It has always been an interest of mine to listen to the career paths of others, web designers especially, it’s like looking in a mirror (something I have developed quite the skill for). I think what’s most fascinating is the often-erratic paths people take, it’s always a different story. There also seems to be an unusually high percentage of folks that were inspired by the web and taught themselves, a theme which resonates heavily with me, no matter the industry.
Posts Tagged ‘Web Design’
Becoming a Web Designer
Monday, February 9th, 2009A Web Designer’s Education
Friday, April 25th, 2008I’ve talked about education before, but yesterday I was blown away (again) by someone who decided to forgo school (for the most part) and forge on with a self-taught design career. The first person I met that did this I worked alongside for a few years (at our first and only jobs) and was always blown away by his natural talent. I suppose I can “lump” myself in the self-taught category, but I did go to college, just not for design. I didn’t self-teach however, I borrowed, stole, and pillaged from a very talented design team.
SXSW ‘08 – Saturday
Sunday, March 9th, 2008Just like most mornings, I woke up and checked my Twitter. The night before put us at the Gingerman where we drank a couple of pints of Lonestar and conversed with several geeks – doesn’t get much better. Dustin Diaz, of JavaScript and Google fame, brought his big camera, to which I proceeded to make obvious “your lense makes me feel inadequate” jokes. Yep, that’s me – taking the obvious one-liners and using them for personal gain. It may have garnered a chuckle, I’m not sure.
Jeff and I got back to our room and I use the words “passed out” here, although it was somewhere between passing out and going to bed – do you know the difference? Anyhow, the alarm came quickly and we got up, showered, and headed down to the complimentary continental breakfast. We’re staying at the Hampton – shitty wi-fi, fantastic continental, take your pick. One more good thing about the Hampton is it attracts a lot of the industry “rockstars.” Shit, Jeff and I were there, and we’re pretty important. I jest, but the highly talented Shaun Inman was there and I did get to pick up the size medium American Apparel Mint T-shirts he brought. Thank you Shaun – it was an awkward moment, but it was never dull – my name is George.
After all this we made our way to the conference, what follows are my notes from the different panels/presentations, enjoy. (more…)
Thriving in the Bro-conomy
Wednesday, November 28th, 2007Yep, that’s a new word, or at least I think I made it up (and if I didn’t, it’s like me to think I made up a word). The bro-conomy, to me, is the economy that exists between “bros.” Or better put, between people that you have, or would like to have, a more than a business/client relationship with – it’s something quite special. So special in fact, that in receiving a $90 dollar sweatshirt for $300+ dollars of work, you are immediately satisfied and feel that you got the good deal.
Think Bro-conomy, Think Big
So how does one crack the bro-conomy nut? When I was at an agency I noticed the guys who were making the deals getting all sorts of cool shit. Occasionally it would trickle down and I would get something like the aforementioned hoody or a circle-hoe. But for the most part it stopped right before the schwag hit the creatives. I think the most important part is exposure to clients. Before the end of this long winded, much adu about nothing post, I’ll talk about web design, a few tips to help one thrive in the bro-conomy, and a few of my own personal bro-conomy stories.
A Simple Guide to Building a Wordpress Theme
Wednesday, October 24th, 2007Downloading and tweaking one of the many themes of Wordpress is all fine and good. But what happens when you want to extend your blog/site past what someone else’s theme can give you? The truth is – this is a realm where most users are terrified to go. While I understand those fears, they aren’t totally warranted. Building a Wordpress theme can be quite easy, given the right process.
I’m freaking out man!
Building a Wordpress theme can be broken down into three steps; design, front-end development, and lastly the Wordpress implementation itself. I’m not quite sure how others do it, but the following guide is a detailed look into the process I have developed for building Wordpress themes.
