Author Topic: Website designer wanted - Free arcade in exchange for your skills! (Read 16174 times)

Turnarcades · « **on:** February 02, 2009, 11:11:28 pm »

Right, it's like this....

I set up Turnarcades about 4 years ago and we are currently doing fairly well with a regular order schedule and good feedback from our customers. Around this time last year I finally found time to throw together a brief, but fairly informative website to increase our advertising range and put in writing and pictures what I found myself repeating in countless e-mails. However, the guys in this forum gave mixed opinions and I had limited funds so I decided to leave it 'as is' with the intention of completing or re-doing it myself at a later date. Turns out the half-site was enough to generate plenty more business on it's own and 12 months on I've not really touched it.

The time has come for an overhaul and although we are very busy, our profit margin is still slim and as I'm a new homeowner funds are now tight and will be for some time. I have a fairly precise idea of what I want from the site and how I want it to look, but I simply don't have the time or the skill to put it together in a manageable and professional way. So what I'm proposing is basically this:

Roughly 10 page website, with a 'dark' feel to it, simplistic layout and some arcade theming
Some logo work, photo-shopping of existing artwork/photos to match the theming
An 'instant quoting system' - something like a checkout with options, but not a checkout system, just a price guide
A manageable layout that can be easily updated by me (simple text and picture editing)
Better tags, cleaner coding and faster page loading

I would like to offer a 'trade swap' to someone in exchange for creating this vision for me. Basically, I am offering a slimline 'Mini' or 'Bar-Top' cabinet as payment for designing and coding our website. These machines are usually priced between roughly £500 and £650 if ordered directly from us, so I would be looking at having a site designed with roughly this level of work put into it. I know a few people PM'd me in the past with offers of their services so this request is open to all as long as you are fine with the 'payment'. You can choose which design you would like from these two and we will customise it within our regular limits for you too (your choice of button colours, marquee design and control layout up to the regular 2 player 'fighting' layout). You would be getting something like one of these two:

Ideally I would like to avoid PM's and would prefer it if you could post any interest or ideas here. To give me a brief example of what you are capable of and what you propose, give me a brief description then (if you can), take the HTML from the existing website pages and knock something together to post here in this thread. This will give me a chance to respond publicly so anyone working on a design can modify it based on what I say I prefer.

Craig @ Turnarcades

Blanka · « **Reply #1 on:** February 03, 2009, 01:58:09 am »

I think you should start with getting finished cabs into a photo studio and get some good example shots. The kitchen-look and mobile-phone-megapixels do not add up to the idea that it is business.

surface tension · « **Reply #2 on:** February 03, 2009, 06:12:30 am »

Blanka's right on this one. The photography is very important. It doesn't have to be expensive though. Beg borrow and steal. Be creative.

Arrange to take your systems to friend's houses where there are locations that offer up more than your own place. Be prepared to supply lots of beer though.

If you have a friend with a decent SLR too, this is a real bonus.

Studio shots are also a good idea, but again, there are ways of doing this on a budget. Google it and see. You'll learn lots more on the way too.

HaRuMaN · « **Reply #3 on:** February 03, 2009, 06:28:04 am »

Yay.

1997 called, they want their website back.

Blanka · « **Reply #4 on:** February 03, 2009, 06:46:12 am »

And when photographing, take a white door or a big black, grey or white sheet of cardboard with you. Use it to control the reflections. It's not nice to see the photographer, his lovely assistant or a pile of crap mirroring in the bezel glass. And try to stay neutral on the lens. 50mm lens equivalent is good, 85 is even better.

Rusty Shackelford · « **Reply #5 on:** February 03, 2009, 08:15:24 am »

Totally off-topic your site says your in West Mids. Where about? Im in Brierley Hill

Turnarcades · « **Reply #6 on:** February 03, 2009, 08:34:07 am »

Thanks for the tips on photography. I did mention previously that the window for photo opportunity was limited because we only build cabinets to order and they go out for delivery just as soon as they are finished. This will obviously be addressed though, I have a library of much better shots now anyway from the last 12 months taken with a decent camera that, although not taken with a neutral background, would be easy to 'shop out with Adobe. This would be part of the task for my designer as I don't currently have the time myself.

