Wale A. » Feb 27, 2011 0
Model Markley W. (RM # 293107), who also been a past Model of the week on RM, just had a photoshoot with Style and Action Photo. I have also covered Style and Action Photo here on ReelModels when I had an RM Talk interview with the owner/photographer, Gerry. This photoshoot was added to a new section called the “La Porte” series. See more of it here.
Wale A. » Nov 15, 2010 0
Some of you may have noticed the Portfolio section for ReelModels.com was just recently activated a few days ago. This section of the profile pages has always been visible, but it was never activated, so it really could not be edited. RM members will now be able to add items to their Portfolio via the Account Settings page. From the public perspective, visitors will be able to see listed items where available. The Portfolio section is located right underneath the Photos section.
Some additional updates are planned later, such as direct edits and perhaps a more detailed/dynamic Portfolio.
Wale A. » Nov 1, 2010 0
The year 2010 is almost winding down. I began reviewing various stats since the launch of the RM Blog and found some interesting numbers. I opened up the the blog early January, but really didn’t start pushing content and monitoring stats until April. I pulled out the log for this year. As of October end, it’s had 1423 unique visitors, 4399 visits, 12,188 page views and 43,127 hits. Not too shabby for a new blog. Below is a quick chart summary of unique visits each month:
It is quite nice to see a fairly steady growth overall, and more so the steep spike between September and October. The spike is quite obvious for many reasons. September was when I got back from a long needed vacation and started working on the new RM. October was when I launched the new RM, started the Model of the Week showcases and began pushing various other updates.
Another very neat stat were the top 3 most popular content that was being viewed:
It’s very fascinating to find out the most popular article is Part 1 of the Art of Shave series. I started that series out of frustration and just wanted to vent. Moreover, I wanted to share with other guys out there the proper way to shave, for those in a similar confused state. I plan to publish a follow-up Part 3 soon. Also interesting to note is the fact that the next 2 most popular items were the RM Talk series. It makes me excited to know people seem to be enjoying them, which will motivate me more to keep at it. Following a close 4th is the very first Model of the Week publication with Leah.
I look forward to seeing the momentum continue to grow and to bring more interesting publications and showcases to the site well into 2011. I have some possible opportunities I am looking forward to next year, hopefully things come to fruition. Thanks to everyone who has been very supportive including all the readers, models, photographers and industry citizens.
Wale A. » Oct 12, 2010 2
The New ReelModels.com is now live. Fun fact, the internal code name for the New RM was actually RM2-MF, which really meant ReelModels v2 – Moving Forward. Throughout the entire month of October (and perhaps well into November), I will continue to rollout chunks of updates until most of the core functionality is running.
The New UI.
The site has been giving a fresh new look which is one of the things I am most excited about. When I first launched RM into Beta, I was more concerned about the basic functionality rather than aesthetics. Hence, I had a decent layout, but not something I thought would stick too long. This time around, I spend more time on the aesthetics side. The new UI is a lot more refined, consistent and fluid. I spent a lot of time focusing and designing a solution that would provide optimum screen real estate for all the various visual elements without sacrificing functionality.
A Re-vamped Homepage.
The re-vamped homepage is the next item which I felt was just as important in this release. The homepage is the very first page people see when they get to the site. It really needed to capture the feel of the content on the site and provide certain key highlights that will easily allow users to make a decision of where to go. In a nutshell, the blueprint for the layout was broken down into 5 stacks: Header, Navigation, Banner, Content and Footer. The header is where you will see the search box and menus related to your account. The navigation is where menus for the pages will reside. The banner area is where banner related content will be captured. The content stack is where most of the dynamic content will reside, such as news articles, showcases, member spotlights, ads, etc. The footer will mostly be RM related information.
Model of the Week Showcase.
MOTW is something that is brand new in this RM release. It will give qualified models a chance to be showcased on a weekly basis. The peice will contain inetersting facts about the model and various other stats. It is something I am really looking forward to, as it will give more insight to all the various types of personalities. Applications for MOTW are currently being accepted. Send the following information to motw@reelmodels.com:
Headline
The headline is essentially the latest news. It was previously called Blog Stream as it was tied to the RM Blog via RSS. Clicking on a headline should take you to the full article and the rest of the RM Blog.
Featured Models
This section is where anyone with an RM account will be featured. This section is currently static, another rollout patch will be applied soon to make it cycle through members.
V.Stream
This essentially stands for Video Stream. This will be the perfect spot for videos of industry related video material that I find and see fit.
Enhanced Profile Pages
You will notice right away that the new profile pages follow the same look and feel of the site. One of the new enhancements you will also notice on profile pages is the ability to contact models direclty via the contact form.
