Simplicity is Key

The designs you make between becoming relatively familiar with Photoshop and learning to create a worthwhile design, are often the worst. Because as you start learning different techniques in Photoshop, you naturally want to exhibit them through your work. But more often than not it just adds to the clutter of web designs people start out with. Watching Jon Ive talk about Apple products helped me understand the importance of simplicity and how to avoid it. And I have definitely made this mistake on more than one occasion.

For example, gradients are nice when used properly, but subtlety is key.  Using gradients that have similar colors, and that are perhaps only a few shades apart adds depth, without it looking overworked and cheap.

Familiarity is also important. When making a search form, people usually use a magnifying glass icon, because that image association is embedded our brains. It’s the same with colour. Green is for positive actions, red for warnings or excitement. These little things make seem unimportant but they really can make the difference between an alright site and a great site.

Work on your brand first

Its important to make a strong first impression when trying to find potential clients. That’s why your personal place on the web should encompass all your skills, all your ideas of what web design should be, and perhaps where you think it’s going. Don’t follow trends, set them.

If you are not able to make yourself look hire-able, how can you expect to create a site for clients who want to be. Some essential things to include on a personal site might be :

• Portfolio – Make sure this is updated as often as possible
• Services – Outline your services clearly and make sure you can do them all
• Testimonials – Ask clients for their opinion – it gives your site a bit of personality
• Contact Info – Pretty self-explanatory

Some of these sound pretty obvious, but it is surprising how many people forget the important things, especially when they are focused on making something look good, but without thinking about the end user, your missing the point of having a site in the first place.

Stay Frequent & Social

Things like Twitter and Facebook are great because they’ve brought blogging to the average Joe. They’re simple, fun and you can gain alot from it with only a few minutes of use a day. I dont have time to blog daily (or weekly for that matter), so when I have an idea, thought, or something to share, I tweet, or Share on Facebook. And the more I am active on these, more people come to my site. My SEO is fine, but I get a lot of referrals directly from Twitter and Facebook primarily because of my frequent postings on these services

Designing frequently is also important. Web Design isn’t a static career. Trends come and go, practices and frameworks are introduced weekly. Keeping up to date can set you apart from everyone else. Break the mould, and try to create a design as different as you can from the last. If you don’t have any clients right now, create something anyway, and hone your skills.

It’s not about what you want or even what the client wants

Its about what their end-user needs. A lot of clients seem to think that a 2 hour tutorial on Powerpoint gives them a creative advantage over you, but the fact is, they hired you to solve something for their users, not them. Yes, clients know more about their business, but they hired you for your expertise and you have to find a way to let them remember that. It’s alright to say no to clients, as long as you have reason to. Whether its regarding payment or a design suggestion, if they are wrong, and you know it, be straight and tell them (nicely though).They’ll thank you for your honesty.

Just remember that with every design you make,  its an opportunity to better yourself. Try to create something different. Every time that you open Photoshop is a chance to improve, to do something entirely different, to experiment, because you’ll never learn otherwise. Stop when you have to, or if you think your ruining something, and do something else. Have fun with web design, it’s not meant to be serious but to grab attention and excite people.

This is my ultimate career, and I can believe I’m doing it right now. Of course I have off days, and get sick of it from time-to-time, but I play around with colours and images all day – whats not to love?

This is what else I’ve been reading this week.

• Subscribed to Popple3
  February 11, 2010
• New Beta of Google Chrome for Mac Now Available
  February 11, 2010
• Subscribed to ZacharyZips
  February 11, 2010
• NOTHING IS IRREVERSIBLE
  February 8, 2010
• Online Marketing for Beginners - Added Bytes
  February 11, 2010
• Gridmaker For Photoshop CS4 - Article - andrewingram
  February 9, 2010
• Designers *First* Designs…
  February 8, 2010
• 10 Things Clients Look For In a Design Portfolio
  February 6, 2010
• Subscribed to Hjerpseth
  February 5, 2010
• 11 Common Web Design Mistakes (Blunders) | Web 2.0
  February 5, 2010
• The Principle of Contrast in Web Design
  February 3, 2010
• Mosspuppet's Epic Steve Jobs Interview [Mosspuppet]
  February 2, 2010