I already said my HTML skills were limited so unless you are going to take up my offer and show me how it's done then please don't litter the thread with pointless comments as it puts people off who genuinely have something to offer. All the ---steaming pile of meadow muffin----kicking was already done this time last year (scour back through the threads) so unless you can contribute please don't post. The website was my first effort and everything has a learning curve; it's been great anyway but I recognise it needs an overhaul to have maximum impact, so that's why I'm making this request.

Oh, I'm on the border of Wolverhampton and Walsall by the way Rusty.

parag0n · « **Reply #7 on:** February 03, 2009, 08:50:47 am »

Hi Craig,

I've been lurking here for a while trying to collect the info (and parts) to build my first cabinet, and seeing this offer definitely seems like a fit!

I'm a Web Developer (php mainly) by trade, based in Manchester, and do a lot of HTML and CSS work within my job.

Unfortunately i dont have anything very recent (design wise) online, since i'm working on internal company projects at work right now, probably the best example of my design work is my Blog.

If you want to talk here, via PM, or via email {parag0n aht ivixor dawt net} to me about some design ideas, feel free to contact me.

I definitely agree with the other guys on photography, I find the easiest way for something so big is to hang a couple of (white) bedsheets on the wall, light it well using 'pixar' lamps, and use a tripod & dSLR (if you own / can borrow one).

Ta,
Bob

Turnarcades · « **Reply #8 on:** February 03, 2009, 10:16:44 am »

Thanks Bob - my brief is written in my first post, the rest is artistic licence for you! I kind of like the 'mood' of your blog as I would like to go with a dark colour scheme. Take the source from a couple of my pages, modify it a bit and post a simple .jpg on here of how you think it could be done and I'll compare it with what others comes up with.

scriptfactory · « **Reply #9 on:** February 03, 2009, 12:11:31 pm »

This would be a fun little project. Do you have your logo in a Photoshop/Illustrator format (or any format without the bevels) so we can use it in a mockup?

Turnarcades · « **Reply #10 on:** February 03, 2009, 12:58:45 pm »

Absolutely. I've uploaded the .psd logo to Megaupload for anyone who wants to work with it:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=XEZVE5PL

Feel free to modify it as needs be, or even create me a new logo using the text only. A wire-frame cabinet with a 'hyperspace' kind of surrounding in black and silver would look great!

Vegetable · « **Reply #11 on:** February 03, 2009, 05:08:54 pm »

About time I used this membership for something...

http://www.spetom.com/storage/turn_basic.jpg

Hello! Thought I'd knock up a quick 30 minute Photoshop layout for you - nothing too complicated. All fonts / text are just really there to give a general feel. I don't really have time to create a new logo now!

I've consolidated and re-arranged some of your current pages (hope that's ok) to give 6 main pages.

The three 'Products' pages you have could, I think, be easily condensed into one main Products page listing them all, along with a separate page for each item. This would give plenty of space for multiple images of each product.

I've also combined your Examples page and the Options / Extras pages.

Graphically, everything is simple enough. Rounded corners, and the arcade buttons that form the main page links would depress as you roll over them while the text would change colour.

The image represents the site as seen in an 800x600 resolution display. Higher, and it would look more like:

http://www.spetom.com/storage/turn_basic_res.jpg

I'd do it in php, but you wouldn't find it any more difficult to edit text than HTML. With stylesheets, it'd actually be considerably easier.

Now where's the rest of those submissions!

Tom

Turnarcades · « **Reply #12 on:** February 03, 2009, 06:06:46 pm »

Very nice work Tom - this is already close to what I have in mind. I like the colour scheme and the colour fade from left to right. The title font looks nice and retro, and with a reworked logo could look the business up there if 'blended' into some arcade artwork, similar to this effort by Bandit submitted last year:

Something like that across the top would be great, plus I really like Tom's idea of having arcade buttons as the page links. Having some varied button colours for each and perhaps having a 'click' animation of them depressed when the user clicks the link would be good. Tom's shows that photoshopping even the existing pics to remove the background isn't too hard, so some balancing of light and cosmetic touch-ups could improve this too.

Blanka · « **Reply #13 on:** February 04, 2009, 01:55:25 am »

Just looked at the PSD with the logo and that one needs some polishing as well. If you print it for maquees, it will be that large that you see all hic-ups.
- Try to make it all vector
- Try to be less fancy with the filter layers
- Remove the background tile-emboss effect.
- Rotate Miss Pac and ghost in line with the overall curve (you can paste graphics on the text-line!)
- Make a mister-pac alternative for real males that order.

