Tampa Wordpress Web Design - Massive Ant

Tampa, FL -- Graphic Design, Web Design & Development, WordPress Expert Developers, CMS

news

Massive Ant Community Support – 813preps.com

Massive Ant is proud to support local youth sports. We did a ground up redesign of 813peps.com, the authority on High School baseball and other sports here in Tampa Bay. Jarrett Guthrie came to us looking to get out of the Blogger platform and into WordPress without losing the more than 500 articles the 813preps team had put together over the last few years. Our developers structured a new database coupled with a clean newspaper style redesign to give the website user an up to date, easy to navigate experience. Jarrett and his team do a ton of work, largely uncompensated because they just love baseball. To keep their cost to run the site at zero, in addition to supporting the website we also provide hosting on our dedicated server and manage the email.  Here’s wishing all student athletes a great season!

New Client: Biotectics LLC

Happy to have on board local Tampa lab, Bitectics, LLC. Biotectics is a research and development laboratory of plant based, green and natural products in personal care, food, and other sectors. We’ll be developing a new visual identity, trade graphics and website design.

 

visit Biotectics.com

Content Upgrades, what the hell are they?

In the modern world if you have a thing or do a thing that thing better have a fancy name. Which brings up “Content Upgrade”, what is a “Content Upgrade”?  It’s pretty simple, give me your email and I’ll show you my…  More specifically, give me your email and I’ll give you something, usually some content, expertise, knowledge. Fair trade? that’s up to you.  Here’s a primer.

Create These Content Upgrades and Get More Conversions

Pass or Fail? Grading the new USF Logo – USF Unveils New Academic Logo | WUSF News

At first glance you instantly get that Deja vu feeling. Then it hits you pretty quickly, the Merril Lynch logo. “Close” is an understatement, but you be the judge. Don’t want to get an argument about intentions, and I like to think no designer would purposely want to go “there”. Just do a google image search for “bull logo” and you’ll see it’s pretty easy to come up with an original unoriginal bull.

Many logo refresh attempts are met first with “why?” and most people are not comfortable with change, it’s disconcerting. I feel this is the case, again. Let me explain. USF has had a few too many logo iterations in the past not so long a space of time (yes I’m mixing in the Academic logo with the dizzying array of athletic logos). Other than it being a bull, there is no logical visual progression, each new version too different from the last. Once again that is the case with this new version. Lending itself to criticism for not building a  consistent visual brand at a school that is doing well improving it’s academic reputation.

Well, what’s done is done, how is it? Is it good? When it comes to logo redesigns the trend is to simplify on each iteration, moving away from multiple colors and gradients to a flat one color design arriving at minimal shape recognition. Apple and Starbucks are the classic examples. The new bull on it’s own follows that trend, and it’s done well. The bull is faithful to the actual bronze bull on campus. It has a strong defiant sense. It’s a BULL damnit!

So, well done on the bull itself. There is potential for this bull to be a lasting one. You can cut or smooth out a few angles here or there but how much more simple can you get before you lose it as a bull. And all would be well in the world here in Tampa but then there was this: I have to admit that we are font snobs around here. Many a project goes over time as we battle to the death over arc, stem, descender, ligature and other terrifically boring aspects of fonts. So we have to say WTF? on this new USF. The “U” and the “S” have a semi extrusion giving them a 3-D aspect, which would be fine but this is absent in the “F”. There is a weird perspective, a disjointed spacial feeling to the eye, like Cezanne’s fruit on a table that looks like it wants to roll off, or Manet’s bench that goes under at one perspective and comes out another on the other side. This is furthered by the extrusions having different sized “barreling” with the “U” having a much larger aperture than the “S”. This also makes the “U” look slightly larger than the “SF”.

So, we’re gonna pass the bull but fail the typography. Hopefully the logo on the side of a bus gets partially blocked by a minivan.

