I have been developing websites now for around 15 years, and one of the things I have learned during that time is a developer’s job is never done: as the web technologies and download speeds change and improve, so the developer has to keep up in order to bring a website that is accessible and interesting to the viewer.
The last major redesign I made for the Photo Dharma website was 5 years ago in 2012, and since then things have changed considerably on the internet: mobiles are now the medium most used for access, web speeds have, of course, increased greatly, and design features have moved on as well.
In between times I have indeed made many improvements to the site: adding download facilities for large groups of photos, pan and zoom slideshows and supporting tablets and phones and so on.
I have now redesigned the website to accommodate much larger images: thumbnails are improved from approx 320x240px to 800x600px, slides from 800x600px to 1200x900px, and even the newer originals are much bigger than previously owing to getting a better camera, with higher pixelation (24MP).
Because of the size difference, instead of laying out thumbs 4 in a row, they now occur one by one as you move down the page, which makes the presentation much tidier. The redesign also includes a different, more ModernUI look to the site.
I continue, of course, to add albums to the site, as and when I can get them ready: there are now over 200 albums and 12,000 photographs (in three different sizes) available. I have removed the videos page, as is it outdated by now, and all the videos can be found either embedded on the page, or on my Dharma Documentaries site, which is a better home for them.
After about 10 days work on the conversion last night I uploaded around 26,000 files to the site to implement these changes, and the whole website is live again now. I would very much appreciate any feedback people can give, because it is only through that that I can find out what works for people, and what does not.
