2010August 11th: Designing for iPadAugust 11th: More insulation servicesJuly 14th: Inspire 2010June 25th: Jamieson Brothers WholesaleMay 14th: Thermal surveys, interior designMarch 26th: After Effects video productionMarch 19th: Conference video servicesFebruary 18th: ecoInsulateFebruary 4th: Busy, busy, busy2009
December 21st: JBA Seed PotatoesDecember 4th: client databasesOctober 26th: deliberationOctober 21st: helping the helpersSeptember 25th: high techSeptember 7th: cyclic career pathsAugust 19th: packaging designAugust 7th: anyone for a lock-in?July 2nd: swimming with sharksJune 25th: handle with careJune 25th: peter delves associatesJune 15th: welcome to the new siteMay 21st: switching on the lightApril 30th: hanging aroundApril 10th: morgan imagesMarch 24th: time machineMarch 13th: vma awards 2009February 2nd: reach for the starsJanuary 27th: eskdale solutionsJanuary 1st: happy hogmany2008
November 10th: eskdale roofingNovember 6th: getting iloadedNovember 2nd: stuart sprayOctober 31st: wee print jobsSeptember 22nd: callistiSeptember 4th: solwaybankJuly 24th: what's kit doing?June 30th: central hotelJune 1st: Welcome to the site
December 21st: JBA Seed PotatoesDecember 4th: client databasesOctober 26th: deliberationOctober 21st: helping the helpersSeptember 25th: high techSeptember 7th: cyclic career pathsAugust 19th: packaging designAugust 7th: anyone for a lock-in?July 2nd: swimming with sharksJune 25th: handle with careJune 25th: peter delves associatesJune 15th: welcome to the new siteMay 21st: switching on the lightApril 30th: hanging aroundApril 10th: morgan imagesMarch 24th: time machineMarch 13th: vma awards 2009February 2nd: reach for the starsJanuary 27th: eskdale solutionsJanuary 1st: happy hogmany2008
November 10th: eskdale roofingNovember 6th: getting iloadedNovember 2nd: stuart sprayOctober 31st: wee print jobsSeptember 22nd: callistiSeptember 4th: solwaybankJuly 24th: what's kit doing?June 30th: central hotelJune 1st: Welcome to the site
August 11th 2010: Designing for iPad
So we've recently got our hands on our very own iPad, adding to the ridiculous pile of Apple hardware in our home/business (two MacBooks, two iPods, an iPhone (two if you include the one lost in a field somewhere) a Mac Mini, an ancient eMac and a filing cabinet full of peripherals).
It's a gorgeous bit of kit - as Mr Jobs says, it's totally lovely to browse the web on, and Google Earth is just a joy to play with - and throws up a few interesting design and code issues too:
Another new resolution to design for. In fact, there's two, thanks to the iPad's magical rotating feature. Screen resolutions have been gaining width steadily for a while, and the prevailing habit has been to think of the 'fold' as a point at which to bury less important content; in Portrait mode, this is no more.
No more Flash navigation. Whatever your thoughts on the iOS Flash debate, it's good to see something finally kicking this horrid habit out. If it isn't coded, it isn't there. No support for Flash video, either, of course: I'll be following the lead of YouTube and using .h264 from here on.
Some interesting CSS issues. For instance, Mobile Safari doesn't do fixed positioning: it shows you the proportion of the website which fits on screen and treats what you can see as a 'viewpoint'. So if you've got something strapped to the bottom of your web page, it's going to stay at the bottom of the page. When you scroll, you ain't going to see it no more.
It's pleasing to see, though, that every site I've worked on over the past few years works OK on iPad. That's what standards-compliance is for...
No comments.
August 11th 2010: More insulation services
Solway Insulation is a new launch this month - a fairly simple but attractive site for a company which is fast-expanding in the region. The man in charge of this particular company was one of my first clients, from way back in 2002: doesn't time fly.
This is a first outing for Unify, which is a fairly nifty bit of database-free content editing software which lets the client edit the site in a wysiwyg format, without altering the overall structure of the site. We're still working out how to make this run with include files and friendly URL strucures, but it looks like a potentially useful bit of software for the future.
Technologies: CSS, xHTML, PHP, Unify.
No comments.
