Moving this Blog...

FYI - I've installed WordPress and I am moving my blog there. Since I've upgraded to the newest version of Blogger, and I'd stand a better chance decoding the human genome which is composed of 24 distinct chromosomes (22 autosomal + X chromosome + Y chromosome with a total of approximately 3 billion DNA base pairs containing an estimated 20,000-25,000 of course. SO.... in other words, join me on my new blog LOCATED HERE! If you've commented here, and would like to re-comment there - please by all means do so. Thanx!

-max

Rippin' DVD's Baby! Mac the Ripper

Ahhh Ha! You thought I meant illegal crap didn't ya! Ooooh ya bastards! No!

Let me set the stage for you. I LOVE - SIMPLE LOVE WITH A SICK ADDICTION QUALITY - The British TV show GREEN WING If you haven't seen it, get the DVD! I did and that is why I am writing about MacTheRipper which I just downloaded. First, my bestest friend in the world Hana asked her sister who is living in London to pick me up season's 1 and 2 for Christmas. YAY! I am also lucky enough to be able to play them in my mac. However, some of you may or may not know about region codes. Well simply put we ( in the US ) are in region 1 - and England is region 2 and there for I can not play the DVD's in my regular DVD player.

So yeah, if you happen to pick up a movie that's still in theaters at a outdoor shop in China, those are region 6 and won't play on a dvd player in the US, Canada, England, most of Europe and any where else for that matter - except China.

So along came MacTheRipper and god bless 'em for doing so. Sure you can be a tool and rip DVD's you rent or borrow and you'd be a tool for doing so.... BUT here I am with a real reason to do so. A friend and her sister out of the kindness of their heart got me a present that granted I can use, but you only get 5 times to change your Mac DVD region and I do intend to switch it back at some point. So - the plan,... Rip the DVD's to remove the region code and simply enjoy them on my home DVD player and watch them on the big flat screen and above all, turn all my family and friends on to this twisted, yet enjoyable, warped British TV programme.... or however they spell it over there.

I'm rippin' right now, and it's BEAUTIFUL. And did I mention, it's a free download. Amen.

MacTheRipper is a DVD ripper (extractor). It removes CSS encryption, Macrovision protection, sets the disc's region to '0' for region-free, and is capable of removing RCE region checking. It can also copy ARccOS copy-protected DVDs.

Off I go with Joomla

So - I started messing around with Joomla!, a pretty swell CMS ( Content Management System ) for my latest and greatest site - Media Hype Cre8tive. When I first started doing video and graphics back in 1991 - we called ourselves Media Hype, so it was only fitting.

I decided to go with Joomla! this time over Drupal for several reasons. I was able to set up Joomla! pretty easy on my new host. You have to keep in mind I am not an admin,...well usually not willingly. This was the first time I set up Joomla! on my Apache server and set up the Database. It was a little a little clunky at first, but the documents were pretty helpful as was the book "Building Websites with JOOMLA!" by Hagen Graf.

Like the Drupal book I reviewed here, Matt Raible gave me this book as well to review.

I figured I'd go a step further and tell you how things go as I set up Media Hype Cre8tive as well as how helpful the book is/was.

First off - out of the gate - Hagen's book was a life saver getting started. It cater's to chuckleheads like me who think they know what they are doing, just enough to be dangerous... well the book helped me not be dangerous and actually get things rolling. I started out just doing it, setting up and installing Joomla! on a whim,... but soon found myself in the land of "what the hell?" Having realized I bit off more than I like to chew - I first went thru what Joomla! had to offer and it is extensive and useful - however, in my opinion it does seem to be geared towards a tech-head or at least someone with admin experience.... even tho they say its not.

When I felt that squished up facial expression starting to harden into my new look I remembered that Raible hooked me up with the Joomla! book and was quickly flipping thru it and found it a nice go between. What Joomla! assumes you know, the book explains. It does have alot of PC references and examples but I was able to work thru that. The main thing is that the Joomla! book got me where I needed to be quickly - and nobody was more surprised than me when I went to the URL and there was my login for admin, working!

Before I would just call my friends at Contegix and say, could you please give me a DEV folder with { INSERT CMS NAME HERE } and they would make it happen. So it was quite an accomplishment for me. Altho, looking back at what I did - with Joomla! and Mr. Graf's book I can see that apes could do it,.... I still feel like I accomplished something. So YAY ME!