Video

My favourite Super Bowl advert this year

• 10 ways to make Internet Explorer act like a modern browser
  February 1, 2010
• 20 Fonts Ideal for Big and Powerful Headings | Freebies
  February 1, 2010
• Admit It, Microsoft: You Suck at the Web – GigaOM
  January 31, 2010
• How to Design the Apple iPad in Photoshop | Circlebox Blog
  January 31, 2010

Videos

What an epic performance!

Since I’ve been designing, “Helvetica”, has probably been my favourite typeface. And I know I’m not alone with my opinion. “Helvetica” has been a staple in advertising, design, and street signage for the past 50 years. And after watching the documentary “Helvetica”, directed by Gary Hustwit, it has enlightened me on how significant this typeface actually is.

Created in 1957, by Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann, Helvetica was first called Neue Hass Grotesk. The idea behind the name came from the word “Helvetia”, which is Latin for Switzerland. But seeing as this typeface was intended to be sold in America, “Helvetica” was considered more marketable.

Helvetica is now one of the most widely used typefaces in the world, being used in some of the most popular logos and is also default on Apple computers. Its used on road signs, extensively in advertising campaigns, even on shop windows.

What makes it so special is its simplicity. does not scream for attention, and perhaps that is why its so popular. It doesn’t require effort to read it, nor is it expressive. Massimo Vignelli puts it well in “Helvetica”

You can say, “I love you,” in Helvetica. And you can say it with Helvetica Extra Light if you want to be really fancy. Or you can say it with the Extra Bold if it’s really intensive and passionate, you know, and it might work.

When designing this blog, I didnt have to juggle typefaces for hours to find the perfect one, because there is Helvetica (look at the headers). Therein lies the problem with it. Its so neutral that people are applying it to anything they do. It does seem like a never-ending trend. It was popular in the 60’s and is still as popular today. There are not many truly great typefaces, and so people turn to the one they know so well. Its saddening but true, some potentially great designs out there are out there in the sea of neutrality, simply because of the fact they use Helvetica.

But don’t let me discourage you from watching this truly excellent film.

IMDB Link http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0847817/

Trailer

Here’s what I’ve been reading recently

• The iPad Dilemma
  January 28, 2010
• 20 Easy-to-Learn jQuery Animation Tutorials
  January 26, 2010
• 20 Color Combination Tools for Designers
  January 23, 2010
• The Best Icon Sets for Minimal Style Web Design
  January 21, 2010
• Kids Spend Every Waking Minute in Front of a Screen [STUDY]
  January 20, 2010
• In Depth: 7 technologies to thank the 1970s for
  January 8, 2010
• At the top of the tallest building in the world
  January 7, 2010
• Cleaning Up Your Mac for the New Year
  January 7, 2010
• 11 Most Popular Blog Design Styles (With Examples)
  January 4, 2010
• Decade in Web Design
  January 4, 2010
• Nirvana + Lady GaGa = Epic Mashup [VIDEO]
  January 4, 2010
• 40+ Stunning and Inspiring Website and Blog Footers
  January 3, 2010
• The World Doesn’t Need Someone Telling Us What We Don’t Need In Tech
  January 3, 2010
• Adding Depth with Pixel Perfect Line Work
  December 30, 2009
• Great Examples Of Coming Soon Pages And How To Create Yours
  December 29, 2009
• Impossibly simple image randomizer with jQuery
  December 28, 2009
• The 50 Best Photoshop Tutorials of 2009
  December 26, 2009
• Muse - MK Ultra (Live From Turin) 2009
  December 24, 2009

The blog template now looks more like a blog, rather than a gimmicky excuse for one. One of the most important things about any website is the fact that “Content is key”, and I think I forgot that last time. I have what I need on the side of every post, and nothing more. I always say I’m going to post weekly, but now that it looks pretty, I think I can manage at least one post a week.

