About "Are you ready?"

“Are you ready” is a web design service from a young designer striving to created the best websites in the world. It is also a look into the mind of a web designer, gamer, activist, and all around madman.

the preparation

Five months. That is how long you prepared for this moment. Since last spring, you ran, lifted, blocked, threw, and made plays like it is the only you know how to do. The people you looked up to for leadership for the last three years are gone. You are the man people look up to. You are bruised. Elbows are aching. That tweaked knee has not fully healed yet. Yet here you are, under the spotlight of the biggest stage in your life. The crowd is wild, the band is playing. You and your brothers around will enter the field of combat. In a few minutes, the world will know the answer to the question everyone, including yourself, has been asking all year,

“Are you ready?“

About "Are you ready?"

“Are you ready” is a web design service from a young designer striving to created the best websites in the world. It is also a look into the mind of a web designer, gamer, activist, and all around madman.

a dream by an unremarkable man

This is the project of an unremarkable man. He is an average man in an average life. But then he discovered computers and the internet. That was when he decided to make himself remarkable and make it online. All the sudden, someone who could not complete a circle with a pencil can make a perfect one with software. Someone who cannot get to the punch line of a joke can write it down and publish it online (even if it is still not funny). Here is an opportunity for a man to finally stick out, even if he is still just a speck in the world wide web. He will make that speck grow, whatever it takes.

For now, all he can do is design a few sites, install a blog or two, and write a post now and then. For two years, he was studying design in his spare time, reading about layouts and color, fixing CSS problems in the middle of the night, and using Photoshop until it is as familiar as the back of his hand. And yet, he is considered unproven, an unknown commodity.

“Who needs a web designer with no experience? Who needs someone without a design background?”

“We might need you, but we are not going to pay you what you are worth and you will like it.”

“Let’s not answer his emails. He’ll get the message.”

“Who are you?”

These are things he puts up with for the last year. Is it frustrating? Does this get to his nerves? Does it make him reconsider his dreams? Yes, but not this time.

This is life. No matter how many times he has been ignored, life goes on. The world will go on without him. However, he is convinced the world will only get better if he were to participate in it, thus the existence of this site. He too is seeking for the answer everyone, including himself, is asking,

“Are you ready?”

About what I do

First and foremost, I am a web designer. I am able to implement designs from concept to installing it into your favorite content management system. If you already have a design, I can code it for you. My main expertise is blogs and I know everything there is to know about blogging. As you can tell, I like to write about whatever interests me, which is many things.

web designer/developer

Believe it or not, my first foray into web design and development was the beginning of freshman year of college. This is my first post back in 2003:

Welcome! As you may notice, this is my first post. I'm not going to describe myself like a huge profile but you'll learn plenty as I post more. So to give you an idea of how I exist, let's look at yesterday.

• - my internet service didn't work (bad for sanity)
• - my roommate is a douchbag (and why he's such a douche)
• - a girl I thought wanted a relationship (and acted as though we have one) likes someone else (haven't talk to her in days so that's how messed up this is)
• - and more tragedys that made me who I am

But enough about my teenage angst, more importantly messing around with my xanga site I discovered a little things called CSS and from there it lead to what I do and who I am today. I am currently a web developer for one of the largest websites in the world. However, my true aspirations remain in web design. While my web development skills will lead to small web pages, faster load times, and reduced bandwidth costs, most people will only notice the pretty site. I believe an understanding both of both disciplines is essential in a successful websites as I continue to develope both.

About what I do

First and foremost, I am a web designer. I am able to implement designs from concept to installing it into your favorite content management system. If you already have a design, I can code it for you. My main expertise is blogs and I know everything there is to know about blogging. As you can tell, I like to write about whatever interests me, which is many things.

blogging rainman

I have a keen understanding of the blogging process, but for the most part I can barely write an original post. As a matter of fact, I am looking for contributors in "Are you NKay?". In reality, I am looking for someone to takeover writing. So I can design the site, set it up in a blogging platform, turn the design into the blogging platform template, and do a bit of maintenance and organization. I am still a terrible blogger though, not that it stopped me from trying and trying again. I've been blogging for over four years, which is much longer than my web designer career, so I know I can help you in that department.

About what I do

First and foremost, I am a web designer. I am able to implement designs from concept to installing it into your favorite content management system. If you already have a design, I can code it for you. My main expertise is blogs and I know everything there is to know about blogging. As you can tell, I like to write about whatever interests me, which is many things.

writer?

I question my writing ability since I have a love-hate relationship with the pen. During school, I hated research papers with a passion. I hated papers with page ranges (i.e. all of them). Just like design, why write more when I can say the same thing with less?

