Sandy Alemian is an author, speaker and coach who is spiritual, accessible and fun and her web site needed to reflect that. We used bright - but not obnoxious - colors, and a deceptively simple layout. Built in Wordpress, the site is fully expandable as she grows and incorporates her videos, products which can be purchased off the web site using Paypal, and an events plugin so people can keep up with where she's going to be.
The Rock and Roll Oracle™ is a psychic divination card deck inspired by rock music. The site is fun, high energy and eye-catching, with a music theme. The challenge was using symbols like guitars and music notes in a new way that didn't shout cliche. Since I also designed the card deck itself, I wanted to use the card back as the background for the site. I made the content background a semi-transparent white so you can see the card design through the content, while still having the content easily readable. This is also my first foray into developing sites using Wordpress. It's a new era of execution and I'm loving it!
For an empowerment coach, the key is the message. So this site is clean and simple, with the underlying technology of automated response and content presentation virtually undetectable.
For this site I relied heavily on my intuition. The client needed concept to completion from scratch, including a logo, but had no clear vision. Key words were healing, calming, and balanced. We both agreed that a calming green and earth tones were the right direction. Beyond that, we didn't really know where to begin. Since she is a practitioner of the healing arts, I knew there was an Eastern influence and felt that the yin-yang was a good place to start for the logo, but since it's highly overused, we looked for a way to make it unique. Since Robin's "power animal" is the Wolf, we decided to combine wolf, moon and yin-yang into a very original logo. The client loved it. We kept the background soft and clean so the logo would stand out, and used a large button motif for the homepage content, creating an inviting and clear welcome to the site.
Soleil means sun in French. The challenge was to make the site as bright as sun, but without hurting the viewers' eyes. While I generally like to stay away from Flash openings, the client's desire to have the web site introduced with a sunrise was thematically perfect and definitely sets the tone for an exciting time.
This photographer focuses mainly on family events, and wanted a site that was accessible and classy. It was to use technology but not be too flashy or "slick". A new logo was needed and placed as the cornerstone of the site. The "E" was from the original logo and since the owner took over the business from his father, he wanted to honor his father by keeping part of the original alive. I chose Bernhard Fashion for the new logo font since it has such a classy old-time feel, without looking dated. The navigation was two-fold: photo galleries and business information. Since a photographer's pictures should speak for themselves, I used images for the gallery navigation and put them on top, with the informational links on the left side. Keeping with the old and new theme, I began the layout with the stability of boxes, but offset them to show that Larry isn't stuck in the box. Brown and gold emit a feeling of timelessness and class and I echoed the subtlety of the background "E" of the logo with the faded camera behind the "Welcome!" on the homepage. The photo galleries were created in jalbum, and while technologically advanced, still are presented simply and with class.
For this site, the client challenged me to take a hugely layered and complicated site and present in a way that was clean and minimalist. It may look simple, but it is layered with discreet technology.
Florence's projects and personality span a wide range of industries and attitudes and her site had to synergize all these different energies. Combining fun and professionalism into a single site, I used solid colors and dynamic movement to make the site fun, with a solid and simple content area which shows the professionalism within the joy.
Mary is a very light-hearted energy worker and massage therapist who wanted a fun site. With a star-trailing cursor and hidden pots of gold, she has just as much fun going to her own site as her clients do!
Quiet strength is the theme here. A filmmaker with a unique voice, Mateen Kemet was a finalist on the Steven Spielberg show "On The Lot". This web site reflects his simple focus and power.
I'm very honored to have been able to donate my time to build this site for Air Force Week Los Angeles a couple of years ago. To recreate the excitement of a USAF show, I incorporated several instances of Flash, including the Thunderbird flying over Hollywood, the index page navigation block, and the full page flyby. Embedded music and a custom calendar app, add to the fun experience. It was an interesting challenge being creative within strict rules and guidelines of this government agency, but I always love a good challenge!
A spoof of 1950's machismo, Gentleman's Corner is was a tongue-in-cheek web series encouraging men to take back control. Since the theme was primarily spoofing stereotypes, I went for the stereotypical 50's cheesy advertising feel and placed the videos themselves inside an old television set. It was my first presentation to the client and he approved it immediately.
The Pet Gazette
How do you create a web site around PDF downloads of a newspaper? By keeping it simple. I made JPGs of the covers, and placed them in line as downloadable links. Three rows for the 3 regional versions, with a maximum of 5 issues per row to keep it clean. At first I thought it might be over-simplified, but the client loved it.
Copelessness
Copelessness is a dramatic movie about a man who had it all and lost it. I had already created the Key Art for this film and used that design to build the website. From the beginning I knew it was being submitted to many film festivals, and since I understood that it's acceptance in those festivals was an important key to the marketing, I created a perimeter in which additional laurels could be added. One of the themes of the movie was about the box we often paint ourselves into, so the content of the site stayed within the space created by the navigation links and the movie title. The colors came directly from the poster and I chose ones from the background to allow the primary poster colors to pop instead of blend. There's a pretty awesome theme song you can hear when you go to the site, too.