- Use proper kerning. Some letters collapse now. You can put the cursor between any letter-combo and alter the distance with alt-left alt-right.

parag0n · « **Reply #14 on:** February 04, 2009, 08:23:28 am »

OK, heres my quick concept for the site.

http://thinkl33t.co.uk/uploads/turnarcades/

Its based (obviously) around an arcade machine.

The left hand menu would drop down when a main header is clicked, and show any sub menus.

Pages would be edited through a CMS (content management system), using TinyMCE for the actual editing, so you should be able to avoid doing any HTML, and the text stored in a MySQL / PostgreSQL database.

I'd build the cart / order generation system in Jquery (javascript), and make it generate a nicely formatted order that customers can then email through to you.

The art for the marquee needs tidying up (as i just swiped the header from your current site for now), and i'd like high-res photos of the cabinets for the right hand side of the product pages.

-edit- stray parentheses

Turnarcades · « **Reply #15 on:** February 04, 2009, 10:23:06 am »

Another nice design there from Bob. This seems to be gathering momentum now so I think my message is getting across. So far I'm torn between the two menu arrangements (upper row vs. side menus) but both artistic representations (arcade buttons and imitation sprites) are great. I particularly like Bob's colour scheme and proportional font sizes.

Quote

Just looked at the PSD with the logo and that one needs some polishing as well. If you print it for maquees, it will be that large that you see all hic-ups.
- Try to make it all vector
- Try to be less fancy with the filter layers
- Remove the background tile-emboss effect.
- Rotate Miss Pac and ghost in line with the overall curve (you can paste graphics on the text-line!)

See my previous posts - I'm looking for a bit of logo work that will be easy to shrink/blow-up and Blanka's tips are probably the way to go. I'm happy to lose the background of the logo but would like something else cabinet-styled to replace it, though I would like to keep the text arrangement and characters (though they may require re-working slightly). Having this text coupled with a stylish icon as I described will give me a recognisable logo that is more interesting than just text, but easily worked into other designs or made into a marquee with little trouble due to it's proportions.

If someone could show me something now based on Bob and Tom's designs and what I've said, and with a blended banner across the top as described in my last post, we're going to be close to what I want. Thanks for the input from everyone so far.

TPB · « **Reply #16 on:** February 05, 2009, 07:02:14 am »

Quote from: Turnarcades on February 03, 2009, 06:06:46 pm

The title font looks nice and retro, and with a reworked logo could look the business up there if 'blended' into some arcade artwork, similar to this effort by Bandit submitted last year:

Did Bandit receive some goodies for his efforts ?

Who's going to earn the cabinet, if you receive worthwhile submissions from a number of members ?

I reckon you need to bite the bullet, and select the successful tender for the site re-design. Otherwise, there could end up being a number of folk left with a sense of entitlement after the work they've put into designing their mock-up's.

parag0n · « **Reply #17 on:** February 05, 2009, 08:24:19 am »

Ok, i've done a v2, with a quick pacman-themed logo.

http://www.thinkl33t.com/uploads/turnarcades/

As far as the logo goes, i've thought about putting fairly dim/faded sideart in the center bits of the 'walls', depending on what you think will improve it of course.

Not sure how much more work i can do on this before you make a decision though, having to do it in my lunchhour at work at the moment!

Turnarcades · « **Reply #18 on:** February 05, 2009, 09:17:46 am »

Quote

Did Bandit receive some goodies for his efforts ?
Who's going to earn the cabinet, if you receive worthwhile submissions from a number of members ?

At the time I was mereley asking for comments on the existing site and he took it upon himself to do a mockup. I probably would have worked with him at the time but he has been absent from the forum since then.

Well the cabinet will be payment for actually making the website on my behalf. This thread was created as an equal forum to professionals and amateurs alike as there are some home-grown heroes out there who may not get a fair crack of the whip usually if it's not their trade but are willing to do this on the side and earn a machine in the process. It's fair to offer a skill in exchange for someone else's if they are willing to do it.

Thanks for your re-work and comments Tom; it sounds like you can deliver on what you say you can do. Save your effort for now and give me a few days to mull it over. Anyone else can still contribute though and anyone who submits a decent mock-up will receive a £50 discount on any complete cabinet or £20 off a bare wood kit.

parag0n · « **Reply #19 on:** February 05, 2009, 11:17:32 am »

Since i have this here anyway, here's a bigger & tweaked version of my header.

