CNYRadio.com / CNYTVNews.com

cnyradio.com

News site covering the happenings of the local broadcasting industry.  Started with just local radio, then added local TV in late 2010.

After the site’s original owner closed it in 2005, I obtained permission to revive it in 2007.  Rebuilt the site from scratch using WordPress and Adobe Photoshop Elements, launched in 2008.  Redesigned twice since then, most recently in early 2011.

As new stories are published, links automatically post to site’s Twitter feed and Facebook page, recycling fans back to the site.  Site encourages new users to connect on either platform, so they keep coming back.

Syracuse Press Club award: Internet Public Service, second place, 2011.  Considering this is just a hobby in my spare time and first place went to a local hospital which has a full-time staff to maintain their website, I was thrilled to get second place!

AudioTheater

audiotheater.net

Was hired by the owner of an audio production company in Atlanta to create his company’s official website.

Original site was created in Dreamweaver.  It was nice, but because the client did not own a copy of Dreamweaver, he needed to contact me to handle any updates he needed to make.

Current site was created in WordPress, which allowed me to basically create a “turnkey” site for client.  After a few “tutoring by phone” sessions, client was able to take over — he continues to post new content on his own, including audio clips and graphics.

Peter Naughton Productions

peterthedj.com

This is the website for my own mobile DJ business.  The “top” screen shot is the current design which was launched in September 2011.  The bottom screen shot is the site’s original design dating back to 2010.

Unlike the above two websites, which were built using “off the shelf” theme templates which I customized to my liking, the new look of PETERtheDJ.com is my first effort using the ThemeFrame custom theme creator.

Although ThemeFrame’s WYSIWYG interface greatly reduces the amount of time spent hand-coding, ThemeFrame doesn’t just “do everything” for a designer (at least, not yet).  An adequate knowledge of CSS, PHP and HTML is required in order to utilize the features offered by ThemeFrame.  Installation of ThemeFrame also required the installation of a local web server on my own computer, as the program is designed to run within a web browser.

In the sidebar of this website, you’ll notice a schedule of my on-air radio shifts, links to my DJ business Twitter feed and Facebook page, and some of the latest headlines from my “DJ Blog,” which offers photos from my performances and general event-planning advice to customers.

Website includes a special “Contact Form” which customers can use to tell me when they need a DJ, so I can respond with my availability and a price quote.

The “old” screen shot used the same “off the shelf” template which is still in-use at CNYRadio.com and here on this website, pnaw10.com.  If you look closely, you can see there are some basic similarities in the “skeletons” of the sites, but I’ve done quite a bit of work to give each site its own unique appearance.

Lite 98.7 WLZW

[Click thumbnail for a larger view of the site from 2003.]

Site for the market’s leading Adult Contemporary radio station.

Created the site’s template, CSS stylesheet and graphics from scratch.

Several different versions of the masthead were created, each featuring a different slogan or “positioning statement” used by the station.  A different masthead was randomly selected for display each time a page was loaded.  Also had the “status bar” just below the masthead show the name of the DJ or show currently on-air at any given time.

As the station’s Program Director and Afternoon Drive personality, I also handled ongoing maintenance.  Duties included keeping the homepage fresh with new content and updating secondary pages with current information about station contests, upcoming remote broadcast schedules, on-air talent biographies and photos from station events.

Big Frog 104

[Click thumbnail for a larger view the site from 2004.]

Site for the Utica/Rome market’s leading country music station.

Created the site’s template, CSS stylesheet and graphics from scratch.  Although the Lite 98.7 template was a basis for the Big Frog 104 template, extensive changes throughout help make this site stand out as unique.  The masthead featured all of the station’s major personalities, along with station mascot Jeremiah B. Frog.

This was before the advent of RSS feeds and APIs, so yes, those concert dates had to be updated manually on an ongoing basis.  Although I assisted with the ongoing maintenance from time to time, most of the daily upkeep was performed by WFRG’s promotions director.

Oldiez 96.1

[Click thumbnail for a larger view of the site from 2004.]

Site for the Utica/Rome market’s leading country music station.

The design here is remarkably different from both of the stations above, notably in terms of the “nav menu” running horizontally just under the masthead, rather than vertically in a sidebar.

The masthead in this screenshot features photos of Elton John, but every time a new page was selected or reloaded, the site would randomly choose a different masthead — roughly 20 different versions were made, each featuring a different “core artist” or group from the Oldiez 96 music library.

This website wasn’t updated as often as the above two because updates were only made at the request of the program director, who didn’t request updates very often.

WIBX 950 News/Talk/Sports

[Click thumbnail for a larger view of how the site looked in 2004.]

Site for the Utica/Rome market’s leading news/talk station.  This site was considerably “different” as the main focus was local news.

Rather than require the newsroom staff to learn web design or how to transfer pages to/from an FTP server, I established a free “Blogger” account for the newsroom.  I set up Blogger to display the WIBX logo at the top, and then embedded the Blogger page as a “frame” inside the WIBX homepage.  Voila — the newsroom staff could use Blogger’s user-friendly interface to post news stories to the web on their own, anytime, without my assistance.

This page was eventually embedded into the homepages of the other three stations’ websites as well.  The idea was also “borrowed” (and is still in use today) by WTNY in Watertown, which, at the time, was owned by the same parent company as WIBX.