Welcome to William Kidd Media, the internet home of Nick Macari - a New York City based freelance Web Developer & Graphic Designer.
Samples of my work are stored on my original personal site at stargate3.com.
quick contacts: nickm@wikiddmedia 917.407.8428. see contact page for full info. (email link contains anti-spam measures)
Web Development:
Of course these days a website is often considered the single most important marketing tool of any business.
There are many different types of websites on the internet today - simple personal sites, more robust business sites, and major business/corporate sites. The actual functionality of these sites varies as well, from being strictly informational, to being fully functional on a national or global level (such as communication and financial institution sites).
There are many, many facets to web development. The internet is also a liquid medium, meaning each day new technologies emerge and the way a site is developed, designed, marketed and visited is constantly changing. Each of these facets of web development can be explored to extensive ends, consuming a lot of time, energy and money.
The importance of these areas and bottomline impact on your budget and project depends on your unique goals and needs.
When I develop a site for a client, my years of experience allow me to touch on all the facets of web development at a basic level. To go beyond a basic level in any one area, means implementing a correct strategy, working within your budget to achieve realistic goals.
Most of my work is done with small and medium sized businesses. Whether a client comes to me with little direction or forethought, or has an organized plan and strategy.
Its my goal as a freelance web developer and graphic designer, not just to deliver a product - but help my clients find success. This means I'll sit down explain options, strategy, and in the end maximize their presence for their budget.
I enjoy my work, but I enjoy seeing my clients successful even more.
Throughout this site you'll find a lot of information about creating websites, logos and graphic design. It's all written by me, and presented as if I was discussing it in person, no-nonsense and direct.
A young professional at 33 - but not a kid, I often feel older then I am in my ways of thinking - I believe in dealing with people on a personal level, inherently trusting people, doing what you say you're going to do, not-making excuses, doing things right the first time or not doing things at all.
- I always talk to potential clients very frankly and openly.
- I'm not the cheapest solution available, and I make no efforts to hide this fact.
- I'm not about the hard sell.
- I have my set rates, I maximize my clients budgets as best I can, and I go above and beyond whenever I'm able to do so.
- I'd like to think I do great work. I give excellent service and make my clients successful.
- I discuss projects direct and to the point because both our time is valuable, and I'd rather be working on a clients project, or doing one of my other personal passions (writing and game designing), then giving sales pitches all day.
While the internet has quickly become the marketing cornerstone to any business, print is still an extremely effective advertising/marketing medium.
Of course any serious and legitimate business should have core identity materials - a logo, business cards, letterhead, and mailing envelopes - Beyond this a well designed printed piece can speak volumes to an intended audience. Whether its a flyer, direct mail piece or magazine advertisement, print is tangible and highly impressionable.
While Wikiddmedia.com may emphasize web development here on the site, of course I started out in print design and production before the internet was even around. These days, I'd say I do just about an even split on the workload between printed work and web development.
Many times clients come to me for a complete design solution, having me do all the materials from their logo, to their website and their advertisements.
Lets face it, people judge books by their covers. And, as the old adage says "You don't get a second chance to make a first impression".
A well designed logo tells clients you're serious about your profession, and your product or service. It lets them know that you pay attention to detail and quality is important to you in every aspect of what you do.
A business logo defines your image on every level... plain and simple.
You may have the best functioning widget in the world, but if a client meets you (sees your logo and other identity materials), is unimpressed, or worse gets an uneasy feeling from the lack of professionalism and presentation, they very may well turn to one of you competitors - someone whos widget isn't as impressive, but someone who presents themselves in a fashion that instills confidence making the client feel comfortable and sealing the deal.
I really enjoy logo design because it has so many different levels to it and even on the simpler designs, is a very creative process. I have more info on the creative process to logo design on my primer page.
Often, I am approached by small businesses or startups taking their first steps toward serious branding and marketing. Many times these clients request a logo design when what they're really looking for is the creation of a static graphic instead. Let me take a moment to clarify the difference.
A logo is a symbol, typographic or illustrative design, adopted by an organization to identify itself, product or service.
Professional logos are virtually always created as line art or vector art - which means they can be scaled to literally any size without losing any quality. This core ability allows logos to be placed on a very wide gammut of marketing materials from a small business card, to a baseball cap or jacket, to the side of a vehicle, to a large roadside billboard etc...
Logos typically need no or very minimal changes to be applied to various uses.
In contrast, a static graphic is a design, or illustration created to a specifc size and use. This type of graphic may or may not be line art and often may contain a mixture of photographic (or raster) elements as well as line art elements. Static graphics begin to lose quality when you enlarge or more >>
All material on this site is © 2004-2008 William Kidd Media and Nick Macari and may not be copied or redistributed without permission.