Now - going forward, as I develop stuff for this site I will post my accomplishments as well as my failures and frustrations.... if any. So please do play along and watch. If I know you, or you at least seem trustworthy - I'll give you a limited username and password so you can come inside the Media Hype Cre8tive site and look around. Let Me Know!

That's it for now. Let's see how this turns out aye?

-maxi

How to be a good web design client.

Or at least make an effort.

Sure I do creative stuff, design a bit, programming ( very little ). I run a multimedia business doing video, graphics and web design. In fact however, I am more like a coach, a teacher, and a therapist at times. BUT when I try to help, sometimes it’s taken the wrong way - a client comes to me thinking that since they know their business, service, or product inside and out that they will be able to dictate to me how their web site is supposed to run.

This also applies to their commercial, or their brochure or whatever promotional vehicle they choose. While we do need to partner for the project, it is very hard sometimes to educate and instruct a client on how the process works. Too often a client comes to you wary and takes your guidance as a sales pitch. Or they may just be overwhelmed by the technology. People strongly believe that they can buy a $50 web design program and conquer the Internet. You have to let them down gently while educating them. It’s easy to see why a client could and often times, do think you are full of crap when you describe what goes into an effective web site.

And still they think they can get the same effect and more bang for their buck by paying their nephew to do it instead of you. If as a designer, I get those kind of clients. I offer them my services as a consultant, and I send them away - they will be more trouble than they are worth and they are not serious about making their site or business successful. Clients also don’t want to be educated most of the time. Seldom do they realize or see themselves as partners with you and resist your advice. They believe that since they know their business and their clients they art direct or instruct you how their site should look. This is always a bad move, and you end up with a site that appeals to the company internally but not to outsiders.

Instead of effective marketing, you’ve created a vanity piece. When the site flops and traffic is almost non-existent this will be the designer’s fault and not the client’s company itself. That is why you must, up front, establish that your role is not only to design, but to educate, and consult. That your offering your skills and services as a member of their team and you must earn their trust. I will just address web site design and web promotion for clients or potential clients. My goal is to help clients be better team players. I will address some of the common mistakes clients make when offering suggestions for site design, and explain why it’s bad. Keep in mind, It’s never a bad thing getting feedback from clients, or idea’s - it should be strongly encouraged - but it is important to make sure it is a two way street. Otherwise, you end up with a designer just trying to get the client out the door and a client who is unhappy with their site. The following come from different clients I've worked with at different points in my career. Here are some of the common mistakes made...


Bad Navigation
You want to make sure your users do not have any trouble finding information. It is a good practice to have a set of your main links at the top of the page as well as the bottom. It is more convenient for your users to click on a link at the bottom of your page than to have to scroll to the top of the page. The link, be it a button or text needs to be clearly understood by visitors. If you as the client understand it, but no one else will - you need to change the name of the link to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Otherwise you have a link that may not be clicked on. That is always bad!

If you create drop down menus, your visitor should not have to click on one page in order to find a link to navigator to another page. Users will get frustrated and leave if they can not find what they are looking for. Everything on your site should be at most, 3 clicks away as a rule, give or take a click.

Slow Loading Pages
I do not know what is more annoying than going to a website and waiting for it to load. Visitors do not want to wait for their information. We live in a fast pace world and want everything immediately. Granted with high speed access this is less of a problem BUT because of high speed access you shouldn’t design a “heavy” web site.

High quality graphics and rich interactive media is the number one course for slow loading web pages. I know your website will look more attractive with these rich graphics but it is not worth it. Export your images at a lower quality to achieve faster loading pages.

Unattractive Color Scheme
This is an important and underrated area in web design. You want your visitors to feel comfortable. Do not design your website so that it is a strains their eyes. Have warm attractive colors that compliment each other well. This is where you as the client need to trust your designer. It’s never meant as an insult, but it is usually taken to heart when a designer suggests changing your color scheme. This is for the best as the designer is trying to create your brand, or your corp. identity and not trying to insult your daughter’s favorite color, or your country’s flag, or the colors of your college - whatever. It’s amazing what people use to justify bad color combos.

