Summer time.

Below is some of my personal project work from over the summer break, it's important to keep busy & your idea's fresh!!
You can find more of my work over at http://soulatech.deviantart.com/

soulatech.com

The project is finished & live online at: http://www.soulatech.com/

But why is it a onepage design? The reason being is after years of looking at other designers websites is you have to go though loads of pages & loads of links which load more data than what is needed. So I decided from the start a "onepage site" would be prefect as it only need to load once & everything I wanted to showcase is there from my design work to contact details so clients can get in touch.

I also understand that clients dont want to be spending ages looking though work & trying to find details needed...this is the main reason the site has this onepage layout. [Time = cash!]

Below is a screenshot of the site live online.

What next?

After speaking with Noli from twindots, we arranged a set deadline & price. Then I had to edit my .psd file & upload it to mediafire. [Mediafire is a free hosting site for files to share via the internet.] then simple E-mail him the link.

After this it was simply a waiting game till the coder had coded the site but we came across 1 issue with my design & that was the fact I wanted a flash .svf button to play the background music.

The issue was that the .svf wouldn't work in some web browers like I.E 7 & firefox 3.1, so we talked baout using a product which is free online & work in all browsers today. We both decided on soundcloud, as they have a free flash plugin web player.

The coder made sure it would still fit within the size design to the .psd & sent me a preview to make sure I was happy & he could go on coding the rest of the site. I'm happy knowing the level of detail he goes into & clearly explained everythign to me as I'm not a coder.

After this issue was addressed, he finished the prject 2 days early of the deadline & sent me all the files needed with usernames/password to the xcontrol panel to host the site. Having experience is this before it only tuck half a hour to upload thye site & have it fully working online.

Downlaodable .psd file: .psd final website design

Final design

After I was happy with my final design, I started looking for a website coder to code the project. My budget was £250, in which this had to cover the cost's of coding, hosting & the doname I wanted.

I asked a few freelancer's I knew online though social networking & forums but I was being told the £250 would just about cover the cost's of the coding alone. With this in mind I had to take a break & think about if I wanted to spend more money or not. In the end I contacted my old boss at twindots & we talked via E-mail & phone about the project brief & the hostings I would need.

We came to a agrement of £180 for the coding, hosting & doname. The hosting & doname will need to be renewed yearly and is hosted via twindots private server. Which worked out prefectly within my budget.

Summary: It really does help to know people within the area's needed & building up a good working relationship.

Layout idea's

I started all my idea's in photoshop using the 960 grid system, below is a download .zip of all the images from start to finished idea of the site design. The reason I've done this is because of the hassle & time it would take me to upload them all individually.

First layout design

Layout final design

Link to downloadable .zip of layout files: Layout design images.