Idea Generation
From the start I new I wanted to make a portfolio website which would be ideal for someone like myself to put up work for others to see. So when generating ideas I took a look at many other 3D artists websites to see what they had done and then I went ahead a made a basic mind map of the pages I would like to have - as seen below.
Here is my mind map, it shows what I would like to have in each page which I believe I have successfully achieved most of the stuff I listed and planned to do.
Inspiration
One of the artists I research was a VFX student named Miguel Santana, his website was very interactive and visually pleasing. Like most things, he has a warming colour scheme which is always nice to have as colours can have such a big impact on you and how you feel.
On the website he has included a number of interactive features and slide shows. He has embedded a number of videos onto a single page which I great for ease of use. the menu is clear on the right and the website overall is split up nicely. On the far left you have small thumbnails of some of the work he has done and when you click on them it opens them up with a bigger version. The main page is sort of like a blog where he comments on the works he posts and it is all in order of when it was originally posted. Making it easiest to find his newest work.
This is the website for a character artist called Andrei Szasz. This one is done a little bit more differently and the whole website it more oriented around his actual work. There is little information about himself- but I like the way it is easy to see his work as it's all right there on the homepage.
All his main works are presented on the homepage and after that some of his older work can be found on the link below - but obviously you'll want people to see your later work as opposed to some of the older stuff. When you click on on of the images, it takes you to a page with a number of different views of the character. Including breakdowns and WIP's. By doing this you get a great knowledge of how he went about creating that particular piece.
Website Concept
After mind mapping and doing research online by looking at other peoples art work. I decided that I would like to make a portfolio website. Looking at some amazing & inspirational work online really motivated myself to do things in a similar way to them. I planned to have a well structured and simplistic website to navigate around on.
I chose to do a portfolio because I would like to have a place to display my work digitally as it can be used to show people things in a matter of seconds and I thought it would be fitting being an interactive media student. When clients are looking for potential employee's they often search online and having the accessibility of a website means they can easily find out information about myself and the style I work in and If I would be able to do the job for them.
I broke down the menu section into 4 different tabs which included , Portfolio, About, Contact and Blog. I thought this would make it easy to move around the website having bold and clear titles. A big banner at the top straight away tells you who I am and what I do - Jordan Dunstall - Digtal Artist. On the homepage it's a brief summary of myself, but on the 'About' page it goes into greater depth. I've also planned to add a show reel on the homepage, this gives instant and interactive access to my work. For the actually portfolio page I wanted it all clearly laid out so people can see the thumbnails then go ahead and click them to bring up a larger version. Lastly, the contact form would be a place for people to speak to me and ask me questions - fairly standard things.
Final Website
Here are some screen shots of the website I designed for my portfolio, it includes some interactivity to view my work and information about myself. The website is all designed in a styles that suits myself and I planned to make it easy to understand and navigate around.
This is my main page, it has a minimal design scheme, but I have done this to keep navigation simple and easy to use. I planned to have a YouTube video embedded into the homepage but I couldn't work out how it was done in Dreamweaver. I thought having a large banner at the top made it easy to understand what it's about and it was all designed in a style I like. At the bottom I included a few sample pictures of the work I done.
This is my portfolio page, it layed out in a nice easy to use way. Furthermore, using a tutorial I found online I was able to make it so the menu selection bar at the top darkens according to which page you're on. In this case it is portfolio. This makes it easier for the audience to know what page they are on. Each image is able to be clicked on in order to bring up a new pop up window. A process that we got taught during a demo. As you can see below.
Here is a screenshot of the pop up windows when you click on a specific piece of my portfolio - which will automatically adjust the size according to the screen size. This means it could be used on a number of devices.
Here is the 'About' page of my website, it is fairly obvious what this page is all about. It's just a breif summary of who I am, what I do and some of my interests. And of course a photo which is yet to be put on there. Again, using the technique I learned I was able to have the 'About' button darken as it is selected. I think it is important to include an 'About' page as if I client is looking to hire you'll they'll want access to some information about yourself and your background.
Here is the contact page I did. It is minimal and easy to navigate. I have implemented a contact form using techniques learnt from the demo's in class and an online source. This makes it easier for a someone to contact me as opposed to opening up an emailing program and having to get my address etc. What they need is all there for them. Furthermore I have added a Facebook and Twitter link in the corner which are just images with links to URL's. That way people can have other options to contact me and find out information about me.
And finally the 'Blog' link on my website is just a link to another page. On this page the audience would be allowed to see some of my WIP's and other off topic research. In this way people can see how I approach my work and the development stages I take.
Off Topic Research
The 960 grid system is a tool used to give guides to your websites, therefore you can create then in Photoshop using these guides giving you greater freedom and control of the look. And then using some CSS which they provide for you, it allows you to transfer the website designed in Photoshop into Dreamweaver. There are various column options available but the two most popular are the 12 column and 16 column variants. The 12 column layout consists of 12 column grid has 12 available columns each of 60px width, with a 10px gutter on each side. The 16 column version consists of 16 columns of 40px, again with a 10px gutter on each side.
Here are some screen shots of the two different column layouts:
Here you can see various websites that have used the 960 grid system and just goes to show how versatile of a system it is. You can see how it is broken up in a number of columns - these are your guidelines you stick to whilst designing it in Photoshop. The 960 grid system appealed to me greatly as I didn't find the designing aspect of Dreamweaver so friendly to use and where as I'm a lot more experienced in Photoshop it would have given myself the ability to go that extra mile design wise, whilst still having a fully functional website.
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