Bob

Vegetable · « **Reply #20 on:** February 05, 2009, 02:11:41 pm »

Ok, I've spent a bit more time touching up the original submission, though it isn't vastly different:
http://www.spetom.com/storage/turn_basic_res.jpg

Web work is only a hobby of mine; I have a completely unrelated full time job that keeps me busy. I may be shooting myself in the foot, but in honesty, I can't claim to offer some of the features Bob is. It would just be a fairly basic php driven site.
The 'instant quote system' feature you ask for isn't a problem, but I would need to re-acquaint myself with JavaScript!

Tom

ViciousXUSMC · « **Reply #21 on:** February 05, 2009, 03:32:47 pm »

This is a great opportunity for me as I am on a $0 budget and want a personal arcade. I can only do about half of what you need though

I am a semi pro photographer (I just got picture of the week in a world wide hotel photo contest yay)
and a pro level photoshoper (have won many photochopin contests and wow people with stuff all the time at work)
but only a basic level web designer.

I actually do a lot of the internal web work for my company but we use a wiki layout so its easy to do.

Well good luck with your new site, I hope you find the right person for the job.

Turnarcades · « **Reply #22 on:** February 05, 2009, 06:51:38 pm »

Thanks for your comments ViciousX, it's a shame you can't do more as a bit more advanced photography and graphic design skills could really lend to this project. I imagineyou could really throw together a great logo with photoshop.

Thanks to both Tom and Bob for these re-workings. I will sit down with these and try to get a picture in my head as to how it would all look in reality and maybe post some pics with my annotations on here to see if the points I make are feasible. Whatever I decide to do, you guys are in my cool book and would gladly be shown due courtesy if you came to me for a cabinet so your efforts have been worth it.

rootyb · « **Reply #23 on:** February 06, 2009, 07:55:30 pm »

Would you be willing to ship the "payment" to the US?

My latest projects:

http://phase2games.com
http://phase2games.com/fetch
http://lasertagofcarmichael.com (I hold no responsibility for the non-graphical elements of this site. That's all the owner's doing)

Turnarcades · « **Reply #24 on:** February 06, 2009, 11:12:36 pm »

Like your stuff rootyb, however I've looked into US export before and it's extortionate (plus UK customs regs are a pain; when it comes to electrical goods over a certain value are very strict) so I'm afraid I can't do it. I was hoping for a few more bods from the UK would pitch ideas (I can think of a few names who expressed interest before in this kind of deal) but the ideas I've received so far have been great nonetheless. I'll give it a few more days then Bob or Tom I will be contacting you for business.

rootyb · « **Reply #25 on:** February 06, 2009, 11:14:07 pm »

No worries.

Best of luck to ya!

Turnarcades · « **Reply #26 on:** February 10, 2009, 09:57:59 am »

Last call for this if anyone has a submission or ideas. I will be making a decision in the next couple of days.

Chukka · « **Reply #27 on:** February 10, 2009, 11:33:18 am »

Hi! My friend (and business partner) owns a professional advertising agency and websites are part of their expertize. We will be happy to make a real professional website with all the goodies for you in exchange for the cabinet (Because we love arcades

). They can make a layout for you to show you exactly what they are capable of if you are interested. But I will have to send it to you by E-mail or pm.

thatitalian · « **Reply #28 on:** February 10, 2009, 11:52:49 am »

Here is what I have done previously:

http://braia.co.uk/

Also No.1 in Google and in Yahoo if you type "braia"

Turnarcades · « **Reply #29 on:** February 10, 2009, 01:15:01 pm »

Quote from: Chukka on February 10, 2009, 11:33:18 am

Hi! My friend (and business partner) owns a professional advertising agency and websites are part of their expertize. We will be happy to make a real professional website with all the goodies for you in exchange for the cabinet (Because we love arcades ). They can make a layout for you to show you exactly what they are capable of if you are interested. But I will have to send it to you by E-mail or pm.

That's no problem - read my brief from the above posts and ask if they can e-mail it to me at either samshaw946@hotmail.com or craig@turnarcades.co.uk asap. Doesn't need to be hi-res or have all the graphic work done, but I need to be sure of your graphical capabilities and imaginative skills.

