The New Evolution of Brian Gardner
Many of you know that a few days ago I underwent the beginning of the Evolution Project - which was basically an online, ongoing redesign of my website starting out with my Vertigo theme.
What you see now is pretty much the finished product, possibly with a few small style changes here or there.
Thankfully I was able to re-incorporate the focus of my business and services back into the homepage, which was a concern of some readers. (I never intended to leave that part out of the site, just needed some time to code the page to look the way I wanted it to!)
Anyhow, one of the major reasons I wanted to undergo site design, while maintaining my logo/brand, was to open it up a bit to allow for more content. I didn’t want the content that I am planning on adding to dominate the overall site, so I have configured a Blog Page, which will pretty much serve as the hub of my everyday thinking.
On that page you will see a place up top for my latest blog post, followed by a side-notes section, which uses the Sideblog Plugin. Underneath that, I have introduced two new categories to my site here - a special category for WordPress news & tips, as well as something that I’ve been looking forward to doing for a very long time - video blogging.
Now that I have the site design done, I can start working on the content - so my hope is to write a lot more than I used to. Things that I will write about will cover topics from WordPress to social media to internet marketing - basically trying to open up my posts to all things that pertain to blogging.
Feel free to leave a comment to this post if there is anything specific you’d like to see me write about, as I’ll definitely be looking for suggestions!
Hey Brian - your site is looking really good. Love the new blog page, and can’t wait to read a lot more of your writing!
Abby - thanks for dropping a comment. I’m really excited about what I have in store for this site, so it should hopefully be a good thing for others.
Brian,
Great work, I just love how clear and uncluttered the interface is and your eye for keeping navigation simple and the important information easily accessible even for first time visitors. Kudos!
Thanks Kevin - I’ve always been one to go after the simple look, so hopefully the way the site is designed will provide a positive visitor experience.
Hi Brian,
Was nice to see a live revamp of a wordpress theme as it demonstrates to many how it can be done, changing the basic shell to something a little more personal. Your site is looking good now.
As for what I would like you to write about, well I think that many readers, including me to a certain extent would love to know how to extend wordpress and their blogs, to do other things. You mention video blogging and I am sure that many readers and bloggers would love to know how to go about this as well as photo blogging.
Perhaps these are things that you could write about first?
P.S. You have changed the header on this site since my past visit. I have to say I preferred the first one which the ‘jagged and arched’ bottom. Perhaps just me but it was better
Sites great though - well done.
Mark - thanks for the feedback - appreciate it. I’ll definitely plan on writing “how I do things” types of posts - no problem there. As for the jagged aspect of the header, I didn’t want the entire site to feel grungy, and having the denim background and the jagged sidebar headers were enough in my opinion. I wanted people to remember me as a designer/consultant, and not a rock band!
Brian,
It looks GREAT!! Only thing I would recommend is the possible addition of Gravatars with the comments? Not needed, but a fan addition and sometimes I think it encourages comments.
Keep up the good work!
Kyle - great suggestion with the Gravatars - truthfully, I’ll have to research how to add them. I’ve never had comments styled in a way that those could be used well, but this time I think I can.
Really enjoy your redesign, again :). I like to see how pushing yourself to use WordPress in other ways than just your regular blog.
I also have to agree with Kyle on the subject of gravatars. To me, especially with Gravatar now being built in WordPress, they could be featured more on your themes.
But again.. love your design
I’ll be adding the Gravatar feature pretty soon, so everyone should be happy!
Brian - always impressed with your work. My question is simply, how do I scroll back through your blog posts? If I goto briangardner.com I get a 5 post listing in the footer, fine, so I goto BLOG on the menu bar. There I get your new ‘blog page’ which has your latest post, and 5 recent posts on the side… For example, I want to view the post on the Vertigo update - no archives, no way to run back through the posts, and no place to search.
Oh, also, Gravatars are nice, but a ’subscribe to comments’ option is nicer!
William - thanks for the suggestion about archiving - overlooked that, and will address it somehow!
After a few months experimenting with a very different format with the Hemingway theme, over the weekend I made the switch back to Vertigo. My changes I’ve made thus far haven’t been overly radical, and this coming weekend I’ll have more time to rework the site.
Great suggestion with the Gravatars - truthfully, I’ll have to research how to add them. I’ve never had comments styled in a way that those could be used well, but this time I think I can.
Initially, I found them difficult to style with Vertigo, and it took some trial and error before it worked the way I wanted.
My first thought was to call the “avatar” class, as the get_avatar function generates an IMG tag with an “avatar” class. But for some reason, that refused to work.
But when I wrapped the PHP call to the get_avatar function in a <span>/</span>, and had the span call a class that I called “gravatar.” I defined that class as having a float, that worked and it worked well.
There are two things I love about Vertigo.
One, the code is incredibly clean. Something like comments.php is complex because it has to be complex. Everything else, though? There’s no wasted code. It’s lean and it’s mean.
Two, the theme is lightweight. A website hit serves eight or nine files max. There are WordPress themes that serve thirty or forty files. It’s a fast theme for the end user, and it’s easy on the server resources.
It’s an impressive theme, and there’s so much users can do with it. This website — which looks absolutely fantastic, by the way — is the prime example.
Great work!
Allyn - thanks so much for taking the time to share all of that - very much appreciated. I love what you did with Vertigo - it looks fantastic!
To all - I’ve set up the Gravatars, let me know how they look, and if there are any styling issues on any browser.
The gravatars and, indeed, the site as a whole look great.
I look forward to reading your posts but hope you will leave aside enough time to ensure that your Revolution themes continue to lead the field, and that improvements such as gravatars surface there too.
Keep up the good work.
William, fyi, if you go to the Blog page, you’ll see a More Blog Entries link that takes you to a blog archive with a next page link.
Love the gravatars
Any chance on making a little tutorial on adding those to the Revolution Themes?
Love the look especially the background textured scene. Great job Brian as always.
Looking forward to more content.
What’s happening with Shadow Feet?
Fantastic - thanks Brian!
I’ll see what I can do with adding them to Revolution - to be honest, it wasn’t that difficult to add them here, really just a matter of uploading/activating the plugin.
Donnacha - you should have no worries about Revolution. That is my biggest project, and by far the highest one on the priority list. It will always come before other things, and I have NO intentions on abandoning that at all.
Brian,
If you want to avoid using a plugin, I would recommend using the code found here:
http://hackwordpress.com/wordpress-25-how-to-add-gravatar-to-your-wordpress-theme/
If you need something for pre-2.5 I might be able to hook you up with that as well. Let me know!
(Sorry, when I converted to a link it appears that the comment was deleted, so trying with the URL)
Brian,
I’d love to know any tips on video blogging that you come across. Also, what components will you be using, i.e. camera, software. I think video blogging is the next big thing and I would love to incorporate it into my blog as well. Unfortunately, my blog is about what I do for a living (loan officer for a mortgage company) and can’t seem to come up with topics that suit video blogging.
I’d really be interested in how you went about creating your first video post, might make a great tutorial.
Nice changes to the site, you have fantastic themes.
Respectfully,
Joe Bartolotta
The Upfront Mortgage Broker
More well done to you Brian! Another great theme. I’ve not been online for a bit so I completely missed the works in progress stage of the new theme. It was a very pleasant suprise to see when I first came back to your site.
One question - when you said you are going to start writing more - is this going to replace your Shadowfeet work or is that still getting going?