Model & Agency Directory
The “Models” and “Agencies” navigation link will take you to each page respectively. The Models page will have a list of Models on RM. Currently, it just replicates the featured models section since the index is still being worked on. The Agencies page will have a list of some agencies for now. One of the future enhancements I’m looking into is for agents to be able to register accounts which can be directly linked to this directory. There are many different directions I would like to take the directory listings, but I’m still figuring it out as time goes on.
Gigs
This navigation link will take you to RM gig listings. You will notice it is currently not yet active. A working version of it has been built, but not rolled out yet to the live site. This should be coming in the next few days.
Wale A. » Oct 7, 2010 0
A re-vamped ReelModels.com is coming soon, and by soon it could be as early as next week. It’s been a crazy/busy year to say the least. From ups and downs, to time consuming trips and other Digital Media Projects, it was very difficult and challenging to keep up. Around this time last year was when I started development work on ReelModels.com and then launched it into beta a few months thereafter. During the past year there have been many other things going on that took my focus away from this project as always, such as the web re-launch of JasonCaesar.com alongside “The Musical” EP…but still I continued to apply some minor features to RM.
Until now, things have been pretty calm. After returning from a long needed vacation to Florida, I decided to re-organize myself, catch up, lay out a new path and began working on the New ReelModels.com in mid September. Furthermore, January 2011 will be the 1 yr anniversary of when ReelModels.com went live into beta. I think the pressure of this also made me want to have the new RM ready before then.
After many iterations of various layout concepts I finally settled on one and began developement work on the site. Since I already had the original code base written, it was more about expanding the framework this time around and implementing a much cleaner and fluid design built for content. I’m proud of this release (though a little nervous), and some of the features I’m looking forward to in the next few weeks of deployment include: Model of the week showcases, gig listings, video reels, status updates and more RM Talk interviews.
You can see a teaser screenshot below.
Wale A. » Oct 6, 2010 0
October is Breast Cancer awareness month. Knowing people personally who are battling it right now and having gone to some events this month, I thought it only natural to show my support. So here’s a little e-note from ReelModels.
Wale A. » Jun 17, 2010 1
It’s been a couple of weeks now with very little RM updates. I have been quite busy with various other Gnetic Media related projects such as the launch of Edge88.com and MapleLeafLax.com sites, among other things. So many tasks have been occupying my time. On the other hand, the time away has helped me dwell on various things to put out as a priority for the RM portal in order to hopefully start spurring more activity on the site. On that priority is RM Gigs.
The latest news is that I have been developing and testing the soon to be new section “RM Gigs” for the site. Gigs will be a simple page where anyone can easily post a gig. I think of it as a simplified listings page for gigs/casting calls etc…à la Craigslist.
Below is a screenshot of what it is looking like so far:
Wale A. » Apr 25, 2010 0
Last week I was trying to make some changes to the RM Blog that was hosted on WordPress. I implemented the Grid Focus theme by Derek Punsalan which I wanted to tweak for RM. I was running into several problems and restrictions because of WordPress policies. I contacted Derek directly and he was very helpful in how to go about the changes. I decided that I would be better off moving the RM Blog from WordPress to my current hosting server.
In order to free some space for the RM Blog and relieve myself of having to maintain too much, I thought it would be a good time to retire my old blog, district12. Not many people know this, but the concept behind RM came to me way back in 2006. At the time, I called it district12. I didn’t have the time to go along with it, so I just used it as a blog. Below is a screenshot I found of the concept layout I did back then:
It is nice to re-visit the past some times and see how things have evolved from an original idea. It was quite a nice throw back to those days. Hopefully I can kick it up a notch with RM and pick up the pace from where district12 was supposed to go.
This weekend I was able to fully migrate the RM blog to my current hosting server. The new URL is now http://blog.reelmodels.com and direct links have been updated to reflect the change. I also want to say thanks to Derek Punsalan of 5thrityone.com for helping out with the questions and also for a minimalist yet beautiful theme.
Wale A. » Apr 21, 2010 0
It’s been crazy the last couple of weeks. So many things going on and so many things to get done. Sometimes it just feels like I am still not that much closer to where I want to be with RM in terms of time frame.
I’m still working on Release 3. So far, the following are a work-in-progress:
(1) Profiles for Photographers. What I have so far is quite basic, but it is a start to get the Photographer roles activated.
(2) Enhancing UI elements. User experience is very important to me, and this is why I take my time. I’ve been cleaning up the Edit section and adding some better UX processes.
(3) I have already begun the initial process of creating the Portfolio section which will be a list of items/links a User can add, to show gigs you have been involved in that are available online.
Hopefully I can deploy R3 for May.
Wale A. » Mar 24, 2010 0
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