Link

The process was relatively straightforward – meet with client to assess needs and goals from old site to new (much more visual content, larger videos, easy administration), decide on an appropriate design structure (in this case, a WordPress theme served as a basic template, from which many tweaks and changes were made), deal with a server changeover and build it up, checking in with the client at regular intervals to make sure that things looked ok.

I have to say, having a positive, easy-to-work-with client and some great source materials made this job a real pleasure. While my last job for Freeman Energy Corporation (disclosure: I am an employee of FEC) was also an easy and straightforward approach to a business website, having such great photography and working with some flash integration gave this recent job much more satisfying results.

Thus ends my first web design gig since arriving in L.A. I’m hoping to pick up a few more while looking for jobs in the solar industry, as it’s a pretty painless way to pay the rent.

No, you haven’t clicked on the wrong bookmark – this is the one and only What-What.com; I’ve just given it a long-overdue theme update.

[Warning: Geek-out area starts here] After scouring for hours on the WordPress Themes area, trying theme after theme both there and here – even going so far as to tweak various aspects of the html to fit the basic tenets of my visual style for this blog, such as proper width (for fitting photos and videos), sidebar composition, removal/obfuscation of various linklove items, header resizing and so on – I finally (on page 17, of 34) came across this theme, called “Ahimsa”, which struck me as being almost precisely the look I had going with the previous theme (called “Borderline Chaos”, may it rest in bits and peaces), but in a brighter, rounder and way-more web 2.0 friendly package. I think it fits so well that I’m even leaving in the coder’s linklove (see bottom right)! I also kept a few other themes in case this one begins to grate in a few weeks. [Geek-out area ends]

The big thing that this update allows me to do is use Widgets, which are various sidebar items, in a much more flexible way. And if you don’t like that sidebar, you can even hide it by clicking on the label at its top left. Sweetness.

The last thing to know is that the theme is optimized for Firefox, Safari and Chrome. Sorry Explorer, you’re way too square!

And now, back to our regularly scheduled programming.

In recent news, I spent the New Year in New York City, that lovely metropolis, with my good old buddy Peter and his film-school friends and my (baby) cousin, who is now a first year at NYU. We had a terrific house party, or so I am told. I was lucky enough to be able to crash free of charge at the Brooklyn apartment of a guy I worked with for 6 months – about 8 years ago – at Zeff Photo Supply.

Now, what’s new for the Def Selector in 2009? Just about everything. Since getting back from Europe last summer, I’ve been working on digitizing a selection of my grandfather’s slide collection. I’ve estimated the overall collection at something like 15,000 pictures, and will probably have about 850-900 of them scanned, after which I am going to show them to my grandparents and record the “director commentary”, for use in a chaptered DVD. While my original goal was to finish by Christmas ’08, I failed miserably, and am now hoping to get it done by the end of January (still pretty iffy). Then an even bigger change is in the works. But I don’t want to jinx it so I will let it sit for the moment.

Stay tuned for more heavily-reposted weekly media, more inane time-wasting links, and more mediocre photography! Although in terms of the last, it will be less mediocre now that I have a stellar new lens! And for now, please enjoy the following brief selected photographs, by Howard G. Freeman. More to come!

“Hi, I’m the What-What dot com favicon!”

Previously:

So it’s long past due for me to add a “favicon” to this site. What is a favicon, you ask? A favicon is the little icon that appears next to the web address of a website, as well as on your favorites list. It adds a small visual distinctiveness to an otherwise cluttered mess of text-based links.

See some examples of where favicons go by clicking here and here.

I have gone through a lot of my photographs from over the years and come up with a few ideas, all of which I feel describe myself and/or this website in some way. Vote for your favorite, or if none of them really mean anything to you, suggest a concept in the comments and I’ll see what I can do.

Here are the candidates:

“He-No” face – a Japanese way of drawing a face using hiragana

“Rebel stencil” – from Kuta Beach, Bali

“Glasses stencil” – from above the tunnel in Budapest

“Lenin Sun” – from Statue park, Budapest

“Lotus” – from somewhere in Japan

“Fish graffiti” – from Padova, Italy

“Peace rap” – from somewhere in Romania

One thing to keep in mind is that a favicon is displayed usually at 16×16 pixels, or one-quarter the size of what you see here. That’s the reason I’ve kept them so small.

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