Danny Outlaw has given us an advanced preview of his re-designed Outlaw Design Blog. And I’ve got to say it looks fantastic, Danny talks us through the process & reasons behind it, and what we can expect from the new design, and in fact the new Blog, as his re-vamp goes further than just a fresh new look.
What I love About the New Design
Before we get Danny’s thoughts about the design and the inspiration behind it, I thought I’d talk you through some of the things that make this design stand out for me.
The Subtle Touches
Yeah a word I love to use, but this is a prime example of how subtle elements & details help build a feel of quality. Everything from the background illustrations, the bullet holes and the 1pixel highlights around boxes to the small little green bar on the hover state in the top navigation. It seems everything has been thought of.
Footer Area
A smashing example of a very useful and simple footer. We’ve got special attention to a new feature of the site, the podcast, as well as some relevant links & information, topped off with a very hand & easy to see search bar.
Overall solid feel
With everything in mind, and looking at the full design – it has a very solid and easy to use feel about it, something that not all blogs have. What I mean by this, is it’s a site that just feels right, and I can imagine feeling comfortable spending any amount of time on it. I’m Looking forward to seeing it go live (which I believe is on the 20th April)
The Preview
Click the image to see a full size preview of the design.
What inspired such a huge relaunch?
To put it simply, I always a bit unhappy with past versions of Outlaw Design Blog. While the designs them self weren’t bad, I just didnt feel they helped me contribute to the community as much as I wanted to.
I started Outlaw Design Blog because I wanted to share my skills, opinions, and thoughts on the business of design. While a traditional blog helps do this, it is only one of the many tools out there for sharing such things. Now that the web and its users are more accustom to finding information in a variety of formats, I decided it was time to raise the standards and start offering information in a variety of multimedia formats.
It is really this interest in multimedia sharing that really sparked the fire for the re-launch.
When Outlaw Design Blog was just a thought, the idea was to create a “super blog” that was a combination of Freelance Switch, PSD tuts, and Smashing Magazine. I never really came close to create such a blog in the past, but this relaunch should change all that.
Rob Palmer Branded07.com who did all of the illustration and the better part of the design also inspired me a lot. I love his site and work. I have worked with him in the past and he is just amazing! He went all out on this design for me and he deserves many thanks for that.
What cool features can we expect to see in the re-launch?
One feature that will play a large part of the new Outlaw Design Blog is one that I have already started playing with a bit and that is video. I am planning on making video a part of as many posts as possible in the future. Everyone learns in their own way; some people learn better by reading, other by hearing or seeing. For this reason, I want to add video, text, and possibly audio for every post that can handle it. After the relaunch, and as my video editing skills improve, the videos should become a little more professional looking and less like home videos.
Aside from regular videos for posts, I am working on doing a semi-regular video with David Leggett from Tutorial9 which should be awesome.
Another feature that I am really excited about is the Outlaw Design Podcast. I am working with Andrew Lindstrom from the Well Medicated Blog to create a podcast with a few other panel members including David from Tutorial9. The podcast will be monthly and cover a variety of topics the freelance creative should appreciate.
I have also been building up a collection of high quality stuff to give away. You can expect to see everything from hi-res textures to premium WordPress themes.
I have been working on building up a collection of Photoshop Tutorials. So you can expect to see anywhere from 2 to 4 Photoshop tutorials a month.
I am also working one finding some developers to work with to create some top notch web tutorials for designers.
This new design also has an entire section dedicated to review of products and software that creatives are interested in. On these types of posts, readers will be able to read my review, write thier own, and read others review of the product. There will also be a link to purchase the product, as well as compare prices on it.
Additional Screenshots
What Do You Think?
Does it look promising to you, does it sound like Danny has made a change for the better? Did you prefer it before? Whatever your thoughts we’d love to hear them. I personally am really looking forward to it, from the design side of things I can’t wait to see the site live, and from the content side of things Danny has put a lot of effort into improving what he has to offer his visitors, so I’m also excited about seeing and reading that!