Still no HTML5, still set in my ways of XHTML Transitional. Lots of CSS3 though, and @font-face is being used extensively. The theme for this theme is “BIG!”. Big heading text on the homepage, big footer and the font is easily readable. There is no more useless jQuery that slows down the site, and while IE6 isn’t fully supported yet, I’m here all week.

I think this is a very much needed update to the site. If I’m going to attract clients, I might as well showcase the best I’ve made in a while. But of course, no design is perfect, so if anyone has any changes/features they’d like to see here, please leave a comment!

Oh and by the way, if you have a design blog/site and you want to have a link in the sidebar, please don’t hesitate to contact me!

As I start writing this, its 3am and in the 9 hours since Apple introduced the iPad, and I’ve been trying to figure out why I feel let down. Everything about the event was perfect. Steve Jobs, as usual, put on an excellent show. He could sell you a used mattress and you’d be leaving happy. The device however was an utter disappointment, and the reason Apple gave for selling it is even worse.

They say they are trying to bridge the gap between the smartphone and the portable computer, that it has to excel in key things like: Browsing, Email, Movies, Music,  eBooks. But Apple has forgotten that they have already made products that to these things, and they do them well.

When buying my iPhone, I justified the purchase by saying to myself that it would mean one less device. Instead of having a phone and a MP3 player, I could just have a phone that can play music, movies, browse the web, read PDFs & emails. Sound familiar?

Apple is now trying to make us believe our experience would be best serve if they crammed the best from the iPhone & Mac into tablet form, hence a “One-for-all” device. That sounds acceptable in theory, but it just doesn’t work that way. The PC is already the best way to browse the web and compose documents. The iPhone already has the best solution for checking emails on the couch. And the TV, which has been at the pinnacle of must-have devices for the past 60 years, is still the best way to watch movies.

So when Apple say they’re trying to bridge the gap, the real reasoning behind it is for more exposure to their online stores. The iPad has the iBookstore (bit of convoluted name, no?), App Store, and the iTunes Store, built right into the device. So the $499 price point is pittance compared to how much they will earn through their online repositories, from the stats given at the start of the Press Event anyway.

In the months following up to the iPad’s announcement, we have let ourselves fall victim the rumors and hype surrounding the device. It was going to have cameras, flash,  20 hours battery life and it would run OS X. Sadly, none of these were true, yet 24 hours prior to writing this, it seemed entirely plausible. Usually when Apple announces a new product, there are always more than a few rumors.

But when those rumors didnt turn into a reality, before we accepted it because Apple countered with an outstanding device. This time however, there was no outstanding device, and there was mixed emotions following the iPad announcement.

Expecting all things “magical” when it started, I felt like that was an hour of my life gone once it finished. I’m really not surprised that others felt the same way. Gizmodo’s “8 Things that Suck About the iPad” lists its failures succinctly, while theNextWeb describes how Apple “missed the mark”.

I’m not saying that I cant see any usefulness in the device, but that there are not enough reasons to warrant a purchase. For example it would be nice to not have to bring books with me to college, and have them stored on that device, but I can already store them on my Mac, and its not that much heavier than the iPad.

But why would I need to see my emails on my couch when I have an iPhone? Why do I need to browse the web on a device that can’t do everything that the web has to offer. There is no doubt that the iPad will be snapped up by millions and indeed it’s price is very appealing.

Perhaps after 30 days and your iPad is gathering dust on the coffee table, it may still have power, but it wont do anything you cant do already.

As I crawl through hundreds of unread feed items each day, a certain Apple handheld device is sure to be mentioned a few dozen times. As it stands, the iPhone is the most popular phone probably ever, and since 2007 has been revolutionizing the mobile industry. It has forced competitors to innovate, yet as of yet no other device has been able to stand up to the might of the iPhone.

