I'm looking to create a very basic wordpress theme that I can use for my fleet of e-commerce sites I'm working on this summer. I've laid out sites in Photoshop an sliced them before, but I've used xSite Pro for the actual site structure. How do people create wordpress themes? Is there software that people use that somehow coordinates the different CSS elements and "builds" the different php files once the site structure is done, or is everyone hand coding these things through trial and error? What a nightmare that would be.
Just make a copy of the default theme and modify that, or you can download a "blank" theme from the internet
A theme is more or less the same same as a website. It just has a bit more structure with header, columns, and footer. Use Photoshop to lay it out with that structure in mind and slice it as usual. Then you need to integrate the layout and the php/wordpress code.
if your willing to spend a few bucks, my sig is the best investment I ever made for theme building. I use to mod themes and look for hours for themes, but I can crank i out now in a few minutes.
It always helps to start off with a theme that has already been created and then modify it to suit your requirements. Choose a theme with a structure that is suitable for your website and go from there.