Author Archives: kbs

Border Hopping with Cory Mawhorter

Posted by kbs

cory150

In mid February, I undertook a tutorial about changing fonts on a web page*(see footnote at the end of this post for details).  I had tried other solutions but this one called FaceLift was better. I am using it here on this blog. Notice that all of the headlines are in a slab serif font? See also Pages,  Categories, etc. in the sidebar? This is Gold to a web designer. This enables me to give my clients unique design (aka “branding”), my raison d’etre.

I like to learn more about these authors. Many are engineers in school or just out. Always interesting to see what other projects  they have done and what kind of work is in their portfolio. http://facelift.mawhorter.net/ was the homepage. Odd thing here was that the author, Cory Mawhorter, was not very forthcoming. No portfolio. Just one other project which looked like a precursor to FaceLift.

I started digging in his personal blog and found a post from October that he was finalizing plans to take his van on a quest to see America. 50 states in 52 weeks. He had a number of delays, but by the time I was reading his blog in mid February, he was three weeks into his trip. It was the Monday before Mardi Gras and Cory was in New Orleans…. Continue reading →

WordPress as a CMS

Posted by kbs

My name is Ken and I am hopelessly addicted. (response: “Hello Ken.”) Last November I joined The New York City WordPress Meetup Group to meet other WordPress junkies. I wanted to see what they score and where. Always looking for that Blue Magic plugin. (see American Gangster)

wpsmallIn February, I went to a MeetUp titled WordPress as a CMS: The Strategy of Content Publishing. It was well presented but it wasn’t what I had expected. (That could be another post: expectations. But not here.) My comments did lead to some good discussion with the presenter Johnathan Andersen, who started a message board thread about CMS. Below is an excerpt of my post there. I am including it here because I think it begins to explain my evolving approach to web site design.

What do you think it means to use WordPress as a Content Management System (CMS)?

I have been designing sites for about ten years. Most of my clients are writers, photographers illustrators, a book publisher and a few small business owners. The more computer literate have been using Adobe Contribute to edit their sites. I started using WP about three years ago with some of my authors. Publishers Weekly wrote that an author should be blogging whenever they have a new book coming out. That’s when I added WP blogs to their sites. I have always wanted my clients to maintain their own sites and WP seems like a great solution.

WHAT IS CMS TO ME?
Content Management. For starters, that means pages for Press, Bios, News, Coming Events, Portfolios (Galleries) and Contact as well as posts for a Blog. It also means an eCommerce Store, though I have not had any demand for that yet. The traditional Blog and the Magazine formats can accomplish this.

I want to do some work outside of the available Theme Templates. I am a graphic designer. This is what I love. I also believe original site design gives my clients unique branding. But that probably doesn’t apply to this thread, except to say that I am learning to design my own modular WP sites (Thank you Chris @ www.css-tricks.com)

Because I want my clients to have as much control of their site as possible, I have been building some sites with Chris Pearson’s Thesis theme. (see www.thesisterproject.com) This has great promise, particularly because of the two extra Thesis Dashboard panels.

I will be very interested see if this generates any discussion. I have only been to two meetups but am looking forward to seeing what develops. It is great to get out from behind the monitor and meet with people. Even better when we are sharing the techie bong.

This is Valentines Day. I love my wife. (and my new iPod Touch)

113011UPDATE: see Smashing Magazine articleHow WordPress Took the CMS Crown.

Netizen of Elsewhere, USA

Posted by kbs

Elsewhere, USA

In early January, I received an email from Dalton Conley announcing that he would be at a Barnes & Noble in Greenwich Village reading from his latest book “Elsewhere, USA.” I have known Dalton for thirty years. He was twelve years old when his father and I became friends while working together. In 2002, I got to know Dalton even better when he asked me to design a website for him that organized the books and papers he had authored.  It was then that I read his memoir “Honkey.” Dalton was beginning his professorship in the sociology department at  New York University. Currently he is the acting dean.

As an artist, books about zeitgeist like Christopher Lasch’s “The Culture of Narcissism” and David Brooks’  “Bobos in Paridise” have always inspired me. I don’t know if Dalton’s book will meet that standard but listening to him talk provoked me beyond my expectations. I went to his reading out of curiosity and support but given how much my work and thoughts this past year have been about computers, the internet, websites and blogs, I was fascinated to hear Dalton, the sociologist, address these issues from a historical and cultural perspective. Continue reading →

More Addenda

Posted by kbs

This is exciting. Thanks to Michael Martin I believe I have finally found a Sideblog plugin solution  for adding posts to Steve Brodner’s sideblogs. I have been looking months for this. There is also this post about PHP coding not using the Sideblog plugin.

Galleries, NextGen Solution

Posted by kbs

I have been working on a new site for Margaret Roach that will be known as The Sister Project. It has greatly expanded my belief in blogging as the new publishing and WordPress as the leading software. I will be writing more about The Sister Project (TSP) after we launch in late November.

One of the five TSP blogs is Galleries where we will display curated submissions of poetry, prose, photography and art. The Galleries need software to organize and present the art and photography. There are many WP gallery plugins available but our research led us to NextGen Gallery. It offers a variety of options and seems to be well maintained–many plugins are not. As with many Open Source programs, the instructions and tutorials could be more thorough. After spending many hours “under the hood,” I think I know how NextGen runs but some things are still not clear. That is why I am doing this test post using paintings I made almost twenty years ago. I want my clients to be aware of this solution and it gives me a chance to post some paintings from one of my favorite series.

Below and in the sidebar are thumbnails of my Field Report art. Almost all of the drawings and paintings are based on one avocado plant that I grew in my apartment. Other works based on the direct observation of nature are also included as part of this series. This last week I went to the Morandi exhibit at the Met. I suppose Field Report is my “Morandi” statement.

(This is the navigation for the NextGen Gallery.)

Pronto! Buongiorno Marco. Galleria?

Posted by kbs

self portraitLast Spring, Marco Ventura told me that he wanted to have his illustration portfolio on-line and asked me to design it. Marco lives in Milan but his reputation and clientele are international. I met him when I was assigning illustration for the Time magazine feature Spotlight. (Before I knew Marco, I was unfamiliar with Italians answering the phone “Pronto.”) He had digital files of all his work and sent them to me by email. I made my presentations to him using Skype.

Marco wanted a very minimal site with a white background and images that were not too large. Like many of the artists and photographers I have dealt with, he was concerned with… Continue reading →