You may follow the progress of the work at the Ycademy Demo Site which features the Semiomantics XO Theme.

Looking forward to seeing you on YorgoLive tonight.

Related posts: How to Customize WordPress 2 How to Customize WordPress Semiomantics XO Transparent WordPress Drafts Customize WordPress with Semiomantics XO XO Photo Press WordPress Theme

Transparent WordPress Custom Theme

Playing with the XO Theme Version 3.3.x from Semiomantics and CSS3, I notice how easy it is for most anyone to customize the XO Theme by adding transparencies and other CSS3 elements. Here below you find some drafts. You may visit the test site from : http://globalthebrand.com.

On the test site we use the Semiomantics Widgets and Theme Handler plug-in as well as a modified Supersized plug-in; the latter needs some more work to make it more responsive. Also we use TubePress which behaves fine also on mobile.

The Theme is Semiomantics XO with 3 custom child-themes; any theme can be associated with any page, post, category, tag or sidebar.

Related posts:

1. Transparent WordPress Semiomantics XO
2. Transparent WordPress Theme Design
3. Semiomantics XO Blog
4. The 1001 Faces of Semiomantics XO
5. Semiomantics XO 2011 for WordPress

Time again to monitor and check the performance of our new WP based Semiomantics XO 2012 Script on search engines.

Here’s a screenshot of yesterday’s post “Portraits of Africa 2012″ on Google – have a look! Positions 1, 2, 3 and 6 ahead of 10,800,000 search returns – YEBO GOGO!

When looking up “Portraits of Africa 2012″ on Google, I also checked how the images in my article were ranked – here’s the detail of the screenshot showing the Image of a “Young African Girl” on position one, followed by the Image of a “Young African Boy” on position 4… and a small ad I created ages ago peeking at us on position 2. All of them ahead of our South African presidents… just too funny! The young generation is on the move!

It becomes even more intrigueing when we look up “Portrait of Africa Images” on Google and find these young faces of Africa featuring amongst some really classy photography! And again… the random positioning is just too weird… for those who read this and understand what I mean! Welcome to the future :)

Fact is, that with the increasing importance of images and media on the Internet – and with this for our website development – … and people preferring to look at something for quick grasping of the contents rather than reading long time-consuming – and even worse: thought-provoking -  texts… that the correct tagging and classification of photos and images becomes more important. Here as with any post what counts is to be found on Google – Google Top 10 that is. Noone else looks further…

Congratulations to our young friends who’ve made it to the top ranks and find themselves in interesting and attractive company! There will be more….

Young African Girl from my series “Portraits of Africa 2012″.

Portraits of Africa 2012 – untouched… straight from my simple NIKON Coolpix P90 … just the magic of a Young African Girl.

Although the black & white version adds a specific note, I preferred to show the soft gold tones of the skin.

Within my photo series “Portraits of Africa” here is the image of a young African boy.

I just love Black & White Photography and how it adds depth to a picture, especially portraits and expressive faces.

“Portraits of Africa” are shot on a simple NIKON Coolpix P90 with a minimum of post-editing, ideally nothing at all.

We are pleased to announce that the Conference Services website  “Hakamela Conferencing & Event Management” will soon be under construction on Semiomantics XO 2012.

Hakamela Conferencing & Event Management will open its doors in Pretoria, South Africa. This high-demand Service Company  will be run by professional Conference Management Expert Lynn Sakuinje.

Web Design South Africa will be designing a simple, practical and user-friendly website that will target top 10 positions on Google under the relevant keywords and focuses on high visibility on the mobile web.

New Semiomantics XO Theme for WordPress

The above Screenshots represent just some of the pages, features and looks the 2012 Edition of the high performance XO Theme for WordPress has up its sleeves. The above site is the fruit of the 2 Days Ycademy Online Seminar for Semiomantics Developers and designers.

The 2012 Edition of XO is focused on even more flexibility in as much as editing, cross-browser and cross-platform compatibility are concerned.

The Site displays perfectly on Mobile devices, showing responsiveness also of the plugged in scripts chosen of which some have been adapted to satisfy the high standards of Semiomantics Publishing Scripts for Excellence.

The site elaborated at the Ycademy Online Seminar this past week-end features some smashing features, such as:

• Background Slideshow, customizable for each page, post or archive
• Built in Directory
• Media Library for YouTube and Vimeo
• Pro-sliders which can be deployed anywhere on the site
• In addition to the responsive design, a separate light Mobile Version is available
• Bold and Efficient Navigation
• Built in Custom Fonts
• Social Network connectivity and publishing
• and much more.

The XO script is well commented and offers designers a clean and straight forward environment for custom developments. XO uses best practices for WordPress development and makes the best use of the possibilities offered by the WP back-bone, assuring smooth integration and optimized conflict handling.

