Laura Hamilton UI Design and Development |
Silicon Valley Saratoga, California Phone: (408) 315-9431 Email: mslaura@viviente.com |
SKILLS SUMMARY
- Design and development of web-based user interfaces
- Expert HTML and XHTML development and cross-browser/platform optimization
- Rapid HTML mockup and prototyping
- Flash animation and interface creation (including ActionScripting)
- CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)
- JavaScript
- XSLT/XML expertise
- Clean, straightforward visual design
- Image editing, optimization, and manipulation
- Team player: work across departments with Marketing, Engineering, Product Management, Professional Services, Sales, Customer Support
- Superb oral and written communication skills
- Photography of products and personnel
- Fluent in French and Spanish
- 10 years of design/development experience
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PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE & WORK HISTORY
June 2005 - present Owner/Web Architect
The Portable Baby
http://www.theportablebaby.com/
- Interaction design, visual design, web development for this successful online store of products that make it easier to travel with children
- Owner/operator of this business.
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Big Corporate Jobs
November 2001 - May 2005 Yahoo! UI Architect/Designer
Yahoo! Resumix
HG Recruiter clickable mockups: http://www.viviente.com/resumix/genie/
HG Hiring Manager clickable mockups: http://www.viviente.com/resumix/hmw/
Resumix 7 Flash presentation:
http://www.viviente.com/resumix/flash/resumix7.swf
- Interaction design, UI design, and front-end programming/development for the award-winning series of Hiring Gateway enterprise software products: HG Recruiter, HG Hiring Manager, HG Relationship Manager, and HG Profile Manager.
- Hiring Gateway was chosen as the Top Human Resources Product of 2003 by Human Resource Executive Magazine, who called it "an applicant tracking system so intuitively designed that an operating manual is unnecessary".
- Process: HTML Wireframes were created to determine proper workflow, then working XHTML/JavaScript mockups were used to develop visual components, perform user testing and correct any further workflow issues. XSLT templates were made from the XHTML to create the working product. Final step was my review of the working UI, and correction of any errors or changes to the UI inadvertently inserted by the back-end developers.
- Customized HG Relationship Manager and HG Profile Manager software to match the look and feel of client websites, and played a key role in implementation. Customers include nVidia, ChevronTexaco, City of Seattle, Park Place Entertainment and many more. Close relationship with Professional Services team members.
- Created scripted static HTML demos for software products, used by Sales and Marketing teams in customer presentations.
- Updated and maintained Yahoo! Resumix corporate website
Yahoo! HotJobs
Yahoo! HotJobs Job Search prototypes:
Checkboxes: http://www.viviente.com/resumix/naples/set1/01searchresults.html
(Click on "more locations >>" in left navbar, then check "White Plains")
Highlighting: http://www.viviente.com/resumix/naples/set2/01searchresults.html (Click on "more categories >>" in left navbar, then "Submit" in the resulting selection box)
- Created clickable scripted XHTML prototypes for Yahoo! Hot Jobs Job Search redesign.
- Process: Visual Designer sent image files to me with his general vision for the new search pages, gave me background on project, goals, target audience, history, etc. I then created the working XHTML prototypes linked above to show my refinements to the interaction and UI design, which were used for in-house and user testing.
- Clean, optimized, front-end code used directly by Web Development/Engineering, saving an extra cycle of code production by that team.
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October 2001 - November 2001 Freelance UI Designer/Developer CAM Systems
http://www.viviente.com/camsystems/userconsole1_11.html
- Redesigned the internal IT Help Desk system for maximum usability. Interaction design and UI design.
- Extensive JavaScript programming to add new workflow processes and customize existing ones.
- Project completed on time and under budget.
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March 2001 - April 2001 Contract HTML Designer Yahoo! Yahoo Book Reviews redesign:
http://www.viviente.com/yahoo/reviews/review1top.html http://www.viviente.com/yahoo/reviews/review2all.html http://www.viviente.com/yahoo/reviews/review4detail.html
- Visually designed sections of Yahoo! Shopping such as Book Reviews, Author Interviews, Hot Video Games, International Cuisines, etc.
- Developed hand-coded HTML pages to meet strict Yahoo! guidelines for maximum user download speed and minimum document file size.
