Design Ex. 12 - Cameron Moll

We've been given the task in today’s lecture/seminar with Shaun to analyse a web 2.0 website. I got given a guy called Cameron Moll and it turned out to be his portfolio.
All websites used can be found linked at the bottom.

Moll is a graphic turned web designer; he also is an author and speaker.

When it comes to web designing, Moll likes to stick to a particular style and keeps most of his sites relatively similar with the navigation running long the top, information centred to the screen and the use of a subtle over all background colour and then a darker shade of the same colour in the body of his site. These all work very well.

However, occasionally he does tend to make something a little different. Take the Css Mastery Case Study site; even though it’s a fictitious site, it goes against everything he normally does. For example, the navigation is in the form of a contents page in a book, and main body of text is split into two neat columns.

Getting back to his portfolio site. I like the use of colours and textures. These are subtle changes which are most effective. On top of that, the images which he uses to show his work are good because the bold colours contrast well with the red background. What I find a bit strange is the fact that there is no navigation, rather links to other sites like his blog, or a google search. I also like how everything is laid out in the same way. For example, the relative texts ate all inline with one another, this makes it look very neat.

Looking at his sites, they all seem relatively the same, apart from the one I have mentioned. When I develop my discipline, I would like to develop a style but I would like to more make things that are different from one another so I don’t get stuck in a rut making the same style of website over and over again. Variation is key.

The things I would take from his work and use myself are the use of colours and the subtle changes he makes to them. A good example of this is the March of Dimes website (see below). Cameron uses a pale shade of purple as the overall background colour and then uses a darker shade for logo and navigation.

Another thing I would use is his use of textures. They tie in with the theme of the website very well and again are sometimes only subtle.

Overall I think he is very talented but I would like his online portfolio to maybe have more pages.

Websites used:
http://cameronmoll.com/portfolio/
http://tuscany.cssmastery.com/#
http://marchofdimes.com/

Other examples of work:
http://cameronmoll.com/projects/lds/home1b.html
http://www.hiram.edu/index.html
http://www.english360.com/
http://www.cameronmoll.com/projects/bmb/
http://www.joyent.com/
http://www.vivabit.com/

kuler (adobe)

After just watching a fairly boring video on Flash publishing (http://tv.adobe.com/watch/flash-in-a-flash/episode-6/), I found this. Well... the guy int he video showed it me.

Its Adobe's version on the colour wheel. It lets you search its database for colour schemes to do with anything. I typed in 'ice cream' and it gave me colours associated with ice cream. I then typed in 'Ben and Jerry's' and it gaveme colours associated with that! Amazing. You can also create your own.

Check it out.

kuler (click the word) or the link is here http://kuler.adobe.com/#

New Year, New Project.

Uni started again last week and we were set a project straight away (sad face). the brief was to find a retail outlet (this can be anything from a bar to a little shop to a hair dressers), and make a website for your chosen business in two weeks. Apparently, its do-able. We'll see though.

Anyway, I chose the beauty salon Euphoria in Beeston, where I live. It just happens to be owned by my Mum. I chose this mainly because the website that euphoria (its supposed to have a small "e") has at the moment is rubbish. It would also be easy for my to go in and take photos and information.

So I have made 3 design ideas and Im still waiting for a forth to come. But heres the first 3. Let me know what you think and whats good/bad about them. Preferably tell me which one you think I should use.

Thanks :)

Designers

Wikipedia (yes I know its wrong to use... but its just too good) defines a designer as "a person who designs or creates something." That's kind of a given really. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Designer accessed on 14/1/10).

Anyway, we were given the task of finding three Non web designers and we have to write about them as a designer, why we like them/their work and how their work can relate to my web design work. The three designers I have chosen are sort of the same - not very diverse... But the brief didn't specify how diverse they had to be.

Designer 1: Clothes Designer: Paul Smith

I have chosen to do Paul Smith as one of my designers simply because I love his work. I admit to owning a number of his clothes and accessories.

He's been designing for 40 years and started out in Nottingham (where I live) with a tiny shop on Byard Lane in 1070. Now he has shops in places all over the world like New York, London, Tokyo, Dubai and Los Angeles to name a few.

The main reason why I like his work so much is, that he's not afraid to break the barriers. For example, when some of the high street clothes shops made t-shirts with shirt designs printed on them (so it was a t-shirt that looked like a shirt), Paul Smith went one step further with one of his women's collections by printing pictures of cardigans and scarves on to tshirts so make it look like you were wearing just that. See the photo below if you didn't understand a word of that. That's what I hope to do with web design when I'm good enough at it. Then, hopefully, I can get my work out their and do stuff other people haven't. Another reason why I like him is that he uses lots of colours that go together really well (which kind of helps when your designing clothes). This is a good skill for web designers to have to help make your websites eye catching. A good example of how Paul Smith does this is with his Signature Stripes. (see picture below).





