Topical Site

(The first part of this project actually started with the Site and User Analysis, which was described on a separate syllabus page.)

The topical site, as you know by know, is a small (6 - 8 node) site on some topic you've selected. You've already picked your topic and described the goals and audience/users for the site. Now you'll begin designing the site and developing content. I'll add more detail to each of the main steps below as we get to them in class.

Find Five Sites to Inspire Your Design

Due as J8, an online journal entry Thursday, 10.9.08.

Spend some time looking at websites that you think can contribute ideas/techniques for your topical site. These sites don't need to be on the same topic as your site: They just need to have some type of element or aspect that you want to include in your own site. I'm not suggesting you simply copy another layout or menu system. Instead, you're looking for things that are like something you'd like to do: A page with a very subdued but elegant color pallette that you think would work well for your site might help you to develop a similar (but not identical) color palette for your own site. So you're looking for inspiration, not things to copy.

For the journal entry in which you show these five sites, you need to include a screenshot of each site, followed by some text describing how and why some feature of the site (shown in the screenshot) is something you'd like to emulate.

Create Visio Wireframes

[skipped this]

Create Photoshop (High-Fidelity) Mockups

Key terms for analysis (from readings, handouts, discussion):

• Hierarchy
• Whitespace
• Proximity
• Similarity
• Genre
• Grid
• Navigation systems
• Contact info

Create CSS for Site + Draft 1 of Site

For the first major draft, all pages should be online but up to half of them may be placeholder pages (with lorem ipsum text, etc.). Several pages should have completed (if still unedited or rough) text in place. All major graphical elements should be in place, although they may not be completely polished. CSS should be in place (as an external file where possible--don't embed all of the CSS in individual HTML pages).

Final Site

(tba)