I need help to design a new site...

[blackshadow]

I am a photographer and have had my own website for a while www.blackshadow.com.au which is hosted through a template/hosting solution for photographers www.photium.com but it is now time for me to update to a more custom site that offers benefits my current site lacks.

I can’t find an “off the shelf” solution that offers what I need so it looks like I will have to either build it myself or find a very cheap web designer as my finances are very tight at the moment. The only web design skills I have at the moment are very basic HTML but I am tech savvy and have a bit of time to teach myself some more skills in this area.

I know there are some open source solutions out there that offer parts of what I need but it’s the tying everything together that I find a bit daunting. My current leanings are for either a WordPress or Joomla installation to handle the basic website functionality and user management. The part that gets difficult is integrating the gallery and ecommerce side of things in a seamless installation.

I’d really like advice from some experienced web designers in how to best go about putting together a site that meets my needs (as detailed below).

TIA, Richard

Essential
Professional clean look
Easy to maintain and update the site
Optimised for recognition from search engines

General Site
I like the basic look and feel of my current site but I would like a new site that incorporates the following:

• The home page to have a photoblog flavour where I can post a photo of each new event and make a few comments about the event then when site visitors click on the image they can go to a gallery containing all photos from the event.

• The ability to send out email newsletters to registered users advising them of website updates or other news.

• A sidebar (or top bar) that allows users to easily navigate to the sections such as those listed below from all pages of the site.

o Home/Photoblog
o About Me
o News
o Clients
o Tearsheet
o Bands
o Testimonials
o Ordering and pricing
o Bookings
o Registration
o Contact
o Guestbook
o Links

• An event calendar on the front page

Image Gallery Requirements

• Logo up the top
• Nested galleries (eg Music may contain sub galleries such as Concerts, Festivals, Promo shots and then each of these contain a number of galleries and each of those galleries could contain a number of galleries)
• Easy to sort the display order of galleries and photos.
• Style the same as the rest of the website
• Links to main home page and all other site pages
• Full size image maximum side to be 640 pixels
• Thumbnails maximum side to be 150 pixels
• Do not display filenames of thumbnails
• Upload multiple file to the gallery either from browser, FTP or the Windows Web Publishing Wizard (preferably all three) – I am open to using gallery generation software such as iview MediaPro or JAlbum
• Ability to input key words for each gallery (or image) to allow users to search the site
• Password protection for client only galleries
• Image security (watermark and/or right click protection)

Shopping Cart
To allow customers to order photo prints

• print pricing for each item (a number of different prices depending on print size)
• each order to generate email to me identifying the prints ordered, contact details, postal address, postage and handling (different for Australia and International orders)
• calculate and collect payment by Direct Bank Deposit, PayPal or Google Checkout

[bcackerman]

All of this stuff can be done if that was what you were asking. Your old site doesn't look that bad, mayb just lighter colors or something.

The site that you would want build would take a while and with your tight budget... I'm not sure. Try to post your project at a site like sitepoint.com/contests/ or a free-lancer site.

[kiko_friendly]

I'd do it cheaply if ya like.

Email me if interested to see some examples of my stuff - rise@burningviolet.com

[zkiller]

Originally Posted by bcackerman

All of this stuff can be done if that was what you were asking. Your old site doesn't look that bad, mayb just lighter colors or something.

The site that you would want build would take a while and with your tight budget... I'm not sure. Try to post your project at a site like sitepoint.com/contests/ or a free-lancer site.

did you mean http://www.sitepoint.com/marketplace/?

[projectallcon]

Hi ,

thanks for posting your project here and we would like to hep you out .

I have a website design company , 2senior web designers and 9 web programmers . If you wish , I hope we can have a talk .

Msn : jackallcon@hotmail.com

Email : jackallcon@hotmail.com

Yahoo ID ; jackallcon

Thanks and wish for your reply .

[Aethelwine]

Hi

i saw your site, its nice only , but you used lots of images, its not informative, you can put more stuff on that , i read your forums, you are a photographer rite i think thats y you r putting lots of photo in that site and i have a solution for your request too

i read you have knowledge on html , you can improve that through on line itself in W3School tutorial site its my suggestion only,

i know one best company in chennai , its crewind technology located in nelson manikam road , its one of the best company in chennai , they have so many customers, they creating so many websites , well knowledged people were working there , finally they provide good and quality sites to their customers, they fulfill their customers request

Timing delivery to their customers , moreover very reasonable money for creating a web sites , for more information you can check it out in http://www.crewind.com