Thursday, December 07, 2006

Final Project Mission Statement

For Major Project 3, I am independently continuing with the Connecticut Campus Compact website. I plan on revisiting my sketches and mindmap and adding more images, content, and video. I will include more information from my findings in the campus compact state sites. I also plan on expanding the information in my secondary pages to help make Connecticut Campus Compact a more complete working website.

Wednesday, November 08, 2006

Site-Seeing: Chapter 8

> Chapter 8 discusses the elements beyond the basic web and the content and resources that are used to develop an applicable web site. I must admit I found this chapter to be the least effective in communicating to me what I should include in my web development. I find it hard to understand formatting and databases that I should use but hopefully I’ll be able to find out more as I review the chapter.

> The content in your web site needs to gain a lot of responsibility to be compelling. It needs to be useful, consistent, informative and applicable so that your audience can experience an up-to-date and unique page.

> To keep the content in your site consistent and relevant it is best to use dynamic content publishing that way it’s easier to make changes and allows you to automatically update your site.

> Another plus about using dynamic content publishing is that you’re able to focus your navigation and content to your audience. For example, when a certain visitor goes to your site their favorite items will be listed such as links, products and interests allowing for a closer relationship with you and your visitor.

> Wroblewski states that the “only constant in web design is variation” which is agreeable and often true when designing a web site that has its own look and feel and can be distinct from the thousands of others out there. It’s often hard to construct a layout and template when different settings throughout computers easily construe your design into completely something different from your original.

> This statement from Wroblewski definitely relates to my opinions when it comes to the web and design. –“No wonder many designers coming from the print world end up fighting against the very nature of the web.”- Couldn’t have said it better myself, Wroblewski.

> Anyway, the best way to maintain your web site is to use applicable variables that will help with the content being up-to-date and convenient.

> Templates are a great way to keep your content organized and dynamic. It’s best to use a template when you want to showcase products from a store, etc.

> Once you’ve set up your template its key to ask yourself questions relating to html, content, layout, hierarchy and structure of your page. You want your site to contain content that is deliberative and useful.

> Web applications are an extensive entity in itself but with careful planning of your template and content it is worth the effort to create a unique interface that will get your audiences attention and your satisfaction.

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Site-Seeing: Chapter 7

> The homepage of your web site is an important feature that needs to take on a lot of responsibility to intrigue your audience. You want your home page to reflect you and be an overall welcoming site that is organized and distinct.

> With a unique home page you can’t forget to keep it easy and efficient. You want your audience to be focused when they arrive at your site. Three responsibilities your home page needs to acquire are an introduction, entrance and announcement. Your introduction describes what your site is about and has a personality, an entrance consists of your navigational system and allows doorways to the rest of your site and an announcement contains what you are informing your audience and any new content you have.

> You want to be selective with the type of images and information you use on your homepage; too much and your site will look cluttered and unorganized. With the new Connecticut Campus Compact site there will be about six images that I’ll incorporate. Three images will be along the header to give a strong, welcoming visual appeal and will also be on the side near navigation.

> It’s also a good idea not to go overboard with the interactive elements, such as blinkings or fast moving images or shapes. Your audience can misinterpret these features and not want to take time to figure out where they need to go. For the CT Campus Compact site I’m not including too many interactive elements; only a calendar, scrolling images and a search box.

> It’s important to remember to just include the right things for your audience so that they feel welcome at your home page. Include a visual weight, balance and hierarchy that will suit your audience’s needs and allow them to feel comfortable navigating through your site. I hope to fulfill all those responsibilities with the redesign of the Connecticut Campus Compact site I will be creating.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Site Seeing: Chapter 6

> The elements that you use in your web design need to be presented clearly and dynamically so that your ideas and personality shine through and communicate to your audience.

> The five most common lexicon elements to a site include navigation systems, body text, images, page footers and forms. For Major Project 2 I’ll be focusing on at least three of these elements to enhance the look and feel of the Connecticut Campus Compact web site.

