A picture of Rachel Nabors, me!

Rachel Nabors is a web designer and front end developer, an award winning cartoonist, and a creative gun for hire.

Check out my illustrations at UXBooth.com!

February 9th, 2010 | Articles | 2 Comments

Recently the awesome Andrew Maier of UX Booth approached me about illustrating his article, Telling Your Website’s Story with Sketchboarding (because of my comicking background, I imagine). I was only too happy to oblige! Below is an uncut version of two comics that got turned into one:

There are more comics in the article. Andrew did [...]

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Die Flash, die.

February 1st, 2010 | Articles | 4 Comments

I used to say that there were only three real uses for Flash: media players, animations, and games. (Everything else can be replicated with jQuery and AJAX.) These were the fingers with which Flash clung to the Internet. But one by one, they are being stomped on by HTML 5 and Javascript. And now that the ipad and iphone don’t support Flash, the tide is begining to turn for Adobe’s darling. Share with me this moment of schadenfreude…

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WordPress: Best of 2009 and Trends of 2010

January 9th, 2010 | Articles | Please comment!

2009 saw WordPress 2.7, 2.8, and 2.9 in rapid succession. As the platform continues to evolve toward perfection, its ease of use now extends even further to developers as well as end users. My favorite feature of the latest installment, WordPress 2.9, has to be the native post thumbnails support. You can now select an [...]

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lovemysmartcar.com: How viral media can be deterred with social media

September 25th, 2009 | Articles | Please comment!

When I fell in love with my new smart car, I knew I had to create a blog all about the experience of owning one of these beauties. Little did I realize that lovemysmartcar.com would prove instrumental in dousing the flames of a viral if not inflammatory photograph. This site is a case in point for how social media can be used to deter viral bad press.

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Making a case for the dialog element in HTML 5

September 19th, 2009 | Articles | 3 Comments

I’d spent a lot of time writing a post about the glorious new tags introduced in HTML 5, but unfortunately, just as I was about to put it up, I caught wind that the spec for the <dialog> tag has been nixed. Considering that a hefty portion of my article was devoted to illustrating how [...]

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Triangle Web Women, creating a custom Twitter background

August 18th, 2009 | Portfolio | Please comment!

When Rebecca Murphey asked me to design the Twitter page for the Triangle Web Women’s meetup group, I jumped at the chance! It would need to encompass the group’s vision… and include super heroes!

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RacheltheGreat.com, a portal page designed to reinforce my personal brand

July 5th, 2009 | Portfolio | 1 Comment

I had to design a site that matched my Twitter page and new business cards. Using CSS sprites, canonical URLs and the little-used border-radius property of CSS, I designed and launched this personal portal in one day.

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Twitter for Fun, but not so much for profit.

May 30th, 2009 | Articles | 1 Comment

Over Memorial Day Weekend, I made a new background image and coordinating avatar for my Twitter account (psst, I’m CrowChick). While I was researching my task, I kept running into articles about “how to get the most out of Twitter,” articles from people who promised that with Twitter, you could “build a publicity powerhouse” and “harness the power of the masses.” This contrasts nicely with the opinion of a coworker of mine, who stated that, “Twitter is a waste of time.”

I agree with neither of these sentiments. Twitter is useful, but it isn’t the be-all and end-all of marketing or promotion. It’s best to think of Twitter as a supplementary item, like a MySpace page or Facebook presence. It can be useful on both a professional and a personal level.

In this article, I’ll try to dispel some Twitter myths and provide some insight to how you can get the most out of your Twitter account.

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“Better User Orientation Through Navigation” on UXBooth

May 5th, 2009 | Articles | Please comment!

I’m delighted to announce that my latest article on usability has gone live at UXBooth. It’s all about, as you may have guessed, website navigation and how to keep users oriented and moving. Shoo shoo shoo! Go read it now! And of course, I’d love to hear what you think!

c_gretyl

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KarenLuk.net, an illustration gallery in WordPress

February 28th, 2009 | Portfolio | Please comment!

When Karen Luk asked me to design a gallery site for her with a CMS to help organize her artwork, I jumped at the chance to help a fellow artist. But there were some interesting conditions: under no circumstances could the site look like it was powered by WordPress, and she needed it all done in time for a looming convention!

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