3D Printing Supplies

Development Process

The theme of the website was chosen based on one of my favorite hobbies 3D printing. The purpose was to create a very simple retail website with a small selection of products. This was to make it easier for consumers to choose products and to not be overwhelmed with too many options. The simplicity and small selection of products would also help newcomers to 3D printing and give them a range of printers that would meet their budget. The website will allow my uncle to sell items carried in store and allow customers to learn more about 3D printing. It will allow him to reach a wider customer base and make it easier for customers to make purchase decisions.

There are many steps involved when designing and building a website from scratch. The first step was to figure out the overall purpose of the site and what audience it was meant for. Next, I had to come up with the overall site structure and how visitors to the site will have to navigate. This was accomplished by creating a simple diagram with the basic menu and webpage layout. Each page had its own category to clearly show what the webpage was about. For example, the Printers page would show all the printers for sale along with information about them. Each webpage was to have the same layout to make navigation easier and so visitor would be able to find what they are looking for and not get lost.

Defense of the Final Product

Again, the overall site design was built around the idea of simplicity in terms of its layout, color scheme and typography. As stated previously each webpage will have the same general layout, text and colors. Keeping this consistency will not only make designing and building the website faster and easier but will also not distract those who visit the site. Using the homepage as a template each of the other webpages can be built off of it with only needing to make minor adjustments. The navigation menus stay the same with only the content on each webpage needing to be changed. When you use the main navigation menu on the top of the page it shows you what page you are on further assisting the visitor in navigating the site. In terms of the color palette it is again kept simple with the intention of not making it too distracting or to cause text to fade into the background. Instead of using a plain white background I opted to use a background with a white and grey checkerboard like pattern. This again was used on each and every webpage. In terms of font, Roboto Mono and Roboto Slab were used do to them being well optimized for readability with nice letter spacing and simple text. Roboto Mono was used for the primary font with Robot slab being used for headlines.

Opportunities for Improvement and growth

Going into this project I thought too large and planned on adding too much content. Because of this I spent too much time on the planning stage and not enough time on creating the website. The planning stage is certainly one of the most important parts of website design but being that I am inexperienced in web design I was not able to fully. The original site design included more webpages than what is currently on the site. In order to get a more functional site up and running I decided to scrap many of the webpages. If I had more time, I would have added the ability to add items to a cart and to make purchases instead of only being able to view products. The formatting of the website is nowhere near where I would like it to at this current stage however it still follows the simple site structure I had in mind. There are many things I would do differently especially with the knowledge that I now have. First, I would have created a more detailed outline of the site and possibly sketched out a crude model of what the site would look like. This would give me a better template to go off of. I would have also focused on the core setup of the website and then focused on the individual webpages. I was disorganized and did not have a specific order to follow. Also, I would have set smaller goals to accomplish.