Category: Other

Haven’t done much in the way of photography recently, but I have been tinkering with my site again!

I put a lot of the code for my websites together myself, either by pinching bits from other places and reverse engineering it to learn how it works and fit it to my own design, or editing existing template code (for example, my glass eye runs on Pixelpost templates).

I also learnt a lot from reading Dan Cederholm‘s two books, Bulletproof Web Design and Web Standards Solutions. They might sound like a dry read but if you’re interested in creating simple, strong, flexible websites using CSS and HTML they’re actually a very good read, the skills you need delivered with humour and clarity and plenty of fully worked-through examples.

I digress!

One thing I came away with more than any other from reading them and putting my sites together bit by bit is getting little personal details right. I’ve always been unsatisfied with the basic 404 error page and the ‘No Flash detected’ error text I had on my portfolio site, so yesterday I had a little fun in Photoshop and made something a bit more personal.

I’m certain hardly anyone will ever see the Flash error image as according to my Mint statistics only 2% of all the visitors I’ve ever had to the site don’t have any form of Flash installed, and I’d bet most of those were me visiting my own site on my iPhone to see how it rendered!

So that leaves the 404 error pages, which you get if you follow a bad link to a page on my site that doesn’t exist any more, or you type in a wrong address or something. I have no idea how often that happens really but all the same I whipped up a 404 page by using the front page as a template and cutting back the navigation to the bare minimum. Then I made some custom 404 images and used some Javascript to randomly call one of the images whenever the page is reloaded.

Which I think is kinda cool in a terribly geeky way. 🙂

If you fancy a peek, here’s a link to a page on my website that doesn’t currently exist and never will, which should generate a friendly 404!

I already use Flickr to host my iPhone photos that are worth sharing, as well as displaying the most recent 5 in the sidebar on the front page of this blog, but I decided I wanted somewhere on this site to properly showcase them so I’ve just added a new page – iPhone photos.

I selected 24 of my favourites and used Airtight Interactive’s free Flash gallery creator, PostcardViewer, to display them above a short blurb about the apps that I use. As and when I have new photos I want to add I’ll just swap out older ones I’m bored of – apart from anything else I just love tinkering with my site and adding new pages! 😉

Also, I keep meaning to finish a blog post about an app I recently added to my collection called ToyCamera (by the creator of QuadCamera). I’m not as enamoured with it as I am CameraBag but it does have some charming qualities. I also have a giveaway to announce. Really ought to get that uploaded today but there are some ‘real world’ chores I should probably attend to first…

Enjoy the gallery!

I’ve just noticed a number of hits coming from Smashing Magazine, where it seems my glass eye is considered one of 50 wonderful, inspiring photoblogs, alongside such equally (if not more so) deserving blogtacular luminaries as Dave Nightingale’s chromasia, Sam Javanrouh’s daily dose of imagery and Kenny Weng’s moodaholic.

That’s pretty gratifying, to say the least, so I better make sure I don’t let the side down, and that I go check out some of their other recommendations that I haven’t come across before.

In other news, what is it with photoblogs and lowercase titles?

An interesting article about New years Resolutions in Resurgence magazine, as sent to me by my secret spy on the web (that would be my mum, then). I particularly like the last line of the following submission, and although the context of the words in this example are quite specific, it’s an attitude that feels relevant to me in many other contexts.

PAUL HAWKEN • TAKE CARE OF OURSELVES

The planet needs ten thousand acts of mercy and kindness to be saved, undertaken by hundreds of millions of people. There are legions of action lists and they are good. While we vote, organise, plant, retrofit, reduce, renew, and teach, it is good to remember that the organising principle of restoration cannot be fear. We gather and congregate around warmth, grace and generosity. If we ask ourselves why we are saving the planet, the answer is always life: our life, the life we share the planet with, and all life to come hereafter. In order to restore life, we must every day take care of our own life. It starts with our mind, heart, and body. Daily acts of personal renewal are essential to creating the conditions that are favourable to all life. In that renewal, we understand that there are no inconsequential actions, only consequential inaction.