July 14th 2010: Inspire 2010
I managed to finish my first two terms as a lecturer without losing any more of my hair - although switching to lecturing one day a week probably helped.
At the end of last term the Creative Industries department hosted an exhibition to showcase students work: our web development work was a part of this. We built a showcase website to host student sites on which was displayed in one of our development labs: the site is now viewable online too.
I hope my students learned something over the last few months; I certainly learned a lot...
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June 25th 2010: Jamieson Brothers Wholesale
I've been working with JBA Seed Potatoes a lot this month, building new systems and functionality into their front-end website and stock control systems. This is one of the sites we've recently launched: Seed Potato Merchants, a new channel to market for the company.
We had to do some tricky Javascript and jQuery work to make the user interface a bit more friendly - there's a lot of data being pushed at the user here - and quite a lot of preparation to make the existing (ASP) back end systems work with the new (PHP) front end.
We're now going to work on taking all the new features we've built - including customer accounts and order tracking - and work this back into some more projects for the company, which should continue to keep us busy...
1 comment.
May 14th 2010: Thermal surveys, interior design
It's been a bit quiet round here of late, the reason being that I've just been far too busy to update. Which isn't best practice, I know, but it's been a bit crazy of late.
I've just launched a couple of new sites in the last couple of weeks:
Thermal Image Surveys is a new offshoot from the ecoInsulate family, offering - as the name would suggest - thermal imaging surveys for domestic and commercial users. We built a heavily customised Wordpress system, shunning the standard template system to craft a new front end which supports multiple columns, friendly URL structures, and client-editable meta data: a totally custom front end with the stability of a Wordpress backend system. I'll be interested to see how it performs in SEO terms.
We've also just set up a nice simple site for Joy Jack Interior Design. Joy has been working in the region for almost 30 years, and wanted a simple, minimal design to show off her interior design work, which we launched earlier this month.
There's a whole host of other work on the books at the moment, including some serious new developments for JBA, a fun creative video project, and a couple of other websites which I can't talk about until they launch!
I'm now booked up with freelance work until July, so unfortunately I can't take on any other design contracts until this time, although I'm happy to advise as a consultant, and provide hosting/email services. As always, the best thing is to get in touch.
1 comment.
March 26th 2010: After Effects video production
Just finished some video work for JBA, a long-term client who are keeping me very busy this year. This 10-minute video was shot on location in a local garden centre; the ident at the start and end were created using Photoshop and After Effects, and the titles put together using Final Cut Pro. A fun little project which came out looking pretty good!
Readers with children might pick up on the influence for the ident - thank you CBeebies. You can view the video on JBA's website or their YouTube channel.
1 comment.
March 19th 2010: Conference video services
I've been hired by the Crichton Development Company this month to provide video services for the Ladyfield Charette - a series of public meetings which took place to allow residents and developers to work together to come up with a sustainable development plan for the local area.
The process was carried out with the incredibly talented team at DPZ Consulting, and consisted of five days of development, with three presentations held in different locations on the Crichton estate. We worked with both companies to provide full video coverage of the presentations, even producing an 80 minute DVD of the final presentation within a 12-hour turnaround for the following day's events.
1 comment.
February 18th 2010: ecoInsulate
Launched this month is the new site for ecoInsulate Ltd, an environmentally friendly insulation company. The company has a pretty cool insulation system which is water-based and chemical-free: apparently one of the most efficient insulation systems on the market today.
We wanted to develop something that stood out a bit, so built a visual around the 'Morning, Noon and Night' slogan: some PHP/Javascript wizardry built a system which changes the look of the site depending on the time a user visits (you can bypass this by clicking on the little icons at the top of the page).
A nice little project, and one which we're hoping should bring in lots of new business for this up-and-coming company.
1 comment.
February 4th 2010: Busy, busy, busy
It's been quite quiet in the blogosphere for the last few weeks. In my defense, the day after my last post, my third daughter Emily was born, and we've been coping without very much sleep for the last six weeks.
Workwise, I'm pretty booked up for the next couple of months. I'm accepting freelance work from mid-March onwards, but realistically I won't be taking on any more contracts until April. I've got two database/tracking systems in development, three ongoing website development contracts, a video project and a couple of ongoing support contracts to take care of.
