The Latest design to come out my Quentin de Manson designs. Its a website for  Nickei Falconer who works as a counsellor in Christchurch, New Zealand. She calls her business Life Works

This site is the first in a package idea I am experimenting with at the moment. Its goal is to create the customer a website where they can change the content and have a professionally finished website for an affordable price. Great for start-ups and sole traders.

The concept was to use wordpress a free blog based CMS (Content Management System). Choose a free theme, ‘tweak’ it to suit the client then get it ready to go. Judging by how quickly it takes me to put a site together in this style, I thought, ‘piece of cake’. Mmmm… Not so much. To make yeah.. quick and easy. But you still have to manage the client. The time is spent is persuading the customer on why i recommend some things and not others, the time is in the dialogue to get the content just right, the time is in giving the client the preview of the website before the build and so on, do you get my drift?

So my high and lofty ideas to make affordable/cheap professional websites has hit a bump. Not a wall, but a bump. Perhaps some time needs to be spent in documentation, guiding the client through the process, without me having to explain the same stuff to different clients several times a week (weither they read this is a different matter entirely)? Maybe have an online project management and client management system like basecamp set-up. So all they have to do is login and see where I am up to, what they need to do and download documentation on whats happening. Mmm, well there are options, I will keep you informed on how the experiment continues. Does anyone you know need a website that my little “experimental package” may for fill? Let them know I exist, I might be able to help them.

Credits for elements that contributed towards the above website:
CMS: Wordpress
Theme Adjusted: Kirby – By Ian Stewart
Plugins Used: Dynamic Headers, Akismet , Google site maps

I went to the documentary Handmade Nation last night. Organised by Miss Millie and sponsored by Felt. Credits over heres what i thought…

SO lovely to see many wonderful women and a few brave men in the theatre. The theatre seemed quite full. Quite the success! I caught up with a few delightful ladies I have not seen in ages, which was awesome. The doco itself is very inspiring and left me feeling capable of anything! I also really liked and appreciated the honest portrayal of crafters. Some make things to sell because they like it, not because it makes them lots of money. Infact alot of them sounded like they held down familes, jobs and their crafting lives, including making enough to sell their work at craft fairs. Its funny I always got this idea we are all supposed to strive to craft and make money crafting full time. For some, they make a product that works and it becomes a sort of fad and takes over, all of a sudden they are making enough money to live off. But for others it doesn’t, no reflection on the quality or coolness of the product, almost luck. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is friends and creative outlets and sometimes funding your craft. One resounded clang I got was a guilt lifted, the guilt I felt for not making it ‘big’ in my hobbies or having my hobbies make me enough money to live off. So what right? I like my hobbies, just because i dont make money off them doesn’t mean I stop doing them. I get to share it with a few, my photos get used on walls and in designs, thats enough right?

OK so about the money thing. My actual JOB is web design. Life in freelance has been slooow. Since Christmas I have been only just making ends meet and thats thanks to the support of my amazing loyal customers and fabulous partner. Due to slowness I have been REALLY looking into what I am doing and how I can re-think it, re-market them and get this show on the road again. I have made no secret of it though, the talking it out really helps me get perspective and removes the stress of it all somewhat. I also have had many great ideas come my way thanks to my business-y techy friends, esp Ben from Diversity.

The changes are inspired by the new ways of communicating to customers via the internet, things I can do to really help business’s in their online marketing strategies. The need to start pushing my passion for usability and logical layout has also become apparent. I really don’t make a big enough deal of that side of my web design experience. I am still working on the best way to explain these new services and how best to reflect it on my online presence and then follow that up with real life stuff. So many ways to do this these days, its so easy to get bogged down by them all! Along with it, will be a new website design AGAIN. Yeah what can i say, its what i do… So watch out soon to be a new website, new marketing approach and new bunch of services. Any colour requests?

Found here via swissmiss

The creatives will love this, quite wise I think. Any excuse to investigate the theory and motivation behind design. Love to know what you think….

I also liked the point on hiring people who are better than you and leaving them to it. So many owners of business’s let their ego dictate their decisions. Seen many a business with amazing people and never really succeed because they wouldn’t give the right freedom to their staff.

Texture Plants

We all know I like my gardening right? I had the honor of redesigning one of my old sites I designed from scratch, around two years ago.

