"A clean, effective portfolio and online presentation." —juror Kelly Goto
"I loved this well-organized collection that is equal parts sensible philosophy and bold project selections. It elegantly highlights pride in the work and not simply the clients." —juror David Wright
Overview: As a primary source of its promotion and new business, Hybrid Design wanted its website to be easily navigable, with a smooth viewing experience, and to provide enough context for the studio's work, without becoming overly cumbersome or daunting. It's a bold, graphic and colorful showcase with a minimized navigation and organized access to the studio's projects and methodology—in a format that functions well and looks great on a variety of screen sizes.
• Designing the site took about four months, from concept development to deployment.
• Developed in Flash Builder using ActionScript 3.0, the site takes advantage of some of the studio's favorite frameworks: Gaia and the GreenSock tweening library.
• The navigation consists of a simplified catalog-style browsing experience that can quickly filter a large body of work.
Comments by Ed O'Brien and Matt Maher:
What was the most challenging aspect of the project? "Designing for yourself is never easy, but in the end, we kept coming back to the idea that, as with any experience, content is king. The challenge of creating a site that could display a large body of work in an easy-to-use format required designing a navigation style that allowed quick filtering of many cross-category projects. The solution we landed on kept things minimal, allowing us to focus on the rich visual images and putting featured work front and center. The feedback to this content-first approach has been overwhelmingly positive, as often times people are left sifting through small, overly cropped images of work."
What would you do differently if you could start the project over? "Obviously, technology changes, and when we revise the site next time, there will be updates, in both technology and functionality. We are constantly looking for ways to improve the site, as everybody has a different point of entry and browsing experience. The benefit of this being our own site, is that we can implement them."