Source: USF Unveils New Academic Logo | WUSF News

STEAL THIS SHIRT!

Why? Why Massive Ant, why should we steal this shirt?!?! Get a shirt we’ll plant a tree. Because it’s a cool design. Because it’s good quality. Because it’s made in the USA by an awesome small business. Because it’s good for the environment (for every shirt we’ll plant a tree or maybe two or three).  Because you’ll be helping us increase our brand awareness.  Because this shirt once inspired Abbie Hoffman to write a book. Because you’re not a thief (because things cost money, so don’t steal, buy this shirt). Because every time we’ve said the word “because” you’ve been slowly hypnotized into buying this shirt.

click here to BUY NOW!

When we count to three and snap our fingers you’ll awake feeling refreshed and looking great in your new shirt.

1,2,3…

Snap!

Makes a great Holiday gift.

P.S. Stay tuned, we have two other Massive Ant branded charity shirts coming soon! One for our favorite ALS charity (Project Main St.) and one our favorite Rescue Animals charity (The John and Christine Tortorella Family Foundation).

 

 

 

New Website: Day 1 Sports & Entertainment

We’ve done a few sites for some of their clients, so we were eager to get to work on their own website. Day 1 Sports & Entertainment is a full service sports agency based in Atlanta. Day1 represents some very high profile NFL players, and is branching out into other professional sports as well. Like any good agency they get the best contracts for their clients but  it doesn’t stop there, they provide community outreach opportunities for their players to give back, as well as wealth management services to make sure their clients futures are secure.

The Day1 requested a website be developed that had the look and feel of the unique business environment of professional sports athletes. A bit of our WordPress movement skills were needed to showcase what these people do while highlighting a few of their players. Another fun site to work on and it’s pretty cool to see these guys at work on Sundays.

Tampa fans stay tuned… we are hard at work on Buccaneer Mike Evans’ charitable foundation website.

Day1Sports.com

New Website – Baricchi Institute of Movement

About 10 years ago we did a website for a nationally known dance studio that opened a branch here in Tampa. We gave the client the option of a Flash website, one that would allow us to use some animation and music to convey the movement and mood of a ballroom dance studio. The other option was a fairly new method of building a site, a fairly new platform (CMS) that we were playing with at the time, WordPress. You see, Flash was incredibly capable for building beautiful dynamic websites, but it was very difficult for our clients to update things such as events and schedules (something a dance studio would need often). The client chose to go with the Flash site. On the up side we did a beautiful site. On the down side it wasn’t long before they needed weekly and sometimes daily updates to the site. Now there were ways to get Flash sites updated by having Flash pull from a text file (xml) but it still had to be handled by us.

This was a turning point for us,  we were smart enough (and lucky!) to see what the future held. With SEO turning away from keywords and metadata to an algorithm that relied on frequent and relevant content, and the constant problems with the monster that Flash had become, we decided to jump headfirst into developing WordPress websites.

So why are we telling you this? Well, one of the principals of this dance studio was a world champion dancer named Luca Baricchi. He remembered the site and everything we went through to get it just right. Jumping ahead to the present Luca was developing a unique approach to the techniques, training and educational methods of classical dance, and was establishing a new institute. Luca hadn’t been to the USA in some time but we were honored when he flew in from Italy, just to meet with us. He wanted the fluid and graceful feel of the Flash website but needed the infrastructure of WordPress to allow him to grow as his institute did. We always missed the freedom of design and animation that Flash served. So we’ve been sharpening our skills to marry that freedom and functionality into one site platform. We also designed a logo to match the feel of what Luca’s techniques and spatial 3 -dimensional movement..  Be sure to have a look at the results.

Baricchi Institute of Movement

Spec this!

“But my Grandmother doesn’t like the coffee, can you give me 3 others to choose from?”

