Editing a Flash Webpage

heggie

Makes sense why the changes are costing so much compared to your initial purchase, a template may cost 50 dollars, but chaging its layout/structure could easily cost 5 times that.
Template & unique do not go together, surely, if someone is showing you a list of pre-designed websites, you can't expect a custom one?

Talk to a proper web design/dev company when you value the online aspect of your business, and want a true bespoke website.

Smcgie

heggie wrote: »

Makes sense why the changes are costing so much compared to your initial purchase, a template may cost 50 dollars, but chaging its layout/structure could easily cost 5 times that.
Template & unique do not go together, surely, if someone is showing you a list of pre-designed websites, you can't expect a custom one?

Talk to a proper web design/dev company when you value the online aspect of your business, and want a true bespoke website.

Thanks Heggie, i was edgy about templates but he said that it had to be picked to let him know what i was after. Ive waisted 6months on this project, and i think im going to go back to square 1 with the site. I can create a site myself through word but i find it wouldnt be near as attractive as a professionals.

Is dreamweaver much of an addition? or any other software for that matter?

heggie

word shouldn't be considered for a website.

dreamweaver is good software, but that's all it is, a tool for creating a site, it's not going to make it for you. People spend years learning how to design, contruct & develop websites. Just because it's relatively easy enough to throw something up on the web doesnt mean you should. For roughly the cost of the adobe software (dreamweaver, photoshop etc - keeping in mind you would still need extensive training to use these) you could hire someone to create a website for you.

One thing to watch out for though, is jack of all trades. In my opinion, a website has atleast two critical people in development (other than the client) - thats the designer & the developer. A designer studies typography, grid systems, layout, usability, information architecture, whereas a developer implements them (hopefully to web standards) and creates great code. They are 2 separate jobs, but any decent web studio should have both of these covered.

The Mighty Ken

As has already been said, you get what you pay for.

If you want a cheap website for a small business, get a simple HTML one done up by a junior designer and forget about Flash altogether.

Smcgie

Who would you use, or can you point me in the right direction? I need someone that i can work with.

PM me.

Thanks for your time Heggie, really appreciated.

The Mighty Ken

I don't really know any junior designers personally but I'm sure there are a few on there that would be willing to help you out.

p

He isn't ripping you off from the sounds of things. 250 quid could be a days work. With Flash sites, often what seems like something simple can take a long time. I'd imagine that's the case even more so with template sites.

You pay a premium price for Flash sites, HTML ones are generally easier to maintain and cause less hassle. It's hard to advise the best course of action really. You could get a better designer than that guy, but they'd probably cost more. Sounds like this guy is a bit of a beginner so isn't pricing things or communicating pricing to you effectively.

Axwell

I dont think you can go blaming him for the spelling mistakes if you provide the text for him to add so really that comes down to your own error.

As for changes to the site, as someone else said changes should come afterwards and he has every right to charge for them at that point.

Another issue i think is your own beliefs on what is good design and this a lot of times is the biggest problem i feel. If you speak to a designer about a website then you are going to them for advce as much as to develop you a site. If you like the look of a flash site and feel its a perfect example of a good site then you cant complain down the line when you get a flash site and then find out its not a good example of web design on here. There was no need for flash to be used in that project but it was what you wanted.

You get what you pay for as with anything else. Advice and a designer pointing out to you what is good design and what you should be looking for in your site is part of their job and as much part of the service as anything else. If you dont want to pay for this kind of service then you leave yourself open to getting sub standard work and not being happy in the long run.

forbairt

A few things I can think of .... in response to various questions on here.

If the customer originally didn't ask for the source files they won't be getting them. If they did ask for source files that takes me out of the loop further down the road so I charge accordingly.

If I work on graphics they won't be getting the source files they are getting the end result. If I work on flash they are getting the final product not the complete source code. It would be different if I'm contracted by a company as their developer to develop something for them specifically.

Templates similar to the one shown (both look very Template monster to me) are probably a complete bitc.. to customize. There is a reason they sell for 50 quid. Normally they don't have nice ways of updating them apart from adding a bit of text here and there. (which sometimes can be as simple as updating a bit of XML somewhere).

Hmmm not knowing the amount of work involved .. I can't really comment on the person in questions prices. Especially as I don't know their hourly rate for work.

In the past I've received extremely bad text / copy for a site and I've taken it upon myself to fix it up. My engrish not being the best it took me a while to sort it out and I didn't end up getting paid (for the english corrections). In future what the customer supplies me with would be what gets put on the site apart from any glaringly obvious things I pick up. Unless you've got a contract stating otherwise with the designer ... I would assume that the text you give them will be what will appear on the site.

(just a few thoughts on it all)

heggie

Smcgie wrote: »

Who would you use, or can you point me in the right direction? I need someone that i can work with.

PM me.

Thanks for your time Heggie, really appreciated.

No problem, I would use myself, or recommend myself hehe but I'm too busy to take on any new projects at the moment. If you take a look at http://creativeireland.com/directory/ you should find some companies to check out, also there are users here on boards - Forbairt and DJB among others which may be able to help. Best of luck.