Portfolio

Nicholas Homes

This is the first of the Nicholas sites that I worked on, and this was a new site that I worked on with our designer. One aspect that I am pleased with on this site is the automatic generation of the pdf printouts for each of the complexes and properties. This was an interesting skill to learn and it works well on the site.

Since the redevelopment of this site it has won an award each year in the International Property Awards.

NGI Holidays

Most of the work on this, the Nicholas Owners and the various Admin sites was ongoing development work as per the clients requests, and as such cannot really be seen from the cutomers point of view of the site. This work was mainly involving making better use of the data within the database and giving the client more flexibility of being able to carry out as many of their tasks as possible themselves.

Nicholas Heights

The main involvement I had on this site was in getting the language translations to display properly from data supplied in the database, including making sure that the language characters were properly displayed.

Get Connected

This is the first project I worked on at Meantime, and we worked with another company who provided us with the anaysis and specification of the site which was then carried out. Later once the site had been live for a short time Meantime were asked to create the CMS for the site, and I also carried out that project.

Purely Mineral

On this site the main work I carried out was to create the CMS system, which is also used for creating invoices, stock control, etc. The main customer facing site was already in place and I tried to keep the CMS site design very similar.

I have also made some additions at various times to the customer facing site as per the clients instructions, such as the login feature for return customers.

41000 Faces

The main feature of this site is the flash based image display, which is driven by a XML feed created from the database. For this I worked very closely with the designer who created the Flash movie and the structure of the XML feed.

Another area that took some work on this site was the image uploader, as the details were sent to both to the site database and also to an outside party, which I implemented using cURL. This was an interesting challenge and involved quickly learning a technology, which I enjoyed.

JPF Flowers

A lot of analysis was carried out on this site which I then followed and put into place, so myself and the analyst worked very closely together on this project. This was a complex site as there are two very different ordering processes being used by the company, but these have been very carefully interwoven so that the customer is not aware of this and so can carry out their purchases using one-streamlined system.

This complexity also has an impact on the admin system for the site, which is used for invoicing, delivery routes, ordering, etc. However the admin system again is quite streamlined, removing the complexity for the client, which took a lot of time to implement to make sure that as much as possible is automated by the system.

Hilden Design Ltd

The is the site for Hilden Design, a previous employer and shows the work that I did alongside the work of their graphic designers. It is also a good example of a quick makeover as the site was completely redesigned from a simple flat brochure design while the designers were at an exhibition. I wasn't aware of the re-branding that been carried out and suddenly our Director appeared with the brochure and asked me to make the site over to match so there wouldn't be any discrepancies between what was happening at the exhibition and the website.

A few improvements were later made but overall the layout was from that rapid 2 day re-design, until recently.

Hilden Ltd

This is a full e-commerce, database driven site, with a CMS system for product updates, which I was fully responsible for creating.

The site has a news section which is updated on a regular basis and more sections are being added all the time, with the site being used as a marketing tool for Hilden, who are the manufacturers of table, bed, bath and kitchen linen.

This site uses PHP, MySQL, XHTML, CSS, JavaScript and AJAX, with the payments being processed through WorldPay.

The site has moved on since I worked on it in terms of design, but the majority of the code being used to run the site is the code that I created when I developed the site.

Liddell

This is currently a static site which acts as an on-line version of their various brochures.

The styling of the site was largely determined by the design of the brochure as the company wanted them to be as similar as possible. Customers can request brochures on-line and make enquiries about products.

Affinity Housing

The main request for this site was that it was a very clean and simple layout, based upon their logo. As this is a site for a housing agency we also had to ensure that it complies with disability legislation, and I also added accesskeys to the menu tabs to further assist with this.

The site has a link through to an on-line payment system which is maintained by the Council with whom Affinity work, and also allows tenants to report problems and request repairs, and download various documentation relevant to their tenancy.

Lancashire Food Festival

Now having just had it's 9th year the Food Festival is going from strength to strength and where they originally only used to run the website in the months leading to the festival we spoke to them and showed them the value of keeping the site running throughout the year.

Although the main traffic to the site is in the months prior to and following the event we have added a contact form for both visitors and exhibitors which is used throughout the year, which has helped the even to grow even further.

Hopefully in the future a gallery will be added to show images from previous years to give new visitors a flavour of what they have missed and what is to come, and will let previous visitors remember fond memories and bring them back for another year.