Designer 2: Interior Designer: Adrienne Chinn

My second designer is an interior designer. Mainly because I think rooms are like websites, everything has its own special place. The designer I have chosen is Adrienne Chinn.

Chinn owns her own interior designers, Adrienne Chinn Design Company Limited and had an "intention of bringing high quality original interior design to the residential and commercial marketplaces." (http://www.adriennechinn.co.uk/the.htm accessed 14/1/10)The business has been going since 1999.

I love Adriennes work because she can make a room into any style the client wants. This is a good skill to have for a web designer. To be diverse can mean getting a really good job rather than just an OK one. She also know what things work well together.

Whilst designing websites at the moment, I like to go for the simple effect, mainly because that's all I know how to do at the moment.Chinn also goes for this approach regularly, but knows how to make the "simple" look good. I hope I do this too.
See the example below of a kitchen she designed. Simple, yet elegant.


Designer 3: Graphic Designer: David Carson

For my final designer I chose David Carson, a graphic designer, supposedly one of the worlds most influential graphic designers. He worked for a LOT of big name/brand companies during his long career (1983-present) including Microsoft, Nike, MGM Studios, Quiksilver and American Airlines. (Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Carson_%28graphic_designer%29 for a list of nearly all of them).

When looking at his work I found his bold use of colour amazing. (See my example below). As for the same reason as Paul Smith - what he does works.

The main thing I like about him is his extensive use of typography and the way he experimented with it. No graphic designer would have the its to do what Carson did if Carson hadnt done it firs, its too much of a 'risky' move.

A final thing that I would use from Carsons work is the ability to do what you want without any boundaries. Sure, if you have a client, then you have to do what they want. But if your designing something then go all out.


I realise I have gone faaaar over the word limit. But ohwell! I stick to them normally :).

Software Development Models: Waterfall and Whirlpool

The Waterfall Model is given its name by the way the phases run downwards (like a waterfall). It comprises of five phases and the next phase cannot be started until the last one is totally finished. This means that if a problem arises later on in production from an earlier phase, it cannot be corrected without it affecting the rest of the production. The first phase of this model is Requirements. This is like the brief at the beginning of the project, it tells the designer what to do. Phase two is Design. The third phase is Implementation. This is basically the phase of construction or coding. Phase four is Verification – testing to make sure it works. The final phase is Maintenance which is simply the upkeep of the software. See the image of this model below.



The Whirlpool Model combines the Waterfall Model with the Prototyping Model. However, this model only has four phases. During the first phase, system requirements are given and risk assessments are carried out. The second phase is probably the most import is this model. Here, all possible alternative strategies are analyzed. If the risk assessment from the phase before flag up any uncertainties then this phase is used for preliminary prototyping with the data already collected to find out a possible solution to the problem. The third phase a prototype of the software which has some of the characteristics of the final design, like a scaled down model. The final phase is a second prototype being made by analysing the first one in terms of strengths and weaknesses. The second prototype is then tested, and the final phase is repeated. The best thing about this model is that it allows the designer to deal with more than one phase at once unlike the Waterfall Model. At the end of each phase, a review is completed. See the image of this model below.



The Use of the Whirlpool Model in Web Design
The Whirlpool Model is a far better model to use than the Waterfall Model when making website for a number of reasons. The first one being, that the internet is changing all the time by means of new coding and applications. So by using this method, the developer can keep going back to the website and changing it to keep it up to date.

Another reason is that each phase doesn’t have to be completed before moving onto the next one. This would be fairly hard to do as the developer is constantly changing the code when making the website when something goes wrong.

A third reason of choosing the Whirlpool Method over the Waterfall would be that in this method, testing is done constantly, and this is needed for web design.

First design I idea - First attempt

Since Ive been designing a website for my swimming club, I thought I best actually start desigining. So I did. Heres my first design. I like it. Although, compared to others in my group its pretty rubbish. You have to remember Ive never done anything like this before though...

So here it is. Ill design probably 2/3/4 more. But I like this. Even though I know you arent just supposed to go with your first idea. I think it works nicely, is relevent and to the point clearly.

Since its just the first attempt, and just the home page, theres a few 'tweeks' that need to be made (Thanks to Sam Marsh for pointing those out!). Theyl be done very shortly, with more designs.

But if anyone actually reads this... please let me know what you think!

Colour Scheme Designer

After Tuesday's tutorial with Simon (which was very useful I might add) I came away with this. Its another colour wheel, but it doesnt only show you the colour and give you the code for it, it shows colours which contrast well to this colour. Its amAZing. Thanks Daryl K! Heres a little screen shot and the URL for those of you who want to pay it forward.

Colour Scheme Designer