Hi All

 

As a married father of four, times are currently hard.

 

Fed up with my current role as a System Development Manager (not as glamorous as it sounds) and always having had an interest in web design, I have decided to embark on a two and a half year plan to become a home-based freelance web designer, coinciding with my wifes return to work.

 

Starting small by targeting a 'small business' customer base, my current site has just been launched.

 

I'm quite happy in writing standard compliant (X)HTML and CSS from scratch. I now need to plan the next two years 'study' time. Currently trying to give myself an hour after work in the evening and as much as I can get away with on Saturday's!

 

I feel I now need to hone my Dreamweaver Skills, along with learning basic Javascript, PHP, Flash and get to grips Photoshop/Fireworks for some added design flair.

 

Then I plan to investigate relevant CMS and E-commerce systems and how easy they are to bolt into my designs. With regards to CMS, as I have adobe CS3 people say Contribute .. but expensive for the end user? Also have had Wordpress and Drupal recommended.

 

Maybe with a little SEO practice thrown in for good measure!

 

Is this the right plan ... and any further tips on the ways forward or areas I should concentrate on? All help and advice gratefully received.

 

Thanks,

Steve

Hey man,

Freelance sounds like a good way to go. I would say just learn as much as you can and carry on the way you are heading.

I followed you on twitter and good luck my friend!

Hey man,

Freelance sounds like a good way to go. I would say just learn as much as you can and carry on the way you are heading.

I followed you on twitter and good luck my friend!

 

 

Cheers Tank!¬

I feel I now need to hone my Dreamweaver Skills, along with learning basic Javascript, PHP, Flash and get to grips Photoshop/Fireworks for some added design flair.

 

 

If you have dreamweaver then fine, but use it without using the design view aspect, if you allow dreamweaver to generate code you will get lost in that code, dont get me wrong dreamweaver has its pros and its cons, but learn to hand code if you have the time.

 

If its any help I would recommend concentrating on the below in that order

 

HTML / CSS

JAVASCRIPT / PHP / MYSQL (More emphasis on php / mysql

CMS's (wordpress,EE, Joomla etc)

 

Learn to handcode from the outset

Never use WYSIWYG

Learn how to host sites / ftp programmes

 

EDIT: Almost forgot wish I had known about Firebug, ietester and all the other webdev tools available when I started out

I will suggest you to get familiar with cms and ecommerce platforms first and try to design and develop some themes for those platforms as it doesn't requires advance php or programming skills. This will surely help you in earning a decent amount for living.

welcome Ghoper, welcome here and best of luck for your new freelance business.