The continuing saga...

[RJM62]

A while ago, I posted about a gig I have, trying to reproduce a student artist's dream Web site design for the Web. The artist is extremely picky about things like buttons and shadows, and until recently, she had literally no idea how the Web renders things.

I have her taking the W3C online tutorials right now so she has a better idea of how the Web works. My plan is to get this design done, turn the files over to her boss, and let someone else take over. I simply don't have the time to do it, so I'm basically building the design, and checking out.

Because of this, I'm very desirous of turning over an easy-to-understand design using as much CSS as possible to generate the elements and effects, both because it's more efficient and for ease of updating in the future.

But the artist is obsessive about things like shadows, borders, and buttons that can't possibly be rendered to her degree of exactitude without using images for every element; and because she keeps changing things like shadow feathering and button widths, the images she sends me are always different sizes, which means I have to tweak all the adjacent elements to accommodate them, keep them from overlapping, etc. It's not rocket surgery, but it's time consuming.

The following is the [redacted] text of an email I just sent the artist trying to explain why it would be better to use CSS to generate very close approximations of the effects she craves, rather than using images to get exactly what she wants (a degree of control over gradients, feathers, and so forth that's impossible to achieve without using images).

I'm starting to like this artist, and I don't want to hurt her feelings; but at the same time, I feel I'd be irresponsible if I didn't tell her that she's being a bit too picky. This email concerns a sequence of button and shadow changes that I've been farting around with for entirely too long, and which produce such subtle variations that no visitor would ever notice the difference.

I'd appreciate any comments.

-- TEXT OF EMAIL FOLLOWS --

Dear [Artist's name],

First of all, Merry Christmas!

Could you learn to love a shadow like the one I have up right now?

[ link to test page on my server ]

That [shadow] requires no image at all, and can be tweaked a bit in terms of color, opacity, and width.

The way you're going with these shadows, it's going to take hours of time on your part and the Web designer's every time you want to change an element. It's also going to cause you to have extra space at the bottom of pages to accommodate the background images, and will slow the page loads on slower connections. You can do away with all that by just using the established CSS box shadow property.

The code necessary to generate the shadow as I have it now is as follows:

#container { 
    margin: 0 auto 0 auto; 
    width: 1104px; 
    box-shadow: 0px 30px 50px rgba(8,8,8,.4); 
}

That's it. No images. Just that little piece of code. Much more efficient, takes much less time to edit if needed, and doesn't slow page loads.

Do you know that the total time I've spent making code changes just for all the different buttons you've sent me is now up to 5.25 hours? And the time dealing with that one shadow is up to 1.4 hours? When you're dealing with images, they force changes of other elements every single time you change them. For example, every set of buttons you've sent me required me to change the padding and positioning for the menus and all the adjacent elements, which is time-consuming and tedious.

Or let me put it another way: Since the last bill I sent, I have spent 6.65 hours doing nothing but farting around with buttons and shadows, which means that as of right now, [ the boss's name ] owes me $764.75 just for buttons and shadows! That actually makes me feel a bit guilty, even though it's not something I could control in any way.

That's also why it takes me so long to make the changes every time you send me a new graphic. I can't just pop the old ones out and the new ones in. Every change forces me to make other changes to all the adjacent elements to make things fit. It takes time that frankly, I really don't have. But worse yet, once this site goes live, it's going to create the same problems again, and again, and again every time you want to change something.

I know you're an artist, and I know you want everything perfect. But I also know (1) that your drive for perfection is costing the boss a lot of money; (2) that because of the limitations of the Web, you are never going to get the design to look EXACTLY like what you have in mind; and (3) that if I use images to make it look EXACTLY like you have in mind, then you, your Web designer, and [ the boss's name ] will curse me until the day I die every time you have to make a change, because you'll have to do this stuff all over again.

What you are trying to do is make the Web work like your canvas, or like A.I. That's like trying to hang curtains using a hammer and nails, but no curtain rods. Yes, you can do it; but every time you want to open or close the curtains, you'll have to take out the nails, move the curtains, and nail them back up again.

HTML and CSS have ways to get your design close to what you want, and to do it easily, and also make future changes easy. I really think you need to lower your perfection standards a bit and accept what CSS has to offer you, because if you don't, you're setting yourself up for a lifetime of aggravation.

I feel I have to tell you this because I'd be irresponsible if I didn't, so please take it in the spirit intended.

Best,

Richard

Thanks,

-Rich

 

[PilotAlan]

Rich,
Very good email, explaining things in layman's terms. Especially the nails and curtain analogy.
I only have two comments:

I have spent 6.65 hours doing nothing but farting around with buttons and shadows,

I am not sure that's professional language. Not a big thing, but a different term would have the same meaning without the implications.

It takes time that frankly, I really don't have.

You're a service provider, and the customer should not be concerned about your workload.
Further, it casts doubt on the whole remainder of the very well explained email, i.e. does it not work the way I want, or do you not want to spend the time to "do it right" (from the customer's perspective).

Next time I want my website redone, you're in the speed dial.

 

[murphey]

Does the artist understand the difference between 72 dpi on the screen and the high quality (usually 600-1200 dpi) of the original artwork (if it's applicable)?

 

[PilotAlan]

Website design hell:
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/design_hell

God bless you, I'd hurt people.....

 

[RJM62]

Rich,
Very good email, explaining things in layman's terms. Especially the nails and curtain analogy.
I only have two comments:

I am not sure that's professional language. Not a big thing, but a different term would have the same meaning without the implications.