There should be a couple of new sites appearing in the portfolio over the next few weeks, so check back soon - if you're looking for a freelance web or media designer, book now before the rest of my spring schedule gets booked up...
2 comments.
December 21st 2009: JBA Seed Potatoes
After a long development cycle, we finally launched JBA Seed Potatoes today. I've been working with JBA for a good three years now, building the original website and doing loads of design work for them over the years.
The new site matches the branding we worked on back in August and is complimented with a new Guide which I worked on with Hoggett Creative over the autumn. We kept a few styling tweaks from the original JBA website but built a whole new organisational system in the back end to make updates easier, and streamlined the ordering process using a new user flow and liberal use of Javascript for client interaction.
We'll be working together in the new year to roll out updates as an ongoing project, so keep an eye out for more exciting developments in the tuber world...
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all my clients, past and present!
No comments.
December 4th 2009: client databases
I've been working on a client database for a long-term customer for the past few weeks. I can't give out too many details on the project for data sensitivity issues, but the database is built to let the company access client data fast and securely online.
It's been built on a MySQL database with two layers of password protection for security, and uses jQuery effects to speed up user interaction time. An interesting project, all in.
4 comments.
October 26th 2009: deliberation
we recently launched the new site for deliberate, a london-based pr company with an impressive client list. we took the original flash design and translated it into standards-compliant xhtml/css, before polishing it up with a few wee jquery effects. a fun little job: looking forward to working with benjamin and co again soon.
No comments.
October 21st 2009: helping the helpers
the carers' centre website launched this month - a joint collaboration with the princess trust for carers and abbey group. it's a uk-wide resource for unpaid carers, to let them know more about available benefits, and allowing them to network with other professionals in the industry. traffic is looking fairly amazing already.
1 comment.
September 25th 2009: high tech
a new addition to the portfolio is hytek cars in dumfries. we carried out a facelift and some usability upgrades on the site, using its existing backend system but cleaning up frontend content: you can see a comparison between old and new here.
hytek's site is built using drupal: a bit of a baptism of fire was had to get it all up and running, but it's quite a nice system once you're used to it. some heavy reading was involved in the run-up to launch!
this is the first site to run on our brand new spangly ubuntu linux server, which is running in parallel to our existing windows box. a bit of adjustment required to get used to using a command-line interface only: /etc/apache ls and all that...
1 comment.
September 7th 2009: cyclic career paths
from tomorrow, i'll be spending a couple of days a week at the beautiful crichton campus in dumfries, in my new position as (and i'm breaking into capitals here) Lecturer in Creative and Applied Multimedia (there, won't do it again). a nice symmetry there, as this is where i started my degree in 1997.
i'll be lecturing in flash, actionscript, and sound/video editing - there'll be less emphasis on web delivery than i'm used to, but it should still be a lot of fun.
No comments.
August 19th 2009: packaging design
new to the portfolio is this printing work for jba seed potatoes. the new packaging will be rolled out across the whole of jba's extensive and ever-growing (no pun intended) product range and is on the shelves now.
the new packaging is designed to compliment the companies brand and stand out over the competition - look out in your local garden centre for the new packs.
here's an embiggified version of the photo above, and here's the original designs.
1 comment.
August 7th 2009: anyone for a lock-in?
a quick logo composition for the vaults, a local cafe/bar, which will be finding its way onto print, signage and t-shirts shortly. here's some that didn't make the cut: #3 is my favourite, but i suspect it might have been a bit too smartarse for it's own good...
No comments.
July 2nd 2009: swimming with sharks
shark bait productions is a film production company specialising in wildlife documentary production. i put together this site for them this week which will showcase some of their work in the future - at the moment it's just a brochure site with a blog for the company to publish updates to clients.
the site has its foundations in wordpress , built in php as usual. using wordpress to power something like this does feel rather akin to using a chinook to deliver a letter, but there you go - it does the job very nicely anyway.
2 comments.
How soon will you update your blog? I'm interested in reading some more information on this issue.
June 25th 2009: handle with care
the carers centre is a new initiative which will provide a support and networking resource for workers in the care industry around the uk. it's a fairly major development, with backing from the princess royal trust and abbey group, which is going to be quite a long-term project.
i'm going to be working hard on building the back end to power the system and designing and building a w3c compliant user focused front end. more as it develops.