> When you combine these elements you’re able to provide a useful site that contains valuable information and content that will stimulate your audience to interact with each.

> It is important to remember that each element has to communicate to the audience. That means that your elements need to include specific information, be organized and relevant to one another.

> It’s always a good idea to include a footer to your web site. This allows your audience to easily find and contact your information without having them search through the site for the info. This will make it easier for you and them if you leave the important stuff on the bottom of the page.

> When designing the layout of your site you want to remember to keep your navigation clean and simple. An elaborate navigational system can clash with the rest of your site and confuse your audience.

> It’s also a good idea to limit the amount of navigation you include in your site. Too many methods such as a site map, search box and embedded links can overcrowd your site and not allow your audience to get to where they want to go swiftly.

> For the Connecticut Campus Compact site I know that I want to include a calendar, a few embedded links and a navigation system. With these three elements I should allow easy movement for the audience. I also will try not to add more than what’s necessary to the site.

> Text plays a huge role in the layout of your site. You want your body text to have readable font at a decent size and for it to be dynamically placed on the page. The body text should not be too long, but instead short and focused on the content. It also helps to create visual interest when using images along with your text so that your audience can see what you are informing them about.

> An element I won’t be including in the CT Campus Compact site are forms. Forms seem like a complicated system that can mainly be found in corporate sites. I want the CT Campus Compact site to reflect a more personable look and feel that is geared towards students and parents (and mainly not top officials).

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Revised Mission Statement for Major Project 2

For Major Project Two I plan to support the Connecticut Campus Compact website. The purpose of this site is to inform the overall public about the educational services and volunteer contributions that the organization is involved with. The site will stay with the look and feel of the national site by keeping the logo and the same color palette. The site will advance from the original one by including interactive elements, such as a calendar, events table and photo gallery.

Chapter 5: Site-Seeing

> Your personality determines who you are; it is a definition of your experiences and the way you interact with others. Web sites define experiences, reveal interactions and have similar aspects to a personality. It is necessary to include content and designs that will appeal to your audience and engage them to return.

> You want your site to leave a lasting impression with the audience. To do that you need to include a unique design and layout that is organized, supports and reflects who you are. You want your audience to have a positive reaction when they are done viewing your site.

> The look and feel of you site needs to be visually appealing with the design, typography and color palette you choose. These elements help to communicate to your audience the type of personality you have and how it is different from others (initially sites).

> Your site should be able to tell a story about its personality (every web site is a narrative). This makes the web site unified, meaningful and engaging, allowing your visitors to have an enjoyable experience. (Wroblewski)

> Web sites should always try to give off a positive impression; if it doesn’t then it’s a site that lacks in good design, layout and interaction.

> It’s interesting to think that your web site is indeed a product. You are selling your ideas and all of the visual elements to your audience. Essentially this is giving a brand name to your site.

> Wroblewski describes a brand “as an idea or impression made on your audience by the experiences with your goods and their presentation”. On the web, it is important that you present your site with an interactive interface that is informative and appealing.

> It’s hard to make your site unique from all the million others out there on the web. The design and content reflect strongly on the type of site you are distinguishing from the rest.

> Color and typography strongly set a mood and send messages. Colors can make you excited, comfortable or sad. These emotions all reflect upon the opinions of your audience. For example, yellow reflects energy and warmth while violet is associated with regal and sensual emotions. A typeface’s visual characteristics reflect how the audience feels about them. It’s important to use a typeface that is appropriate to the main theme of your site.

> Other visual elements that play a large role in the design of your site are shapes. It’s good to include abstract and organic shapes, textures and patterns that can set a tone and manner. This will interest your audience and make your site that more unique from the rest.

Monday, October 09, 2006

CT Campus Compact Mission Statement

The purpose of the Connecticut Campus Compact web site is to inform the overall public about the educational services and volunteer contributions that the organization is involved with. The site will stay with the look and feel of the national site by keeping with the logo and the maroon and blue/green color palette. The information communicated in the site will include the purpose of the universities and the students’ participation as well as the different events, features and benefits there are with becoming involved with this institution.

