Deborah, Author at hexadecibel.org

Using Style Tiles

I’m currently working on what will be a responsive WordPress website for a theater incubator and have noticed for a while that Photoshop comps are really limited when it comes to designing responsive websites. How many screen sizes should you design for? What about accommodating a CMS?

Instead of comping every screen size, I’m going to create Style Tiles which were introduced on A List Apart by Samantha Warrren. If you have never heard of Styles Tiles before, go now and read the A List Apart article. I’m serious – read it!

The concept is still making its way around the Internet and now other people are sharing their own methods and templates. Samantha offers a Photoshop template, Adrian Gould collected templates in Illustrator, Fireworks, InDesign and Keynote as well. Namanyay Goel created Webstiles for a HTML/CSS version. I also found a WordPress theme called WP Style Tiles created by Steve Fisher and Jesse Friedman.

I’m going to try out both the WordPress theme and the Photoshop template to see which one is more helpful to my workflow and presentation.

Announcing the updated 3 Chicks that Click Photography WordPress website!

My client Alyse Liebowitz of 3 Chicks that Click Photography has an updated website and a new business focus. After keeping a blog on the WordPress platform, she decided to move the entire website to WordPress to better manage her content. She explains her change in strategy on her own blog.

Though I started with a commercial WordPress theme, the color and typography are customized to match 3 Chicks’ branding. I have to mention one of the plugins we are using that becomes more and more useful everyday: WordPress SEO by Yoast. I’m not the only one – here’s an article on 6 Reasons you should be using it too!

Notice anything different?

I’m trying out WordPress’s own responsive theme, Twenty Twelve. I used a version of Twenty Twelve for a client website and decided to use it on my own site to make it responsive. So far it’s working out well, but if you see anything odd, please let me know!

First Article on Boxes and Arrows

Boxes and Arrows is an online publication featuring articles on Information Architecture and and design that has been around since 2001. I just had an article on the 2013 UX Awards published there today.

Remembering family past and present on Memorial Day

This year on Memorial Day, my Aunt, Cousin and my Cousin’s family made a special visit to my late Uncle’s grave to remember his service in the Vietnam War. I wish I could have been there in person, but because of digital photography and social media my cousin could share the images of the service with family members scattered around the country.

Sifting through all the information available on Ancestry.com, I discovered another family member who fought in a war long ago. My grandfather’s great uncle, Ora Butler Douglas, was a young man in his early 20’s when he enlisted in the Union Army to fight in the Civil War. After his promotion to 1st Sergeant, he was wounded in the Siege of Vicksburg May of 1863. He died later that summer and was buried in Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri. He was only 25.

Though he left no descendants, my great-grandfather Ora Philander Seward inherited his first name. He has a virtual memorial on Find A Grave and someday I hope to visit and see the site for myself.