Do use common sense of course, trust your designer’s eye as he or she has been around the block and knows what works and what doesn’t, usually. Do not use bright backgrounds. Having a red, yellow or green background can draw to much attention from the users and they will be distracted from what is important on the website. In addition, do not use dark text on a dark background. You should make sure your text is easy to read and is more prominent than the background.

Page Layout
Be consistent. Consistency is important. Do not make each page different. Make sure they all look the same and the navigation is always in the same location. Have the important information located at a section that is easy to find and do not forget to have a common theme throughout the site. Using a content management system ( CMS tool like Drupal or Joomla or countless others. )

Sideways Scrolling
I hope this would go without saying BUT most developers are aware of this web design malpractice. Typically I do not see many websites where the users have to scroll horizontally. There should never be any reason for this. On the opposite end of that spectrum, sometimes a client may have an older machine/monitor - or they have their monitor set for 800x600 - the new standard is monitor resolution is higher than that, usually 1024x768 and higher. Client’s have to be made to understand that designs are made for this standard, and just because it “doesn’t look right” on their monitor it shouldn’t be changed to fit their screen, we are appealing to the masses. It’s a hard sell sometimes.

Non-Cross Browser Optimization
Just because your website looks perfect in Internet Explorer does not mean it will look the same in other browsers. Usually it won’t especially if your site is designed with something like Frontpage. Each browser handles HTML Tags differently. Be careful when designing your website. Constantly check your websites progress and make sure it is compatible in all browsers.


AND THE GRAND DADDY OF ‘EM ALL,...

Not Taking Advantage of SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION & SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING
Optimize your website! The only excuse for not having a search engine optimized website is laziness. Add a title to your website, META tags, ALT tags, relevant content, title tags on links and other SEO practices. Internet marketing is its own beast to tackle and that is a huge understatement! This is the element that hardly any client takes serious.

WHY?

Several reasons. One: It sounds like crap when you pitch it to a client. Each search engine works differently, different algorithms, different priorities of keyword placement, how their spiders work, how the conduct business - the list goes on and on. You have to be honest and tell the client that SEO is a moving target and not, NOT an exact science - and you can not,... CAN NOT guarantee top ten, number one, or high performance. You can’t blame the client for being wary or thinking, why bother. Unless they’ve done their research, it’s a hard sell to get the client to understand that it can take weeks, months, and years to get a decent ranking. Alot of site inadvertently employ black hat seo techniques ( underhanded ) - they think if they stack their page with hidden words, or they have different URL’s that lead to one site, or they use tons of keywords - the list goes on and one and believe me, the search engines know all the tricks...and you’ll be
penalized if you do them. Sometimes a site can be black listed, and it is an uphill battle to get back in the search engines good graces.

Internet marketing takes a lot of time and dedication, but making sure your website is SEO friendly is the first step to attract a lot of traffic to your website.

It is an art form all it’s own and as a client, you have to work with a design firm you trust as well as educate yourself. Keep in mind that you can spend thousands even millions on your site but with out top notch SEO and SEM you might as well buy stock in beta video decks,... or use NetZero as your main pipe. It has to be taken serious and it has to be factored in.

If you have had issues with clients, feel free to share them here. Not in an insulting way, we are trying to help clients be better communicators, and partners in design.

SEO Is About To Change

Highly regarded SEO expert and Enquiro head, Gord Hotchkiss, while chiming in on SEO mythbusters, came to a harrowing conclusion: SEO as we know it is about to change drastically. Change is inevitable, but SEOers are soon to be in a sink or swim situation.

Hotchkiss begins with reaffirming that natural search engine optimization is not dead, as the doomsday mythspreaders are saying. SEO is not just alive, but is becoming more crucial as universal search results go by the wayside.

...the current paradigm of one query, one page of 10 organic results holds. In fact, the entire SEO industry is hanging on this paradigm. Right now, link baiting/building, optimization, competitive intelligence and all the rest are aimed at securing a top spot in the organic results.

But what happens when there no longer is a "top spot" because every result is personalized, based on your geographic origin, your past search history, your behavior or preferences you've shared with the engines[?] That's where search is going. . .

Geotargeting, personalized results are a "King Kong sized monkey wrench in the SEO works," says Hotchkiss, which, to mix a fantasy metaphor, means the SEO "quest stands on the edge of a knife."

