For this final project, I decided to make a website for my friend. He records, produces, and publishes music for a plethora of musicians at the University of Miami, but his online presence has been a bit lackluster. We have made music together for a while, so I thought paying it forward with some online help would definitely help grow his brand and make his music more accessible online. As a part of my New Media Design course, I started with building him a logo, and pretty much a brand, too, so in this class, I wanted to bring the whole project to fruition.
The Bootstrap website I designed features his music projects in a couple of different ways. I linked all of his socials in the hero section and the footer to give users a direct link to find more of his content. The primary aspect of the website I knew I wanted to include was an embedded video player.
Making a clean looking website is great, but for this website to really aid him, he needs to have people hear what he makes and want to listen to more. His style is very unique, so I wanted the website to portray that by using warm colors and cozy images. Finally, I put in a booking form to help him get more freelance work as a producer.
One of the biggest things I learned from this assignment was how to work with a client. Though I am good friends with my client, I almost found it more stressful to try to build something he would be proud to display. I had originally gone for a different color scheme and had to switch it up completely after asking him what he wanted for the website.
Another client based challenge I found was getting the right resources from them. It was hard to get high quality images in certain areas, and though I did end up making it work, some of the easy things that I did not prioritize ended up being the more challenging aspects in the end.
Past the challenge of working for a client, I also ran into some technical challenges. I ran into trouble with my embedded video when the Bootstrap resource I was using was outdated. Using the wrong version drastically affected the display on the website, and after finding the solution, version number is one of the first things I check when using Bootstrap’s documentation.
Finally, I found trouble sizing the YouTube thumbnails I was using. I found that to get the organized look I was going for, using exact dimensions was important in organizing the “Recent Videos” section.
I am very proud of the website that I have built. Especially when comparing the first website I made with this one, it is hard to believe that all that progress was made in a three month span. Mostly, I am proud that the product I put out was worthy of my friend’s approval and has even gotten more of my friends’ attention in my Music Business program.
