Site additions...

[Danielle@WPA]

Re: Site additions...

Okay - I've added a new feature on my site where I'll be putting up random wallpapers and ones that I will eventually make (of my own and not "borrowed") and put up. These that are here are just some ones that I like. The star wars ones I made myself from movie screenshots I did on my comp. I plan to do lots more and make some collages, but that'll wait until I have time. :)

Go here for the media page and click on the "Wallpaper" tab in the middle. There's only ONE page of walls so far, but the buttons are still there. (I hope the positioning is ok).

I just wanted to post it because I JUST did this last night and haven't really been crazy about going through every single pic to be sure it works. I'm sure they all do, but people here always find the little things. :) (thanks)

So, my next project will involve updating the picture pages (which I need to improve) and adding the audio section, but that'll probably not happen until later this fall. I want to add some recordings of me playin' my horn. I just have to practice and get good enough to make those recordings. ;)

Anyway, I know there's probably some people here that might be interested in some of the wallpapers I will add to my site. Just know that these here were not made by me (except the SW ones) and I plan to take a lot of my pictures from my trips and places I've been and put together some pretty darn good desktop pictures. So feel free to come back and check for updates as I will be adding about 30-35 per week as I go through all the pictures I want to use and create those wallpapers.

I'm one of those people who's a little obsessed with changing my desktop often. So, I kinda got into the swing of just creating them on my own. Just need a little Photoshop to help me along the way and I'm all set. Plus I thought it would be fun to make some of my own personal designs. (to come later). :)

Hester,

I was talking to you. :) I clicked on the "here" link from your original post and it went to one of your sites....maybe an old one???? Wow! Love it! I used Bluevoda to create and publish mine but PhotoShop must be the program that makes your so wonderful. Can't seem to find any templetes that look as nice as yours in BlueVoda but maybe I'm looking in the wrong place. Would you suggest photoshop and if so which one? Can you give me some direction, please?

Danielle

[Hester]

Re: Site additions...

Hester,

I was talking to you. :) I clicked on the "here" link from your original post and it went to one of your sites....maybe an old one???? Wow! Love it! I used Bluevoda to create and publish mine but PhotoShop must be the program that makes your so wonderful. Can't seem to find any templetes that look as nice as yours in BlueVoda but maybe I'm looking in the wrong place. Would you suggest photoshop and if so which one? Can you give me some direction, please?

Danielle

:)

Okay... well first of all, I had used a pre-made template that I liked that Voda had in one of their freebie packs. I modified it a bit with photoshop just to get the size/spacing right for what I needed.

I started with THIS free template that I got from VodaHost... I liked the layout where the buttons would go... and decided to make it work that way.

I tweaked it a bit with photoshop to make THIS version...

And after a few months and me deciding to add some color to the site, I re-did the whole thing, changed the buttons up and used more photoshop tricks that I learned along the way. I changed it to THIS....

The changeover was kinda like THIS...

I was mentioning before how I'm in the process of redoing it again... but the "blue" site will stay on as my personal site... will be tranferred to a new domain name eventually. And the revamp will be for my drill design business. :)

When I started doing my original site, photoshop was used very minimally. I had a couple pics with drop shadows and stuff... and of course being able to change my template. But getting involved with designing my own web site just gave me more opportunities to see what else was out there and try and learn how to do things. I have about 12 bookmarks of photoshop tutorials and if I ever have free time (which isn't a lot these days) I'll look up something and try it.

Everything on my "blue" site was more or less the result of experimenting with stuff. I was looking up how to make "bent paper or photo" and on my Media page, that polaroid pic was just one of those experiments.

The "****" on my front page... done using a tutorial also.

