WEBSITE IMAGES:
Newer images (and re-scans of some older images) were scanned with a Canon FS4000US dedicated slide/negative scanner. Most older images were scanned on an HP Scanjet 7200C flatbed scanner (nothing special, by any stretch). A few of the images were scanned on a local color lab's drum scanner, and a dozen or so of my very earliest 1999 scans were created for me by Paul Brady, a friend and photographer extraordinare from Indianapolis. I didn't own a scanner at the time, and it was his early scans of my images that excited me enough to actually start this website. Thanks again, Paul. Your work started this whole mess! LOL.
All images were initially scanned into Adobe Photoshop 5.5 for any color balancing, cropping, and adding borders, etc. Scratches and dust marks on older shots were also touched up in Photoshop. Conversion to jpegs for the website was performed in Adobe ImageReady 1.0, and were set to 'high quality' in the 65% range. I've kept the photos pretty small in size to speed up loading time for those with slower modems. Most jpegs were sized to 270x370 pixels, and in the 35-50Kb range. It's hard to see much detail at the small scale,
but I felt that ease of navigation and loading time was more important. Maybe someday I'll increase the sizes.
WEBSITE DESIGN:
Rod's Photo Gallery was entirely laid out and hand coded in NOTEPAD. I was teaching myself how to write HTML in early 1999, and enjoyed hand coding pages to learn different effects. The site kept growing, and I just continued hand coding all the pages throughout the life of the site. A bit tedious, but I still enjoy writing the code. I tried to design the site to be as user friendly as possible. Each main section of the site is designed in 'geographic' or 'subject type' sub sections for ease of organization & expansion. Individual photo
pages include forward and backward thumbnail links to allow for an easy one-click 'tour' of the photos. Link buttons are located on the top and bottom of each page, and page lengths are as short as possible to minimize the need for scrolling.
Monitor
Resolution: |
All the website pages are actually designed with 2 different versions of each page. One version is for 800x600 resolution monitors, and the other for 1024x768 and larger monitors. An automatic redirection javascript is included within the HTML coding to automatically take the visitor to the proper version of the page, based on their resolution settings. The pages are similar to each other, but modified in layout and sizing to best fit the screen. A 3rd version of each page
was initially designed for 600x480 monitors too, but I deleted these pages on 08/03/02. According to my tracking software, only 3.2% of recent visitors used this small resolution setting, so it has become a waste of time to keep formatting new pages dedicated specifically to the size. The layouts were active for over 2 years, but are now automatically directed to the 800x600 layouts instead. In the future (probably mid 2004) I will be recreating a 3rd version yet again, but this time for 1280x960 and higher settings. |
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| Graphics: |
A majority of the graphics and backgrounds on the website were created from scratch in Photoshop 5.5. The main title block of the website was hand drawn, with an 'inverted image' sailboat from my Key West Sunset photo pasted onto the ends. The background clouds below the title came from my Stormfront in the Keys
photo, with a little manipulation. I added in 2 little lighthouses with a 'lighting flare' effect, and then 'desaturated' the entire image for the black & white effect. |
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| Javascripts: |
A few distinct javascripts are evident throughout the site. The 'Drop-down Text' effect featured on numerous pages originally came from a standard 'Frontpage' effect. I placed a simplified generic version into a .js file, so it could be applied throughout the site easily. Both the 'Changing Cellcolor' mouseover script & 'Add to Favorites' pop-up script, also featured on numerous pages, came from freeware versions featured at DynamicDrive.com. Three different scripts used throughout the site: 'Magic Text',
'Magic Captions', and 'No Click!' were freeware scripts designed by Simply-Magic. Lastly, the animated applet scripts 'Lake' & 'Clouds' were freeware scripts available from Java Boutique, and Tourek Fouda respectively. A big THANK YOU to the original script designers for sharing these wonderful scripts. |
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WebRings &
Links: |
Rod's Photo Gallery presently belongs to 24 different WebRings. My WebRing choices were based upon the content of specific sections and sub-sections of the site. Lighthouse related rings are located on the 'Lighthouse' gallery index page, nature related rings on the 'Natural Wonders' gallery index page, and various geographic and subject related rings located on various sub-section pages, etc. Rod's Photo Gallery also belongs to 4 different sections of 'The Rail' ring. There are presently over 200
individual websites linking directly to this site (that I know of), and all of the individual lighthouse photo pages are indexed within the Internet Index of Lighthouse Links website. |
WEBSITE HISTORY:
| 1999: |
I created Rod's Photo Gallery in late March of 1999. The site was extremely crude and simple, and initially included just a few dozen Lighthouse photos. By mid April, the concept of organizing the site into 4 distinct galleries was created, along with the addition of a Guest Book. The site grew to over 50 pages by June, and the 'Natural Wonders' gallery finally opened in July. I added a new 'Links' page, joined a few WebRings, and introduced some 'Animated Applet' photos to
the site in August. By the end of the year, the site included over 120 pages, 123 Guest
Book entries, and 11,000+ visitors to the Home Page. Not much traffic in the beginning, but the site was finally starting to show up consistantly on most search engines. |
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| 2000: |
The year began with a brand new color scheme & title design, and I finally started feeling comfortable with the overall style of the site. The 'Cityscapes' gallery opened on the site's 1 year anniversary in March, and I secured the 'rodwatson.com' domain name in April. Two more states were added to the 'Lighthouse' gallery in June, and another two in November. I mainly focused on adding additional photo pages throughout the year, with a few tweeks to the design here and there. By the end of 2000, the site was up to 200 pages, 264 Guest
Book entries, and 44,000+ hits to the Home Page. It took a year and a half, but the site finally became what I originally intended it to be. It was an overall productive year. |
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| 2001: |
2001 was a very dissapointing year for Rod's Photo Gallery. As an Architect, I became extremely busy early on in the year, and never really caught up. I lost interest in the website, and didn't add much to the site until the end of the year. The 'Waterfalls & Streams' sub-section was added in November, with an occasional new photo added in every once in awhile. By the end of 2001, the site had grown to 220 pages, 395 Guest Book Entries, and 100,000+ hits to the 'Lighthouse' gallery main index page (which
surpassed the Home page in hits during the year). Photo enlargement sales and traffic to the website did increase substantially during 2001 though. |
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| 2002: |
2002 began as 2001 did. I was busy on the Architectural front, and didn't have much time to play with the website. I always wanted to completely redesign the color scheme to a 'Desaturated' background color, but at 400+ pages (with alternate resolution pages) it seemed too much of an task to perform. I finally convinced myself to start the transformation in June, and completed it for uploading in early August. I added this 'Site & Sales' information section, redesigned the graphics and layout, and updated all the links at the same time. Now I finally feel
invigorated to work on the site some more, and hope to devote much more time to it once again. I really like the new design, and hope you do to. Wish me luck in the future! |
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| 2003: |
Inactivity on my part once again took hold through most of 2003. No new subsections were added to the site, just some occasional images here and there. In December though, I started the process of adding another 40 new photo pages consecutively, which I finished in February 2004. I nice burst of energy, finally. |
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