Content or design: which comes first?

[Aku]

I guess I'll play devil's advocate, I'm a content before design person and from a design standpoint I think it's preferable that way. Maybe it's the years of art school + working in the design field. XD How do you know what a design needs to do unless you've got your content first? To me it feels like I'm cheating my content. I've definitely done it both ways, but I think there are instances where writing the content first and then creating the layout yielded better results for me personally.

I suppose you could argue that with shrining, we sort of have a formula already and a lot of times we already know what we are going to write about--so you already know what you'll need on the design (navigation, places for long-form writing, etc.). But I think sometimes that kind of thinking is what holds us back from using design as another means of telling a story. It depends on the person, though. For me, design is really important and it's a lot more than just housing for an essay, I really want it to tell a story along with my shrines!

I think that's why I had so much fun designing the layouts for Gintoki and Caesar--it was something I did after I developed the content and could really pick good imagery and language for my design to suit what I wrote. For Ranka, I made the layout first and while it's a pretty container for the content, I think that it has less of a narrative than the previously mentioned shrines.

[high seraph]

But I think sometimes that kind of thinking is what holds us back from using design as another means of telling a story.

I agree with you here, and I think what you did in those two shrines you listed is simply fantastic -- I remember my jaw dropping when I first visited your Gintoki shrine, waaay back when I was going through the shrine nominations for SOTM in the livejournal community, and picked it for a winner lmao. You're definitely right, the layout shouldn't be just a container for the content, but it should also be part of the content itself.

That's something I'm gonna pay attention to for my next projects. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!

[Laura]

I actually work on the content first! :)

For my Haruka/Michiru fan site redo, I actually spent a long time writing up brand new content for the site before I created a layout for it. When I had all of the materials I wanted to present in front of me, I was able to come up with a unique design... specifically, a single-column layout for information about both girls, and then a double-column layout for information where I could split specific character content up (Haruka on the left, Michiru on the right).

I usually like to write all of my content up to see how much content I'm actually dealing with before creating a design. If it's not a whole lot, I might be inclined to simply make a one-page shrine... or if it's a lot, I like to organize it into several separate sections to make it easier to navigate, then figure out layouts from there.

After all, the content is the real feature of the site; a design is just something that presents it. :)

Sometimes, it's nice to take a break mid-way through writing and editing to work on a design. Breaks up the monotony a bit. :)

[Laura]

I guess I'll play devil's advocate, I'm a content before design person and from a design standpoint I think it's preferable that way. Maybe it's the years of art school + working in the design field. XD How do you know what a design needs to do unless you've got your content first?

^same here, years of working as a user interface artist/designer and graphic designer's kind of pushed me into having a different approach to making sites. XD

[nyxmidnight]

I'm mostly a content-first shrine-maker. When the layout comes first, I often end up stuck on what to write. But when I write the content first, I can just open a basic Bootstrap file and plonk my content right in. I begin with the structure, so I place all the headers, like a sort of writing plan, and then I get to the writing. Only after do I get to "dressing up" the content in a layout.

[dubiousdisc]

I guess I'll play devil's advocate, I'm a content before design person and from a design standpoint I think it's preferable that way. Maybe it's the years of art school + working in the design field. XD How do you know what a design needs to do unless you've got your content first? To me it feels like I'm cheating my content. I've definitely done it both ways, but I think there are instances where writing the content first and then creating the layout yielded better results for me personally.

I suppose you could argue that with shrining, we sort of have a formula already and a lot of times we already know what we are going to write about--so you already know what you'll need on the design (navigation, places for long-form writing, etc.). But I think sometimes that kind of thinking is what holds us back from using design as another means of telling a story. It depends on the person, though. For me, design is really important and it's a lot more than just housing for an essay, I really want it to tell a story along with my shrines!

I think that's why I had so much fun designing the layouts for Gintoki and Caesar--it was something I did after I developed the content and could really pick good imagery and language for my design to suit what I wrote. For Ranka, I made the layout first and while it's a pretty container for the content, I think that it has less of a narrative than the previously mentioned shrines.

I agree with this method 8)

[Destinie]

For me the design used to come first but now it's definitely the other way around. I feel that I need to figure out how much content I will have before I make the design. This is because if I have a very lengthy site I want to make sure that the design accommodates the text and makes it easier for someone to spend more time reading it. Plus, I feel like I waste my time designing for a site that doesn't have enough content to warrant me actually making it. I don't want to spend hours on a layout and eventually scrap it because the content just didn't work out. (It's happened a lot for me... /sob)

*high-fives other professional web designers lol*

[Robin]

I almost always develop content first. In fact, sometimes the design and layout of a site has been a mere afterthought--I think this might be my "Bachelor's of English-self" showing through rather than my "webdesigner-self". LOL!

I envy those who can spend hours and hours in image programs making beautiful layouts...(mostly because I have no patience for visual art LOL)

[Todd]

I hate making layouts. I know it's silly because I love making fan sites, but I am very content-oriented. My writing is my strength and the part of shrining I love the most. I definitely start sites by writing content first. There gets a point where I stop writing though and make the layout. It might be because I don't want a site waiting on that task I hate, or that I want to see some of the content I've written in a layout... Either way, I make my layout in the middle, and then go back to finishing up the content. By the middle I generally know what I need in terms of navigation and whatnot.

[Crystal]

I'm like the opposite Todd. I love designing layouts but writing content is my bane. I've gotten better at it I think but it's still a pain to do sometimes. I have a short attention span.