Site-Seeing: Chapter 4

> Designing a website is also like creating a picture (whether it's a drawing or painting). Within every picture there is a foreground, background, objects and other visual elements that help you understand the message that it’s conveying. Web pages all have messages and it’s up to you to create an informative and organized visual layout that your audience can learn from and enjoy.

> It’s important that your audience can successfully navigate through your web page without any problems. To create a successful website there are many principles, such as proximity, similarity, and continuance, which help to create distinct visual groups that are differentiated and meaningful.

> An important way to visually organize information is by creating a visual hierarchy. With a hierarchy there is an order that will creatively and cohesively appeal to your audience, as well as keeping your site balanced and simple.

> Having a balanced layout in your site will help keep your viewer’s attention and create a system of unity between all of your elements, whether its design or technology related.

> I think the most important part about creating a visually organized site that can communicate all of the principles discussed in chapter four is to simply remember who your target audience is and what you want to express to them. By making your design and content organized, you are creating a website that will send a clear message to your viewer’s.

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Atlantic Freedom Tour Mission Statement

The goal of the Atlantic Freedom Tour site for the Amistad America Program is to communicate information about the history of the ship and the educational program that students can become involved with. This site will include updated video of the crew, blog postings from the students, and the ship’s progress on its voyage. There will be an interactive map of the different ports that the crew will be visiting and content about the events at each port. This site will entice viewers with images, hands on stories from the crew, detailed story of the history of the Amistad, and a colorful nautical scheme. The audience of the Atlantic Freedom Tour site will include teachers, (most importantly) students, and any one else interested in learning about the historic Amistad and its current journeys.

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Site-Seeing: Chapter 3

> The construction of your site is one of the most important elements that will either make or break your site. If the audience finds it hard to search for what they are looking or if, most frustrating, your site is slow with download times, then your aggravated users will not return to your site.

> The best way to ease waiting time for your audience is to use CSS, crop images to reduce their physical size and to compress photos by optimizing them. These three tips can make a big difference on minimizing download times for your web site.

> Web users love to browse/wander sites and gather information. To keep them anchored to your site you need to provide navigational tools, such as menus, links and search boxes. This will provide necessary interaction for your audience.

> It is important to let your users know the differences between your links and where they will take them. I was surprised to see that there are five different types of links, and probably more, that help us know their particular purpose. External, internal, download, inline, and action links all help your audience get to whatever content you want them to view. With all these different links it’s important to remember to keep them all short with words, provide a range of color (especially for you visited and unvisited links) and to make them descriptive.

> The site you build should contain navigational tools, content, a page title and header. You always want to have your audience’s attention focused on the content of your page and to do that, sometimes it’s easier to make your site simple, with not a lot of technology and fancy elements incorporated.

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Personal Web Site Mission Statement

The goal of my personal web site it to showcase the work I’ve done in the form of a portfolio. Included in the site or portfolio will be IDD work, outside work I did at an internship over the summer, and some of my interests, such as art, music and traveling. The design of the site will reflect my personality with it being simple, clean and having a color scheme of earth tones. The site’s audience will consist of students, friends, family and anyone else interested to see my work and get to know a little more about me.

Revised QU Branches Mission Statement

The objective for the QU Branches Catholic Campus Ministry web site is to provide a well structured and informing page that its audience, which are students, parents and alumni, can visit and enjoy. The site will be visually appealing with interactive elements, such as rollovers and a photo gallery, as well as keeping with the color scheme of the school’s colors, which are blue and gold. The main information that will be provided are updated events, weekly schedules, and content that Fr. John has written. The site will also have more of Fr. John’s stated needs and will hopefully become a popular site that will be within reach for visitors from outside of school.

Monday, September 25, 2006

Site-Seeing: Chapter 2

> The theme of this chapter is to always have a plan before executing a project, and in this case, that project is a web site. Your plan should consist of ideas about navigation, personality, organization and interaction. These four items will help with the building of a site and in the end, allow your audience to understand what you want to tell or "speak" to them.

