Determining which prospects you want to work with is often considered a luxury. Don’t think of it that way. Even if the economy is in the tank and you absolutely need the gig, you should be very critical of the prospects you’re considering working with. These are the people who will become part of your immediate and potentially long-term future, and you want to make sure you don’t spend that time drinking schnapps to get through the day or grinding your teeth at night.

Remember: the prospect you’re considering is the client you’ll have.

Check out the full article: Getting to No

From Photoshop to Wordpress – Part II – Coding

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… lesson learned. I never thought it would have taken me so long to write it but life comes at you with unexpected road bumps and you just have to deal with it. From now on tho, if I ever do another series, I’ll make sure all the parts are written before publishing the first one.

I’m just so happy that it’s out there and I hope it will help some of you learn how to slice a Photoshop mockup.

Like anything else in Web Design, understand that this is merely one way of doing it. It’s how I’ve done it for the past 10 years and it’s worked great for me.

As for Part III, I’m starting it this week and I hope to publish it in the coming weeks.

Thank you for you patience!

Search Engine Optimization is not a legitimate form of marketing. It should not be undertaken by people with brains or souls. If someone charges you for SEO, you have been conned.

Visit: Spammers, Evildoers, and Opportunists

We all want really nice looking web typography, and there’s a ton of solutions out there. Here’s mine. I’ve to warn you, it’s very lo-tech. It’s done with images. But with really nice ones.

Visit: textorize: Pristine Font rendering for the Web

This project was started last year when Jacob proposed it to Linda and myself. Actually, I suggest “Draft 1″ back in February of this year but the whole company name, domain, etc… was started late 2008.

Anyways, it was a long time coming especially when all 3 of us have day jobs. The time devoted to all things The Web Squeeze is pretty slim. But we made it! And we’ll be starting the whole process all over again with another booming project

Now… go get awesome hosting from Collision Hosting!!!

September being one month before the HTML5 spec goes to last call in October, there’s been a few significant changes to the HTML5 spec that we wanted to briefly share with our patients.

Visit: September HTML5 spec changes

I usually never do much in the summer because that sun is just way too inviting to stay indoors, but this year it’s been a pretty crappy summer… around here anyways. Well… enough about the weather and on to why and what’s going on.

First off, the blog will be changing a bit in the coming days, weeks, months? as I really think I’ll be going for a more “tumblelog” effect. Adii’s re-designed blog is really inspiring and I’ve been thinking about doing this for quite some time. Now to see it in action gives me the added “humph” to do it to mine. The design in itself will probably very similar as I’m quite liking these colors so it’s more a re-arrangement of the actual content that will be taking the heat.

Secondly, since launching my portfolio last month, I’ve had quite a few job inquiries so that’s really great. And I’ve had lots of great comments on it too! Bonus! I’m also planning on writing a bit on the design process for it as well. Things like why I went with WP, colors selection, etc… These are all things that I LOVE to hear about from other designers so hopefully others will enjoy what I have to say as well.

Third, over at The Web Squeeze, we’re working like crazy to get our newest project off the ground. We’re really shooting for a September 1st launch and that’s in 2 weeks!!! *gasp* We still have quite a lot to do but we have such a great team that I’m sure we’ll make it! *crosses fingers*

Lastly, with the above 2 points taking all of my time, I still haven’t finished that dreaded Part II tutorial. I know people are getting antsy… I am too and I totally understand. There’s really nothing more to say on the subject except that I hope you’ll all enjoy Part II.

So that’s it. Stay tuned!

I pretty much stuck to the mock-up I had originally planed, except for the little “My Work” section. I decided to keep the sidebar intact throughout the site instead.

I’ve also added a Blog portion where I’ll talk about client work and process behind certain designs.

Anyways… I’m really proud of this. What I like best is the different colors I used. I think that teal banner really makes it stand out more.

Let me know what you think and if you’ve run into some problems with it.

Yep… I’m talking about my tutorial series I started at The Web Squeeze “From Photoshop To Wordpress” where the first one is about Design. Originally, I had planned to do all three (Design, Coding, WP) a month apart. That was the plan. But as I heard once before:  The Devil laughs when one plans ahead.

No kidding!

So why am I so late in releasing Part II – Coding? It’s the age-old excuse: lack of time.

Some of you may think it’s a poor one but that’s the only one I got. Unfortunately, I don’t have all day to write articles and tutorials. I actually have 9-5 job outside of my web design hobby and The Web Squeeze. I have a daughter that’s growing up too fast that I like to spend my time with when I get home from work ’til I put her to bed. I still play soccer and that’s something I doubt I’ll ever stop doing any time soon. And now summer is here and week-ends are spent as far away from the computer as I can.

On top of all that, I have clients that need stuff from me and new ones coming in now and then.

The good news is I’m learning. I’m learning to manage my time better and I’m learning that, like I said above, if you plan on releasing a Series of tutorials, do them all at once.

One more good news is that I’m 90% done with Part II.

I’ve known of the site from a while back but it didn’t make an impression with me at all back then. The design look quite outdated and I didn’t think it would take off. DesignFloat did the job for me; it looked good, alot of people on twitter used it and it supplied me with endless amounts of reading.

That’s until it started to crash… monthly, then weekly and then daily. That was getting annoying. People on twitter were getting annoyed and well… I just stopped going there and submit articles.

Then I noticed in my Flickr home page that Chris Spooner had this great looking logo up there and I couldn’t wait to see the rest. Finally, they launched the new design last week and I’m finding myself looking at it everyday.

Now let’s hope they have a good server (or a few) and keep the service up.