Refined Target Audience...

Primary – Educationalists
Gregg is 37 years old and works at the examining body BTEC. Gregg is fairly self contained and spends a lot of his time on his laptop computer. He has a 17” widescreen laptop with a screen resolution of 1152x864 Pixels, his operating system is Windows Vista and the browser he uses is Internet Explorer 7.

He mainly uses his computer as a means of communication when he is on his travels and often uses his computer on the train. The main other uses he has for his laptop are internet viewing and word processing. His skills in using his computer are not really that great but he can comfortable use it for his requirements.

As he uses his computer a lot on his travels he has a 3G mobile connection so the speed is not as high as broadband but is still higher than dial up. He also has a monthly download limit of 3GB.

Secondary – Potential Employers
Trevor is 35 years of age and is the owner of a small design company based in Leeds. His company is only 5 years old but has managed to establish itself as one of the best design companies locally. His pay is based on the number and level of clients that they receive, but is generally in the region of £40,000 P/A.

Trevor has access to a number of computer systems; at home he has a 15” Mac Book running the OSX operating system. On this computer his screen resolution is 1152x864 and the browser he uses is Mozilla Firefox 2.0.

At work he has also uses his Mac Book but has in his office he has a 20” iMac that is also running the OSX operating system but this has a screen resolution of 1280x1024 and he also use Mozilla Firefox 2.0 here as well.

Tertiary – Private Clients
Carl is 45, is married and has two children. He is a homeowner and is self employed. He owns a small shop which involves selling home made furniture that he and his brother produce. Their business is started well but they would like to extend into the national market and appeal to customers all across the UK and because of this they are looking to create a website.

Carl does not have any notable experience with computers and only uses it for email and the occasional catch up on news websites. He has a fairly old computer system in the back room of their workshop.

It’s a very basic computer and not very fast. It is running Windows XP and has a screen resolution of 1024x768. He does not really understand how to update his system and is still using Internet Explorer 6 as his browser.

Carl would require some form of training on how to use the website for processing orders and some basic requirements for the website are contact information with a map and he would also like customers to be able to place orders online and would also require a method of online payment.

He does not necessarily want the site to be all singing all dancing and would prefer if it worked well rather than looked nice.

Delivery Requirements - Portfolio

Technologies:
CSS Version 2.1
This is something that I have only reacently picked up and am looking to improve upon even more. CSS will be the vital ingrediant to the look and feel of the website as it will be used to style all of the pages and their elements. In order to create the CSS I will be using Dreamweaver.
The style sheet will also need to be validated using the W3C Validator.

XHTML 1.0 Transitional
XHTML is now seen as the standard web language and has replaced HTML. I will therefore use it to place content onto the web page, which will then be styled by the CSS.

FTP (Dreamweaver)
The file transfer protocol (FTP) within Dreamweaver will be used to upload the created website and associated files from my local machine to the internet.

Flash
I will also look to incorporate some form of Flash in the design, this will not be anything major, but as it is a new skill that I have learnt reacently I will be looking to show off some of the techniques I have learnt.

Feedback Form
This will be the main and preffered method of communication that the users will be able to use to get in touch with me. There will be a small box where the user can input their comment and also a drop down menu where they can select how they have managed to come across my website. The feedback for itself will be linked to my email adress.

Software:
Dreamweaver
This program will be used for the actuall build of the site. It will also be used for the creation of the CSS code. The FTP within dreamweaver will also be used, so this is a piece of software that I will be using throughout the majority of the build process.

Adobe Flash
This software will be used for creation of any flash elements, whatever they may be.

Adobe Photoshop
Photoshop will be used for creation of any graphical work on the website. The look and feel of the site will ultimately be decided on the type of graphical elements that are on the page, which is why Photoshop will have a major role to play in the creation/.

Portfolio Target Audience

Primary Audience - Educationalists
The design of the portfolio is for use in the final presentation where there will be a number of educationalists present, so it makes sense that they are my primary target audience. An educationalist is generally someone who will be able to appreciate good design when they see it and will also be very specific in their likes and dislikes. Age wise I think generally between 30 and 50.

Secondary Audience - Potential Employers
The level of web experience that a potential employer will have is quite high. They will be very specific about what they want to see. Generally an employer will have experience in actually creating websites and graphical work. The reason that they will be on the website in the first place is to try and spot someone that they see potential in, so the portfolio must only show the best of my work.

There is however some potential employers who have no experience in web development at all and are simply in charge of the business because of their management skills. This type of potential employer will probably be more difficult to please as they will not be able to appreciate some of the work that goes into creating even something rather simple.

Tertiary Audience - Other Designers
As is often the case I find myself scouring the web for other peoples portfolios, often just for that bit of inspiration to keep me going when I lose concentration. I hope that my website will be used by other designers to offer them inspiration.

The profile for a designer can vary drastically. It starts with beginners or “baby designer” as the phrase goes. The baby designers won’t have that much experience in web development or graphic design. Baby designers are in most cases students between the ages of 16 and 23.

On the other hand there will be the more experienced and probably employed designers who will be generally between the ages of 20 to 40.

Portfolio Website Goals

Must be limited to containing at least 10 main pieces that will be accessible to the general public
This will allow the website not to become cluttered which will hopefully allow the work to be more easily accessed. Limiting it to a maximum of 10 pieces of work also make me only choose the best of my work where as I otherwise may be tempted to put on something that I would not this way.

To be made using CSS
Weather the portfolio should be a design task itself or if it should be something subtle and let the work speak for itself. Making the portfolio in CSS is a way of still making the portfolio a piece of work even if the design is plain because it shows a different skill that you are capable of.

Must Validate
A simple yet very effective goal, it will show that the coding is correct and it is an crucially important, especially when the large proportion of the target audience is potential employers.

To meet Priority 1 of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
Meeting this priority is something that I think the majority of web designers should be taking as a given, but many are not doing so. Simply making the website accessible to a wider range of people is what every designer wants, so why they are not doing it is beyond me. If I’m honest this is something that I have only recently become familiar with, but I will now start to try and implement it into my working methods.