the importance of a website

Finnegan

Finnegan

Well-known member
I'm almost done with my undergraduate study in film and media studies, and in case I don't get into graduate school, I want to start planning for my future in film production. I know networking is huge, this business is all about who you know. I live in the LA/OC area, so that's a good start. my question is this: in this day and age, is it still important to have a personal website? between social networking sites like facebook, high quality media streaming websites like vimeo, and email, it seems like websites are a little outdated.

is the professionalism associated with a website worth the cost of maintaining/updating it, and having someone design/code it, and paying for hosting - just to be able to put up a bio/resume/reel?

if so, where do I go to find people to design me a webpage for my filmmaking endeavors?
 
Yes. Very worth it IMO.

For getting freelance work, making a website was one of the best things I ever did.

To find a person to design, ask around your friends, or post a classified. It's not cheap– I might suggest taking a couple classes on Dreamweaver and making your own site if you have the time. hosting itself is pretty cheap.
 
just make your own website. it's not that hard with joomla or wordpress these days. even learning how to do css and html pages from scratch is easy with dreamweaver.
 
I don't have a lot of time, certainly not enough to learn html/css/dreamweaver from scratch. even if it is a tad expensive I'd be inclined to have a professional design me a sleek, elegant website and code it for me. I know that I'd spend a long time learning it and still not be able to really design the look I want. so, when you pay for a design does is that simply the design/template or does that include all the coding/links and stuff?

what hosting do you recommend? what companies do web design?
 
Finnegan said:
I don't have a lot of time, certainly not enough to learn html/css/dreamweaver from scratch. even if it is a tad expensive I'd be inclined to have a professional design me a sleek, elegant website and code it for me. I know that I'd spend a long time learning it and still not be able to really design the look I want. so, when you pay for a design does is that simply the design/template or does that include all the coding/links and stuff?

what hosting do you recommend? what companies do web design?
Click to expand...

hosting - bluehost
domain - godaddy

Well if you want to update things yourself, you'll need an ftp program and possibly dreamweaver. Otherwise, the designer might keep it all and you send them updated clips, pictures, etc. The latter is of course more expensive.
 
Templates are available all over, I'm sure someone can make it for little. Maintenance is incredibly inexpensive. I've barely even noticed I have one as far as finances are concerned, with the hosting and domain registrar of the above post.

Social networking sites are nice, but they're also easy. A well made website shows dedication and seriousness that other things just can't. However, it also depends on your marketing strategy. If you are good at making contacts and maintaining them you might want to emphasize social networking sites, especially if your demographic goes for that. Keep in mind that "Myspace" has connotations of high school girls spreading gossip with a lot of your potential audience. Marketing is all about looking at those kinds of connotations.
 
Learning HTML and CSS and doing it in something simple like textwrangler (MAC) or notepad (PC) is really really easy. It might be worth spending an afternoon here: www.w3schools.com to see if you can do it. It isn't as daunting as many make it out to be.

My site (below in my sig) took me just over a day to get up and running. It is simple and does what I need it to. Of course you can get extremely complex with your design but if you want simple, just DIY.
 
Learning how to make great Web pages is not simple, though, it's incredibly complicated. So complicated that you are unlikely to find any professionals who can do it top to bottom, at least a very good Website. We have already used 5 people to do my Website, my friend is the head programmer and is creating the back-end of the site and the general layout guidelines, like the architect, then we have had two separate graphical designers, neither of whom know much about making Websites (though one does Flash sites), and then two separate CSS people as well, the first of which was so bad that we had to hire the second. You'd think CSS wouldn't be that difficult, but it actually is very difficult to find anyone who knows how to code GOOD CSS. It's easy to find someone to make it bad and quick.

So the issue is really how professional you want it to be. My Website is basically version 1.0, it's at www.jlbmedia.com. There are NUMEROUS improvements forthcoming, still, even after months of building it. The site is static now, not dynamic, so there is no back-end built. There are no photo galleries yet. The basic corporate design is too plain, it needs reworking. The music video layout is still being turned into a CSS file, so that's not up. Request a quote form not built. There are lots and lots of little things that just take so much work to get right, and even things you don't realize until after it's up.

The good news is with my type of site, and why I had it built this way, is there will not be a need to open FTP for most changes. I will be able to upload pictures, text, probably basically anything without ever needing to ask anyone to code it, or FTP to the site. That will all be done through the back-end. That was ideal for me as I don't know how to code and don't want to screw around with it.

And yes, Websites are essential.

If you need a Flash guy or really good graphic designer, my editor Brendan is excellent and he is inexpensive / reasonable. A lot of graphical designers will try to charge you $75/hr, which they are not worth (let's be honest here, only the very top ones should get paid that), but he is better than 95% I've seen and he's cheaper than 95% too.
 
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my main concern is the price. I don't want to spend a ridiculous amount of money for something that will essentially serve as a place online where my professional contact information, reel, and resume can be found. however, I do want a pretty sleek design. what are your thoughts on pre-made flash templates? I know there are a handful of sites that charge anywhere from $50 to $80 for a pre-designed flash site that is fully functional right out of the checkout line. also, how do you update sites like that? do you have to know the coding and html or have an FTP?
 