The Texture Plants site has been re-organised to allow people to browse by plant purpose aswell as alphabetically. Some helpful gardening know-how advise has been added, the gallery was tweaked to make browsing the images a little easier, Virtuemart was upgraded and the catalogue given a new layout to help the user gather more info without having to click all the way through to the product description. To add to all of that I gave their template a spruce up, they were after some bolder and darker colours to make the site easier to read and scan. They were happy to stay with their old joomla system, so all was familiar on that front. There was a final push to get it live ready for Christmas, which we achieved! Wooo hoo!

Working with the guys who own Texture always keeps me on my toes and reminds me there is more to gardening than growing vegetables. Now I am imagining my deck full of lovely interesting looking succulents with a nicely setup table and chairs to sit and drink tea in the sun on. Have a look around the Texture site for some inspiration and oodles of gardening advise. Even better, if you love visiting garden nurseries and are in town go and have a look around, its not your normal nursery, inspiration for the succulent lovers and more is abound…

This time last year I put together a website for a local charity auction a friend of mine was running, to raise money for the champion center in Christchurch. The Champion Center is a fantastic early intervention service for families with children who have developmental delays. I know people who use the Champion Center and they all rave about how supportive they are. Last years auction was such a success the ladies and gentleman are doing it again, I have just uploaded the latest images for auction in 2009. Take a look at the site, there are some divine images. If you’re in Christchurch and are in need of some images for your walls, or just feel like a fun night out, perhaps its time to get yourself a ticket? Not only do you get a beautiful image, framed and ready to go, but your money has gone to a fantastic cause.

www.cactusclimbing.co.nz

Phew! I was pretty stoked when I go this job, thanks to an old flatmate I got a meeting and then the redesign job for one of the coolest New Zealand outdoor equipment manufacturer labels. I’m not just saying that either. (I have a cactus backpack, 5 years on, it still looks like a good solid backpack and its been everywhere…used while studying, biking to work… everything, the reason i like, the zip is still working and the fabric isn’t fraying. Usually this happens to my bags within the year)

So I was designer and project manager for this baby. A few hair tearing moments, mostly when it came to things completely out of my control, programming, hosting and what not. But its done and I am really happy with it. Its a Joomla and Virtuemart website for those who would like to know.

We have been about a month in the thinking, planning, designing and making. This has been my occupation in my evenings and weekends. Inspired by Tim Burtons film “The Corpse Bride”. Mostly this design was an act of self indulgence…

What to expect from her in the next month or so:

• An “about me and contact” link at the top
• A shop! It will start on etsy then i will have my own. Mostly my photography, but i would like to sell website “stuff” eventually.
• A resources area for links to other sites divided up by categories ect.
• Wallpapers and free photo downloads
• A few more tweaks on the design.
• many more links, in “Link Love” she needs beefing up!

In the mean time let me know your thoughts. Not sure if I like the blue anymore. But I NEVER like my designs after i have finished them. So I tend to ignore myself.

Panic software have a sale on right now, I grabbed “Transmit” because quite simply its the best ftp app I have used thus far and software that saves you time and is easy to use is worth the money. I just thought I should say (and take screen shots), that I really like this layout. Easy, pretty and the language is chatty and nice… why not give them money?

For a website I am working on using Joomla and Virtuemart I needed Tabs in the product details area. Here is what i found and it worked with very little hassle. 

1. Install and activate these plugins:

Magic tabs

In magic tabs  plugin manager select the default mode to be “ID” and save.

Scriptgrator

Just activate

2. In your product description have you content divided like so:

{magictabs mode=manually}
TAB 01::Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetuer nec eu magna consequat volutpat. Ut porttitor purus hendrerit nibh id sit id ultrices eu netus. Et eros cursus Sed sit adipiscing Vivamus ut magna Nulla nibh.
||||
TAB 02::Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetuer nec eu magna consequat volutpat. Ut porttitor purus hendrerit nibh id sit id ultrices eu netus. Et eros cursus Sed sit adipiscing Vivamus ut magna Nulla nibh.
||||
TAB 03::Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetuer nec eu magna consequat volutpat. Ut porttitor purus hendrerit nibh id sit id ultrices eu netus. Et eros cursus Sed sit adipiscing Vivamus ut magna Nulla nibh.
{/magictabs}

tabs in joomla virtuemart

 
Viola! I will start blogging on my website adventures now and then I have decided. Really getting into the cool jobs now, so would like to share what i find for those that may find it useful.