You're a service provider, and the customer should not be concerned about your workload.
Further, it casts doubt on the whole remainder of the very well explained email, i.e. does it not work the way I want, or do you not want to spend the time to "do it right" (from the customer's perspective).

Next time I want my website redone, you're in the speed dial.

Thanks for that. The "farting around" was indeed a slip on my part, although I doubt the kid will take it the wrong way.

The time issue, however, they're already aware of. I really didn't want to take this assignment because I'm backed up, and I was up-front with them about my current workload issue right from the start. But they still pretty much begged me to take the gig because of a referral from someone else whose design I'd translated to the Web.

I'm pretty good at looking at something visual and coding it. I used to have a business partner who was an artist, and I was the coder. Together, we built some beautiful sites. But he's since passed away, and it's taken me years to become even halfway competent at the design end of things. Once I have the design, I can bang out the code. It's coming up with the design that's a challenge for me.

So in a way, one would think this a perfect gig for me -- and if I weren't so busy with other stuff, it would be.

Thank God for work one way or the other, though; and thank you for your feedback.

-Rich

 

[PilotAlan]

The time issue, however, they're already aware of. I really didn't want to take this assignment because I'm backed up, and I was up-front with them about my current workload issue right from the start.

Then disregard my comment. If the understanding between you and the client was that you were time constrained, and this relatively straightforward job has become a time suck, then the comment is absolutely appropriate.

No worries, always glad to help.

 

[RJM62]

Does the artist understand the difference between 72 dpi on the screen and the high quality (usually 600-1200 dpi) of the original artwork (if it's applicable)?

I've explained that to her a couple dozen times. After maybe the seventh set of buttons, she finally grasped what I was saying. I really don't know why it took so long... I'm usually pretty good at explaining things like that, but she didn't grasp it at first.

It also took her a while to believe me when I told her that you can't use A.I. files on a Web site. I wound up having a long talk with her about different image files and their relative pluses and minuses, and suggested that she become comfortable creating simple things like buttons in Fireworks. That seemed to work.

-Rich

 

[denverpilot]

Sometimes it takes a dollar amount to hammer it home.

Was talking to a friend who owns a small computer shop recently and his stories of the hardware end of things were equally interesting/incredible. He mostly works with small businesses, and small chains of franchise stores. His number one comment was, "They're all constantly broke so they never call until something is completely broken. No maintenance or reviews of what they're doing which would often save them thousands of dollars in emergency calls."

This week's fun included a company that kept everything to run the company in a proprietary NAS device that had proprietary power supplies and NO backups of any kind. Guess what failed?

One if his techs went on-site and studied the NAS and with permission did low level physical surgery on it to wire it to a conventional power supply to get if running. Then recommended a) that they buy a better NAS with redundant power supplies and keep a spare power supply on-site, and more importantly b) they start making backups of the NAS for all the various possible disaster scenarios, and keep the backups off-site.

You and I know these are "duh" level pieces of advice, but it's always fascinating to me that he makes a living explaining such simple things over and over and over to small business people. And pulling their heinies out of the fire.

I'm sure his emergency dispatch fee is hefty but reasonable to bring one's entire business back to life -- all for want of a $100 USB drive.

He, like you, has a great reputation and word of mouth advertising keeps the appointment book full.

 

[RJM62]

Sometimes it takes a dollar amount to hammer it home.

Was talking to a friend who owns a small computer shop recently and his stories of the hardware end of things were equally interesting/incredible. He mostly works with small businesses, and small chains of franchise stores. His number one comment was, "They're all constantly broke so they never call until something is completely broken. No maintenance or reviews of what they're doing which would often save them thousands of dollars in emergency calls."

This week's fun included a company that kept everything to run the company in a proprietary NAS device that had proprietary power supplies and NO backups of any kind. Guess what failed?

One if his techs went on-site and studied the NAS and with permission did low level physical surgery on it to wire it to a conventional power supply to get if running. Then recommended a) that they buy a better NAS with redundant power supplies and keep a spare power supply on-site, and more importantly b) they start making backups of the NAS for all the various possible disaster scenarios, and keep the backups off-site.

You and I know these are "duh" level pieces of advice, but it's always fascinating to me that he makes a living explaining such simple things over and over and over to small business people. And pulling their heinies out of the fire.

I'm sure his emergency dispatch fee is hefty but reasonable to bring one's entire business back to life -- all for want of a $100 USB drive.

He, like you, has a great reputation and word of mouth advertising keeps the appointment book full.

I had similar experiences when I was still in that end of the business. Sometimes it's a balancing act, especially with small businesses.

As for my young artist, she was happy with the CSS-generated shadows. She's also studying HTML / CSS now, and is starting to view the coding aspects of site-building as art in itself. She's playing around with things like box-shadows and rgba values, and is starting to get pretty excited about how much CSS3 has to offer.

But she still has a lot of questions; so it looks like my place in all of this is going to be redefined as more of a paid mentor / tutor / guru / occasional PHP coder, which is just dandy with me. It's probably the best possible outcome for me. I do like this kid and enjoy helping her learn, and it takes a lot less of my time this way. So I think it's working out okay.

-Rich

 

[EdLarkin]

Rich,
I doubt they understand their designs will not render the same across all computers.

I had an issue a couple years back with a "software architect" who wouldn't accept their special shade of green on a web page wasn't the same on their office and home computers. It took forever to convince this person that Pantone color shades didn't exist for web sites.