Tuesday 21 October 2008

Sensible-music goes live

We're proud to announce that the Sensible Music Group website is now live. This has been a very exciting project for us being as we are big music fans here at HUGHES | DESIGN. Obviously not as big as fans as Sensible.


This site is a great show case for the kind of work we do. It's a bespoke design with a content management system. It also streams audio and video content, which is a first for us, or certainly in such quantities.


Design
When we first met with Sensible, they had some pretty clear ideas about the kind of site they wanted, and the features hey wanted in it. Being a recording complex with a sense of history, but also very cutting edge with some of today's biggest names passing in and out of the studio, it was necessary to try and get a balance between retro and modern.

The header and navigation are inspired by vintage guitar amps, the nav switches based on the those on the Mojave Ampworks Scorpion 50 watt amplifier head. The dimensions of the home page are based an a Carvin 212 BELAIR 2 x 12, 50W, all-tube combo guitar amp - just to give the site an authentic rock'n'roll feel.

We commissioned Ben Sullivan an illustrator to measure up the studio complex and then create the isometric illustrations used throughout the site and the interactive one that acts as a studio navigation on the Home page.

Technically, the site is part static and part content managed. The Equipment pages and Clients & Projects section have have a simple to use CMS (content management system) that allow Sensible to upload images and text descriptions of the recording and musical equipment they have available while the clients and projects section allows them to upload images of acts, along with streaming flash content of the recordings and or/videos that Sensible have been involved in. The system also allows Sensible to organise the Clients and Projects content in a top 100, alphabetical or a combination of both.


Visit the site at www.sensible-music.co.uk and see for yourself.

The site is so new, it's still being populated with content. So it could change while you are there.

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