.

Introducing Jeenols.com

I'm not sure why i haven't mentioned this in my blog, but i have built a modest sort of quaint wedding website for my sister and her fiance-- at her request. And not until my mom mentioned it this morning did it occur to me that i should mention something. According to her a cousin of mine in the East Coast only knew about the wedding site because it's in the Invitation and wondered why i hadn't advertised it on koolgreen.com. I am wondering myself right now... I guess i just forgot?

The request came soon after i had just completed a website project, www.thedonkeyhouse.net. No its not a porn site haha. I was excited about the Jeenols.com concept, despite the absence of financial compensation and the exasperating thought of long hours in front of a computer (I couldn't charge my sister ya know...). I have a friend who's built a few awesome wedding sites that i couldn't envision ever making let alone building one. You see i have been offered website jobs before but i'd always said no. I just dislike the idea of deadlines or worse coming up short of a decent website. I couldn't handle a client being unhappy about my work. Web creativity isn't my forte you see and whenever i was able to create something nice, it hadn't come easy. It has always been painstaking and frustrating. I suppose i should thank The Donk' House because building their site allowed me to broaden not only my experience in web building but my creativeness. It is the reason why i had ventured outside of my web reservations. I found myself experimenting a lot with Photoshop, Microsoft Image, and dreamweaver. In fact most of the web ideas for the site came about arbitrarily and fortuitously. I had no game-plan for the site at all. And I only agreed to do it because i there was several months on the time table and the fact that it is a Poker Site. I have a Poker site myself so i figured it was a cinch!

I am happy to say the Donk' House owners are very happy with my work. It's great! And i am being compensated handsomely thank you...

As soon as my sister said she wanted a wedding site i began to conceptualize the overall look and color scheme. I thought about the chocolate brown motif, a nice and easy color to work with-- web-wise (Just don't ask the florist that. He'll go crazy...). Naturally, some shade of green was going to permeate the site haha. I figured she shouldn't have any objections with that. I am koolGreen aren't I?

I spent a few hours looking through wedding sites hoping for inspiration that night. I even tried emulating some of the beautiful web templates i came upon. Unfortunately i came up short in this endeavor and felt immensely disappointed in myself. It was late, so instead of starting over i called it a night hoping for a fresh start in the morning...

The next morning, with steaming coffee mug in hand, and feeling somewhat refreshed i deleted all of the prior night's work in hopes of building at least a site template before sunset. I knew i had to change my approach because emulating someone's site, i discovered the night before, proved to be more difficult than piecing-together my own. So i decided to do that... I grabbed a picture from my sisters myspace profile, a picture of the wedding location, and a picture of a newly wed and began to work. Surprisingly within thirty minutes, i had completed the logo then the site template shortly after... That just goes to show original work is much easier to fine-tune than borrowing someone else's. Yea just some webmaster wisdom there haha...

The end Product? Well, i think it's okay. Aesthetically pleasing at least i believe. It is not abundantly adorned with flowers and all sorts of things "white" often found on most wedding sites nor is it replete with Jee and Nols' photographs. The plan was to be somewhat unique somewhat beautiful without the "overuse" of any piece or aspect of the site. I believe i have succeeded in that... Some might not agree with my font of choice but i think most will agree with my color scheme. It's easy on the eyes and clean looking, not busy like some sites.

If i had to critique the site myself, i would say it lacks functionality and perhaps interaction. Some might even wonder why there isn't an "About us" page. Don't worry, i am still debating that... There is no guestbook or an RSVP page available, a lot of people are saying that it is a must for a wedding website. I would beg to differ!

Happy Thanksgiving all!

Posted by: Marc Gabay
Wednesday, November 21, 2007