Visual Lizard
Wil Alambre
Wil works for Visual Lizard Inc. Wil is a web developer. Wil has been a web developer for over eight years. Wil likes working on web sites. Wil makes web pages in his spare time. Wil is one of those lucky people who get’s paid for doing what he loves doing. Wil would happily work on web sites for free. But Wil needs to pay bills. Luckily, developing web sites pays Wil’s bills. Lucky Wil.
Wil is influenced by many things, and it is reflected in Wil’s work. Wil likes comic books. Wil continues to collect graphic novels from a variety of publishers to this day. Wil likes movies, even the cheesy bad ones. Wil is one of those people that keep Hollywood in business, despite the drek they put out. Wil plays video games. Wil owns a Gamecube, and defies anyone to convince him he made the wrong choice. Wil plays roleplaying games, both table top and live action. Wil likes roleplaying because it’s like playing pretend as kids.
Wil was a kid in Thompson, Manitoba, Canada. Wil was very cold there. Wil moved down to Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada to continue his schooling. Wil is less cold here. Wil attended the University of Manitoba and Robertson College. But many of Wil’s skills were self taught. Wil spent many a moment in front of a computer. Wil read web sites. Wil learned web sites. Wil built web sites.
Wil entered the web industry in 2000. Wil learned about dynamic content and database oriented design at his job. Wil pushed and prodded at scripting languages and datatable layout. Wil discovered a lot about what makes a content managed web site tick. Wil made it sit up and beg. Wil also worked alongside a world class web designer. Wil learned about grids and colours and layout. Wil learned how important proper navigation and content and presentation was. Wil built some excellent web sites for very important people.
Wil joined Visual Lizard Inc in 2005. Wil learned about open source software. Wil learned MySQL and PHP. Wil discovered many smart people working with the same tools, and learned a lot from them. Wil wrangled code, working alongside already brilliant Visual Lizard staff to improve Catalyst, their content management system.
Wil works with Visual Lizard to build web sites. Wil gets paid, and buys comic books and video games.
Lucky Wil!
This Is Why I Love Whiteboards
Yesterday, what I thought was going to be a quick thirty minute task turned into a six hour interface rebuild. Sometimes, you just need to step back from the screen and rethink the whole thing... preferably with smelly markers and lots of drawing space!
Easily one of my favourite additions to the Visual Lizard offices is the wall of whiteboards directly behind our workspace. More than once, I’ve needed to bounce an idea of one of the others, and having a giant drawing surface within reach makes everything easier.
The to-do item I was tasked with started out simple enough, but quickly became very convoluted, with concepts and variables conflicting all over the place... and it seemed every solution only twisted something else out of shape! Inevitably, I was forced to step away from it for bit to clear my head (and have lunch). When I got back, Dwayne and I approached the problem on the whiteboard, trying to wrap our head around what we were trying to accomplish without any code getting in the way.
In the end, we were able to quickly turn my growing problem-task into a series of coherent requirements, and a couple hours later, I was not only finished, but had managed to add some functional and aesthetic improvements. :)
Comments
On My Radar
Folklorama
Aug 01, 2010
Scott Pilgrim vs The World
Aug 13, 2010
Resident Evil Afterlife
Sep 10, 2010
Iron Man 2
Sep 28, 2010
From The Web
Urbanized
Gary Hustwit next film in his design trilogy, after Helvetica and Objectified.
Linked by Wil Alambre
Apple looking into iOS4 and 3G issues?
My iPhone 3G has become frustrating to use since upgrading to iOS4. What happened to the silky smooth experience that sold me on the hardware in the first place?
Linked by Wil Alambre
Office for Mac 2011 beta 5
Linked by Wil Alambre
W3C's Unicorn Validator Checks Multiple Standards at Once
It's described as brutally unforgiving and that it's near impossible to get a perfect score. Sounds like a challenge! ;).
Linked by Wil Alambre
The Gamer's Alphabet
Q is for Q-bert's curse filled speech bubble... he was a bit of a potty-mouth, wasn't he?
Linked by Wil Alambre
YouTube to increase upload limit from 10 to 15 minutes
Looking forward to bigger, longer internet meme music videos. Oi. :).
Linked by Wil Alambre
Flower Warfare - Psychedelic Action Scene
Linked by Wil Alambre