Apple are in a great position right now. Sales have never been higher, even more incredible is the fact that this is during economic turmoil. The iPhone native App store now has over 100,000 applications, compared to a measly 1,000 apps the Palm App store has only just reached.

The device itself is simple enough to use, yet powerful enough to create amazing software (as long as it doesn’t interfere with the device’s core functionality), elegant and possibly gives the best user experience from any device I’ve ever used. Having said that there are always problems with any device, and the Jesus Phone isnt any different.

So as a new year begins and the flurry of blog posts about the all-but-confirmed next iteration of the iPhone are published, I just want to outline a few things I think are essential for the iPhone to get that bit closer to perfection.

Camera Improvments

The 3gs camera spec bump was both well received and long overdue. But 3mp is not an option for any self respecting phone these days. In 2007, the Nokia released the N95 with a 5MP Carl-Zeiss optics, where as the iPhone 2g (first generation) came with a measly 2mp, without video recording, 4 months later.

Not only that, but Nokia allowed basic editing, options to send photos via bluetooth, and had a flash! Things Apple still are too stubborn to include.

My recommendation? Apple should aartner with a camera manufacturer that knows their stuff, develop a camera to blow others away. Perhaps include 720p (or even 1080p) recording.Also what would be nice if they could create an iPhoto app as standard for basic editing. Mmmmm….

Wireless Everything

I admire a few things about the Palm Pre, most of all, the wireless charging. I’d love if Apple went one step further and introduced that, and wireless syncing. Imagine, no more rooting around your bag for a cable and then spending ten minutes trying to untangle the bloody thing. Steve Jobs famously dislikes buttons, but surely wires annoy him more.

Bluetooth is another thing Apple can do much better with. Sending files through bluetooth has been standard since the beginning of the noughties and yet Apple tend to turn their gaze at the simplest of things.

iFixit has proven that there is an FM Transmitter in the iPhone, but Apple hasnt enabled the feature yet. Seems utterly pointless but hopefully this will change soon.

Innovate & Ask for help

The last few iterations of the iPhone have all been a bit similar, more polished rather than ground breaking. We know, through the wonders of the underground iPhone Dev community, that the iPhone can do so much more than what Apple advertises. If someone can make a better iPod Music application than the one thats already there, Apple should let them.

And Apple, please dont charge developers for the privilege of making you money, because thats just greedy. Let Windows users in, let beginner programmers mess around with the SDK because chances are, they’re going to be the ones making you the most.

iTunester

So Fresh!

Now I’m not talking about turning iTunes into a fully-fledged social network, but be a bit more open to other social properties. iTunes 3 was advertised to have tools for the “avid social-networker” but a few links to Facebook and Twitter dont really count these days?

Stuff like Last.fm integration would be nice. Perhaps the ability to tweet what your listening to (that could get a bit out of hand, way too fast). Even just having a bigger presence on social networks would be good. The “12 days of Christmas” application was a decent idea, but if they to really entice people, they should have given away stuff that doesn’t sit in the bargain bin.

Battery Improvements

Every iPhone user has at least one problem, and its this problem. The battery is just too small. I would happily sacrifice size for the abillity to use the phone for a day without charging. What would be ideal is if Apple sold additional batteries so we could exchange between them if one runs out. Perhaps one day we will be able to. Sigh.

Home Screen 2.0

Perhaps one the most aggrivating things about the iPhone is the home screen. On Nokia phones, you can see recent calls, emails, and messages, along with weather information. In the iPhone its just a photo (we have choice in what photo it is :O, kudos Apple), and the date and time. Compared with what the phone is capable of, this is a bit puny. What I really want  is something like this :

Drool

‘Nuff said.

Conclusion

Apple really has created a thing of beauty. But some of the exclusions are just idiotic. People are used to having to not charge a phone for days, having important information on the home screen, and just simple things. Apple may be ahead for the forseeable future, but not without innovation. I hope they deliver something outstanding come June, because were waiting, impatiently.

