Lisa Loeb: aka The value of all night working sessions…

01-18-2008

If anyone ever tells you that you can’t get a full multimedia-based website up in a week, they’re lying. It doesn’t, however, necessarily mean that you SHOULD, and if it happens often enough, you will die of exhaustion, your family will leave you, and you will lead a hopeless shell of an existence.

I can now unveil the new Lisa Loeb site, which is still very much imperfect (we are still adding archived content, as well as more music, videos and the store), but I am nonetheless proud of. The domains are propagating as we speak, just as Lisa prepares for her appearance on my not-so-secret-crush’s show, Late Night with Conan O’Brien.

I wanted to get the site up and live to take advantage of the inevitable traffic spike after a TV Appearance, plus we have a new CD coming out next week as well… so, I am excited, I am delirious with exhaustion, and I am so out of whack with my work/life balance right now it is insane.

But, it’s worth it.

And, if anyone else asks me to deliver a WHOLE JOOMLA SITE delivered in a week or 2, please, in the nicest possible way, take that cactus over there and please shove it up your rear. Twice. :)

picture-37a.png

Go check out www.lisaloeb.com when the domain is working, and buy The Purple Tape on CD. And, if you don’t click on the visuals link and look at the videos and appreciate my work, I will personally come and kill you and your children and your children’s children, because that was a pain in the arse.
:)

4 Projects: Annaliese Frank, Unbride, Wedding Workshop & WACOSS

12-31-2007

I have been so busy with my end of year work catchups… like with getting our new! site! ready! finally!… that I haven’t been able to post many projects. The new look facilitates it a bit better and there will be a few more in the New Year.

Annaliese Frank

Annaliese Frank Wedding Photography

Annaliese wanted something simple and feminine. You can check it out by visiting http://www.annaliesefrank.com

The Unbride

Justine Ungaro - The Unbride

Justine Ungaro asked me to design a custom Wordpress theme for her bridal blog, The Unbride. Justine is cute, rock n roll, and loves the black ornate flower thing, so the end result was something a little fun and crazy. Justine hasn’t posted on it yet (c’mon girl!), but you can check out the design anyway :)

The Wedding Workshop

bride.png

Cathrin D’Entremont hired us to produce an illustration of a bride to be used as her main “mascot” for her workshops. She wanted something cheeky, feminine and modern. If you know anyone that is looking to plan a wedding, I suggest they check out The Wedding Workshop, which gives loads of great advice about how to plan a wedding. It only costs $20 to get some great advice… check it out here: http://www.theweddingworkshop.com.au

WACOSS

WACOSS - Western Australian Council of Social Services

After designing the website for their 2008 Conference, WACOSS (Western Australian Council of Social Services) asked me to redesign their main page, which was looking outdated. The CMS that backs it is having some issues so I haven’t yet been able to fully edit the content, but the design is live and the result is great, considering that maroon and khaki were the colours to work with.

I really love CMS work, it is so rewarding and I am proud to help an organisation like WACOSS, because 3 years ago I would’ve been falling over myself to work with them in Policy. Oh how things change!

So, thats it for now… I have a post coming about our funny and dramatic Christmas, so its not all work :)

Open letter to developers: The IE6 Death Blow

11-24-2007

James Thomas outlines a plan for killing off support of IE6.

My friend Andrew and I were talking about this issue just last night, so I was amused to find this article sitting in my feeds this morning.

IE6 has become the bane of my existence – and I have been wondering if IE6 support is something that we should be aiming for in the medium term – after all, IE7 is a free upgrade, Firefox is a wonderful free alternative, and, well, IE6 sucks donkey’s balls.

The only logical reason I can think of for not having IE7 or Firefox (Or Safari on OSX, which is what I use) is because you are stuck with IE6 on a work computer and your IT Department hasn’t, um, deployed that FREE upgrade yet… and part of me thinks that it is the role of developers to push for change. As long as we keep supporting outdated, time consuming software (even when our audiences are predominantly broadband-enabled, modern browser using folks like mine!), people will see no incentive at all to change. It’s a cycle that we need to break, in many respects.