No comments.
June 25th 2009: peter delves associates
i've been working with the lovely people at clearview lately. we've just completed a branding overhaul and new site for peter delves associates, personal consultants and trainers based in warwickshire.
the site allows the company to accept bookings online with support for group bookings, discounts and multiple locations, as well as user-tailored content and user tracking functionality.
No comments.
June 15th 2009: welcome to the new site
it's been far too long in the making, and i'm not sure it'll ever be fully complete, but this is officially v7 of Kit Allen Dot Com. explore, enjoy, and feel free to leave comments if you like.
this version of the site runs off wordpress, fast-becoming my cms of choice. the 'world' was built in flash, with everything else coded in jquery on standards-compliant xhtml and css.
oh, and check out my custom networking links at the bottom of the page...
2 comments.
I Will have to come back again when my course load lets up - even so I am taking your RSS feed so I can read your site offline. Thanks.
Impressive. Nice work dude.
Mark
May 21st 2009: switching on the light
i've been working with my good friends at callisti recently to lend my design and user interface skills to their team: i think we're all quite proud of the latest release, eprojectorlamps.
analysing data from the sites previous incarnation, we concluded that users were visiting with prior knowledge of the product they wanted to buy, so we focused on making it as easy as possible for them to get to their required product. the three-stage process on the front page uses jquery and a live feed to get the product into the basket and ready for checkout without leaving the front page.
this is a good example of evolving user interface design, and a lesson in how it pays to know your user...
1 comment.
Update: an award from the Design Awards Gallery and a #5 spot on Google for 'projector lamps' within the first week of launch. Not bad!
Kit
April 30th 2009: hanging around
handmade hammocks came to us at the start of the year to ask if we could do anything with their actinic site. an effective selling tool was looking a bit drab after several years service and was in need of an upgrade.
i produced a visual walkthrough for the client which took their existing content and gave it a fresh new look, using jquery effects and a simplified user interface to make their products shine. i quote our client:
'i was a bit nervous of opening the file you had sent - what if it was absolutely nothing like i'd hoped for? the fact is, it is far, far better than anything I had imagined and I am absolutely delighted with what you have done.'
which is always nice to hear. since then, we've been learning actinic the hard way - fortunately, we've made some great progress and we're hoping to launch v3 of the site in may.
No comments.
April 10th 2009: morgan images
i've been working with morgan images this month to develop a file upload and digital online shopping system.
the structure we developed uses ftp to batch upload photos, resizing them on-the-fly using .net, and allows clients to purchase prints of their images using a nifty shopping system, storing data as client-side session variables for extra-fast performance.
the system is another outing for my jquery-based developments - using integrated window systems allows for an intuative and user-friendly interface.
the system is sadly client-only, so you'll have to commission glenn if you want to see the results...
No comments.
March 24th 2009: time machine
on sunday afternoon i opened my trusty macbook to find that the hard drive had failed in a terminal manner. worst case scenario for many people, and it would have been a disaster but for apple's fantastic time machine.
time machine, for the non-mac fraternity, is an integral part of os x which archives any change you make to your system and lets you return to it to retrieve an old version. the idea is that you point it at an external drive and let it backup automatically in the background.
it's total system failure where it really comes into its own, though. the same day, i was able to locate a new hard drive; i had it picked up the next morning, and after a ten-minute install job was able to run time machine to restore my system - a process which took just over two hours for 140gb of files. perfect.
No comments.
March 13th 2009: vma awards 2009
spent a day this week in london, covering photography at the annual veterinary marketing awards. involved some snapping in tricky low-light conditions, but was a fun challenge nonetheless.
No comments.
February 2nd 2009: reach for the stars
working on some concept work for white star as they broaden their remit into audio-visual. click here for a preview of a logo design. their website is due to launch later this month.
No comments.
January 27th 2009: eskdale solutions
eskdale solutions recently unveiled their new promo video, which we collaborated on over the back end of last year. eskdale contacted me for my production skills and we ended up doing a lot of after effects work too, producing motion graphics and visuals. i'm looking forward to working with them in the future.
you can view the promo on eskdales website.
1 comment.
You know so many interesting infomation. You might be very wise. I like such people. Don't stop writing.