After 7 months off the air, Chuck returns. Very surprising, considering that it was supposedly on the NBC axe list in May. It wasnt getting enough viewers, which would be usually a very good argument for any show to meet its end. However, the show has attained somewhat of a cult following, and when the dedicated viewers were informed of its demise, they planned several online and offline movements to keep their favourite show on the air.

Chuck, when you hear of it first, sounds quite odd and you may wonder why it was aired at all. What? An electrontic store worker (akin to the likes of Best Buy, PCWorld in the UK) has government secrets stored in his brain, and now has to become a spy? That sounds like a rediculous tv show. And you’d be right. It is. But how many serialized shows are purely for fun, that let you relax and just gives you pure enjoyment? Not a lot, and even fewer reach out to the geek world.

Perhaps a show to compare Chuck to is Jake 2.0, which I must admit, I watched, but that was beyond rediculous. It didnt give any character progression, no polt lines worth following and its abrubt end (after just 13 or so episodes) was justified. Not to mention it was just stupid.

What makes Chuck stand out is it likable characters, its clever mix between a comedy, a romantic drama, and an espoinage show. All of those account to why it needed, and indeed was given, more airtime.

This worked through the use of online mediums such as Twitter and Facebook, but also with the help of Subway, one of Chuck’s biggest sponsors. People used hashtags #savechuck, people bought subs the date of the season finale, and lots of online petitions. Eventually NBC ordered 13 episodes, and then an additional 6 which ere to be aired in March. But the fat cats at NBC must have liked what they saw because its returning at the start of January, which a 3 hour special, spread over 2 days.

To say I’m happy is an severe understatement. Chuck was one of the most enjoyable pieces of television in 2008 and with shows like Heroes and 24 going downhill, I think this deserves to be their successor.

Watch one of the trailers below and comment if you’re a fan (or even if you’re not)

Google Chrome is on the verge of being my default browser on any machine that I use. True its missing features, and true it still doesn’t have as many extensions, but it’s faster than Firefox, cleaner than Firefox and simpler than Firefox. You can even sync your bookmarks natively without installing a 3rd party extension, something the Mozilla crowd is working on, but have failed to deliver as of yet.

I’ve been use Chromium (the open source web browser Google Chrome is based on) for about 48 hours now, because the Mac beta doesn’t support extensions. Its the exact same browser but a less cautious one because enables extensions, themes and previously locked settings. Therefore its more similar to the final version of Chrome due to be released in early next year.

The reason why I, and I’m guessing many others are prepping themselves for the switch to Chrome is the reason why I think Google made the browser, because they know the web. They know how a browser should be. Its non-intrusive, tabbing is excellent, and the integrated search bar makes the browser look a lot cleaner.

Firefox users have somewhat of a love/hate relationship with the extensions that can be installed in Firefox. They admire the extensibility, yet hate the bloating that they give to an already slow browser, compared to Google Chrome at least. If Google Chrome is to challenge Firefox in that area, it has to first build a reputable collection of extensions, similar to Firefox, without slowing the browser down. Extensions are now available and Google have done something quite smart with them. They are easily made by anyone with basic web knowledge, and most importantly, each extension has its own process. This means that if a extension goes rogue and starts eating up all your memory, you can simple stop it and your browser wont be affected.

Not surprisingly, the quality of the extension are high. Feedly, xMarks and StumbleUpon all have extensions released. There are some very smart ones released from Google themselves too, such as a Google Mail Notifier which has mail updates on the icon itself. There may not be as many extensions but it’s a start.

Perhaps Chrome isn’t in the same position as Firefox, but it does have the biggest web company behind it and things are looking promising. About 15 months have passed since the first public beta for Chrome arrived and it really has come on leaps and bounds. Google has created something brilliant, now we just have to wait for it to come out of beta.