Client Project....

Well the time is upon me to start my final uni project, which involves working with a real life client, my client is KC Telstar which is a mobile disco and karaoke company, I have been looking on the web for websites of mobile disco companies and so far they have been pretty poor standard and look like they have been done on freewebs, so there is a good chance that I can create something unique for my site that hasn't been done by any of other companies in this area.

I have started to sketch some initial layout ideas and marked down ideas on what pages to include on my cleints site, I will get photo's of these and upload them soon for some feedbakc on my layout ideas.

Web Accessibility - through the "eyes" of a screen reader

What happens when screen readers are not set up correctly.

Writing effective ALT text for images.

Anyone who knows anything about web accessibility knows that images need alternative, or ALT, text assigned to them. This is because screen readers can't understand images, but rather read aloud the alternative text assigned to them. In Internet Explorer we can see this ALT text, simply by mousing over the image and looking at the yellow tooltip that appears. Other browsers (correctly) don't do this. The HTML for inserting ALT text is:

img src="filename.gif" alt="Alternative description goes here"

Improving usability for screen reader users

http://www.webcredible.co.uk/user-friendly-resources/web-accessibility/screen-readers.shtml

What is a Screen Reader?

http://www.nomensa.com/resources/articles/accessibility-articles/what-is-a-screen-reader.html

A screen reader is a software application that enables people with severe visual impairments to use a computer.
Screen readers work closely with the computer’s Operating System (OS) to provide information about icons, menus, dialogue boxes, files and folders.
A screen reader provides access to the entire OS that it works with, including many common applications.

Research Task.

For the research task we were told to look at an artist or a group of artists that have inspired us, I have chosen Neville Brody and Peter Saville, these artists were first bought to my attention during college when a tutor recommended I looked them up for a typography task.

Neville Brody.

Neville Brody is a British graphics designer and as done projects for clients such as Macromedia, The Times Newspaper and Computer Arts Magazine.



'Above; Computer Arts Magazine Cover Submission'

I like his designs as they stand out and are always cleanly layout, I am a fan of bold colours but they have to be used in the right way and well thought out as there are a lot of designs out there that have used bolder colours but look untidy and unpleasing on the eye, the design above shows good use of more vibrant colours well and it works well with the simple white background.

Peter Saville.

Peter Saville is well known for his work in typography, one of his most famous designs was the record sleeve for Blue Monday by New Order, below, this piece of work is very modernist and is very simple but works very well.



The way that he uses simple but effective designs is clever as it will stand out amongst other designs as it strikes your eye as it is so simple and isn’t jumping out you with lots of elements fighting for attraction.