Again as this festival is run by the local council the site was designed to be disability compliant with a clean look without being too contemporary, as the feel of the festival is of days gone by mixed with flavours of today, which I feel we have achieved.

Mumbaiuk.com

Having most of your clients in other countries can make marketing difficult, and websites are the ideal tool to be able to reach throughout the globe. Here the Mumbaiuk site is used as a showcase for products and gives details of the products provided along with a gallery.

The gallery allows clients to see fabric designs online, reducing the number of swatches that are sent out unnecessarily and hence reducing the companies running costs. Also available on-line are the companies safety certificates which can viewed and or printed easily, again removing the need for them to be posted out.

Black Sheep Textiles

Although this is just a site consisting of just a contact form and address details the client wanted something striking that fitted in with the existing logo.

As this logo is in black and white it doesn't give a lot of scope in terms of colour, but we kept the lettering style clean and simple, as per their currently selected typeface, and kept the capitalisation on the buttons, and gave the client a site they are happy with.

Steven Hargreaves Textile Group

This a simple one page site that is really more of a holding page, and gives details of the company and the work it carries out. A little design interest is added by the use of a simple animated image being used for the bullet points, and a woven effect background, which ties in with the company background in textiles.

Oswaldtwistle Mills

Again the design of this site was very heavily influenced by their brochure, and the site has a complete re-work at least once every twelve months when the brochure is re-issued.

Due to this the current site is due to have a complete change over to a Content Managed System, which will allow for things that change on a monthly basis much more easily and by the staff themselves. Also coming soon is an on-line shopping facility, which will allow customers to buy from any or all of the shops within the Mill, but only have to pay once through a combined shopping basket.

In its current format the site provides a great deal of information, and it has quite a lot of visitors so the dynamic elements should only help to improve the site as it will be constantly updated.

Karen Tems

The main design for this site was carried out before I started to work for the company, but I have made several revisions, such as moving the banner and company logo to the top of the screen from the bottom.

Overall the site works well, but many of the effects that are currently achieved with PHP and JavaScript could now be done with CSS, and would result in a faster loading site. The design of the site ties in well with the company logo, and the site is good for providing information about the many courses provided by the company.

Original Fabrics

The design for this site was initially created by the graphics team at Hilden Design, and then worked with them and the client to determine the placement of items such as menus. Again this is another site that was created several years ago, and were I to do this site today I would use style sheets instead of tables to create the site.

Galleries are provided of the fabrics provided by the company, with swatch requests and specific enquiries about ranges all being catered for within the site. From the gallery the details about a specific fabric range can be displayed and fabrics could be clicked on to see an enlarged, more detailed view, however this fuction was later removed.

The rest of the site is given over to company and fabric information, with care instructions and certificates for the companies products being all provided on-line.

Plates of Distinction

This site has had many redesigns and looks, but the main work I have carried out on here is the development work, which is still being used today. The site uses PHP, CSS, MySQL and JavaScript to allow a user to search for their chosen number plate from both the company database of thousands and the DVLA database of over 21 million. The searches can be carried out in three different ways, including a natural search where the user types in a chosen word or name.

These plates are then displayed in the format they would appear if purchased, with clients being able to design their plates by able to choose from borders, flags, etc. and being able to see the finished effect prior to purchase. Customers are able to complete the full purchase procedure through the site, with the payments being handled by WorldPay.

John M Bradbury Art

My work on this site was to give the site a complete re-work and make it look more professional and business-like, but still keep an artistic feel.

Also the original site used frames and my client was finding these a little difficult to work with, as he now carries out much of the work himself. The main challenge with this was the gallery, as I needed to create a system that could be easily updated, using only JavaScript.

As the site is primarily a showcase for John's Artwork the galleries are an important part of the site and the display of the enlarged images including a frame and mount, created with CSS styling, gives an authentic and professional finish.

Realizations

Hopefully this is a Life Coaching site with a difference, although it is primarily a vehicle to allow the coach to gain new clients we felt that it was important to provide information not only about what was in the courses, but about what life coaching actually is.

When I was given the brief for the site all I had was the style of the title 'Realizations' the eye logo, and an image of a sunrise/sunset. The site had to be clean and simple, with the information being the key focus, and I think that we have achieved this, but also added some interest to the front page with the animated Wheel of Life. This feature works well as it attracts attention, but also provides useful information, and as it uses CSS rather than any coding the effect is quick to load and work.