▶ Your Favorite Photoshop Experts Open Photoshop 1.0

While in a sales meeting and going through our website development history… we were dealing with the performance lag issues with the Flash player on Mac’s and Macromedia’s lack of dealing with it. We had two constant issues to overcome with client’s demands, random Flash performance issues coupled with version compatibility, and, the constant issue of content management, which we had semi-solved with XML. While doing a random search we half lucked into seeing the writing on the wall – the demise of Flash – and found WordPress 1.0. So, funny that I just ran into this fun video (well, fun for graphic designers) Photoshop 1.0. I actually cut my teeth on P’shop 3.0 but had messed around with 1.0 it once on my Dad’s Mac.

▶ Your Favorite Photoshop Experts Open Photoshop 1.0 – YouTube.

Can I use this picture?

A very common question around here. We have to be very diligent about the images our clients give us on a project. In today’s litigious society – even though the website is not “our” website – as the web designers we are just as likely to be named along with the client in any copyright related issues. Our safe advice is to go straight to our trusted stock sites and fork over the few bucks needed for piece of mind. It’s also usually easier to find that perfect image, in the proper size,  needed as opposed to scouring the web for a similar image free of rights. However, sometimes the client has found that perfect image and they really, really want to use it but don’t know if they can. “Better safe than sorry ” usually applies here, but it may be worth going through the motions to find out. Here’s a handy flow chart provided by The Visual Communication Guy to put your image through the test.

 

Mind your own business!

Once again we have a client in the process of being bamboozled out of their $$$ by some slick talking SEO salesman promising them the top ranking on a Google search. Luckily we were able to talk them down from the ledge. These people know nothing about what you do, they just have a list of words they will cleverly cram into a few paragraphs that will read like a bad infomercial. Look good to a search engine? Maybe, but most humans will know it looks like a naked mannequin in the window of an abandoned strip mall. Your clients will know it’s not you and the chances of them sharing it or coming back for more aren’t good. In the long run you’re hurting your business more than helping. Our advice has been the same for years… write it yourself. You’ll save money, connect with your clients, and you may find that it hones your skills to do what you do better. We can help make it easy for you to write, publish and edit your content. Ask us how, we’ll show you how easy it is.
So, who knows your business? You. You do!

Opinion Column — The Inconvenient Truth About SEO | Smashing Magazine.

Information Architechture – or, Why We Need Yor Content Now

We have your logo files and pictures. And more pictures. We’ve talked at length about the importance or frequent, relative content and how this is crucial to search engine exposure. But we have no text from you.  Sure we can help you by guiding the direction and particulars needed to create good content. We don’t recommend copy writers because no one knows your business better than you.  So, we encourage you to write your own content. Which brings up the next stumbling block to getting your website design off and running: we need it now!  [Read more…] about Information Architechture – or, Why We Need Yor Content Now

How people read online: Why you won’t finish this article. – Slate Magazine

Apparently the best way to give your readers information is don’t. I’ll keep it short… In the Twitter age, content dies in a non-scrolling website. Maybe long articles will be broken into a series of tweets. Did you get this far? Yes? Further than most. How the KISS method evolved from keep it simple to keep it short.

How people read online: Why you won’t finish this article. – Slate Magazine

Tampa Bay WordPress (Tampa, FL) – Meetup

I was recently asked by a budding web designer friend for some WordPress “advice” (read: training) and since I’ve barely got the time to breathe in my own backlog of development related updates and training I thought I’d put this out there. Someday I’ll make it to a meeting, sounds like fun with like minded folks (even if they’re our competition, ;-)). Anyway if you’re looking for a place to bounce around some ideas and live in the Tampa Bay area, join:

Tampa Bay WordPress (Tampa, FL) – Meetup.

Happy Birthday WordPress: 10 Years of Glorious Journey [Inforgraphic] – WordPress Schools

Giving our web design clients the control and freedom to mange their own content was the best gift in our business development. Our gift to WordPress is to continue recommending the best CMS platform available. Happy to say we’ve been with you since the beginning. Happy Birthday WordPress!

