Audience
I originally approached this website as a place for possible employers to review my work, cover letter, resume and interests. As I began sharing it with friends and family, a secondary audience emerged and it became an outlet to update them on my last four years.
The tone and voice of the copy was written as a narrative in attempt to portray a personal tone to the content of the website. The execution of this tone is only aided by the inclusion of personal photos and personal interests. This tone expresses personality which friends and family are already familiar with, and provides insight for possible employers or professional references.
Organization
Organization of the site has a lot to do with the navigation and content of the site. For instance, I have a homepage, a page with a brief biography, some samples of my work, my cover letter, my resume, a collage of some of my interests as well as this design report. Where each of these topics has their own page, each are linked to the main navigation bar.
In efforts to keep navigation easy, the menu bar includes links to pages that clearly identify the linked page. When you click the 'About Me' link, a page will display providing a brief biography, upon clicking 'Portfolio' the page displaying work samples will be displayed and so on.
This menu design is not only clear and concise, it also has a logical progression through the site that is useful for the primary audience. Not only is the top menu bar an important tool for visitors, this site also includes a right side menu titled "things to do." This menu includes a list of links that send the user to friend me on facebook, follow me on twitter, or link to my linkedin profile.
The Design Process
At the beginning of this project, I was unsure what I wanted my website to look like. As I browsed the templates at Open Source Web Design I found "Under the Bridge." This template reminded me of Mackinac Island and I thought I had the opportunity to do some really neat things with it. Upon changing the color scheme to shades of pink rather than its original grey, I wanted to make more drastic changes. Adding a header of the Grand Rapids skyline, or apple blossoms were each interesting, but not self-expressive.
It was from this that I made it a point to create something original and shows my personality, personal style and interests. I created my own header in InDesign, saving it as a JPEG and replacing the existing one. I replaced the colors to keep the site bright and youthful, and created an original right menu bar.
The overall corkboard theme came from my interests in scrapbooking and making simple collages aesthetically pleasing. Ripped paper and post-it notes, turned photos, and playful pins keep the theme prevalent in the design as well as keeping the tone young, playful and personal.
Believe it or not, I ran into only a few limitations while working on this project and that was simply the ability to work creatively within the constraints of the template. Things went rather smoothly aside from that and a few small technological problems caused from working with my public N:/ drive.
Credits
Thanks to Dieter Schneider for providing me the template, "Under the Bridge" from Open Source Web Design. I also have a few movie posters and celebrity photos included in my interests collage, these pictures have been collected from Google images. The buttons and pins were retrieved from the facebook application, Pieces of Flair.