January 1st 2009: happy hogmany
hope the year is good for y'all. i'll be working with the number one ladies' detective agency in london during 2009. established by the late anthony minghella, the film company currently produces the series of the same name for the bbc.
the upshot of this is that i'll be zipping up and down the country between scotland and london approximately every two weeks, so will be available down south a bit more often this year.
No comments.
November 10th 2008: eskdale roofing
i'm quite pleased with the new eskdale roofing website, which we launched late last week. it replaced the previous site which had been on the go for several years and, while looking dated, had an excellent search engine placement which the client didn't want to lose.
the new design keeps it simple in terms of navigation and site structure; the code is lightweight, valid xhtml with a lot of the meta data transferred from the old site to keep appearing high in the listings. we installed analytics to allow us to monitor performance; and i'm particularly chuffed with the ajax portfolio section, which leans quite heavily on the jquery work i've been doing of late.
No comments.
November 6th 2008: getting iloaded
what's the best way of massively increasing traffic to your site, pushing sales through the roof, and getting yourself noticed? in the case of long-term clients iloaded the answer is this: a fairly staggering promotion which should send some shockwaves through the industry.
essentially, it's a short-term promotion which offers customers blockbuster films such as iron man, arctic tale, no country for old men and hundreds of others for under two pounds; plus a huge range of music videos for one pound a piece. the catch? amazingly, there isn't one.
i've been working hard for the last week preparing graphics and advertising for the site to push the new promotion, although frankly i'm not sure it'll need much pushing. get them while you can.
No comments.
November 2nd 2008: stuart spray
stuart and i have been working together since may this year to put together the new stuart spray wildlife consultancy website.
the site is a fairly massive resource for conservation legislation and gives stuart's clients an insight into the measures required to conform with uk legislation. it's content managed, so stuart can post his adventures to the site, and a mix of xhtml, css, flash and ajax with a whole lot of content and some magic birds to boot (hover over them to see).
in other news: happy 1st birthday hannah, and i for one welcome our new liberal overlords.
No comments.
October 31st 2008: wee print jobs
a couple of bits of press advertising carried out in the rare time this month i haven't been busy working on fun stuff for iloaded and a couple of others (coming to this space soon).
the central hotel asked me to design them a flyer to be distributed with football programmes; stuart spray wildlife consultancy commissioned the press ad above to accompany an article in a nationwide construction magazine.
No comments.
September 22nd 2008: callisti
this month, i've been working on a couple of interesting projects for callisti ltd, an edinburgh-based seo and website management company.
i worked with callisti to develop the branding shown above and have been providing design and development for them as an ongoing service - i'm hoping to continue doing a lot of work with them in the future.
callisti do a lot of the hardcore seo work that makes the difference when launching your site, and offer website management services for larger web based projects.
No comments.
September 4th 2008: solwaybank
i was called on monday by a client wanting a site in a hurry. four days later, the result is solwaybank suffolks - a one-page brochure for one of the countries finest flocks of pedigree sheep.
i've been cutting my teeth on jquery - a lightweight javascript effects library - so check out the zoom effects on the images, accordian functionality on text areas, and the validate-as-you-go form submission. it's been a lot of fun to play with.
No comments.
July 24th 2008: what's kit doing?
design and dev for iloaded
new website design for stuart spray wildlife
funky promo video with eskdale solutions
some groundwork for shark bait productions
and listening to kazoo funk orchestra
No comments.
June 30th 2008: central hotel
fresh off the press: the central hotel website. this small hotel in annan provides wedding accommodation and live music as well as their own taxi service.
i did a photography session prior to the design, before coding custom flash and ajax elements which allowed us to display multiple images and a slider element to switch between bookings and events.
No comments.
June 1st 2008: Welcome to the site
i hope you like it. figured it was time to go back to basics - so here is the stripped-down, pared back version. it's valid xhtml and css and pretty much sums up what I do: web design and multimedia for companies around the uk.
i'm cutting a showreel of video work at the moment, fitting it in whenever paid work doesn't get in the way (which isn't a bad situation to be in, really). it will showcase my multimedia work with public and private sector clients over the last eight years.
until i have time to do this, i'll be posting work updates here, so you can get an idea of the work i do.
