VINTOM - Salem Oregon Web Design by Vin Thomas

Vote For Vintom For Best of Mid-Valley

Vin Thomas — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 15:34:56 +0000

I’ve been nominated once again for Best Web Designer in the mid-valley by the Statesman Journal. I won last year, but it looks like there are a ton more nominees this go around. If you’re not from Salem, this is kind of a big deal, so I NEED YOUR VOTE!

I have worked with a handful of amazing local clients this year. To name a few:

If you agree that Vintom provides the best web-design in the mid-valley, PLEASE VOTE NOW!

WordPress Plugins I Always Use

Vin Thomas — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 18:45:56 +0000

There are a few WordPress plugins that I love so much that I pretty much install them on every site I work on.

What WordPress plugins do you use all the time?

PS. It sure would be nice if I could save this bundle somewhere and install them all with one click like you can with Firefox Add-Ons.

Free Resource — CD Cover Art

Vin Thomas — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 20:43:14 +0000

I recently worked on a couple musician sites. I was messing around in Photoshop trying to create a nice CD overlay. This one never made it to production, but I still thought it was a nice resource. Feel free to download this template and use it in your projects.

Download the Photoshop CD Album Overlay Template

Fixel — A New Collaborative Venture

Vin Thomas — Sat, 06 Nov 2010 15:01:52 +0000

Things have been great for Vintom during the last 3 years. Business has grown like crazy — I’ve grown a ton too as a designer and entrepreneur. I am really excited about a new venture I started with a good friend Josh Hemsley. Both of us have talked for the last year or so about how fun and exciting it would be to someday own a small design firm.

We’ve begun to put this plan into action. We’re starting as a virtual agency with collaboration. The team consists of some of the amazing and passionate guys I know. Check out the 5-man team on our blog.

We’re doing a LIVE LAUNCH next weekend. The team is travelling from all over the country to spend 3 days cooped-up in a beach house in Oregon. It’s going to be great. We’re inviting anyone who’s interested to follow along in many ways. Live Dev, Live Stream, Twitter, etc. Read more about Fixel Retreat on the blog.

Great things to come…

FreshPicd Live Development Experiment

Vin Thomas — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 19:23:24 +0000

I was inspired by Kyle Steed’s approach to the design of his new site. He did large chunks of the development live. I went back a few times throughout the course of a few days and would see new pages, illustrations, and fonts. Sometimes things wouldn’t look right, but 10 minutes later they’d be fixed. It was really cool to see how it all came together. I am going to take a similar approach to a new site I am working on: http://freshpicd.com.

My wife is an incredibly talented photographer. She has recently started to offer her services and has tons of local interest. You’d think that being married to a web-designer the first order of business would be to get a website up. But no, I have slacked majorly in this area.

I have done most of the design already. I have installed a pretty basic WordPress framework that I’ve created on her server, and I will be developing slowly throughout the week. You can follow the development on her site: http://freshpicd.com over the course of the next week or so. My goal is to have it launched by the end of next week (October 1st).

In the end, it will look something like this:

Easily Edit CSS Hover States with Firebug

Vin Thomas — Sun, 12 Sep 2010 22:51:20 +0000

Just a quick tip for all you web-designers out there who want an easy way to select and update CSS hover states using Firebug.

Life At The Agency

Vin Thomas — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 18:49:48 +0000

I have been at Waggener Edstrom for close to 2 months now. I’ve worked on a few really awesome projects and have started to get a grasp for what it’s like to work at an agency. I though I’d write a bit about my experience there so far and how it compares to freelancing.

First off, I really enjoy my team. I think one of the biggest factors in whether you’ll enjoy working at an agency is your team. I am lucky to have a good mix of disciplines, ages, men/women, and personalities on my team. While freelancing, I spend a lot of time sitting at a computer by myself. If creative community is what you’re after, you’ll probably enjoy working for an agency.

Secondly, I find that the creative atmosphere fuels my own creativity. Sometimes a co-worker will have an idea or insight into something that I missed. This can be a really good thing if used constructively. I was recently working on a project where the input of a co-worker greatly enhanced the final product. If it were left up to me alone, it probably wouldn’t have been as sharp.

And of course you can’t ignore the stability and benefits that come from agency work.

Working at an agency has it’s downsides too. For me, the biggest pitfall is the 2hr commute each day. That is time away from my family that I truly miss. When freelancing from home I have the ability to take breaks in the middle of the day to take my kids to the park or eat lunch with them. Gotta love that!

Another thing that I miss is working one-on-one with clients. Most of my freelance clients are small businesses, churches, or non-profit organizations. I work very hands-on with my clients and handle everything from project management, design, development, and site content. As an agency designer you’ll probably not interact a whole lot with the client. At least for me, when working on a project at the agency I deal mainly with a project manager who does all the leg-work. I miss the hands-on personal approach to dealing with clients.

So far it’s been great at Waggener Edstrom. We’ll see what the future has in store.

A Change On The Horizon

Vin Thomas — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 16:08:51 +0000

Last month I was contacted by three different companies who were interested in my work. I wasn’t searching for a new job, so it was a bit out of the blue for me. I figured it was worth checking into. I talked with all three companies, but really felt that one of them was a great fit. So starting on June 22nd, I will start working for Waggener Edstrom in Lake Oswego, OR as an Experience Designer.

They are a really great company and handle some pretty huge projects. I am excited to go to work there and work along side some amazingly talented people.

For the first 60 days I am going to be working 3 days per week so I can wrap up with some of the big projects I am working on now. After that, the plan is to go on full-time.

I am still going to take on freelance projects, but not at the volume I do now.

I’m thankful for this opportunity, and I look forward to joining the Waggener Edstrom team.

New Site Feature: Works In Progress

Vin Thomas — Fri, 14 May 2010 03:45:24 +0000

One of the things I wanted to include in the redesign of my site that launched this week was a place to feature the sites that I am currently working on. I toyed with a few ideas of how to do this. You’ll notice on my portfolio page that I now feature small clips of the sites I am working on. Enough to tease, but not too much since they are still underway.

The clips link to the same shot on Dribbble. If you haven’t heard of Dribbble yet, it is a great website where designers can post clips of what they are working on. Then other designers can comment and “like” the shot. It’s pretty cool. At this point you can’t comment unless you’ve been invited. But feel free to browse my portfolio.

If you are on Dribbble, make sure to connect with me there.

Best of the Mid-Valley 2010

Vin Thomas — Mon, 10 May 2010 19:22:20 +0000

A few weeks ago I was nominated for Best Web Designer of Mid-Valley in the Statesman Journal. The community has spoken and has nominated me as the Mid-Valley’s best.

I am really glad that the community likes my work and look forward to pumping out a bunch of great designs in the year to come.

Thanks for all who voted for me!

Check out the other winners.

PS. One of my clients (Paramount Real Estate) was voted Best Real Estate Agent of the Mid-Valley. Way to go guys!