Website design

Krysman25 wrote:

Hi everyone,

Is there anyone whose passion is website designing?

I would like to create my website but I don't know where to start so I need some advice.

I have the idea, I have drawn on paper how I would like it to be and I am ready for the next step.

This website would be created just for fun and to kill time on it (not much to do otherwise :x), nothing commercial so I don't plan to pay for any prestation :p

Thx!

Have you checked out any of the do-it-yourself sites, like THIS ONE? Free, easy and fun!

Good luck.

Go for wordpress/ blog, or buy a website domain from go daddy and find any freelancer many available in the market with low budget. Good luck

Webs. Com is free but for limited period and it won't allow you have  own domain name attached with their domain name, so it's useless

Buying a domain name is on the list.

Thank you Alliecat for the link but as Wilson derry said, it won't reaaly be "mine" and options are limited.

For Wordpress, I heard some options are also not free. Plus, I have a specific design and specific options I want to put on my website. That's why I want to talk about it to someone who will guide me to the appropriate tool. If the tools I want to implement are easy, I'll do it myself otherwise, I will see with a freelancer.

An idea on the price btw? :x (for a freelancer)

I can't really comment on the web designing freelancers, it depends what you are going implement php, flash, or simple html one page.
Try to search on google
freelance web designer in riyadh

I would recommend you start from Wordpress, if you have the time to spend on it, then you will realize that it's really easy to build a site from single page to as large as you want. The other platform is Joomla.

Customising these needs some time and focus but eventually you can find widgets that can get your objective done. There are free themes available plus you can find great premium themes for like $25-$45.

Basically for resources I would recommend: smashingmagazine.com, webdesignerdepot.com where you can find a lot of articles on wordpress

Another simple option to create a website is squarespace.com where you can make websites in a very easy way, along with hosting, but I personally feel that it has its limits and gets a bit expensive down the road.

For domain and hosting you can get great knowledge from webhostingtalk.com

My checklist and personal suggestions would be something like this.

Domain from name.com; (don't like godaddy, they are a bit of ripoff)
Hosting from stablehost or ovh (where this blog is also hosted). I always suggest to have hosting and domain name separate, in case you need to move down the line. Also having cpanel as you control panel will give you an ease of transfer as majority or hosting use it.

Website or blog platforms, wordpress, onepager, about.me, squarespace etc.

Wordpress themes: rockettheme, yootheme (large variety but with subscription, a bit tough to learn in the begining but you will realize that they are very very customisable).

Thanks for this exhaustive explanation!
I'll pick up wordpress. Plus, there is a large community using it so i think it will be easier for me to get answer if I need any help.

Wordpress is best to use for both static (never changing) and dynamic (changing content, such as blogs) content.

Some beginner web design/coding freelancers can start at 500 usd a project. I can code HTML, CSS, PHP, and am familiar with Wordpress and movable type; and I have fifteen years experience-- my rates started at 5000 usd for a basic site with blog (I only maintain my own sites now, though).

You can find freelance sites where you post the job and people "fight" for your business and you pick what you want to pay.

Good luck with whatever you choose!

Xenolol wrote:

Wordpress is best to use for both static (never changing) and dynamic (changing content, such as blogs) content.

Some beginner web design/coding freelancers can start at 500 usd a project. I can code HTML, CSS, PHP, and am familiar with Wordpress and movable type; and I have fifteen years experience-- my rates started at 5000 usd for a basic site with blog (I only maintain my own sites now, though).

You can find freelance sites where you post the job and people "fight" for your business and you pick what you want to pay.

Good luck with whatever you choose!

I wouldn't say wordpress is the best as it depends on so many factors, I would agree that its good for getting something online fast (amongst other things), but to me it sounds like the guy is interested in learning how to make a website himself, so in that case I would recommend to do it with photoshop and dreamweaver and a load of youtube tutorials. and $5000 is a bit harsh don't you think... as you mentioned sites like elance allow you to get things done for a few hundred dollars!

I indeed found some tutorials explaining how to make your own design on photoshop (I know how to use photoshop so that would be easier). The integration with CSS is the difficult part for me :p.

To put it in simple words, I know exactly how I want my website to look. (I'm currently drawing on paper all the pages design)
I just need someone to explain me the step to follow. For example :

1-Draw you design on Photoshop
2-Cut all the sections
3-Integrate it with CSS
....

Then, I will know what I can do myself, what I can learn to do and what I know I won't be able to do (and find someone to do it for me ^^).

From what I saw on wordpress, you have themes you can use but you can't really change them, you have to use their architecture.


I'm ready to speed up my drawings and organize a meeting to discuss about it around a cup of coffee/tea/chocolate/soup/chwarma/Kabsa/pizza/movie  :p

Krysman25 wrote:

I indeed found some tutorials explaining how to make your own design on photoshop (I know how to use photoshop so that would be easier). The integration with CSS is the difficult part for me :p.

To put it in simple words, I know exactly how I want my website to look. (I'm currently drawing on paper all the pages design)
I just need someone to explain me the step to follow. For example :

1-Draw you design on Photoshop
2-Cut all the sections
3-Integrate it with CSS
....

Then, I will know what I can do myself, what I can learn to do and what I know I won't be able to do (and find someone to do it for me ^^).

From what I saw on wordpress, you have themes you can use but you can't really change them, you have to use their architecture.


I'm ready to speed up my drawings and organize a meeting to discuss about it around a cup of coffee/tea/chocolate/soup/chwarma/Kabsa/pizza/movie  :p

hey,

1. So you first want to draw your website in photoshop like your making a poster. Just make sure you got the resolutions right so your site is not too small or too big. Just do it exactly as you would do a poster

2. you then use the splicing tool to define where you want the site to be broken up into smaller images

3. you then either save or export it, i cant remember exactly how you do it, but its not too hard, you then have options to actually convert the whole thing into a HMTL and CSS or Table website in one go. It does it all for you, so look on youtube for concert export psd to website or something along those lines.

What you should do as well as where you will have your text content make it like a big white image, then when you get to dreamweaver on your exported site you can delete this image from the design that will then allow you to actually write text where it was, you can make it as a background image too if its not a plain colour

I charge it and I get it (and better designers charge more). Good work is worth it. But, as I said, I don't work anymore. Not worth it dealing with customers.

Using Dreamweaver is a crutch. Having Wordpress and the code to look at and a Text file program will better aid in understanding how a website is built code wise. If you use Dreamweaver without understanding CSS and HTML you'll get very frustrated should something go wrong.

There are many tutorials on the web. If you want to learn fast look at them and find a website you like and study the code.

@Krysman25 if you require assistance let me know. I am more than willing to help (at no cost). Web design/coding is something I do for fun now.

Xenolol wrote:

. If you want to learn fast look at them and find a website you like and study the code.