Website Tools for the Artist

When looking for the right tools to help me write about and display my artwork I had to do a lot of research into what not only functioned properly, but what worked for my overall website design. I went with a clean, simple approach but the items and services that make this website function needed to be right.

So in this post I will outline the things I am using, where to get them, and how much they cost if price is an issue. I am doing this because if I was looking for these tools, there might be other artists with similar needs.

WordPress is obviously the engine I chose to use because of it’s slick backend interface, which makes updating a very easy process. It’s the only way to go, in my opinion.

The Simplicity theme was a wonderful find. Kochwerkstatt developed a very clean design which made adapting it to my Signalnoise identity very easy. I had to do a bit of translating (the theme arrived in German) but it’s been smooth sailing ever since because of the nice clean code. The theme is available in bright and dark versions.

The sIFR Titles plugin is what I used to make the entry titles. They are dynamic Flash movies that allow me to choose whatever font I want, making the overall design a bit more consistant. You will need a bit of Flash knowledge if you want to edit the animation that comes with the download.

Flickr handles all of my artwork uploads. You can’t go wrong with getting a Pro account for $24.95 per year with unlimited uploads. Flickr makes possible the following tools which are amazing for showing my uploads on this site:

The FlickerRSS plugin is what I use to stream images from my Flickr account to my sidebar to the right. Very easy to install and edit, and even has tag capabilities so I can display only the photos in my stream labelled ‘showcase’. Very handy little plugin coupled with a Flickr account, which I highly recommend for uploading and sharing artwork.

My gallery is made using the TiltViewer app developed by Airtight Interactive. This slick Flash application uses my Flickr account to suck in the images with my ‘showcase’ tag. It’s a wonderful and easy way to show images in my account without the need of having a typical Flickr page. I paid $90 for the application and it was well worth it.

That’s about the run of it. If you have any questions feel free to comment them.