webqem blog

The last calendar quarter of 2011 has proven to be ‘really big projects go live’ quarter… and amongst that number we’re proud to see OzForex’s new website up and running.

With over 80 wireframes, 60 page templates and 4 videos delivered, this was no standard front-end design project. Our team essentially reverse engineered the OzForex site in scalable format – for 4 international sites – Australia, Canada, UK and NZ – as well as a standalone mobile version. The scale of functional improvements include a new currency calculator, very cool FX Dashboard, set of 3rd party partner tools and full deals application – in both website and mobile format.

Over a year in the making, it’s wonderful to see the end result live – and we’re looking forward to the feedback from users as they move to the new system.

2 years in the making, we’re proud to have just launched a completely redesigned and rebuilt website for the world’s best airline alliance – oneworld.

From initial concepts in late 2009, through new information architecture, wireframes and workshops at oneworld’s headquarters in Vancouver, to the application of new branding and a completely rebuilt content management system – it’s been epic.

The launch went without a hitch and the results have already been very enthusiastically received – no mean feat given the number of entities involved in approval and sign off.

We’re already looking forward to a number of incremental improvements in the coming months and ever closer integration between the websites of oneworld and the airlines that make up the alliance.

Webqem is pleased to announce the launch of a brand new Adobe software training initiative for educators – ready2teach.

ready2teach offers educators an informal, just-in-time approach that will help make the most of the Adobe licenses you have.  Being able to interact with the trainers in a “virtual classroom” means you can tap into a mine of information.  And if you can’t make the live sessions you can view them later anywhere, anytime.  The topics cover all the key aspects of Adobe’s Creative Suite so there’s bound to be something to suit every educator – in teaching, administration or research.

This is an excellent opportunity for all teachers to improve  their knowledge and skills, while experiencing the virtual classroom environment.

For educational institutions it offers a cost-effective solution – to provide training opportunities for all staff – while maximising the investment in ICT.

Find out more at: ready2teach.com.au

We are excited to see there is a significant update to the Adobe Connect Mobile  web conferencing app for tablets ( iOS, android, blackberry playbook)  and smartphones (iOS and android). Previously you were only able to participate but can now host meetings allowing you to control meeting access, permissions and activities from your mobile device. Also updated is the video quality, the user interface and navigation all up making the app much cleaner and easier to use.

For more details you can read the Adobe article or call us.

As we find ourselves designing for more and more mobile devices these days, we’ve been keeping a very keen eye on industry leading mobile sites recently. Designing for mobile is not always straight forward, as you are working with a much smaller screen real estate, reduced functionality (no flash for Apple devices) and needing to make buttons much bigger (as finger are often fatter than the mouse cursor). It makes for quite a challenge – and it’s interesting to see most of the industry resorting to similar techniques to make sites work well and look good on mobile.

Here’s a few mobile specific trends we’ve been noticing.

Sliding Galleries

Allows to easily navigate between multiple slides and frequently offers some fancy transition effects. This is especially useful in mobile layout because on a limited space you can display multiple pictures.

Photo Backgrounds
Large photo as website’s background creates stunning visual effect. Having an overlay of content the photograph faster conveys the story and brings a really great sense of contrast.

Dual Column Navigation

The style is remarkable for having a skeleton οf navigation menu split into two columns. Such layout perfectly serves many mobile sites as all menus are housed within the scope of a mobile screen.

Horizontal Navigational PanelsThe big trend around menus is the use of large horizontal panels, which are sure to be a mainstay in mobile design. They’re space effective and can considerably facilitate fingertip content browsing as the clickable area is larger. And they just seem to mimic the UI of iOS and Android, which makes for a comfortable and familiar interface for users.

Hanging Up the Moon is a beautifully executed website which promotes a self-released, home-recorded music album by Sean Lam. While the music might not be to everyones tastes, it’s worth seeing just for it’s unique design – and well thought-out navigation and usability. We love the subtle bits of animation which really bring the site to life – all tastefully done in HTML5. Site design by Singapore based Plate Interactive (who have a pretty cool site themselves, albeit Flash).

Here is an incredibly minimal, but lovely and colourful portfolio site by Russian web designer, Alexander Zhestkov. One big long expanding page, which renders identically on mobile devices – is a incredibly simple but very effective approach. The tasteful colour palette and the small type are what make it work aesthetically, putting the viewers focus on the portfolio of work. If you dig the design, give the guy some support with some FB likes and Google +1′s.

Website for media companies usually fit into two categories – overly shiny and uninformative, or over informative and dull. We like how Diablo Media have rode a careful between the two. They’ve managed to put together a site that isn’t light on the content, but dressed up well enough that it is anything but dull. The single long page layout, crossed with a traditional horizontal navigation works well with the striking big images. The icing on the cake is the clean and modern typography.

These days social networks like facebook have brought people together to connect, share and discover new things and ideas. And since the beginning film and tv have captivated and brought audiences together. Now Ooyala Social is bringing these worlds together, allowing publishers to harness the power of social to grow their audiences.

Powered by the same core technology that runs Ooyala Everywhere, Ooyala Social enables publishers to grow audiences, boost engagement and drive revenue on the world’s biggest social network.

Built-in social features promote sharing and content discovery. And Facebook Connect-based authentication ensures viewers enjoy seamless viewing, whenever and however they connect. With Ooyala Social, users can:

• Share videos with friends and family, and chat while viewing
• Discover what their friends like and recommend
• Watch on nearly every kind of screen and device
• Rent or buy videos easily with Facebook credits

Facebook is just one piece to the growing social TV phenomenon. Ooyala envisions a future where video viewing, content discovery and engagement all have a connected social dimension—a future that’s enabled by Ooyala’s backend social API integration. Social meets big data, meets HD-quality video on all devices.

One of the first publishers to take the plunge with Ooyala Social, is one of our favorite movie studios – Miramax. The guys that brought you classic films such as Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill, Good Will Hunting and Clerks – are now available to rent right within Facebook. You can even view them on any other device like a smartphone, tablet or connected TV.

We’ve just checked out this video previewing Google Wallet, and we’re convinced that this kind of this is most definitely the future. NFC chip’s in phones have been standard in Japan and Korea for some time, but they were locked into your mobile provider – generally only being able to make payments from a single account (like your Mobile credit). Google Wallet wants to open this up, so you can carry multiple accounts, credit, debit, gift and loyalty cards – all in the one system.

You can imagine it won’t be very long before you will be able to leave the house with nothing but your phone, gone will be the days of fat wallets filled with prehistoric bits of plastic. This is obviously going to have a huge impact on traditional retail – but we suspect that Google have some interesting things in-store for online retail (ala Paypal).

We’re keeping a very close eye on this, interesting things happening.