I looked at an interesting portfolio a couple of weeks ago. Great layouts, tightly concise design, fast-loading, great color - in short a fine style of designing. The website is owned by Matt Marquardt of Breakthrough Webdesign.
I interviewed Matt: “got into web design through some friends that were trying it out back in the ’90s. It looked like a promising field/career and seemed like a lot of fun so I decided to give it a try. . .The very first site I designed, if you can call it a web site, was a very basic page or two in my first HTML class. It just had a few links, pictures and a little JavaScript.”

Where do you get your art for your webpages? “I have a fairly vast library of clip art and other photos at my disposal for my web pages. I will purchase art from various sources and then use it over and over again with modifications so that it looks different on each site.”

What kind of developments do you foresee in webdesign? “The next big development in web page design will likely be the continued evolution to multi-media in web pages. We will see ever more audio, video and animation in web pages as browsers, personal computers and Internet connection speed for the average user improve.”

“I have worked with web page templates but only when I was employed at my former job. In my business, I never use templates, as I find them as much work as a custom site. . .I was given templates built by former employees at my old job to work with. I find templates to be non-satisfying to customers, as they usually want their own look and unique web site instead of a templated look.”

“I like Flash technology and welcome it. Now that the Flash plug-ins are fairly widespread and easy to obtain, and the tools to build Flash animations are easy to work with, I welcome it. . . Flash advantages would be that it can take a plain web site to a new level of personalization for the customer and impriove the visitor’s experience. Flash disadvantages would be possible slow-down of page loading time, lack of plug-ins for visitors, and, if the Flash isn’t designed or implemented properly, a poor experience for visitors.”

“My sources of inspiration are my customers…just making them successful while at the same time growing my business and reputation is all the motivation I need.”

“My favorite web site designs that I did not design would be: cnn.com, espn.com, and other sleek news sites like those.”

” My toughest project was masoncity.net web site project. It involved nearly 20 city departments with unique log-ins that allowed them to manage their own parts of the web site, like add/remove pages, update pages, change navigation link order, and other tools.”

“My interests in web page design would mainly be in keeping up with the industry and staying up to date in the latest trends not only in the design of a web site but in achieving search engine rankings that bring visitors to the sites. My dislikes in web page design would be simply the amount of attention to detail that is sometimes required in certain
projects. It can be mind-bending!”

Thankyou Matt for you viewpoints and layouts.

The Template Prophet,
Arthur Browning