Captain T Productions

Background

Captain T Productions was a photography project for a client who wanted a site to showcase and advertise their work. The business was young, so the build had to support growth, but the uncertainty of its direction created an interesting challenge.

Onboarding and early ideas

The brief was basically:

• ‘We need a website for our photography and drone footage’
• ‘Advise us on the website software and hosting’
• ‘Train us on how to add content’

I researched similar websites, for ideas on best practice and to understand how best to showcase this kind of work. The client provided their logo and using this, I created mockups which explored layout, colours and general vibe of their brand.

Pressed for time on the brand, I reused a trick from my own site: business cards. These show the logo, the typeface and the decorative elements, pinning the site’s style, so I could get on with the bulk of the job, the WordPress theme.

My client decided on idea five as the basic premise for the style. Since this was primarily a photography based site, I didn’t do many additional mockups as my client had limited content at that time.

Design and build

Using WordPress and a custom theme, I built this site based on the client’s initial logo and the colours and layout used in idea five of the mockups as inspiration.

What I concentrated on:

• Keeping the focus clear to the user
• Maintaining a simple layout to draw focus to the products
• Avoiding weird layout shifts on mobile due to a large amount of images

As this was a portfolio project, I offered a free round of edits to the site. However, learning from my handover of the Captain Cycles site, I worked with the client to make the changes, helping them through it, which let them make worthwhile changes, and learning how to use WordPress, speeding up the hand-off time.

Hosting and deployment

For hosting, I recommended Bluehost; it’s reliable, affordable and easy to use.

To help with SEO, analytics and reviews, I installed:

• Site Kit to get analytics so the client sees the progression
• Spectra for a custom feel and ease of viewing for large pieces of information
• Yoast SEO for basic optimisation

Enough to run it and see whether anyone is reading.

Outcome and takeaways

Outcome

The client got a branded WordPress site with flexible media sections for their photography, cinematography and drone work. Working with them on the edits instead of handing over a finished site also cut the hand-off time.

Hindsight

In hindsight, I would spend more time on what the site was actually for. Photography, cinematography and drone work is three businesses, and trying to serve all three from one layout slowed the project down. I would also have written a short guide for the fiddly parts of the dashboard instead of assuming a call covered it.