Blog Redesign!
So… whaddaya think of the new digs? After I made some new decisions about how I plan to use this blog (I plan to use it more and bigger and better), I decided a redesign was necessary. Of course, that’s got me rethinking the design of the entire Magnetic State portfolio site as well – but one thing at a time.
Two vintage title screens from Columbia Pictures
My first goal was a new logo that represented the ‘Blog Dept.’ as an entity that functions both as a component of Magnetic State as well as a standalone publication. In both the name of this blog and the design of the logo, I was inspired by film noir movies (you know, the black and white ones where Humphrey Bogart carries a flask and a revolver in his trenchcoat and says ‘dame’ a lot). I always admired the title screens and studio i.d.’s from these films from the thirties and forties, and I specifically emulated the three-dimensional block letter effects of Columbia Pictures (above). I used a somewhat wild color combination to give my design a modern flair.
Bogart pursues the facts and just the facts. Notice the bold 'Spade and Archer' label on the window.
In films like The Maltese Falcon (pictured), there’s always a business name on the detective’s window or an officer’s name and title on the frosted door window of a cop’s office. I liked the idea that this blog is a ‘department’ at Magnetic State and that the logo can serve as the title on the door, if you will.
As for the web design, I intended to prioritize the content. My previous layout placed blog posts under a distracting header, but now the blog content has plenty of room to breathe, is prioritized vertically, and is more readable. I am thankful for Small Potato’s tutorial on writing WordPress themes, which I have referred to many times over the last year or two. I consider myself an expert on custom WordPress themes now; I have one bare-bones theme that I wrote by hand (from SP’s instructions) which I’ve customized for each of my last four or five WP sites.
Thanks for stopping by and I hope you’ll subscribe via RSS! I have some big things planned for this blog as well as a bunch of new design work to unveil in the next few weeks.
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