To summarize, traditional SEO, which follows a set of principles to push a website to the top spots of natural search results, is nearly an Internet relic. Search engines, diligently tweaking their results for the end-user based on location, search history, and personal preferences, will create an entirely new, largely unpredictable search environment.

That means new tools, new research, new insights in how to maximize exposure, all to achieve presence in various personal search results. In the interim, if the goal of omnipresence (which is the present goal) is not achievable through current standards and practices, then organic search results will become more important than ever.

A prediction here, then, is appropriate. While focus on keywords has been the law of the searchland, SEO professionals will have to more diligently and acutely focus on the end user - every unique end user - mulling scenarios, personalities, and motivations, which makes SEO more akin to traditional marketing, where a firm grasp of psychological concepts is as necessary as the technical acuity of keyword targeting.


Repost from Web Pro News

Nobody gets "Creative"....

I started to think it was me.

It usually is.

Over the past ( going on ) 5 years now I’ve worked with very accomplished technical people who through their own admission possess no so called creative skills, or design eye, or they like to say to me “ you’re the creative guy,...”

I then, in turn, would gladly take on both roles as art director and designer. There’s another way of putting that - it’s called chasing your own tail. So I thought, well if I don’t get it how can I expect clients, employers, co-workers and others in my field.

In most visual communication media, art direction is as important as graphic design, although over the past decade or so, print media has increasingly emphasized design over art direction. On the web - art direction is rare, partly because much of the work is about guiding users rather than promoting concepts, but also because there aren’t many design schools that teach art direction. It’s something you have to pick up and use from your years of experience. On the same token, I can’t ( as a pushing 20 year professional ) accept a recent art school grad as an art director. You gotta be in the trenches - a grunt - a foot soldier before you can be a general, ya know?

Alot of companies ( and clients ) put people, like me, in a position where I have to art direct yourself. In addition to that, there is no concept - no appreciation of using visual forms of communication to get points across unless it is in the form of a soul-less diagram. In addition to that, some companies go a step further and make a creative brain run admin or technical side of a web site. In my case, I am fascinated by tech-tools and CMS and very basic programming but I would never take a position where that would be all that I would do. I think it’s required that a creative make the effort to understand the business world, marketing world and developer/technologists world in order to communicate, because trust me - they aren’t making the effort to understand the creative world. It’s on you!

I think companies who hire a jack of all trades person get what they pay for, a person with skills but limited skills. I understand that budget concerns are what leads these companies to hire someone who can “make pretty pictures” as well as “admin the database” but these same companies would likely be better off ( in the long run ) with people dedicated to their specific jobs. This applies to Art Direction and designers as well. These are two separate positions that need specific attention. You would think a left brain position vs. a right brain position would be obvious but two creative positions are just two creative positions that can be done by the same person.

Not so.

Design no longer serves the product; the product serves the design. The product is merely a vehicle allowing the designer to express his vision. Thus design becomes a modified version of fine art (and practically the only version of fine art that pays). It’s hard to art direct from that stand-point. You have to police yourself, make your client or your boss happy while at the same time, you end up creating something you would normally not create - or worse - you allow someone who isn’t a skilled art director direct the art. How many times has that happened to a designer? A designer with enough skills and talent to know what works and what doesn’t work - and a client, with NO CLUE comes along and flat out demands you do something you are opposed to designing. It never appears in your portfolio that’s for sure. Imagine having to do that, to yourself!

That is what eventually is expected when you are a one man shop, or a one person art department.

And the blame can’t be put on non-creative folks. There is a whole generation out there of branding, marketing, and creative people that are driven to “tell” designers how to design and art directors how to do their job while diluting the positions with non-technical requirements.

In a perfect world, a company would hire an art director and allow him or her to develop a team that consists of technical and creative people and designate them to do specific jobs. Above all, this company would have faith and respect in the AD’s abilities and allow him to develop a style for the company, a look and feel - yes a BRAND, a corporate ID - and then marketing and sales would work with the AD to refine and adopt THAT - run with it and everyone would be happy. ( cough cough yeah right cough )

What we have are websites and brochures that all look like they same guy made ‘em, and company CEO’s ( with no design experience ) doing art direction based off these same soul-less cookie cutter web sites and art directors doing design and tech jobs at the same time. This is the new trend, I’m not sure it’ll change any time soon.