The menu buttons were from looking up how to make reflective glass... etc. And the use of perspective, this and that... lots of practice that took me a LOT of time to get used to. Heck, if I had to do any of those things again, I'd have to pull up the bookmark and follow the instructions again, one at a time. :)

And just know that even though there have been only 3 main templates I've done thus far, I have experimented with MANY variations... different color combos and different shadings, buttons, sizes, etc. These were just the ones I liked the best. (And with the blue one... oy! I think I spent a week trying to find the right colors for that... and when I say "colors", I mean shades of blue specifically). I just wanted it to have the right "feel"... sometimes it doesn't come that easily. :)

My advice is that if you have photoshop or paint or software like that, just take your time and learn how to do certain things on them. It's not a necessity to have cool graphics and stuff for your website to work.... but I understand that you'll look around at other sites and say "gosh, I wish my site looked this cool". I'm there too... and that's what motivated me to skip out on some of my favorite TV shows in order to get some stuff done.

And people have asked if I use Flash or Dreamweaver... I don't have the slightest clue how to do anything with those programs. So, that's another option you have if you wanted to improve the look of your site. :)

[Hester]

Re: Site additions...

I forgot to mention... I use Photoshop 7. I bought it around 5 years ago. I know there are a few newer versions out now, like CS2 or something. I'm sure it's better... but Photoshop 7 has everything I need right now. :)

You might be able to find it pretty cheap these days if it's still around... ?? But if you are on a PC, I know that Microsoft has a free software which is very similar to Photoshop. I forget the name of it... media center?? ... media something??? I don't know. But you can find it through the microsoft website I believe.

[AmaDee]

Re: Site additions...

Darn it, my HS computer teacher was right! My thing was what am I going to need photoshop for as an Accountant. Haaa, the joke is on me.

I too wondered if your site was made using bv at first glance. I just started designing websites, so I like coming across great finds, and yours, I friend, is waayyy up there. Keep doing what you're doing.

I wasn't all that bad at Photoshop...I kinda liked it, but didn't have the time for it then. And to be honest, I don't think I have the time to learn it now.

I do use Paint, though. It comes in really handy with using so-called "fancy" fonts. I learned my lesson with that. I was using really nice fonts on my end and they were showing up just fine on my browser, but were feeding everybody else loads of you know what.

Danielle, web designing, especially if you are learning as you go along, is about trial and error...you just have to look at it with a positive and a willing-to-learn attitude and you should be fine.

And as always, there are a lot of people who come on here to help.

[Hester]

Re: Site additions...

Darn it, my HS computer teacher was right! My thing was what am I going to need photoshop for as an Accountant. Haaa, the joke is on me.

I too wondered if your site was made using bv at first glance. I just started designing websites, so I like coming across great finds, and yours, I friend, is waayyy up there. Keep doing what you're doing.

I wasn't all that bad at Photoshop...I kinda liked it, but didn't have the time for it then. And to be honest, I don't think I have the time to learn it now.

I do use Paint, though. It comes in really handy with using so-called "fancy" fonts. I learned my lesson with that. I was using really nice fonts on my end and they were showing up just fine on my browser, but were feeding everybody else loads of you know what.

Danielle, web designing, especially if you are learning as you go along, is about trial and error...you just have to look at it with a positive and a willing-to-learn attitude and you should be fine.

And as always, there are a lot of people who come on here to help.

Actually... a funny thing what you mentioned about the fonts... I caught it before anyone else saw it... I made that same mistake.

I'll let you in on another tip I did when creating my site. Now, even though most of it didn't matter too much, I read a LOT of the reviews on this forum before I even started creating my site. I looked at what people were doing and the tips people here gave them to help improve their sites. Many ways it never pertained to me for what I wanted, but it still helped. The biggest thing was the fonts... I really wanted to use non-natural fonts, as you can see with the buttons I created. :)

And thanks!! :) You mentioned that you don't think you have time to learn this stuff. I really don't either... as I said... sacrificed some time here and there to learn. It took me about 6 months to go from what I started with to the "blue" version of the site... trying little bits whenever I could. Trust me... I really wanted my site to look the way it is now when I first did it... but I knew that in order to do some of that stuff I'd have to take the time to learn. Luckily most of it was during the summer when I don't have to teach.

And I do wish I could do this more... But again... not much time to do much more than what I try to do for myself. I really want to eventually start designing for other people... but I think I'd rather wait until I become more accustomed to more photoshop skills, as well as writing scripts (which I've never done before) and using Flash (which I also have never done before). :)

[AmaDee]

Re: Site additions...

