The original portfoliography.com, launched in mid early 2004 was a simple, mostly static HTML pages. In recent years, we saw the web going from mailing lists to BlackBerries, Hotmail (or many other xx-Mail) to Gmail; Photo Labs to Flickr, and most importantly from Modem to the ubiquitous Wi-fi signals with broadband connection. The Web 2.0 was born.
With the conditions set, what was then a single, isolated website is now an interconnected web of data flow & portability, what was then your bunch of files on your personal computer(s) are now the Clouds, for the web is the sky, and your data is the ‘Cloud’–suspended online, available for grab whenever, wherever we want it.
We were faced with many challenges back in 2004. We didn’t have enough knowledge, nor technology and the infrastructure to realize our basic idea of how our website could be. They were not enough users to convince us to go knock some boutique web design companies’ doors, and certainly not enough money to hire them. So we ended up finding our own recipe, and cook our breakfast, lunch & dinner altogether.
Thousands of visits, dozens of clients and 4 good years later we decided to renew our commitment. Recreating the website with a whole new direction that would reflect what we have become as a photography company.
PORTFOLIO 2.0
A simple objective drives our renewed commitment: letting you find what you want to see as easy, as simple as possible. This very objective see the light of a simple idea, that transcends into a working plan, research and a 4 year odyssey of how to turn that very simple idea alive.
We wanted to make the website as a digital picture frame that you control to view our photographs, we wanted it to become your personal front of what we do, and how to get in touch with us. At the same time, we were challenged with the massive amount of potential bandwidth transfer–where a photograph can weigh 100kb each, which translates to 3-5 seconds of your precious time, on a 56kbps (remember modem?) connection. Not to mention the animation and fluidity that we want you to experience. We had a technology & tool that people used back then: Macromedia (now Adobe) Flash, which we don’t (and never) liked, we decided to wait and find another way around. After a cool, tremendous 4 years of hill-climbing, rollercoaster like ride, we are proud to present you the new PORTFOLIO 2.0.
Learning can be hard or difficult, stealing is easier, but it is not a solution. Understanding is a black/white process, copying/stealing puts you in a grey area. Understanding, on the other hand will ultimately push you through the border of limits and take you through the beautiful journey of joy & enlightenment. The journey that we had was beautiful. Slow, but one would not trade it for anything simpler. It was rewarding as much as it is enjoyable.
The Structure
The homepage features a BIG presentation of our latest works that fades in/out to another one. You will find the main navigation on top where you can easily navigate from/around our entire site. Both ‘Home’ and the PORTFOLIO® logo will take you back to the homepage anytime, anywhere.
Portfolio is a sub-menu of our gallery albums (more about this below). Projects is where you find our pro bono projects, causes or what-not that do not fit elsewhere. On the right you can search anything that you’d think of just like google; slightly above the search area, you will find a ‘View Work’ button that will reveal a humble introduction and overview of our most recent work.
Scrolling down, you will be presented upon selection of our recent gallery post and blog entry, the footnote is where we put all the quintessential things other website has, like credit, links and random mumbo jumbo that we’d rather have but not slowing you down.
The Gallery
Clicking the big photo, or choosing one of the Portfolio categories will bring you to the Gallery. The Gallery is the very reason why we waited such a long time, we want to have something powerful and easy to maintain without sacrificing usability and simplicity. The gallery features a cool Javascript/AJAX effects that does not kill your browser nor slow you down, clicking the main photo will advance to the next in line, the small thumbnail on the right will indicate where you are, and choose where to go next time ala flickr.com. On the bottom, you may find some useful info about the photo, or caption whenever applicable. If you are a photographer, you may also find the exposure data (EXIF) useful whenver available. To advance to the next gallery (next post) you can see the arrow on the right/left to navigate to/from one gallery album to another. The best part is, the whole thing is done dynamically, no more manual updating of static pages! A mutual benefit of convenience for you and us!
Last but not least: The Blog.
We love to write, as much as we love our camera and photographs, from time to time, you will find some useful articles of photo related news, product reviews, tips/tutorials, random thoughts about movies, music, etc. Like most popular website, RSS/ATOM syndication is available for free.
About Copyright
You are permitted to copy, quote & reblog any material here so long it does more benefit than harm, and no commercial undertaking whatsoever. We’d appreciate if if you could link back to us, or let us know when you use it, we love to share as much as we love others who share them! When you find something and would like to discuss any commercial undertaking, feel free to contact us directly. We hope you enjoy your stay. Do leave us a comment, or drop us some words, we’d love to hear from you!
With all the love, W.