Companies

Getting Design Approval: The Single Mockup Theory

By Darren Hoyt on May 26th, 2008.

For years, my employer has included this line in their standard contract: “We will propose 2-3 homepage mockups and a single secondary page mockup”.

There are variations on this throughout the industry, but overall it’s pretty standard, the assumption being that clients should see multiple concepts before choosing a direction for …

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25 Ways To Improve Your Site In 5 Minutes

By Andrew Faulkner on February 12th, 2008.

A while back I wrote 25 Ways To Improve Your Site Today. Many people thought it was useful. I’m trying again now with a twist. I’m offering you, dear reader, tips to improve your site in various ways - each one only taking approximately 5 minutes.

This is starting to …

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Accessible can be Beautiful

By Andrew Faulkner on January 15th, 2008.

I may be preaching to the choir in this post, but one can always use it as a reference to clients or colleagues.

Accessibility is one of my favourite aspects of web design. It’s also got a lot of hangups and myths associated with it. For …

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The rise of Wordpress for ‘Non-Blogs’

By Andrew Faulkner on October 31st, 2007.

And by non-blogs I mean portfolios, magazines, communities - essentially anything that doesn’t tend to come under the banner of a blog. You get the idea. I aim to showcase some of my favourite Wordpress powered sites that don’t follow the traditional layout. And following that, I’ll explore why these sites have deviated from the mean.
Straight to the juice…
I wouldn’t want to keep you waiting for some examples, would I?

Jen Gordon’s portfolio oozes character and flair. Her Wordpress install powers the portfolio, page hierarchy and her blog.

ComplementaryDuo mixes portfolio and blog effortlessly.

Darren Hoyt shows off his brilliant design talent. Definitely not ‘just another Wordpress blog.’

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Interview with Smashing Magazine

By Andrew Faulkner on September 3rd, 2007.

Coinciding with Smashing Magazine’s first anniversary (hop over there for their birthday giveaway), we catch up with Vitaly Friedman:
Vitaly, welcome to fadtastic. Please say a few things about yourself and Smashing Magazine.
Andrew, first of all the Smashing Magazine team would like to thank you for the opportunity to …

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Interview: Matt Davies on design process

By Andrew Faulkner on August 9th, 2007.

Matt Davies has kindly offered up his thoughts on design processes. Let’s cut straight to the juicy bits:
Matt, what’s the very first thing you do when approaching a new design?
I think of priorities. Design ultimately is about purpose and if your design doesn’t meet its purpose then ultimately the …

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Mobile Moans - The Logos Of The Mobile Industry

By Matt Davies on July 17th, 2007.

Do you design logos? If you do, you will understand the importance of looking around at what other companies are doing in regards to their brand identities. A true designer will always spend a lot of time comparing, reviewing and familiarizing himself with logo design trends so that his work …

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Content Extraction

By Steve Rose on June 27th, 2007.

For me, one of the most challenging parts of web development is the discovery phase, or more specifically, getting the content out of my clients. With four out of five of them it’s like pulling teeth. Sometimes I have to wait for five or six months before they eventually give …

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25 Ways To Improve Your Site Today

By Andrew Faulkner on June 10th, 2007.

Yes, the title may look like this post should be on an amateur blog and that it will be full of references to clip art and animated gifs, but this is serious. I’ve compiled a list of what I think are 25 ways to improve your website in as little …

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Should there be only one browser?

By Andrew Faulkner on May 22nd, 2007.

A while back when I was a young, optimistic, enthusiastic web designer (not that I’ve changed) I took part in a debate at my local web meet-up to discuss whether there should only be one browser. (I was young and reckless back then, I know.) I thought it may be …

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Weekly Thought: Why Good Designers Should Stop Saying “Web 2.0″

By Ezekiel Bruni on May 17th, 2007.

Introduction
I have decided to write something up for you guys once a week. The goal is to improve my writing skills, and to contribute more to Fadtastic. Enjoy.
The Thought
On just about every design blog, you will find at least one post that attempts to define “Web 2.0″, and what it’s …

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9rulers ~ On (Blog) CMSs

By Andrew Faulkner on May 15th, 2007.

I asked various 9rules members to come forward and speak openly on their chosen blog CMS. Here are their opinions in all their glory.
Kyle Neath of warpspire.com
CMS:
Wordpress (Hosted - not domain.wordpress.com)

Killer Feature(s):
Absolutely amazing framework with unchallenged extendability and flexibility.

Let Down(s):
Updates (again). But this is more a gripe with …

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