Archive for the ‘Design’ Category

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Aug 17 2008 at 10:06am

Website Makeover

Well, it’s finally here. After months of work my new design is ready for showtime. I don’t have time to say much about it right now. As with the A Padded Cell/the Webmaster Forums design this was a joint effort between Liam and myself.

I also upgraded my photo gallery from Gallery 2 to Zenphoto. Liam ended up having to write a complicated sql statement to convert it, but I’m much, much happier with the new system. I’ve been using zen for a work project and find it to be much easier to work with than Gallery 2.

If you notice anything that doesn’t look right please do let me know. I haven’t tested the new design much in IE 7 and I know it doesn’t work right in 6 (too bad).

Posted in Design, Wordpress | 3 Comments »

Jul 06 2008 at 11:55am

Do we still need em-based layouts?

Most of my recent layouts have been em based. That means that they scale when the font size is adjusted. This approach seems to make more sense than simply allowing the text to resize while keeping the layout the same.

Well, browser manufacturers have caught on to this. Following in Opera’s footsteps, IE and Firefox are now implementing zoom as the default method of resizing text.

If this is the case, then do we still need to code layouts in ems or can we go back to using pixels? I’m currently coding a new layout for this site and I’ve decided to code it in pixels. It’s so much easier not to have to do grid calculation in ems and worry about what the current font size is. My grid unit is 24px. That’s it. Much better.

So, do you think it’s still worth it to code layouts in em’s? The non-zoom font resizing functions are still there. Will people prefer to use them over zooming?

Posted in Accessibility, Design | 1 Comment »

Jun 03 2008 at 2:54pm

Are graphic mock-ups necessary?

I published an article over the weekend on creating graphic mock-ups. This is really a tutorial meant for beginners who may not have attempted to do this before. I do think that creating a graphic mock-up is an important part of the design process. I find that it helps me to come up with a more coherent, creative design.

Today sj at 37 signals posted an interesting counterpoint to my position. They don’t create mock-ups because, in short, they feel that it slows things down too much and just doesn’t make sense. I think this really depends on the context. If you’re creating something highly interactive then, sure, maybe it doesn’t make sense to do a static proof. On the other hand, if you’re creating a static web site then maybe creating a visual proof and getting your ideas together first is a good idea.

I upgraded my Wordpress and I don’t like it!

The much celebrated Wordpress 2.5 upgrade was released about a month and a half ago and I’ve finally gotten around to upgrading my installation. I was really looking forward to the new Happy Cog designed admin interface. But guess what? I was disappointed.

The new design is surely nicer looking than the old (although I didn’t really have a problem with the old design). They’ve made quite a few interface changes – some good, some not so good. Read on to see some screenshots and analysis of the new interface.

Browser upgrade campaigns, four ways

I’ve come across a couple of interesting browser upgrade campaigns lately. Yes, lots of IE testing! Anyway, it’s kind of interesting to see the way different sites have presented the message.

Purpose of a browser upgrade campaign

The purpose of a browser upgrade campaign is to:

tell people they’re using an outdated browser
explain why this is a problem (optional but effective)
suggest alternatives

New Design at A Padded Cell/TWF

We’ve just released our new design for TWF and A Padded Cell to the public. This new look came together fairly quickly. A few weeks ago we started playing with some colours and fonts and quickly developed a prototype within a few days.

Liam and I worked closely together on this design. It was truly a joint effort. I would work on it for a little while then hand the laptop over to him and he would add some more elements to it. It was really fun to work together on a design and I think it shows in the result.

The new look is a lot more sophisticated than the old look while still retaining a bit of funkiness which was really important to us.

Posted in Design | No Comments »