Otherwise, writing is a blast. I can definitely write column pieces because I am afraid of no one on the internet. I think I have established myself as a competant blogger. While my expertise is mainly with the various geek arts, I can write about other subjects from baseball to war. Be warned though, I am the type of writer that gets straight to the point. No fluff from me.

About the design

This site is a example of what I can do as a designer. I intentionally created a black and white text-heavy site in order to pull off something that has never been done before. The animations are powered by the lightweight JQuery javascript framework. It is important to ensure that even for a dark site that the content is visible and accessible.

black and white

Yeah, it is black. Problem? Probably. I have read many studies that sites with light text on dark backgrounds causes increased eyestrain. Indeed, it does make some people uncomfortable. But I am not sure whether people do not like light on dark sites because of eyestrain or studies that say so. In some cases, certain internet dweebs overreact as if their eyes are melting. Regardless, I do my part in not making my site not too painful to look.

I've increased line height, word spacing, and reduced number of large blocks of text. In case you may or may not have noticed, I have an alternate stylesheet which is the "ghost" version of the site. I have also take black and white to the extreme in which 99% of site is in grayscale. In the blackness scale, "Are you ready?" is Djimon Hounsou.

In the end, I think my light on dark sites just oozes cool. You know what they say, "once you go black, you'll never click back."

About the design

This site is a example of what I can do as a designer. I intentionally created a black and white text-heavy site in order to pull off something that has never been done before. The animations are powered by the lightweight JQuery javascript framework. It is important to ensure that even for a dark site that the content is visible and accessible.

jquery

Before I found jQuery, I used Prototype/Scrip.taculo.us as my main Javascript library. However, I switched to jQuery for two reason. One is that Prototype/Script.aculo.us are like a hot girl and her fat friend, which would have taken up one-third to half of the total size of my site. Second, jQuery is so simple that even I could learn it. This is not to say that using jQuery was a breeze initially. Lack of documentation that simpletons like me could understand curbed my enthusiasm for jQuery at first. But now I am the proud user of five different effects:

• jQuery UI Accordion
• jQuery UI Tabs
• stylesheet switcher
• scrolling gallery
• labels inside text input's and textarea's

It is my goal to fully understand jQuery so that one day I can create and modify my own effects.

About the design

This site is a example of what I can do as a designer. I intentionally created a black and white text-heavy site in order to pull off something that has never been done before. The animations are powered by the lightweight JQuery javascript framework. It is important to ensure that even for a dark site that the content is visible and accessible.

usability

I only design web sites for two groups of people, everyone and everyone else. Everyone has different browsers, operating systems, monitors, and degrees of visibility. Some people do not like the black s...ites, so I made an alternate "ghost" stylesheet. Some people like older browsers, so I cater to them (and left a very special message for IE6 users).

This site uses the new Microsoft fonts. So for Vista and Office 2007 users, here's a little something for your sacrifice. For the rest, you could either use Vista (ha!) or download them here (legally) or enjoy Times New Roman/Times.

To be honest, I do not fully understand web standards, but I follow them as though it is the only way to go. My code is always valid whether its transitional, strict, frameset, dirty, or nasty. The point is that I must give everyone of all background the opportunity to groan at my jokes and be repulsed by my rhetoric.

About the man

I am a 22 year old recent graduate and wannabe web site designer. My interests are politics, computer gaming, sports, and social activism. I love what I do but who wants to talk about my job all the time? The most important thing in life is to be yourself.

I am

Ever since I discovered computers, I wanted to stake my future with it. First it was computer animation, but in college I discovered blogging. I thing I noticed was the copious amounts of bad looking sites and sites that are barely functional. I became frustrated. Even worse, I realized I was also creating terrible looking sites myself (see old xanga site). That's when I decided to delve into the art and science that is web design. In the meantime I was attempting to double major in political science and economics.

Alas, as I became more involved in studying web design and disenchanted with my other studies, I began to think whether to take web design from a hobby into a career. That decision came easy when I found out I was not going to graduate on time. It was May of 2007, here was a kid with no college degree, no design education, and no portfolio other than only one blog design to his name.

So from then on, it was considered my fifth year of college, most of it spent at home. I was pretty much open to any opportunities to advance my skills, but it mostly never came. It is one thing to be outright rejected, that it fine with me. That could be a learning lesson. It is when I get ignored that gets to me the most.

But I am unfazed. Here I am building sites for my favorite client, myself (I hear he's bitchy). So to my potential employers, I am a hard-working and highly-motivated web designer seeking direction. Everything I write on this site is a reflection of myself. You may take it or leave it.

*He looks like if Jackie Chan had sex with the monkey king.