timing changes emotion
• How interaction should respond to user input

Drawing precise SVG paths manually changed how I think about vector animation.

Many of my SVG interactions today trace back to that foundation.

EMIL KOWALSKI — The Precision of Motion

Emil’s attention to detail is on another level.

The care he takes with:

• Easing curves
• Interaction polish
• Subtle feedback
• Motion timing

It made me realize something important:

Motion is not decoration.it’s communication.

I’m planning to enroll in animations.dev, but even observing his work has influenced how I tune interactions in my projects.

Making It Your Own

Inspiration isn’t copying.

There’s a famous quote that says:

good artists copy, great artists steal

That line only makes sense when you read it fully:

Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different. The good poet welds his theft into a whole of feeling which is unique, utterly different from that from which it was torn

Closing Thought

Looking back, each of them shaped a different layer of my thinking:

• Standards matter.
• Details matter.
• Motion matters.
• Sharing matters.
• Patience matters.

Eldora UI, my SVG experiments, and my portfolio are all outcomes of these influences filtered through my own perspective.

I’m still learning.

But these builders shaped my foundation.