Pixelwave Website Design Weblog
Latest News from Pixelwave

I’m pleased to announce that Pixelwave Web  Design has just released a new website for Bedminster Road Garage in Bristol.

It is actually a garage part owned by my brother. They provide servicing and MOT’s for all makes and models of car (including mine when it needs it!). The garage are pleased with the results and hopefully the website will develop over time.

At the moment it is a fairly basic, brochure style website outlining what they do and how to contact them. Getting information for the website from my brother is almost impossible but I’m hoping to encourage him to add more to it over the months. I’d like to see photos and small biographies of the mechanics to give it a more personal, friendly feel. But would also like to highlight the professionalism of the garage by promoting their fleet servicing capabilities and maybe mentioning some of their larger clients – with the clients permission of course.

It would also be nice to add news and information on the sports teams that they sponsor and mention any special seasonal offers that they might have.

Website Design for Bedminster Road Garage

Pixelwave Web Design is pleased to announce the release of a brand new website for Blue Island Ceramics, a Ceramics cafe near Aberystwyth in West Wales.

Blue Island Ceramics is paint-your-own ceramics studio offering a place for people of all ages to go and create something that is uniquely theirs.

Their new website is a bright, attractive brochure style website that promotes their business and provides information on the services they offer.

Website Design for Ceramics Cafe

Pixelwave Web Design has recently started work on a new website for a Ceramics Cafe here in Wales. In fact, they are just up the road from me which is nice as it makes it really easy to pop in and see them and to go through progress with them at any point. Communication is the name of the game and having your clients virtually next door certainly makes that easier.

The business is a paint-your-own ceramics studio offering a place for people of all ages to go and create something that is uniquely theirs. I had worked for the business a few years ago, but it has recently been taken over by new management and they have decided to re-brand and have a completely new website.

I’ve already started working on the design of what will be a fairly simple brochure style website explaining what they offer and how to contact them. After a few small tweaks the clients were delighted with the layout so it is now full steam ahead to produce the website itself. Hopefully the overall design will also be used on printed promotional material such as leaflets and fliers and maybe I’ll be commissioned to produce those for them as well.

I’m pleased to announce that I have recently released a brand new website for Erwbarfe Caravan Park. The new owners of the caravan park approached Pixelwave Web Design abut a year ago asking if I could build them a website that would act as  a promotional tool for the Caravan Park.

After an initial consultation we decided that it would be nice for it to have a personal feel and as the park owner wanted to blog and share her love of the area with the wider world it was decided that in addition to providing information on the facilities available at the caravan park, the website should also highlight places to visit and activities to do in the area and contain a “news and events” section. The news and events section will be updated regularly and used as a weblog for the park owners. It took a while to get the initial content together but once I had it, the website was soon built and is now live online.

The website is designed around an easy-to-use Content Management System allowing the park owners to update the site and the news and events whenever they wish. The finished article looks good, does the job it was intended to and everyone is happy. It has been live for a few weeks now and the recent feedback from my client makes it all worthwhile.

By the way, I’ve had loads of great comments about the site, everyone thinks it looks fab and I’ve already had lots of enquiries from it!  Hope you’re pleased with it too?  Have put your cheque in the post today.

Website Design for Focus on Forestry First

Pixelwave Web Design is pleased to announce the release of a brand new website for Focus on Forestry First.

Focus on Forestry First is a Welsh Assembly Government/EU funded three year project solely for the trees and timber sector within Wales. They approached me in February asking about building them a website.

We had an initial meeting late in February to discuss the possibilities and I then visited their premises in Mid March to discuss their requirements. The original brochure style website they had first asked for had become a website based on a Content Management System and they were also talking about another bespoke database driven website that would become a hub for the business and its partners.

The initial phase of the website development was to be a website based on a Content Management System that would outline the activities of Focus on Forestry First and allow them to add news and events to the site -  as well as edit any other content – as and when they wished.

I had designed, constructed and placed a holding page at their domain within a couple of days and then started work on the site itself. Contact was good and things moved quite quickly and after a few tweaks to the initial design all was approved and the copy acquired. Once the copy had been added there were a few additional small tweaks to be made to the layout but soon all was ready for public consumption and the site went live at http://www.focusonforestryfirst.co.uk on April 20th.