Well, I was sorta forced into designing web pages...heavens know I didn't solicit my current clients. To be honest, I wouldn't know how to sell a free Hawaiian Vacation with no strings attached...yeah, I'm that bad.

After a friend of mine spent over $500 (which was half of the total price) for a website, the designer seemed to vanish into cyber air. I'm pretty good with designs when it comes to Word, Publisher, PageMaker, and other such designing programs so she asked me if I could design her a website in Publisher...which I did (biggest mistake of my life). It was around then, June 2006, that I downloaded the free bv from a website and started playing around with it. I managed to *******ted what I had done in Publisher with such ease that I was amazed...

And now, I can't seem to get off this box. But I like it...wouldn't do it if I didn't enjoy it, to tell you the truth.

By the by, you updated you curent page...does that mean that our server is up and ready. If so, I wonder why I can't access it? Hmmmmmmm

[Hester]

Re: Site additions...

By the by, you updated you curent page...does that mean that our server is up and ready. If so, I wonder why I can't access it? Hmmmmmmm

Well.... since I didn't wanna wait, I went ahead and tried to publish a page and it worked... all I did was moved the original home page back while I try and finish up the rest on BV.

Yeah... June 2006 was when I started with BV also. Actually... it was sooner than that... May perhaps?

Anyway, before that I used Yahoo Geocities website stuff... boy was that a huge bust. It was just terribly difficult compared to BV. I wrote it ALL in HTML code... uploaded pics to the file manager and had to do everything by hand.... trial and LOTS of error. :)

BV turned out to be exactly what I needed... and at this time last year, I might have had about 5 other programs downloaded and installed to build a site... nothing came close to the ease of BV. I love it!!

[AmaDee]

Re: Site additions...

You sound like me when I tell people about the excellence of BV AND VH. I try to encourage my clients to download the program and do their own maintenance...you know, trying to save them a buck or two.

I never got into other web builders, but I've been thinking about exploring others. I've used a touch of flash effects on a couple of my sites and would like to learn more about that, but I'm not really into all flash designs so....

HTML? Not my forte. Actually, it creeps me out. I can tweak it a bit to modify a design but I wouldn't say I know much about writing it. I did a Quarter of Visual Basic and really liked it. I got to design calculators like the one that comes with Windows and I just thought that was so cool...but that was about a year ago and I don't think I remember that much about it to know any thing about it, but it is interesting...

[Aaronsnewscafe]

Re: Site additions...

Okay - I've added a new feature on my site where I'll be putting up random wallpapers and ones that I will eventually make (of my own and not "borrowed") and put up. These that are here are just some ones that I like. The star wars ones I made myself from movie screenshots I did on my comp. I plan to do lots more and make some collages, but that'll wait until I have time. :)

Go here for the media page and click on the "Wallpaper" tab in the middle. There's only ONE page of walls so far, but the buttons are still there. (I hope the positioning is ok).

I just wanted to post it because I JUST did this last night and haven't really been crazy about going through every single pic to be sure it works. I'm sure they all do, but people here always find the little things. :) (thanks)

So, my next project will involve updating the picture pages (which I need to improve) and adding the audio section, but that'll probably not happen until later this fall. I want to add some recordings of me playin' my horn. I just have to practice and get good enough to make those recordings. ;)

Anyway, I know there's probably some people here that might be interested in some of the wallpapers I will add to my site. Just know that these here were not made by me (except the SW ones) and I plan to take a lot of my pictures from my trips and places I've been and put together some pretty darn good desktop pictures. So feel free to come back and check for updates as I will be adding about 30-35 per week as I go through all the pictures I want to use and create those wallpapers.

I'm one of those people who's a little obsessed with changing my desktop often. So, I kinda got into the swing of just creating them on my own. Just need a little Photoshop to help me along the way and I'm all set. Plus I thought it would be fun to make some of my own personal designs. (to come later). :)

Great Design Mate!