Web Development companies in Pakistan are like grains of sand on the beach – innumerable. As a way to make a quick buck, to start up a company without overhead, and to succeed at it, web development tops the charts of most desirable career. Not to be confused with Web Design, web developers are the [...]
Web Development companies in Pakistan are like grains of sand on the beach – innumerable. As a way to make a quick buck, to start up a company without overhead, and to succeed at it, web development tops the charts of most desirable career. Not to be confused with Web Design, web developers are the designer’s studio staff… the tech geeks who learned the software, and mastered the tool that baffled the creative department (I remember when I first tried using Aldus Freehand 5, and spitting and yelling at the computer because the line just wouldn’t curve quite the way I wanted it to).
All web developers will tell you that the bane of their life is the Graphic Designer turned Web Designer, who ‘thinks’ he/she can tell a developer how to build a site. On the one hand, the newly-inducted designer doesn’t understand HTML, DHTML, CSS or any of the web languages, and he doesn’t have a clue how the final piece of art will be “produced” for the Internet. On the other hand, the web developer certainly has not spent four years laboring through Art College, nor does he have viable experience as a designer to understand how to bring the principles of design into a compatible marriage with the latest web technologies.
Unfortunately, websites in Pakistan are being designed and developed by one or the other of the two protagonists - either a web developer will use ready-made templates off the net, and adapt your business needs to a generic format, or a web designer will be throwing tantrums with a freelance developer who needs the experience and makes small errors that destroy the designer’s good works. Bringing the two together is a feat yet to be achieved by any Pakistani web development company, a state which, unfortunately, has led to plagiarism and a superficial sheen of sophistication that the companies cannot transfer to their customers.
Web Development company websites can be clearly divided into two styles of design, both of which are heavily dependent upon the tools: either Flash or HTML. The styles are so distinct, and yet so similar within their own toolset, they seem to be templates downloaded off a site, or very skilled copies of original sites (and surprisingly, since the Internet makes copyright violations so accessible to prosecution, Pakistani companies boldly continue to steal conceptual and visual ideas and images without fear).
All Pakistani Flash sites are compact, with small, pixel fonts that maintain readability at sizes as small as 6 points. A heavy graphic background usually depicts a three-dimensional environment, normally built of metal with large rivets and pipes. The perspective is generally well done, which says to me that a skilled illustrator worked on it. Conceptually, however, this kind of illustration is very common among Flash sites around the world, primarily for companies that want to show off their portfolio of original and experimental Flash work. There is no question that a Pakistani Flash developer is as skilled as an American or European developer, but while they are continually pioneering Flash development at levels far beyond anything a Pakistani developer could hope to achieve, we sit back and reap the benefits of someone else’s ideas.
For example, Theory 7 is an advanced Flash site with high-end graphics and phenomenal experiments in online flash development. While they are certainly not the pioneers of the style floating around Pakistan these days, they are a great example of the “real thing” that all Flash developers here aspire to. Spend some time on the site to see what I mean.
In contrast, go to www.oomz.com and download their e-brochure. They have recently redesigned their online collateral. The first time I heard of them, I thought their work was fantastic for a Pakistani development agency. It was clean, it was exciting, and it was simple above all. The change, from version 1 to version 2, is not pretty. The site is a standard Flash “enter” page; hundreds of sites use the same format: a simple panel down the middle of your browser, a dynamic, illustrative panel, with a drop shadows to create an inset, and tiny, illegible lettering scattered around. Their brochure, similarly, is a trite flash interface of transparent panels over an obscure background. It looks fantastic, and reflects a definite mastery of Flash as a tool, but says nothing for their creativity and designing abilities. In fact, their portfolio (too small in the ebrochure to get any idea of their style, or even their skill) is surprisingly bare for a company with this level of expertise.
