What I Do

I am a force to be reckoned with. I am a designer, developer, and writer; I am a geek; I may or may not be Batman.

I command code in seven programming languages. I enjoy the multifaceted nature of design. I’ve written since I was old enough to hold a pencil and formulate broken sentences.

Developer.

Code is my morning coffee. I work in content-management systems like Wordpress, Joomla, and Drupal. If you have another CMS that you’re interested in using, I’m a fast learner and a great researcher. Back when I was a full-time code monkey, I did a lot of .NET, specifically in ASP .NET, Visual Basic, and (limited) C#. I’m a database whiz-kid in SQL Server and mySQL; I even know a smattering of Oracle but please don’t make me use it — it is dangerous knowledge.

Designer.

Design is my afternoon tea. I specialize in web design, although I’ve been known to dive into branding and identity. When working with me, the design process is not set it and forget it. It’s iterative and collaborative. Clients are not only my clients: we are partners. They are looking for a well-designed website and I am looking for a creative outlet that helps others. I love to design minimalistic websites with a heavy focus on great use of colour and typography.

Writer.

Writing is my life-blood. It is everything I am. I’m no SEO expert who can make the traffic come out of nowhere. I’m not even much of a “proper” copywriter. But I’m passionate. Capable. Wordsmith with a penchant for everything from short, succinct sentences to long, meandering paragraphs. At the end of all things, writing is joy. It is where I hang my heart.

How I can help.

You have an idea for a website. You’re not sure how to go about setting it up. You’re not sitting on an exorbitant amount of money to pay an agency to design and implement your site. You’re an artist, writer, or small business owner who needs somewhere to put ideas and product; this somewhere needs to be beautiful and coded with love. You know this. That’s where I come in.

Preliminaries

• We sit down and chat about your ideas, either over coffee or over Skype. I write all these ideas down in my handy, dandy notebook to absorb after our meeting. This is a “no-holds-barred” conversation: tell me everything in your heart and head. Your words will shape your design.
• After a day or two of absorbing ideas to get the creative juices going, we get an email conversation going about design possibilities.
• With a budget in mind, we draw up plans to make a website happen.

The Particulars

• I provide several mock-ups based on our discussions.
• Based on your feedback, I either tweak one of them or go back to square one for a fresh perspective (rinse and repeat, based on the terms of our agreement).
• If you’re satisfied with what we’ve got going on, you sign-off on the prelim designs and I get cracking on the code.

End-Game

• I implement a test version of your website on violetminded (no content, just placeholders).
• Based on your feedback, I tweak the code until we’re both satisfied and upload it to your hosting.
• Based on the terms of our agreement during the Preliminaries, I provide support for your website.

Interested in my services? You should think about hiring me.