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Avoiding the Designer’s Crisis
Sunday, October 14th, 2007It would be a marvelous world indeed, if every comp/design ever produced was received with adornment and praise. The truth is, as designers, when we submit any comp – we expect that. This type of speculation is perhaps a bit naive – but we wouldn’t put anything out we didn’t think was founded in solid design principles and decisions. Well, that’s not totally true, occasionally we do have to put out work we feel could be better, given the proper amount of time. But for the most part an ill-received comp is not unlike a cold cup of water to a sleeping face, shocking.
“We hate it”
If one could predict what projects are going to go awry and why – perhaps the “Designer’s Crisis” could be avoided. It seems there are a few situations I have found in my limited experience which have a higher risk than others. It’s tough to design for designers, work under tight deadlines, and to follow someone else’s brand guidelines while resisting the “Designer’s Touch”.
Eleven3 Version 3.0
Friday, September 21st, 2007We designer types are a finicky breed. Rarely is something just right and we don’t really like the words time and budget. Good work takes time, a lot of it. That being said, when I launched version 2.0 of eleven3.com I was really excited, I felt I had achieved good work. I’m not sure if it’s just me, or if other designers do this as well, but when I design something I like; I stare and stare and stare.
With any creative work, the longer you expose yourself to it, the more stale it becomes. That’s why, about three months ago, I got the itch to redesign my site.
So here we are, one year ago and change I launched version 2.0 of eleven3. Today I launch version 3.0 – and yes I am just as excited as my last redesign. There are a lot of reasons for my excitement, but mainly it’s just a new look, a new focus, and more flexibility. Gone is the rigid and closed-source Movable Type and arriving is the flexible, fluid, Wordpress.
Continue reading for the off chance of relating to the requirements of the relaunch, the design phase, the challenges of coding the front-end, and the use of Wordpress and a plethora of plugins that now make up the site. A lot of work went into it, my hopes are that it is well received. (more…)
An ODE to IE6
Monday, August 20th, 2007As I was writing up my typical IE conditional statement and creating my IE stylesheet, not necessarily for hacks, but for png fixes and such, I got all emotional and wrote a poem.
Feel free to include it in your IE Stylesheet:
/*
An ODE to IE6 – By A Webdesigner
—————————-
The road has been long,
full of anguish and pain.
How long will we endure,
the internet’s shame.
Once you were nice,
all light and fast.
Then came Firefox,
and lit up your ass.
Get a better browser,
the geeks have been saying.
The internet looks weird,
No PNGs displaying.
Conditional Statements,
feel like dirty code.
With anger and hope,
I write this ODE.
I create thee,
oh you dirty IE stylesheet,
With the hope of the future,
and pressing delete.
*/
Wired.com Redesign and Advertisement Annoyance
Tuesday, June 12th, 2007Wired.com relaunched a few months back and at first exposure, I have to admit I felt a little betrayed. I always liked their quick scan of content and I had been going to the site for so long that any type of change seemed like a bad idea (this same reaction was felt when nytimes.com relaunched, which now I am fond of. It’s not you, it’s me).
But here it is, the year two-thousand and seven, june, and I must say the new site has grown on me. Certain things still don’t feel quite right (list of articles is hard to scan, usability seems to point at ad clicking trickery), but overall the biggest thing that has swayed the new site to my favor is the way they are assigning a hierarchy to their top level stories. Check it out. It’s kind of nice going to a site and having it say to you, “this is what you should be reading.” Not in an annoying in your face star burst kind of way, but in a subtle “water flows downhill” kind of way.
Then I went there today…
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Who’s Portland CSS?
Friday, April 20th, 2007Me!
I had a colleague ask me about this site, asking if it was mine. While I do live in Portland, I do love CSS, I am shocked that Google would bestow this honor upon me. And as James Hall, a CSS guru from The Good Harvest, told me, blogging about the fact I am known for Portland and CSS will make my Google Search ranking even stronger for those terms!
So here I am. Feeling fancy! Indulge me in my narcissism and run a search for portland and css. Oh happy joy day.
Ok, back to the code.
——
Update: Ok, no longer number one, stupid Google! That lasted all of 20 minutes.