So I am certainly in 2 minds, and often write 2 different stylesheets – one with pretty transparent PNGs and lovely styling, the other with GIFs. Bleh.

Anyway, this is an interesting article and I think I may just start doing this — assuming that clients don’t protest of course :)

read more | digg story

EDIT: I have actually been giving this some more thought. I think that we should start an initiative, a promotion, a campaign, whatever, to have an International “Upgrade Your Browser” Day. It can be a yearly event, much like the successful Blog Action Day that recently occured, but with developers and other web professionals campaigning for people to upgrade their browsers.

Thoughts? Anyone in?

EDIT 2: I have now gone ahead and registered “browserupdateday.com” (BUD), which will have 2 main ideas: helping people to upgrade their browsers themselves and encouraging people to upgrade the browsers of their less-tech-savvy friends, family and… errr… being a “bud” to both them and the industry.

Thoughts??

Some of my new creations!

07-30-2007

Since the launch of Justine’s site, I have been working nonstop! If I have been an antisocial beyotch, well, it’s probably because I have literally had to turn off Skype and IM to be able to sit down and concentrate for a block of time. I am really very pleased with the progress I am making since relaunching this site (I will be doing another design as soon as I find the time — my portfolio page is horrible and I need to get on that!).

Right now, I cannot think of anything I would rather be doing than working with my clients, making web pages, and just generally having a ball of a time.

Anyway, I can give you all a few sneak peaks at what I am currently working on:

1. Glo3.com.au

This is a really nifty Australian invention that utilises ozone to completely sterilise and clean boots. Obviously we wouldn’t be keeping it in our wardrobes because it is an industrial thing, but it can be used to dry ski boots, mining boots, and all sorts really. This site is powered by CMS Made Simple and I also illustrated the model on the front page, based on the client’s CAD drawings. Pretty nifty, huh?

Anyway, you can have a look by clicking on the image:

glo3.png

2. Anna Rose Photography

This is currently a work in progress, and one of the many photographers that contacted me after the launch of justineungaro.com . What’s great is that Jen is actually Perth-based and is sweet as pie… so its great! Anyway, because of issues with iiNet there is only a splash page up at the moment, but I think it gives you at least a sneak peek at the direction of the site:

annarose.png

3. Trista Lerit Photography

Another project that I am very excited about! Trista loves florals almost as much as I do, so she’s let me design something purdy and ornate. It is still only at the mock stage, but I thought I’d show you a sneak peek anyway:

trista.png

I am also doing a few other projects like a CD cover, but I can’t show those yet.

Oh, and I have been asked by the ABC to be profiled as someone with a “cool job”. Will tell you more when I know more!

CMS Made Simple: Where have you been all my life?

07-06-2007

I just want to get all geeky for a little bit and gush about a new Open Source CMS I have discovered, called CMS Made Simple.  I have been a big fan of Open Source software for years – I use Wordpress here, and have utilised many diferent solutions for different projects.

The two main Open Source CMSes - Joomla and Drupal – while both very powerful – are more often than not overkill for most basic sites that I produce. If you want a full blown CMS with loads of features, both of these will do really well. But I also find them immensely frustrating for many simple tasks. Most of my clients simply want to update pages, perhaps an image or 2 and a file or 2, and maybe want to blog. I was struggling to find a good solution, without hand coding my own or forking out tens of thousands of dollars.

Then, I discovered CMS Made Simple. No bloat, no hassle. As a designer it is flexible enough to make the sites look great, but also powerful enough to be infinitely expandable. And, to top it off, it is a beautiful example of keeping style separate from the content, meaning that it is really accessible to boot.

The best feature that I have found with the CMS is the ability to browse for add-ons (modules) from within the admin panel. One of the most annoying things about the bigger CMSes is finding the time to test and search for new add-ons, and I love love love that I can just click to install it, try it out, and remove it just as easily. Absolutely Fantastic stuff.

Because I am often a one-person development team, I get really excited when I find things that can save me time, and ultimately, save my clients money, and I think that CMS Made Simple is a project that I will throw my weight behind.

I have a few more that I want to test before I commit, but this one is very much a contender!

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