digital arts news, resources and comment
Posts filed under ‘web design skills’
there are lots of these around but this is much the best I have seen – download it here and keep it handy CSS2-Visual-Cheat-Sheet.pdf
highly recommended – I got this from webdesign magazine disc but the original site is also excellent for current news about social media and web design generally
new movie in folder 179 on where to find the features present in coda in dreamweaver and vice versa
it’s about similarities as much as differences and should help you work in both
remember – I’m teaching you code not software!!!
source files and realtime demo of me creating ( with no planning mistakes and all ) the DAM front page
30 minutes and 105Mb but hopefully it will help
folder 173
we are now at the stage where we need to start looking at what you need to do to pass the website module
you need to demonstrate the following
1. A number of web pages (minimum 3) have been uploaded to a specified server.
The work must be uploaded to the net space we give you. Work on other servers or on CD-ROM, floppy disk etc. will not be accepted. We suggest a maximum of 8 pages, as otherwise tutors may find difficulty in locating all your material.
2. Each page is visible on the Internet using a standard browser.
The work must be easy to find from your home page and must be viewable in at least two browsers
3. The pages contain text, images and hyperlinks.
Not every page need contain all three. At least two images must display.
4. The pages are navigable from each other.
It must be possible to access all pages without using the ‘back’/'forward’ buttons on the browser (and get back to the front page).
5. Some working external links are included.
Links to pages not on your site. At least two are needed.
6. At least one page includes a table.
Tables can be for layout or data purposes.
7. A working style sheet has been used.
Style Sheet definitions must be in a separate attached file.
8. At least one page includes a numbered, bulleted or definition list.
Lists must be correctly coded and contain at least two items.
9. The site has sensible content.
The pages must have some meaning, and must not be crude, offensive or defamatory.
I then want to go over the lightwindow exercise I left for you last week – hopefully you got it working ok
otherwise for next week I need to seethe first page of your site coded and ready to duplicate to make the others
plenty to do…….LETS GO!!!!!
I’m sure you have all seen this sort of thing before – the original lightbox, greybox, shadowbox etc
this one is lightwindow and is my personal favourite
it is done with javascript so you need to include these via some code in the <head> of your page
this page and the javascript you need is in folder 172 – I would like you to have a look at the code and see if you can work out how to use it
I want to see how well you can deconstruct (hack) a page
the home of lightwindow is http://www.stickmanlabs.com/lightwindow/ but also have look at folder 88 – this uses the original lightbox though
make sure I can see what you have done next week
you now need to start assembling the content for your site – we will need this for next week and or before
make sure you have it with you in digital form
artists exhibiting can be very varied – from fine art to games to concept art etc
think about maps etc
look around and see what content is on other gallery sites
as you all went to frieze art – have a look at the sites of the galleries we saw there
the frieze art exhibitors list is here
now you know how the css layouts work in the background I’m finally prepared to show you how to cheat 
online there are lots of templates available for free – lots of these are cheesey and overly complex and tricky to understand the way they work but it’s really good to have a set of basic frameworks where a lot of the heavy lifting has already been done, and in a correct and valid way that you can trust
i grab them from all over and tend to go looking when I need them however it may be useful to you to have a one stop shop of recommended templates to start with
everytime I go looking I end up somewhere different so feel free to add any other sources blow as comments but todays recommended source is at codesucks
here there are 57 fixed width semantically correct layouts for you – somewhere in here I expect you will find a layout that can serve as the basis for what you need for the digital art museum website
we will go over this in the session today
REMEMBER – I AM ABLE TO ANSWER EMAIL QUESTIONS AND OR RECORD MOVIES IN RESPONSE TO QUESTIONS EASILY – EMAIL ME AND IF I CAN I WILL BE ABLE TO ANSWER WITHIN A DAY OR SO – DON’T SUFFER IN SILENCE!!!!
here’s the css for changing link styles – best thing to do is to install it in coda or whatever system you have for saving code snippets
we’ll cover this in the lesson
imagine you have been commissioned to produce a simple website for a small commercial gallery in kingston called dam – digital art museum
the central principle for the gallery is that it will display only work for which the digital element is significant
the gallery is a commercial organisation that needs to sell work to survive so prices are high
they sell prints of images, sculptural pieces and full installations
some of the work they exhibit is fine art some is very much commercial work, illustrations, stills and development work from games and movies etc
it is also acts as an agent for the artists/designers it represents, introducing and representing them with outside clients
it needs to strike a difficult balance between the commercial work that will pay the bills and the more interesting and niche interactive work that may be more difficult commercially
the address of the gallery is
55 richmond road
kingston upon thames
surrey
KT2 5BP
tel 0208 939 4609
make up an email address
you have been asked to look at producing a working prototype website and trusted as a professional to advise on what content is featured and how as long as it meets the commercial and artistic aims of the gallery
the only specification you MUST work within are that the site should be XHTML and CSS based, no Flash and must fully pass w3c validation
we’ll talk more about this in the session today – this is what I need you to look at during the reading week, the first week back we will have a crit about your concepts in my web session with you
you do not need to be doing ANY coding at this stage – just think about design and structure and content
find some examples – eg dam berlin
we looked at forms today in the lesson and I showed you two simple options
freedback.com – a hosted and very easy to use online form generator
and
forms to go – a shareware and more fully featured php based form generator available at bebosoft.com
both are excellent solutions but you will need to be able to strip the html produced apart in order to style it how you want
also look at folder 055 for a video tutorial – this uses freeway and then tacohtml but the process is the same
I’ve been doing some tutorial videos for the new foundation degree art and design course and they are equally relevant for you all I think if you are just getting started with wordpress
folder 156
panic are having a 3 day sale – 50% off
if you want to get coda and transmit for £30 and £9 respectively nows the time
given that googles’ product are perilously close to being ‘anti-design’ (though I still love ‘em) it’s interesting to read this from the google website – some important things to consider in there
