I modified and tried to change as many elements as possible. The core code is as is I have done very little to it. I have added more textures and given it a darker feel. This is to reflect the shorter days we will experience. The core change to Yink is attributed to two reasons, 1. is the shift in the direction of Yink (as always : ) 2. is a gift I received which was a beautiful journal type book I received which I haven’t as yet used (silly I know). As for the Autumn Winter edition I hope to change the skin with the season, so its always fresh and new.

I explain a little more than I usually do as I was looking back at my old skins and thinking, ‘oh I don’t have a picture of such and such a skin which I did a while ago’. Which is sad as there has been many skins to this blog. I still had the last two skins saved so I created images of them to keep as a record here, so from oldest to newest:

The Love4U skin, by far my most favourite skin. The large image at the front was changed every month.

Beautify is my last skin before Artist Journal. The day of the week was written in Japenese and French.

Artist Journal my current skin. The style of this was done in a way which later flash sites began to use with real textures and objects before video made it big in flash. It does have some borrowed elements from Beautify. Thanks to Flo for reminding me its good enough isn’t actually good enough!

I still have other parts of the blog to neaten up and finish as is always the case, enjoy : )

Worst part about it was these shirts can be customised to the customers needs. Quite a few of these shirts had been sent to be altered and then shipped out to the customer. Its only when they arrived back saying not what we ordered did we figure out that picture on the website is completely wrong.

What happened next is what interested me. The guys who work on the website even though they knew about this issue over a week ago, couldn’t ‘do anything to fix it’ in a reasonable amount of time. So I was asked to put a block on these shirts via our system. For me it was a case of 30 mins of work. I could have updated the site myself in 5 mins if I had the access.

I went to inform some of the staff in the department. An older lady who has been with the company for many many years nearing her retirement, she had been swapping the shirts for the correct ones.

I said no you guys can’t just swap the shirts, as the orders are coming in for blue shirts.
“No, the customer ordered white shirts.” She said to me.
I corrected her, “No the customer thinks they are ordering white shirts but they are in fact ordering blue shirts”.

I explained that changing the shirts from the actual ordered ruins the stock levels and also its not traceable what actually happened, the system won’t be showing we sent out white shirts but blue shirts. Which is the correct line.

“I just think that’s ludicrous, when we have plenty of white shirts we can send them.” She retaliated.

I explained a little that head office need accountability of each line of shirt so they know how well they are selling and how much profit they are making from it. Also if someone is sending out something else instead of what the system is saying it will throw their profit figures out for styles of shirts.

And then I took a moment as it struck me that if you’re not sending the item the customer wants, you’re not getting any money. Which makes profits per style completely pointless. Its then it struck me how inflexible and stupid the setup and system actually is.

Anyway I put a block on the shirts so they automatically get removed from the website. I have seen them in the past take months to correct very simple issues. However if I had a say, the web team would be the first to go, replacing her with this old lady who actually understands more how systems should be run.

http://www.walkingleaf.co.uk/2008/03/02/formula-one-2008-preview/#more-250

Have a read and leave your comments.

I hope you like it, if only half as much as me. I will be blogging a little more hopefully as there is all sorts of crazy stuff which has been happening recently and I well tell more when I can.

And thank you to Flo for guiding me at the right time, without whom the Internet would be a gray landscape.

On other news I still haven’t posted up my holiday pics. I will do so soon as I have spare time. Currently I’m busy working away on the IPB forum for eternalblade. Its still in the design stages and coming along well. I’ll only be able to give a good estimate of completion once it goes into coding stages. I’m being quite particular about looks and functionality and don’t really want to compromise.

On personal news I received a letter on Saturday which stated due to an unfortunate illness my doctor would be retiring from his surgery on Monday. The envelope contained a list of other local doctors encouraging me to join up with. The doctor has been practicing locally for 37 years and he’s been my doctor for nearly 20 years. The story featured in the local newspaper although it was brief with news as the letter.
Its good to have a doc who you’ve known for so long. I wish him good luck and best of health

This will be our first tutorial on the subject of re-touching a photograph in photoshop. We will be working on a photo of a model and using a few techniques to smooth and even out the skin.

http://tutorialblog.org/photo-retouching-skin/

I thought oh kewl, as its a subject I’m quite fond of. I had a look at the methods in the tutorial and it felt a little odd as I’ve been taught a different way. So I decided to have a very quick go with the source image and compare my final result with the one done by the author.

Original image

Image after carrying out the tutorial by the tut author

Heres my quick attempt

The speed I carried out in, I probably haven’t got the color correct. I think she looks more like a cover model now though : )
I know the tut wasn’t for creating cover models.

One thing I have realized, that I have a lot of learning to do as far as css based layouts go. This green look was actually my first serious attempt. And for a first I’m quite happy. Although slowly the age is beginning to show.

It isn’t the promised new design, which will be so out there. Its not that one, that one will be next.

Notice the rest of the pages haven’t taken the style, thats because the style sheets were split again upon the upgrade. Some interesting stuff should start happening here, in about a months time.

I’m going to ease off a little. I was just proving to myself that I can. It also does help ones writing skills. Which I have a lot to learn.

Anyway blogging everyday is easy. I think the next task to blog one week with funny posts everyday, then build that upto one month. All in all it has been fun.

My one reader would probably reply “thank, frozen peanuts its been fun for someone!”.

Yeah I love you too, gotta love the fans.