Website Query

[Dulz]

i am looking to set up my own website for wedding and event photography and was wondering if anyone had used any designers/services to build a site that they can recommend. I have designs for a website done on paper but the most important things to me are:

1. having pictures displayed once clicked on in a lightbox format with security marks (i.e watermarks)

2. a secure area to provide customers with password protected areas to view images and order.

All advise and suggestions would be greatly received.

[Dulz]

Cheers Andy, will check them out.

You are welcome. I forgot to say that I am using as my own purpose built picture viewer which runs as a Flash Player insert, that I have created in Opus Pro (which I use for multimedia books etc) as it provides the security I like.

If there is not a suitable slideshow you like I can always build you one - The picture switching currently in use on my site is a standard dual image system that offers some security (so that you can display images without watermarks where you feel it looks better).

There maybe templates well suited to your needs - its a matter of deciding how you want your site to look overall and the scope you require.

Payment PayPal buttons etc. come with their packages and they also do shopping baskets.

Best of luck

[austenb]

hi if it helps dont use clikpic that who i'm with it's ok but if your looking for a real professional look stay away but that's my opinion

[steveayres]

Hi, A little late onto this one, but I have a fair amount of experience with such things. My day job is actually working for a web coding and database services company. As you already have the designs done you've probably got over one of the hardest hurdles already to be honest.

As I say a little late, but do feel free to run anything by me if you think it would be useful (setups, technologies, quotes etc).

Also check out my site below. It's built on WordPress, which providing you have a modicum of web knowledge is a fantastic platform. It was done by me personally rather than the company I work for, but it might give you a few ideas.

Cheers,
Steve

ImageArcade - Photography By Steve Ayres

[MarkUpfield]

Good site is www.clikpic.com
I know alot of people that do use this... however I build mine in dreamweaver slowely tought myself how to use it over time

[skyblue]

Originally Posted by steveayres

Hi, A little late onto this one, but I have a fair amount of experience with such things. My day job is actually working for a web coding and database services company. As you already have the designs done you've probably got over one of the hardest hurdles already to be honest.

As I say a little late, but do feel free to run anything by me if you think it would be useful (setups, technologies, quotes etc).

Also check out my site below. It's built on WordPress, which providing you have a modicum of web knowledge is a fantastic platform. It was done by me personally rather than the company I work for, but it might give you a few ideas.

Cheers,
Steve

ImageArcade - Photography By Steve Ayres

Hi Steve, your site looks very good. Can you explain a little about WordPress, it looks like a good platform to use. I am thinking of building a site with Dreamweaver. Are there any advantages to using WordPress over Dreamweaver? Your site looks very more interactive with rollover popup text info etc. Dreamweaver, or at least the older version I have seems very ridged and I can't for the life of me find out how to have the webpage centralise itself within the browser. (Anyone know how to do this?) I built a site a few years ago so would like to improve on that this time. I am open to ideas about using something different to build the site or even a good template site to use, however being a designer I would rather design the site from scratch myself layout wise than have to fit into ridged templates. I find the clikpix ones inparticular very samey and easy to spot a mile off!

[ap4a]

Originally Posted by skyblue

Are there any advantages to using WordPress over Dreamweaver?

They're different tools for different jobs. Wordpress is an online database driven content management system; you install it and then add your content which gets stored in a database and accessed when required, and you use the Wordpress templating system to control the features and layout.

Dreamweaver on the other hand is offline site creation software, which can be used to create (amongst other things) Wordpress templates. It has it's own templating system, but in comparison to using Wordpress this would be a clunky system for updating and adding to an existing site.

I can't for the life of me find out how to have the webpage centralise itself within the browser. (Anyone know how to do this?)

Without knowing the structure of your markup a definitive answer isn't possible - but if your content is within a container <div> then give that <div> a width (via CSS) and then use the margin settings (again in the CSS) to centre it, eg for a div with an ID of container (<div id="container">) :

#container { width: 990px; margin: 0 auto; }

I built a site a few years ago so would like to improve on that this time. I am open to ideas about using something different to build the site or even a good template site to use, however being a designer I would rather design the site from scratch myself layout wise than have to fit into ridged templates. I find the clikpix ones inparticular very samey and easy to spot a mile off!

If you're happy designing sites then design and markup your own Wordpress template and then either get someone to insert the appropriate WP template tags or learn how to yourself (if you have basic knowledge of how a web site works then it really isn't difficult). You can get most of what you need to know from the codex: http://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Tags

[skyblue]

Originally Posted by ap4a

They're different tools for different jobs. Wordpress is an online database driven content management system; you install it and then add your content which gets stored in a database and accessed when required, and you use the Wordpress templating system to control the features and layout.

Dreamweaver on the other hand is offline site creation software, which can be used to create (amongst other things) Wordpress templates. It has it's own templating system, but in comparison to using Wordpress this would be a clunky system for updating and adding to an existing site.



Without knowing the structure of your markup a definitive answer isn't possible - but if your content is within a container <div> then give that <div> a width (via CSS) and then use the margin settings (again in the CSS) to centre it, eg for a div with an ID of container (<div id="container">) :

#container { width: 990px; margin: 0 auto; }





If you're happy designing sites then design and markup your own Wordpress template and then either get someone to insert the appropriate WP template tags or learn how to yourself (if you have basic knowledge of how a web site works then it really isn't difficult). You can get most of what you need to know from the codex: http://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Tags

Thank you for your answer. However I don't think I know enough about web design to really understand! It's almost like another language! I feel rather overwhelmed by the whole thing of getting a site going, like webdesigners have a whole other knowledge bank in their brain! When I say I am a deisgner and have built a site before, I am a graphic designer so am quite capable of designing a layout and how I want things to work, and when I made a site it was a fairly simple portfolio one done in dreamweaver. However I see more interactive things on the net these days and have more ambitious designs, but my technical knowledge doesn't live up to what I want to do!! So just trying to decide how to design my site and what program to use or use template site, however I do prefer to design the layouts myself. I want it to be a portfolio site for my work, so although it needs to be good and preferably updateable I don't want to have to spend forever making it as need to get on with others things!

[ap4a]

Originally Posted by skyblue

Thank you for your answer. However I don't think I know enough about web design to really understand! It's almost like another language! I feel rather overwhelmed by the whole thing of getting a site going, like webdesigners have a whole other knowledge bank in their brain! When I say I am a deisgner and have built a site before, I am a graphic designer so am quite capable of designing a layout and how I want things to work, and when I made a site it was a fairly simple portfolio one done in dreamweaver. However I see more interactive things on the net these days and have more ambitious designs, but my technical knowledge doesn't live up to what I want to do!! So just trying to decide how to design my site and what program to use or use template site, however I do prefer to design the layouts myself. I want it to be a portfolio site for my work, so although it needs to be good and preferably updateable I don't want to have to spend forever making it as need to get on with others things!

There are business that will take a design (PSD) and convert it to HTML and CSS for you, and some that will also turn it into a Wordpress template for you. I've never used such a service so can't recommend one, but the ones that I have seen seem reasonably priced, and they may be a valid option for you?