XO is a great playground for designers. The DIY version allows anyone to adapt layout and colors to taste right from the back-office; there is no need to have any knowledge about coding or designing. The theme behaves like a Chameleon and adapts to specific needs with just a few clicks of the mouse: pre-configured layout elements transform your XO quickly into a Magazine, Newspaper, personal Author Blog, a Media Hub, a Shop, a Marketing Machine, a Social Media Publisher, a Product Promoter or a Fan Site or most anything your imagination dictates.

For the professional designer, XO offers a well commented environment. Custom code can be added right from the dashboard or, as I prefer using a child theme. XO is tuned for HTML5 and CSS3 use, making it a modern and inspiring framework for exceptional design effects.

Out of the box, the XO Theme for WordPress provides a stable and reliable, robust and optimized solution for common use. It provides built in features such a slider with multiple transitions and a one click selector for easy use.

Layouts can be easily adapted to needs and purpose of the site. In fact, most custom designers rely on the theme engine to format efficiently layouts.

The site featured in the above gallery uses a few pro plug-ins to add functionality in function of customer requirements. The integration of such add on scripts is a relatively simple process for designers and developers.

XO has been developed for high performance, productivity, excellence in publishing and flexibility. For the professional users, the XO Theme constitues a solid base with a huge potential for customization and creative artistic expression.

The release of XO Version 3.3.x is planned for the first week of February. The present Release Candidate has been thoroughly tested. A few minor issues will be taken care off before XO will be available to the public.

If your site is running on Semiomantics XO suing basic customization, the theme can just be overwritten. (Save your custom CSS beforehand.)

If you are using a custom version with custom developments or a child theme, some of your customization will need to be adapted to the enhancements of XO 2012. This concerns namely custom headers and footers as well as custom functions.

Support for developers and designers is available as usual at our Ycademy Online Calls and Seminars or through Semiomantics Pro Support.

Related posts:

1. Semiomantics XO Blog
2. Facebook Strategy with WordPress
3. Ycademy Online Seminar January 2012
4. Semiomantics XO 2010 Edition
5. WordPress Shop Version 3 by Semiomantics

We are living in times of rapid change and the explosion of the mobile market. People use their mobile phones to search the net, to find what they want, to compare it and – to buy it. Sales figures triggered via the mobile net are staggering – and as web designers we have to adapt – which means also to focus on new technologies and learn new languages.

Over the past years, Semiomantics has always evolved along with WordPress Developments. Remarkably, the latest WP update allows for much more creativity. While our Semiomantics based author blogs display perfectly on smartphones through integration of the right plugins and settings, there’s much more scope that we will be looking into at this weekend’s Ycademy Seminar 2012 – which is also a testing ground for the new Semiomantics XO 2012 – to be released soon.

In that sense, I am looking forward to the evolution of Bianca Gubalke Mobile!

In order to follow and implement Web Design Trends 2012, learning new languages like CSS3 and html5 has become crucial – especially also due to the unfortunate conflicts around Flash which cannot be seen on the exploding mobile market. Accordingly, this weekend’s fully online YCADEMY Seminar will need focused attention and strong nerves! That’s the price to pay to be and remain a qualified Semiomantics expert!

MadMax is ready – are YOU?!

I just got some screenshots directly from the iPhone in Europe to demonstrate how the new Monkey Valley Resort Website actually looks on the Mobile web – and I’m absolutely thrilled! The quality and resolution are just outstanding and I left the image big so you can appreciate it here even though the picture may take a moment to load. This is soooo sexy!

Above, you see the Frontpage of the Monkey Valley Resort Website, which features a large elegant slider displaying the various chapters and attractions of the hotel resort 30 kms out of Cape Town, South Africa. What is remarkable here is how beautifully the slider displays – all based on new technology as, sadly, Flash does not display on mobile phones and this forced us to adapt in our Semiomantics Website Development, learning new languages like CSS3 and HTML5.

Much if not most of today’s business on the Internet is piped in one way or another through the mobile web… a reason why Monkey Valley Resort had to be visible on mobile.

Here is a horizontal version (probably 1 : 1) … and of course you can zoom up text or whatever you are interested in… and get to where you want to go in a fast and user-friendly way, eg. Click and BOOK!

The Importance of Functionality in terms of Website Design has a lot to do with the ease and user-friendly interaction between the website and the website visitor: the website has to communicate to the visitor what it is all about in an attractive way, guiding through what it has to offer and fulfilling almost intuitively what the visitor is looking for and making it easy to follow through with the desired action – say to book a room in a hotel…, to buy, pay and even download say an ebook… or to simply offer various sights of a specific area or place that shows the visitor what he can expect, eg. in a holiday resort or when researching a new home in real estate.

Today, being visible on the mobile web is crucial to the success of any website or Internet business – and therefore one of the most important functionalities of a website or blog.

Nowhere more than on the Internet do we see such rapid and continuous change and do we have to adapt, learn new languages and keep developing our knowledge and skills on an ongoing basis as in the virtual arena. A website or blog is not built to last forever and it needs a regular allocation of funds (budget) – it’s a project in constant development, adapting to the changes, changing with the trends and always trying to offer readers and visitors something new, something modern and going the extra mile to capture the traffic that leads to business and success.