Bene

A couple of weeks ago, Kevin from ThisConnect (my partner company) asked me if I was interested in designing a logo, stationary and a web design for a Brussels based photo studio. I took the offer and started with the project. This week, I delivered the last piece of the project, and i thought i share the design process.

Last week, I signed up for a Typekit account, the web font-service with lots of great fonts. There is also a gallery available with examples on how you can implement typefaces in your webdesign.
I experimented a bit with the design from my previous post and tested a few fonts available from Typekit.

Since several months, i’m reading - in between client work - about the HTML 5 and CSS 3 specifications. Many blog writers encourage web designers to implement - already - some of the new HTML 5 and CSS 3 features in their websites (progressive enhancement).

One of the websites I made in the spring of 2009 was for a Belgian contemporary artist/painter/illustrator and friend of mine, Benoît van Innis. His website is a portfolio of his artworks and projects.
Recently, I did an interview with Benoît, asking about his work method and the things inspiring him.
The interview was done in Dutch but i’m translating it to English. (I’m not a native English speaker, I appreciate your correction/comment)

One of the many New Year’s Resolutions I made this year, is to blog more. I want my readers to know about the projects i’m working on this year. On of the websites I made in 2009 was for a Belgian contemporary artist and friend of mine, Dirk Zoete. His website is a portfolio of his artworks and projects. I really enjoyed making this website.

Dirk Zoete’s gallery is currently Annie Gentils in Antwerp.

Recently, I did an interview with Dirk, asking about his work method and the things inspiring him.

The interview was done in Dutch but i’m translating it to English. (I’m not a native English speaker, I appreciate your correction/comment)

Some time ago, a client asked me to do a “green” logo, meaning it had to reflect ‘eco-friendliness’, ‘connected to earth’, ‘nature’ and so on. I liked his briefing and decided to go for it. After doing some research and gathering some ideas and inspiration I started to draw and color.While I was looking for the ‘right’ green color, I found out that it’s hard to find a beautiful green. It took me a long time to decide what green I should use. I created a Graceful Green Flickr gallery to collect inspiration from the color green and the green idea.

Yesterday, a person on Twitter was complaining about the fact that some other company/person had stolen his/her avatar. It resembled the original avatar quite a lot. In fact, there are a lot of avatars with the same look, same colors etc… I think you can avoid having your avatar looking similar to others if you spend a little more time when you choose your avatar and look for some ways to be more unique, more special, more attractive ...

The last couple of weeks, I redesigned a few websites. This websites existed for a few years but needed a redesign. The fact that they were initially made in Flash came also into play. The website owners asked me to convert them into websites with a back-end that they can administer. For all of these website, I used ExpressionEngine as CMS.

Some points in my schedule are essential to me for every new project. Here’s how i plan new projects. It is essential for an independent web designer - like myself - to have it as smooth as possible, your project and client will benefit from a good preparation and open communication. But how do you prepare for a project and how do you set goals?

A quick way to navigate through websites on your iPhone is with custom icons. If you have a Home Screen on your iPhone dedicated to websites you frequently visit, it is nice when the website has a custom icon. So I decided to make a custom icon for this website. With just 1 line of code and a .png file the job is done.