Use BaseKit to create your site from Photoshop

Do you run an online business or plan to start one? Are you in writing or designing and keen to create an online platform to showcase your work, so that clients may approach you with lucrative projects? In such a case, it is judicious to make your online presence felt complete with information updates and relevant images. On the other hand, you many want a website to display photos and fun information for your college pals. Whether you are an entrepreneur, a student or a creative Pro, having your own website is a must for communication and networking across the World Wide Web.

               

After all, a website is your virtual office on the Net a place that reflects the kind of image you want to project about yourself to the entire world. That is precisely why a site should be designed with the focus on your professional side or the USP that you have in mind. So, what are the prerequisites of building a good website? If you are itching to get creative, you may begin by conceptualizing your very own design templates and then hire a code writer to help you get it online. Or you may hire the services of a professional web designer and come up with something really spectacular. But this will inevitably mean shelling out bit bucks!

                

Alternatively, you can create the site yourself, even if you have zero knowledge of programming. Yes, that’s right you can design your site without incorporating a single line of code. While there are quite a few services that let you do just that, BaseKit is a programme that helps simplify it further.

So, What is BaseKit?

An online website design service, BaseKit allows you to create rich and dynamic sites directly from Photoshop designs. Here, the Photoshop file acts as the design template and this can be overlaid with several cook widgets for inserting text, videos, Twitter feeds and RSS feeds. With BaseKit, a designer can create visually appealing and totally functional website even without much knowledge of CSS or other coding languages. You can add and edit as many pages as you want. You can even restructure elements in drag and drop manner. So, if you have a fine eye for all things creative and a knack for designing, BaseKit is the right programme for you. It has been created by BaseKit Platform Ltd, a company based in the UK.

Creating your website with BaseKit

If you are good at Photoshop and want to convert your unique design into a website, here are the options that you can try: Either learn HTML and code the site yourself or hire a coder to get the job done. Alternatively, use BaseKit to import your .psd file and convert your design into a standard, W3C compliant template. All you need is a dollop o creativity to do this.

– Currently, BaseKit is in beta stage and available for invited members only. Therefore, to get the ball rolling, you have to sign up as a beta teaster and wait for your e-mail invitation. Signing up for the beta version gives you a trial period of 30 days. If you wish to continue after the trial period, you can subscribe to the premium package at 10 pounds per month.

– On receiving the invitation, register your account. You can choose  sub-domain for your account and this will be the place where all your web pages will be served.

Once you log in to your account, you will be prompted to import your .psd file or create a website based on one of the existing templates.

– Importing your .psd file is the quickest way to get your website up and running. However, if you are not a Photoshop pro, choose a custom make template from the site’s library. At the moment, there are limited templates to choose from, but the developers hope to add more to their repository soon.

– Now go to your workspace, which is your main editing area and contains all necessary toolbars.

– The left hand column is divided into upper and lower cells. The upper cell is dedicated to page management where you can add new pages, change page setting, change the template, etc. The lower cell has all the widgets that you can use for the website. There is a widget each for several Web components forms, videos, Google Maps, search bar, Flickr, comments area, text box, Twitter, RSS feed and the navigation menu. Just drag and drop these widgets in suitable positions and no extensive coding will be required here. But if you wish, you can edit the HTML components for content of every widget. You can even change the CSS or widget style. However, this depends upon your proficiency.  

– If you wish to see how things look at any point of time, just click on the ‘Preview’ button. And finally, when you are through with the designing, click on the ‘Publish’ button.

– BaseKit is equipped with powerful features to do up a professional website. Browse through the ‘Manage’ area and you will have the option to customize the name and SEO title of you site, description and keywords, What’s more, the programme’s integration with Google analytics lets you track the traffic quickly.

– You don’t have to worry about hosting the site if you are using BaseKit server. You don’t even have to worry about its maintenance, as BaseKit will do it for you. 

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