I’m pleased with the final product, my clients are pleased with it and best of all, their visitors are pleased with it too:

People have been using the website and we have received positive reports back so that is all good!

Pixelwave Web Design has just started work on a new website for a professional building contractor. The new project came to me via word of mouth from another client who’s website I have yet to start on! I’m planning on starting his new site later in the year once he is ready to start promoting his B&B business, but in the meantime the builders who are working on his luxury conversion also want a website.

Their website will be a fairly simple brochure style website designed to reflect their contemporary, professional approach whilst working sympathetically with traditional buildings. It will have a clean, easy to use interface and will highlight the experience and attention to detail that the building contractors bring to their work.

I’ve just had a meeting with some clients and shown them how to use the Content Management System on their new website. They seemed over the moon with it but will no doubt be coming back a couple of times for some help as they get to grips with publishing on the web for the first time.

The system is easy to use, but when you don’t really know what to expect and haven’t published on the web before it can be a bit daunting. I shall be on hand throughout to keep them on the right track.

Spirituality Global has been built for a local rector and author who tends to be a little controversial in his thinking and fairly outspoken! He intends to update the site regularly and it will provide a platform for his latest thoughts as well as providing a medium for the  discussion of a wide range of topics. It will also be used to promote his books and plays.

Pixelwave Web Design has just secured a contract to build a website for Focus on Forestry First, a training and evaluation centre for forestry workers in Wales.

The FoFF (Focus on Forestry First)  project is a Welsh Assembly Government/EU funded three year project solely for the ‘trees and timber sector’ within Wales, concentrating on forestry businesses first.

Through the project businesses can:

• have training plans drawn up free of charge
• access up to 100% funding for training courses
• maintain and access training records through the secure project database

The first stage of the web aspect of the project is an information site providing project and course details along with news and updates on the project. This will soon be expanded to provide online access to individual training programmes and employee records.

I’ve already been to visit the project offices in Mid Wales to get a feel for the project itself and meet the people behind it. This is invaluable information when it comes to building such a website. It not only lets me get under the skin of the business but also helps develop a good, personal working relationship with the staff there. I know their requirements and how best to work with them and I’m looking forward to getting to work on the project. They seemed to appreciate the time I took to visit them and explain things too:

“Many thanks for coming over and getting the website moving; it is a breath of fresh air to find someone who can deal with this & explain things in such a clear & understandable way!”

The holding page is ready to go so now I can get down to the nitty gritty of coding the real thing.

Focus on Forestry First Holding Page

Pixelwave Web Design is pleased to have started work on a new website for the Internatonal Demining Centre (IDC).

The job came to me by way of a recommendation from a client. I’ve built a couple of websites for this particular client in the past, including his company website Qualissol. Qualissol have ties with IDC as they work in similar fields and the director of Qualissol recommended my services to them. Word of mouth recommendations are by far the best form of advertising for a freelance website designer and the way in which much of my work comes to me.

The new website for IDC is a simple brochure style site and they have even sent me a pdf of what they want it to look like. Hopedully it won’t be too long before the site is up and ready to go live.

Things are going well here at Pixelwave Web Design. The ‘downturn’ in the economy does seem to have had a small effect in the number of new projects I have had to work on, but that seems to be picking up again now and I’m quite busy once again. I have a couple of new projects that I’m working on at the moment, and a few others in the pipeline that will hopefully start soon.

I haven’t been sitting around waiting for work to come my way though – although some time off would have been nice! Instead I’ve been kept busy with maintenance and site updates for existing customers. A quick read through this website will show you that I’m proud of my work and always strive to keep my clients as happy as possible. This means that I usually get small update requests that come in from them done within 24 hours. Obviously if the work is going to take longer then I’ll let them know, but I love getting e-mails about an update and turning it around within an hour just to surprise my clients.

Quite a few of my clients have been requesting updates recently so they’ve been keeping me busy. I’ve also been doing more and more computer help for clients and have been doing quite a bit of freelance website editing and maintenance for a web-based project at Aberystwyth University. The variety is great and it works well as a freelancer as I can keep myself busy but have plenty of different projects each with different challenges to work on.

In addition to the ongoing website updates, maintenance and and support, I’ve built a website for my own ‘Computer Tuition‘ Services, and I’m currently working on two websites for new clients, but will post about those separately.