You will notice when it does tho. When you see a site, or a commercial that stands above the rest, that is original and speaks entirely different than the main stream. When you stop seeing ad’s on Monster.com for system admin with photoshop skills, when you get hired for a creative job and you don’t have to report to a developer.


...when an art director actually directs the art.

I hope I live long enough to see that day.

Book Review: Drupal by David Mercer

I received two books from Matt Raible ( co-worker at Virtuas Open Source Solutions ) to review. One was Building Websites with Joomla and the other was DRUPAL. To be honest, it wasn’t all about reviewing them as it just so happened we were in the middle of a redesign of the Virtuas web site using Drupal. I am the first person to admit that I am as far from a technologist or programmer as they get. I shamefully admit that I started my career with a Netscape WYSIWYG tool, and then even worse FRONTPAGE! YIKES. Because those tools were CRAP, I had to learn to code. I doubt most people go from visual tools to SimpleText ( Notepad ) but I did. I do have to admit that I still rely on Dreamweaver for low end projects, and traditional sites. Why am I telling you all this? Drupal basically has nothing to do with these tools and it is not a design tool. I tell you this because it has simply made my design life alot simpler. By using CSS and XHTML my designs have become cleaner, less clutter code and add in PHP and MySQL by way of Drupal and you have a combination that’s simply unbeatable. I am by far not an expert on PHP or MySQL - so you shouldn’t be either. If you can make sense of the code, and have a working knowledge of HTML you will find yourself in a much better place by including Drupal into your arsenal. It forces you in a good way to use clean effective code. Granted, a tech-head would be in their element using Drupal, but as a creative who’s focus is more on the visual and less on the programming I would be overwhelmed with the work load on the Virtuas website alone if it wasn’t for Drupal.

Drupal as I mentioned is NOT a design tool, it is a Content Management System.
The design elements are up to you, I personally find it alot easier to use very simple CSS and HTML, XHTML or in the case of the Virtuas website, a premade design from OSWD.org ( Open Source Web Design ) - Since Virtuas is an open source company, it just made sense and granted saved time. Really when it comes down to it, its all about managing your time effectively and keeping your site dynamic and current. That is why a CMS tool comes in handy.
I just wanted to set you up on my personal situation, and my on going situation with specifically the Virtuas site.

As my roll as Creative Director, I have irons in many fires. Originally Raible and I did the Virtuas website, and I could of used the book Drupal by David Mercer then for sure. This round we hired on Sean Downey from Ireland to lay out our new site. I needed to be able to effectively communicate with Sean and then eventually take over control of the website. David Mercer’s Drupal book sits right on my desk, usually open with a ton of post-it’s sticking out of it. I use it as a reference guide but I have to say, if you are new to the concept of using a CMS tool or even a seasoned Drupal user you’ll find this book indispensable. Because I’m less technical than the average Drupal user and relatively new to CMS I found David Mercer’s book spoke to me in terms I understood. At first, most people used to traditional web design and deployment find using a CMS tool a little overwhelming. You have to force yourself to think differently but this book makes the transition easier to undertake. It covers EVERYTHING. Anytime I ran into an issue, I found it in the book. Sure I use the drupal.org forum, which I strongly encourage you to use. However, alot of the postings there are from people who are very knowledgeable using Drupal, or PHP, MySQL. David Mercer’s book pretty much assumes you are new, and doesn’t overwhelm you with intimidating jargon. If it does, it explains what the jargon is all about and how it works. Sure, the drupal.org users usually take the time to help you - that’s what open source is all about...but having this Drupal book handy, I can look up and figure out what needs to be done without having to wait for replies to my posts. Let me be clear, this isn’t a user guide or reference book. What it does is explain in great detail what you can do with Drupal, and how to accomplish it. Sure, you will need to educate yourself a bit, but this is for the best anyway. While you are at it get brushed up on Apache, AJAX, Linux - check to see if your host provides the server you need. Revisit your coding skills. PHP, HTML, CSS and what not. Look around at some of the other Open Source tools out there available to you like the GIMP project for graphics, check out NVU for web design if you haven’t already. And if you decide that a CMS tool is right for you, give Drupal a shot. If you do, pick up a copy of David Mercer’s Drupal book. It’s the perfect companion for any Drupal Administrator.