Web Design Portfolio
Aside from the site you're on, look at some of the other sites I've made:
Twisted Tours
http://www.twistedtourscalifornia.com
Greg Ziemer has started a business giving motorcycle tours around northern California. He is particularly well suited to it because he has gone on so many rides around the area (and the country, for that matter). I was very excited to work with Greg on this project because he bring so much passion to what he does.
The Twisted Tours website needed to bring the excitement of riding to people who are interested in a tour. I recommended that Greg get a helmet cam so that people can see what it is like to ride on the incredible roads that we have on the Mendocino Coast. Greg came through and has been posting a great selection of videos on YouTube and then to the blog on the Twisted Tours site. The blog was made using WordPress and it turned out to be a great way for him to interact with a wide audience.
As usual, templating WordPress was quite easy. It took rather little time to integrate WordPress into the theme of the site and it all worked out seamlessly. Greg has WordPress's notoriously user friendly interface to work with and the user has no sense of a difference in what's driving the site - as it should be.
This project also gave me the opportunity to work with another local designer, Dave Mathews of KopiaWeb. Dave designed the logo with Greg and the tail down in the footer. I thought their design was a great addition to the feel and the fun of the project and Greg's goal.
Ken Van Der Wende Photography
http://www.kenvanderwendephotography.com
Ken Van Der Wende is a great local photographer who contacted me when he was ready to begin marketing his prints and services to a wider audience.
Ken's work really speaks for itself, so my goal in making his site was to create a site that gets out of the way of the photography; the photography had to be the main focus.
I created a simple content management system (not Joomla in this case) so that Ken could upload his own photos and make comments and add information about them. Ken uploads one large copy of each of his photos and then the photo is dynamically resized, cropped, has a watermark added, and displayed each time it is requested. This works much better than manually adding a watermark to each image and creating it in multiple sizes as one might traditionally do. In this case it means a large time savings for Ken. He also doesn't have to wait for me to update his site.
This site is also a great use of the jQuery JavaScript library and an extension library called "fancybox" that creates the pop up/slider for each of his photos. The site functions equally well with JavaScript turned off, though it is not as convenient.
CodingAID
http://www.coding-aid.com.com
CodingAID is a division of Managed Resources Inc. They came to me creating this new division with a completely seperate identity. They had a clear idea of how their site should look and I made a stylish, modern, functional site.
Things to look for in the site include:
- Forms - They need interaction from their visitors. I used ChronoForms, a great Joomla extension, to create multiple forms that validate and allow call requests, email list additions, attachment of résumés and so forth.
- Webinars - Upon receiving login information, users can view their Webinar library.
- Information Ticker - I found a great little Javascript text "ticker" for the left column of the front page to show information about upcoming events.
Contact me to find out more about how this site was created, how forms make the internet go 'round, and how I can easily build forms for your site that will get the results you want.
Caspar Beach RV Park and Campground
Caspar Beach RV Park and Campground came to me to update their site and we decided on a full site redesign that integrates Joomla, a webcam, and a link to their online reservation system. The result was a modern, usable, informative site.
Because this was a redesigned site I was able to take many of the photos that were on the previous site and adjust them to make them more presentable and make them fit in to the new design. Also, the content was already available, which sped up the process.
I was also able to design the site on a live server even though it was a redesign by creating an unpublicized Joomla installation on my domain. This way I could get feedback from them during development without downtime for their site's visitors.
Mendocino Sports Club
The sports club's site is very simple in appearance, but serves it's purpose well. There are two blogs which are updated by the owner and one of the fitness instructors whenever they like. There are dynamic polls in different sections of the site which provide for user engagement as well as interesting, though not scientific, feedback.
Traffic is mostly members, locals, and people from out of the area looking for fitness facilities to use during their stay (Mendocino attracts a lot of tourists). You'll notice it is similar to this site with a different color scheme. I'm looking forward to spicing this site up with photos and more staff bios as they arrive...
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