Happy Birthday WordPress: 10 Years of Glorious Journey [Inforgraphic] – WordPress Schools.

How secure is WordPress?

As designers we’ve grown to rely on WordPress for it’s ability to morph into any client situation. As developers, it’s an easy choice for the same reason but the clincher is it’s stability and security.  The WordPress team is ever vigilant in updating the core software, and while it can take some vigilance of our own to keep up with the updates, it’s good to know we’re never left wanting for a hole to get patched.

WordPress Core is Secure – Stop Telling People Otherwise

WordPress 3.6.1 Beta

WordPress development sees it’s next iteration with 3.6, beta it if you want to play, or just preview the next set of features, including improved audio/video support and a new cahced auto-save feature, never lost that in-progress post content again.

Check it out at WordPress

WordPress positioning itself well for the future…

After years of Flash development the writing was on the wall, Flash was waning. When it was clear Apple and Flash were not going to play well together on the internet playground, we made the jump to WordPress.  Longevity was the prime factor when we chose WordPress as our preferred platform and prime recommendation for our clients.  As a small firm we needed to reduce long term development time and allow for our clients growth while keeping their cost at a minimum.  With the speed and sometimes surprise of change when it comes to internet technologies being an early adopter, no matter the care taken, can be half research and half gamble, we did our best to reduce the chance factor.  It looks like we made the right decision.

WordPress completely dominates top 100 blogs.

Cobra Technologies

Tampa based Cobra Technologies established in 1995, is a US based consulting and software product company with expertise in content management and document capture(scan). Massive Ant completed a full website redesign as well as branding and logo update. We provided a custom content management solutions to fit their needs as well as secure client areas.

visit CobraTech.com

How WordPress Themes Actually Work INFOGRAPHIC

Using WordPress our clients have found that learning how to manage the content on their sites is a quick and painless process.  In fact most find that they are adding more content then they ever thought the would.  They then quickly find out that they are becoming their own SEO professional just by posting to their sites. The natural next step of curiosity is to ask “how does this all work?”.

Follow this link for a great tutorial of sorts complete with nice graphics that isn’t to technical but offers an in depth look at the inner workings of your WordPress site.

How WordPress Themes Actually Work INFOGRAPHIC.

WordPress Android, iPhone, iPad Updates

Here’s the latest on WordPress for our clients who take advantage of Smartphone content management for their websites.  A new version for iPhone and iPad that adds some great features, video support (finally!), the media library gets some attention, and the best part… autosave for posts.

WordPress for iPhone iPad v2.6 Released

Android users get mostly bug fixes on the latest version and the long awaited post status option.

WordPress Android Update 1.3.8

Archiva Images

Archiva Images images offers custom stock image portfolios for businesses looking to avoid having to customize imagery to fit their needs and avoid a generic look and feel to their marketing materials. We’ve created a customized private back end that enables graphics departments or any employee to access imagery specific to their company and have it easily available in multiple formats and sizes to suit specific needs, whether it be for corporate websites, emails, presentation, or print. Clients can batch images and save sets or email images to others directly from the website for distribution.

visit Archiva Images Custom Corporate Image Library / Photo Library of Branding Images.

Facebook | Massive Ant – Web & Graphic Design

Massive Ant is on Facebook… because we’re supposed to have one of these.  These used to be called “Fan Pages” but now Facebook is just calling them business pages.  So what will you find there? All the cool stuff we find out on the web, design work we like, art, music, videos, and various content that generally doesn’t have a place here, so we’re putting it there.

Come join. Click through and hit the “Like” button:

Facebook | Massive Ant – Web & Graphic Design

Design Trends Predictions in 2010

We’re exited about two of the trends in Web Design we’ve been playing with here at the Ant Farm, Mobile Design (iPhone website versions!) and the design freedom possibilities of CSS3.  Also a move towards print influenced, typography heavy design should bring Serif fonts back in favor, readability returns! A nice showcase of what’s to come:

Design Trends Predictions in 2010.