Yeah, that was my concern, which is why I've spent thousands making a Website, so it can be just what I want, fully customized, and updatable without knowing any coding.
 
JonathanLB said:
Yeah, that was my concern, which is why I've spent thousands making a Website, so it can be just what I want, fully customized, and updatable without knowing any coding.
Click to expand...

I'm particularly interested in the last two bits - I can deal with a website that doesn't exactly imagine my vision (for instance, if someone else designed it based on what I said I wanted), but I would like to be able to change things and upload files without having to go through a lengthy and tedious process involving coding. how does that work for you? what kind of interface do you run to be able to do that?
 
i wouldn't touch any of those flash templates. if ranking high on search engines is important to you, then go for anything besides flash since search engine spiders can't read swf files. plus i find their animations and sounds extremely cheesy and annoying.
plus you'll need adobe flash to be able to edit them.
Joomla and wordpress and other content management systems have thousands of free templates out there and are easy to use and update.
 
Web design (and programming) is one of those things where 2% of people really understand all the ins and outs and the majority of those 2% grossly overcharge the rest of the world for their services.

We are just completing a large project that, if we had approached a major web design house, would have cost upwards of $30,000 between architecture, database design, programming, web and graphic design, and various bells and whistles. The dirty secret of the industry is that, on a project like that, most of the money is pure profit. Because we have a team of people and in-house expertise, our cost of doing that same project, including our staff time, is under $2,000.

A custom website with a very flexible CMS (content management system) can be had for under $1000 (and depending on what you're after, sometimes under $500) if you know what you need and where to find it.

And I also agree heartily with JonathanLB; finding competent people, as opposed to people who claim to be competent, can be quite the challenge particularly when you don't understand the lingo and technical ins-and-outs of what they do.

My company develops custom media-rich websites for our own products and services (not so much for other clients but occasionally we take a project or two on.) Sean, I sent you a PM, we might be able to help with what you're after.

I also echo the idea that Flash (and even some CMS solutions) can be a bad idea if search engine ranking is important. You can always mirror the site in HTML to get your search positioning, but that's sort of extra effort, and honestly, a well-designed HTML (or PHP) site can be very appealing and professional with tons of bells and whistles that will rival pretty much any Flash site.
 
Yes, having a central website where people can easily see your work/resume is very helpful.

For the design, make sure it's clean and simple and that's all that really matters. Remember, you're showcasing your video work, not your ability to hire web designers. The more time you focus on how your site looks, the less time you focus on creating great videos and meeting new people.

99% of people won't be hiring you because of your website, they'll hire you because they've met you and you've proven yourself valuable because of who you are and the work that you do.
 
I know real web designers will hate me for saying this, but you can proably find a friend that has some web design skills who might make you one for peanuts.

I'll throw in a vote for Hostmonster.com for hosting. I use it.
 
Joomla, which basically used to be Mambo, is a good way to get a really solid, easy-to-edit Website for cheap. I've had a few sites done that way, just hobby sites, for about $300 just for setup and customization, really great, keeps costs low and it's easy for me to update too.

But with my production company site, I mean the fact is I've spent tens of thousands on my reel, 3-4 times that in equipment costs, and money on advertising, etc. It's not a big deal to spend a few thousand on a great Website, so long as it lasts years and years. I wanted it fully customized and I wanted basically exactly what I had in mind, not something that sorta worked.

So right now, my site is just 1.0, it's purely static HTML, you could get a site like this made for not really that much money, aside from the graphic design elements and you could probably (through a lot of time, ugg) find good graphic designers to do it for not TOO much. The problem really is hiring the right people, who actually understand deadlines. We've been so unlucky with that, we just kept going through flakes. It's so frustrating!

Version 2.0 of the site will be the fully database-driven, back-end intensive site where I can change all of the text in various fields on the back end (I've had a site like this when I ran a big joke site back in 2001-2002), upload photos, and I have an automatic laurel generator where i just enter the text and it creates the laurel, will take a few seconds at most, which is awesome. The laurel is then linkable to the Website where the film festival is located, etc. I can re-order a section page to move projects up and down as I please, very easily, so it's modular, and then when creating new project pages I can select what boxes I want (like I don't need a director's statement let's say on a corporate project, or I don't need a testimonial on a short film, etc.).

I am not saying that my site is worth the money for everyone, just that for me looking at it, figuring ok great I can have this site for many years where it is super easy for me to update, so no reliance on other people, which for me is really good because I like to be able to do things myself if possible. And also the site is fully upgradeable through the CSS templates, so that when I do new short films I can just have someone create a new CSS layout for it and throw it on the site, and it basically makes it like a new page entirely, new design, layout, etc. So that was a big part of the appeal, to make the site highly customizable and modular so it can be changed in the future without needing to be redone regularly.

There is still a lot more to do with the site, though, and it's been a long process. It works fine now for clients who are checking it out, but it just is not where I want it yet of course.
 
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