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January 2001 - March 2001 HTML Guru & Usability Consultant seeUthere.com (contracted through Visuals Agency, San Francisco) Website Workshop: http://www.viviente.com/seeuthere/homepage.html
seeUthere website: http://www.seeuthere.com
- Evaluated and rewrote HTML for 200+ pages, resulting in greatly increased cross-browser functionality and download speeds. One heavily used page previously took 65 seconds to download on a DSL line and would only load in MSIE. My changes resulted in a download time of 5 seconds in all common browsers for that same page.
- Redesigned nav bars and other commonly used features for greater usability.
- Recommended further changes to visual design, information design and copywriting to improve overall usability of site.
- Educated web team (GUI Developers, ASP Engineers) on HTML 4.0 standards and future use of XHTML. Educated Product Managers on usability issues.
- Created Website Workshop to act as a reference point for web team after my departure.
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January 2000 - January 2001 Staff UI Designer/Developer eCompany Now (a publication of Time Inc.)
- Designed and built the front-end user interfaces for magazine sections including What Works, eCompany Conferences, Web Weekly, the Web Guide, and others (see portfolio). All interfaces created in Vignette Story Server 5.0 using HTML, JavaScript and SS Tool Command Language (Tcl).
- Created and developed Web Weekly section of magazine to help readers navigate to collected web articles on the site.
- Part of core interactive design team for User Registration section of site.
- Created Web Team Guide online directory to improve internal communications among team members
- Trained and supervised junior developers and contract developers.
- Optimized and corrected HTML and graphics sitewide to eliminate browser issues and bugs.
- Created advertisements and banner ads for both on and off-site advertising (see portfolio).
- First staff designer/developer hired at eCompany.
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Independent Freelance Jobs
November 2003 Freelance UI Designer/Developer Gilfix & Associates
http://www.viviente.com/gilfix
- Redesigned and developed the corporate website for Gilfix & Associates, an Elder Law, Estate and Tax Planning firm in Palo Alto.
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April 2003 Freelance UI Designer/Developer Capella Photonics
http://www.viviente.com/capella
- Designed and developed the corporate website for Capella Photonics, a leader in dynamically reconfigurable optical subsystems.
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November 2002 - January 2002 Freelance UI Designer/Developer Putu by J. MacLear
http://www.viviente.com/putubag
- Designed and developed a catalog site for fun, colorful, handbags made by artisans in Bali, Indonesia. Target audience is retailers/boutique owners.
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August 2002 - November 2002 Freelance UI Designer/Developer Hilary Duffy Photography
http://www.viviente.com/hilaryduffy
- Designed and developed a multimedia Flash portfolio to showcase Hilary Duffy's large-scale photography projects in Cuba, Haiti, Costa Rica, Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Maine.
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August 2001 - October 2001 Freelance UI Designer/Developer Riptide Recruiting
http://www.viviente.com/riptide
- Flash multimedia development with sound.
- UI and interaction design of high-tech recruiting firm website.
- Hand-coded JavaScript rollovers and form validation.
- CGI scripting using Perl for form processing.
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September 1999 Freelance
UI Designer/Developer Caribbean
Star Villas http://www.viviente.com/caribbeanstar
- Designed and constructed website for vacation villas on the island of St. Martin, French West
Indies.
- Copywriting in English and French.
- Traveled to St. Martin for consultation with villa developers.
- Photographed villas and surrounding area for display on website.
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FORMAL EDUCATION
San Francisco State University Multimedia Studies Program
2000 - Internet Design & Technology Certificate
Adobe Photoshop I and II Adobe Illustrator I Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) Databases and the Web HTML I and II Information Design I and II Interaction Design Java Programming I JavaScript |
Macromedia Flash I and II Principles of Graphic Design Principles of Programming The Production Process Typography Understanding the Internet Unix I Web Design I and II |
San Francisco State University 1997
- M.A. Systematic and Evolutionary Biology (coursework completed) 1995 - B.S. Biology (Ecology), cum laude
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You can see my old, outdated but still flashy Flash portfolio at http://www.viviente.com/viviente.html Email me with any questions at mslaura@viviente.com.
Thank you!

Laura Hamilton |
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