Classics Unzipped


Pinellas Opportunity Council, Inc., Youth Arts Corps, and Jim’s Harley Davidson, team up to foster entrepreneurial understanding in St. Petersburg, Florida’s low income students by creating a hands-on environment for students to transform their ideas into a revenue stream. Keeping a motorcycle theme, leather goods are “up-cycled” by the students who add their own styles and fashion to donated products which are then offered for sale with proceeds going back into the program.

visit Classics Unzipped

Social Media

Enhance Your Web Presence With Social Media

  • Increase Traffic
  • Generate More Leads and Prospects
  • Improve Search Engine Placement
  • Keep Your Audience Informed and Engaged
  • Stimulate Discussion

Learn more about how social media can enhance your web presence. Contact us today!

We would love to hear from you! Please fill out this form and we will get in touch with you shortly.

Or call us at:

Paul 813.215.1631

Scott 813.787.8540

Google Loves WordPress

More and more clients coming to us for website design are concerned primarily with search engine placement.  We quickly inform them that there is no magic bullet for getting a top ten return, and to be leery of SEO (search engine optimization) companies promising top returns. After all it’s Google’s game and they make the rules, any gaming of the system and they just change the rules, or worse, just blacklist your site.  At Massive Ant we utilize safe “white hat” techniques for your site to steadily climb the rankings without any stumbling going up the ladder.  The first and best thing we do is utilize the awesome features built in to WordPress.  To learn more here’s a few tips we use that illustrate why we use WordPress as our CMS (content management system) of choice:

Google Loves WordPress – Search Engine Optimisation Blog , Tips & Tricks.

Flash or Jquery? Avoiding the “vs” Perspective

We strongly advocated Flash development over the years, but there’s a new queen in the ant farm… Jquery. With content management needs and the Apple-centric developments created by the iPhone and iPad, design times are a changin’. Here’s an excellent non-confrontational piece on this controversial subject:

A Closer Look at Choosing Between Flash and jQuery | Onextrapixel – Showcasing Web Treats Without A Hitch

What’s this?

It’s our web-design blog.  We may shoot over the heads of some with the web-design geek factor getting too high at times but here is where you’ll find what latest subjects interest us, and maybe you too.

YouthArtsCorp.org

youth arts corpsThe Youth Arts Corps is a free youth development, arts education and job training program .  The Corps offers three after-school and summer arts education programs, provides arts activities at a number of residential, recreational and juvenile justice facilities in Pinellas, Hillsborough and Manatee counties, and offers training and technical assistance in youth arts program development and implementation.

We provided a WordPress CMS that provides custom user roles for administration and students to allow the students to essentially control their own content with the oversight of the administration.

visit YouthArtsCorps.org

Geoform.net

geoform.netA unique site for Geometric artists.  Geoform.net is a highly interactive database driven Flash™ website that displays a random array of artists images and interviews while allowing for infinite search options and listings.  A Flashâ„¢ based custom CMS was created for Geoform driven by XML files generated from a custom FileMakerâ„¢ application.  Handling infinite images and an immense amount of data while presenting a clean user friendly website was the goal set by Geoform, we’ve been told we beat that goal.

visit Geoform.net

Outings & Adventures

Tampa’s premiere on-line alternative lifestyle community.
Looking for an alternative, that did not exist, to the same old bar scene and technology’s proliferation of stunted communication through way too many on-line hook up sites, founder Robert Geller, with the support of his dear friends (Lisa, Rani, Brian & Travis) set out to create a new social norm…Outings & Adventures, the new place for fun. Facebook integration, event planning softwatre, e-commerce for events as well as products, this site has all the bells and whistles. UPDATE: O&A is now smartphone enabled for Iphone, Android, and more!

visit OutingsAndAdventures.com