Quote from: thatitalian on February 10, 2009, 11:52:49 am

Here is what I have done previously:

http://braia.co.uk/

Also No.1 in Google and in Yahoo if you type "braia"

Like the stuff in there - did you create the animations etc. yourself?

Chukka · « **Reply #30 on:** February 10, 2009, 02:40:02 pm »

OK, good. You'll have it in 24 hours max.

thatitalian · « **Reply #31 on:** February 10, 2009, 03:19:32 pm »

Quote from: Turnarcades on February 10, 2009, 01:15:01 pm

Quote from: thatitalian on February 10, 2009, 11:52:49 am
Here is what I have done previously:

http://braia.co.uk/

Also No.1 in Google and in Yahoo if you type "braia"

Like the stuff in there - did you create the animations etc. yourself?

Everything was made by me.

Guywiththegun · « **Reply #32 on:** February 10, 2009, 09:14:46 pm »

Can I get in on this too? I work as a web/graphics designer and love getting more experience. The arcade wouldn't hurt either.

You can check out www.fdtool.com for an example of my current company's website. All graphics and coding was done by me.

Turnarcades · « **Reply #33 on:** February 10, 2009, 10:29:51 pm »

Things have certainly got busy on here suddenly; maybe everyone was hibernating last week!

I am going to extend this request for a little longer to give users a chance to put something together - obviously the speed the first few guys knocked something together was impressive so a quick mock-up gives me confidence you can deliver the product quickly if I take you on board.

So just to re-iterate:
- If interested, you must supply a mock-up within the next week or so. I need to see your creativity so I'm just asking for a .jpg of your idea.
- I need a brief of what you can do. Read my above posts regarding what I will need you to do as well as my follow-up comments regarding a logo design and layouts posted so far.
- The cabinet offer is only open to UK users so sorry US webmasters! However feel free to chip in an idea if it hasn't been covered already.
- All serious mock-ups posted will earn you a discount if you ever want to order from us so even if I don't take you on, there is a little reward for your effort.

Chukka · « **Reply #34 on:** February 11, 2009, 04:33:40 am »

So, you won't even ship to anywhere else in Europe??

Chukka · « **Reply #35 on:** February 11, 2009, 10:09:15 am »

Hi turnarcades,

I just sent you E-mail.

Turnarcades · « **Reply #36 on:** February 11, 2009, 12:43:28 pm »

Yes I'm afraid it's mainland UK only as we had to stop European delivery following some issues with couriers and UK customs, plus the delivery charges were astronomical and most interested European customers were either unhappy with the carriage cost or not confident about the safety of the cabinet. Maybe at some point in the next 12 months we can relocate and get another arrangement going but for now we are supplying to mainland UK only.

I've had a few designs now so will be compiling them to post here to get some feedback.

DeLuSioNal29 · « **Reply #37 on:** February 11, 2009, 01:11:26 pm »

I have a suggestion for the pictures.

You could probably do them yourself. Just make sure that they are behind a black or white background so that it will be easier to digitally remove them using Photoshop. This will save you some money and it will look professional.

Here's an example of what I mean. I took these photos on a light beige carpet and used Photoshop to edit out everything else.

~ DeLuSioNaL

Turnarcades · « **Reply #38 on:** February 11, 2009, 02:27:59 pm »

Thanks D, already addressed that problem though, and all future cabinets will be photographed better. Some users here already though have successfully been able to filter out the background from the existing pictures so hopefully they can re-work the existing images a bit when they build the site. I have some slightly higher-resolution photos of most of our cabinet designs so it should be a bit easier than using the small images from the existing site too.

drawfull · « **Reply #39 on:** February 11, 2009, 02:36:07 pm »

Quote from: Turnarcades on February 11, 2009, 12:43:28 pm

Yes I'm afraid it's mainland UK only as we had to stop European delivery following some issues with couriers and UK customs, plus the delivery charges were astronomical and most interested European customers were either unhappy with the carriage cost or not confident about the safety of the cabinet. Maybe at some point in the next 12 months we can relocate and get another arrangement going but for now we are supplying to mainland UK only.

Craig, it will almost certainly be worth your while investigating using a european-based company for such transactions. I had a quote from a UK company of (I can't remember but the ratio is right) £1,000 to ship a machine from the states. I got it here for $500 - rip off Britain.

And I would say to your sceptical customers overseas, if you pack it right, it'll be right.

I appreciate that's above and beyond the topic but it's worth looking into.

Drawfull


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