Lyfter

We're Building Awesome Websh*t Together

Best Use of Video or Moving Image / Honoree

Lyfter

Best Use of Video or Moving Image

Honoree

Our biggest challenge was time as we set ourselves a challenge: one week, one crazy website. Eric Verheijen, Jedi Grand Master

Q: Can you briefly describe your project and the concept behind it?

A: Our old website was basic and simple. It didn't display our skills at all, and we wanted to change that. So we decided to go crazy. Besides the possibility to display our skills, it also fits with who we are. We’re nerds who love games, tech and everything geeky. We also realized that too much craziness might scare off potential clients. Therefore, we decided to balance the craziness with clean, simple and a bit of humour on the side.

Q: Once you settled on your idea, what influenced your decision on the chosen technical approach? How did it differ or go beyond approaches you’ve taken in the past?

A: We work with our own method and our own WordPress Framework. We obviously used that for our own website as well. But besides the challenge of time we’ve set ourselves, we had just introduced a new structure and way of work within our framework. So our website was the ultimate challenge to see whether we needed to adjust things or had included everything. Almost a bootcamp for all our developers.

Q: What were some of your biggest learning and takeaways from this project?

A: What we realized during the process is how much you really can get done in one week. It was hard work, kind of stressful, but also a lot of fun. To be able to work with our whole team on one project was awesome! We once again realized how important it is to communicate clearly and regularly.

Q: Why is this an exciting time to create new digital experiences? How does your team fit into this?

A: We live in a digital age. People have a high understanding of how digital experiences work. Frameworks and technical evolution makes it possible to build amazing things. This opens the door to experiment. To develop experiences that bring people joy. Experiences that are more than providing information and tracking conversion rates. We build Awesome Websh*t. That's our payoff and the reason we do what we do.

Q: What web technologies, approaches, tools, or resources did you use to develop this experience?

A: We used: WordPress, our own Lyfter WordPress Framework, VUE, Sass, PHP 8, NPM, Laravel, Git, ffmpeg, Adobe XD

Q: How did the final product meet or exceed your expectations? What results did you see?

A: As we only had one week, we realised that we probably would have to accept that it would just be an MVP. However, in the end we were actually really happy with what we’ve accomplished. It was more than just an MPV. We had an actual website with most of the crazy elements finished by the end of the week. Now almost everyone we talk to mentions our website and how awesome it is or whether they played the game or not.

Q: How did you reach a good balance of your own creative ideas and technical capabilities with a fair representation of the client’s brand?

A: As we only had one week for development, we spent a lot of time prepping. We are the ones who came up with the concept as well as the developing party. Therefore, we were able to constantly check the technical possibilities with our creative ideas. We had complete control within the project as it was also our own website. So we knew what we wanted and how we could make it. Now we just had to do it.

Q: What did your initial moodboard, wireframe, or prototype look like? How did those ideas change throughout the design process?

A: Our initial idea was an interactive platform with use of video, inspired by numerous web experiments. We’ve worked out some wireframes/storyboards, however after some brainstorming, we’ve decided to go in a somewhat different direction, inspired by the Matrix’ Construct. Once we’ve decided on the concept, we started wireframing to get a view of all elements needed, and finally we started designing based on the wireframes.