> Organization of a site is a crucial part that needs to be clear in categories, navigation, content, etc for you audience to make sense of each category and be able to understand what the main theme or message is.

> It's good to remember that, as Wroblewski states, "the web lacks any real 'physical space'," meaning that you need to provide clues for a user to understand where they are in your site. If you don't have navigation elements on all of your sites pages, then your audience will most likey get lost.

> It's important to keep in mind that less is more. This is great to remember with web site building becuase the more cluttered you make your site with navigation, images, content, ads, etc. the more it will take away from your main point and distract/make things complicated for the user.

> Personality is a key contributor when building a site. Personality determines the kind of audience that will visit your site. Personality covers visual presentation most, with content, colors and images reflecting you and your unique ideas that will help "speak" to your audience.

Thursday, September 21, 2006

Campus Ministry Mission Statement

The objective for the QU Branches Catholic Campus Ministry web site is to provide a well structured page that students, parents and alumni can visit and enjoy. The site will be visually appealing and oriented for its audience, with the main content organized and easily accessible. The main information that will be provided are updated events, photos, and weekly schedules. This site will meet all of Fr. John’s interests and needs as well as helping the site become more popular and within reach for visitors from outside of the school.

Sunday, September 17, 2006

Site-Seeing: Chapter 1

> It is very important to know what you want to say before saying it and the same goes for web sites. Web pages can't rely on words only, there needs to be content gathered (images and text), interaction and organization that a web designer must think of before creating a site.

> For a web site to be understood effeciently by a user, it must have a clear and organized message that the audience will not be confused by.

> The most important part about creating a web site is knowing your client well. A designer needs to ask questions and understand what the business wants in order to achieve a successful site that you both can experience and enjoy.

> I found it interesting that many web sites use scenarios to understand their audience. It's extremely helpful to have a variety of scenarios so that a web designer meets all of the user's needs and interests.

> When it comes down to it, a successful web site is one that communicates key ideas that the audience is looking for.

Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Site-Seeing: Introduction

>Every technology goes through an evolutionary or growing process and the World Wide Web is just in its beginning stages at barely ten years old.

>Like Wroblewski has stated, it has a very long way to go before maturity. It’s easy to think back to when there was no web; it was a simple era and now with it, it has become complex and significant, making our lives much easier and faster.

>There was a simple era with the World Wide Web when it was first developed by CERN. Simple Web sites included basic table layouts with images and text.

>However more images were being used and were in more demand than just text, resulting in a slow download process with poor ability to be viewed. Since the audience wouldn’t want to sit and wait.

>It’s not until people realized that in order for the Web to cohesively be understood it needs to first learn how to communicate effectively.

>Communication is key when building a Web site. The site needs to communicate to its viewer a well rounded page that includes accessibility and good design

>An accessible page makes for a faster and easier time for the audience. Successful Web sites include visual, structural and organizational content.

>A Web site needs to have meaning and understanding from the audience to be considered an overall good site.

>It also needs to deliver behavioral and emotional concepts for it to communicate with the viewer what it specifically is presenting.

>I liked when Wroblewski states that the “presentation (of a site) has a lot of responsibilities”. Presentation is everything when it comes to Web pages. If the information is not presented in a structured, visually appealing fashion, than that site is just not going to be viewed as much. It’s as simple as that.

Thursday, September 07, 2006

Wednesday, September 06, 2006

Preface

1. Optimum web designs are organized, techinal and visually appealing.
2. When looking at a website, you go through a range of different emotions based on what the web page provides.
3. Wroblewski discusses the many solutions that are decided when making a superior site and how we will use these considerations to learn the language of the web.
4. What you are looking at on a webpage is also communicating to you the specific site, and when the site is communicating effectively, it becomes a quick, easy-to-use page.
5. Websites are narratives that have beginnings and endings, and those that tell good stories are the most effective and visually appealing.