Pakistan Digital (not to be confused with www.pakistandigital.com, an HTML site with much better design sense, and certainly more professionalism), another aspiring web company, follows the same pattern, but fails on several fronts, not least because they host their site with Tripod, for free, in return for an advertising banner across the top of the browser. Unlike the racier flash sites, Pakistan Digital doesn’t play with impossibly small typography on a black background. They do, however, have the three-dimensional background, and have decided that animation means constant movement. As a result, small, irritating square boxes float and rotate on all sides of the page, and distract from the content.
Most of the HTML sites I have seen are not worth mentioning. Not only are they badly designed, they are also badly developed – the navigation is designed randomly and links are grouped with no cohesive thought. Images and fonts are jagged, and the layouts distort out of all proportion from one browser to the other. I have a long list of company names for my Hall of Web Shame, including Business2Business Solutions, Cyber Mela, eMarket Planet, Creative Zone (what a misleading name!), Ideal Solutions, The Cyber Bridge, Vertex… Even some of the older companies, like Net Access, lack basic design treatments, such as the effective use of typography and color.
Net Access also resembles BITS’s site, particularly in the layout of the internal pages, and the use of the color orange, which in both cases is overpowering to the point of distraction. BITS manages to retain some level of professionalism with their content and internal layouts, but Net Access doesn’t even have that.
Of the web development companies that seem to be the most prolific, three stand out for having tastefully managed their own corporate image:
- Magsnet
- Connect2web
- Avanza
All of the companies mentioned above have been around for some time now, and their sites reflect that position. They are simple, straightforward, and elegant. Unlike the new breed of web development companies springing up everyday, there isn’t an overpowering stench of font and image CDs bought at Rainbow Center and vomited all over the page. And while they are not in any way extraordinary, the designer in me sees that someone has made an effort to bring form and functionality together in these sites.
Magsnet and Connect2Webb cannot resist adding a little “flair” with stock images and clipart (Because it is beyond anyone’s vision to actually commission original photographs for a website!), but fortunately, not in bad taste. And while Magsnet desperately needs to update the content of the site, Connect2Web gets a Silver award for their site. They also have the clipart and stock images, but the basic grid of the site is crisp and inviting. They have resisted the temptation to go crazy with the colors, and have done a great job with image and font optimization.
Perhaps the only site worth mentioning for high design quality is Avanza, a simple, functional site, with minimal content, and subtle yet clear navigation clues. The site looks like its owners are calm, reflective people with immense wisdom and authority. It also looks like something put together by the collaborative efforts of a good designer, and an excellent developer. I am not sure if it was built locally, but since inspiration from foreign goods is the norm here, I would certainly recommend that the Avanza site be scrutinized closely.
One of the first principles of design that I was taught was that every element on a page or a surface has to contribute a real and tangible message to the audience. If I draw a grey line down the middle of the page, or place illegible text on the background, I should be doing so not just to make the design “pretty”, but to convey a mood, or emotion, a subliminal message, or a an element of a brand or product that inspires recognition, loyalty, desire… Theoretically, this should work really well with web design, since the medium itself corresponds to this principle in its demand for functionality over form. In real life, the two rarely seem to meet.
Understandably, there are very few designers with the background and experience to work with developers. Understandably, web developers polish their skills, and find professional growth by imitating, reverse engineering and “researching” the best examples they can find. But imitation is the practice run, and the trend of unoriginal, uninspired design is reflective of a backward population. We do not create, we do not lead, we follow.
A great example of the trends prevalent amongst Pakistani Web Development companies today is NEXTWERK, and its sister concern, Microgigz. Pop Quiz, kids. Who have these two companies modeled their websites after?
- NEXTWERK
- Microgigz
I think Macromedia and Apple may be flattered, but I don’t think that will deflect the lawsuits for copyright violation, do you?
Perhaps we need to stop following, and we need to stumble on to our own path. Perhaps, we could actually learn from our mistakes, rather than hiding them under the rug, and stealing ideas from our neighbors. Perhaps sites like Avanza and Connect2Web should be the norm, rather than the exception. Perhaps one day, we will lead, and the rest of the world will follow.