The Band Website
December 16, 2009
Editing and finalising
December 16, 2009
Now that everything is coming together, and all pages are beginning to find there place. All that needs to be done now is a double check over of all links to each page and links to other sites outside of the band website. As well as making sure that the music and video player are in check.
The only thing that I couldn’t bring myself to further was the forum page and log in option. At the moment it only stands as a prototype, not as a working function.
As for sticky content this would be most effective when working, as it can involve the audience with the band, making it easy to regularly update the audience via email and blogs, Socializing in the same content as Twitter, Facebook or MySpace.
Another item to add, when transferring the final artifact folder to the cd disk, it failed to incorporate the transparency background to the content div tag on each page. Sadly this affects my original intension of my design, but doesn’t affect the purpose of the site.
All in all this has been a learning experience, dealing with new software as well as old. It has furthered my design skills, using social sites for marketing purposes, learning the standards and functions of interface design.
My Meta tags
December 16, 2009
What i can use from the research now is to form my own keywords and create my title page.
The Light Cascades// Official Site. Indie, Pop, Electro band based in the midlands.
Meta tags
December 16, 2009
Metadata is information about data.
The <meta> tag provides metadata about the HTML document. Metadata will not be displayed on the page, but will be machine parsable.
Meta elements are typically used to specify page description, keywords, author of the document, last modified, and other metadata.
The <meta> tag always goes inside the head element.
The metadata can be used by browsers (how to display content or reload page), search engines (keywords), or other web services.
Band research
Home
</title>
<meta http-equiv=”X-UA-Compatible” content=”IE=EmulateIE7″ />
<meta http-equiv=”content-type” content=”text/html; charset=utf-8″ />
<meta name=”robots” content=”NOODP” />
<meta name=”Description” content=”The Official Website of The Killers. Featuring band blogs, exclusive photos, and much more.” />
The Cure : Official Site
</title>
<meta content=”ABQIAAAAG4j3DPKNOhvG76CQeDu3_xQH68w_2rzxk1t-y9i_yypYFu1znhRKrjYk_4irFq5amF-D-6CJBBlMrQ” />
<meta content=”ABQIAAAAG4j3DPKNOhvG76CQeDu3_xT88PdHJaaQjpEv_X-ke8DGBbf96RRv1PUSiVsvb01dzx05BRqF1KFjMQ” />
<meta content=”ABQIAAAAl5wO-tMRi8nvVWVDUvrRjBTwBfNtIUw4B4qlLVx8uWtHlbj1HBR7Kw9KcK0BVXtrZrVI76kt6n68Lg
<meta http-equiv=”content-type” content=”text/html; charset=iso-8859-1″ />
<meta http-equiv=”pragma” content=”no-cache” />
<meta name=”robots” content=”all” />
<meta name=”mssmarttagspreventparsing” content=”true” />
<meta name=”title” content=”Bloc Party : Home” />
<meta name=”description” content=”Bloc Party Home” />
<meta name=”keywords” content=”home,bloc party” />
<meta name=”author” content=”RetroFuzz – http://www.retrofuzz.com/” />
<link rel=”alternate” type=”application/rss+xml” title=”Bloc Party RSS Feed” href=”http://www.blocparty.com/rss.php” />
Flash
December 16, 2009
Here displays the sequence of the header title that was created in Flash. What I have done to achieve this motion, is began with modifying the document size to the same as in Dreamweaver, set it as 12 frames and changed the background to black, as this will be transparent when in Dreamweaver. The next stage was to separate the text from each other, allowing “the cascades” to stay as normal, where as the word “light” will change over time. By inserting a keyframe in each second of time and only selecting “light”, I increased the strength and intensity glow of the text, beginning slow and subtle working its way through stronger and bolder, producing a flash of light, enhancing the word and fading back down to its original form. This then was published and exported to Dreamweaver, displaying an effected band title.
Usability and Accessibility
December 14, 2009
The purpose for usability and accessibility when building a web site is entirely for the audience enjoyment. Usability refers to clarity within the interaction of a computer program or a web site design. Usability is to do with the layout, language and structure of the site. Producing something that is easy to use, that confuse and irritate the viewer. Accessibility is a general term used to describe the degree to which a product, device, service, or environment is accessible by as many people as possible. Accessibility is often used to focus on people with disabilities and their right of access to entities, often through use of assistive technology. So in this case the accessibility for a band web site will need to specify any importance within the content, whether that may be images, videos, music etc. The listed sites below summarizes 10 key concepts of usability and accessibility in Web design.
Internet marketing and promotion
December 14, 2009
For any product that is being advertised or sold the first place to look is the internet. The internet is the biggest social society to discuss/debate issues/happenings, reviewing technology, artists, t.v. etc. It connects you to a global audience which in turn is the best place to start promoting your own ideas and creations. In my case promoting a music group, is something that is popular with the current situation with the internet. People now have easy access to new and exciting bands from all over the world downloading free music for your listening pleasure. The social networking services are expanding and developing rapidly sites such as:
http://www.myspace.com/thelightcascades
http://www.last.fm/music/The+Light+Cascades
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Light-Cascades/31377759497
In the process of creating a account.
They all provide a free service that enables its users to send and read messages to one and other to voice opinions, to share love for music, film, books etc. It’s a place that can market your product and develop a fan base, Which can grow if you maintain and update your appearance/status reaching your target auidence.
Template
December 14, 2009
Once my template is complete with its header using flash, a menu bar containing 9 pages, a log in bar, a space for content, a copyright statement at the bottom and linked each page to it html title. I will then copy the template 8 times for each individual page changing its content. For pages like Music and Video, it needs to display music mp3 files and video content. The sites I found useful and instructed me to create a music flash player and to convert youtube videos to dreamweaver are listed below.
Music player.
http://creativetechs.com/tipsblog/embed-a-free-flash-mp3-player-on-your-blog/
Youtube videos.
Dreamweaver
November 17, 2009
The next step of this process is to convert my choosen design and aply it to Dreamweaver, working with the programs html, css and flash. This consisting of a wrapper which acts as a container, storing all the components such as a header, menu, content etc. For each components to be created it needs the use of a div tag which distinguishes the size, position, colour, background and text.
Div tags
I will firstly begin the structure of my site, beginning with the header “thelightcascades”, as this is the main focus of the site it needs to stand out to the viewer and what I intent to use is flash. If you were to imagine the bold font of the title to appear a change in brightness, slowly glowing in and out, enhancing the word “light“. Creating a sence of movement within the site.
Below will be the navigation bar a list of what the site has to offer. Also incorporating a similar use of flash again, having each content light up as when a viewer hovers his/hers cursor over text. Allowing easier understanding as to which page you are clicking on.
For my contents div tag im going to have to add a source code that allows me to turn my background transparent, enabling me to still keep the original background but with a lighter colour as well as displaying text that can be easily be read. What I’ve took from the use of my tutorials and research on the internet is a site that explains and demonstrates how to go about squencing the code with css.
http://www.w3schools.com/Css/css_image_transparency.asp
This will also hold images and links to downloads.
