Spicy Web Designer Interview with Nikola Denić of Haragei

Nikola Denić is a web designer and one half of the team managing Haragei (the other is Milan Kristoff), a web development company out of Belgrade in Serbia. Nikola has been designing since 2000 and was originally a “one man show”. Today Haragei is larger, with about 15 people (aka “samurais”) that work for them at any one time. Check out their “Dojo” today.

1. How did you get started in web design?

I think it was sometime in the year 2000, right after the dot com bubble. I tried to create my own web page in a period when the Internet was a much tamer environment than it is now. At that time, things like tables and cool flash effects were considered an achievement. Basically, I was fascinated by web pages and the process of making them. I was using the Internet for 4 years at that point so going into development was a logical step for someone who took all his toys apart to see what’s inside and how they work.

2. When did you start designing websites?

If you count my attempts to make my own website with funky gif’s, that happened in 2000, although the first project I got paid for happened in 2001. It’s funny, from this point of view, thinking back to frames and flash in them. Peaks of development were things like contact forms that send emails, but if you worked with the Internet professionally at that time, you’ll recognize that it wasn’t anything like today – there was no one you could ask.

3 What are the biggest challenges that you face in web design currently?

Originality. That essentially summarizes the biggest problem right now. Being original at a time when websites are shooting out on conveyor belts is very hard. The process that we maintain at Haragei is pretty clear – we have a goal and we are working towards it. Perhaps the hardest stage is the sketching stage; the process of going from a drawing on paper to usable wireframes and having them interact the way we imagined. Making a useful project and standing behind it in every pixel is a huge mountain that you always want to climb and is always interesting in its own way.

4. Do you code on any of your web design projects? And if so, do you consider yourself a “Front-End Coder”? Why or Why Not?

Hmm, I have to explain a little bit about myself first: I started off “old school” – as a one man show. That basically forced me to become proficient in every step – from sketching on paper, through making beautiful markups to optimizing queries in a db.

Today I let my samurais handle the design; although there is virtually no project I haven’t checked over in every gradient and typography relationship in css. This is crucial in order to be comfortable when delivering reliable products to customers, when they trust us enough with the development of their online business.

I think the real answer is that I’m both a designer and a front end coder, simply because as the project manager of all of our projects, and as the company CEO, I have to offer and stand behind Quality Assurance – although I may not do the day-to-day designing/coding work.

5. Where did you go to school and has it helped you become a better web designer?

I have B.CS. from University of Belgrade that really hasn’t done anything particular for me in terms of personal advances, but it surrounded me with very many talented people. Right now I’m considering options for a Master’s degree; I am looking to combine an internal project with the degree to really experience the best of both worlds.

6. Since you first started how has the web design industry changed? Has it changed for the better? If so, how? If not, please explain?

The industry is changing rapidly – on a daily basis, I’d say. I am honestly impressed by people who are brave enough to go into web design and development right now. For the past 3-4 years, it seems like the whole thing has been on steroids and so much knowledge has been created that in order to come into the industry today, one has to have a vision that covers the problem from every point of view. On the other hand, as I’ve said before, 8 years ago, the fight with Internet Explorer was somewhat brutal simply because there was no adequate alternative.

Also, today you have Rich Internet Applications that are very popular and we all use them on a daily basis, which means that today, with the increase in Internet speeds, you learn to rely upon the Internet almost the same way as you would on desktop applications which were virtually impossible before.

7. What are your favorite tools to use when designing a website? Why are they your favorite tools?

Paper? No, seriously, a blank sheet of paper is 9 times out of 10 the tool with which I start designing and coming up with site interactions, regardless of whether I’m working on a micro site, a flash application or a social network. Obviously, after that the whole wireframe is transferred to OmniGraff or Visio (if we’re working on a bigger project) and then to Photoshop.

When it comes to code, I use TextMate on Mac, and if I’m running Windows by some strange coincidence, I stick with Dreamweaver (although it sounds lame).

Firefox with some extensions, such as Firebug, WebDeveloper, etc, is definitely a must have for anyone in this business, so it also comes into my project building process.

8. How many people work at Haragei?

Right now we have 5 people working in-house and over 10 external coworkers.

9. What do you want people to know about your company?

Hmmm… I like martial arts; oh wait, you can already notice that from our website. What is very important for people to know about us is that we, first and foremost, believe in a specific philosophy that follows corresponding business standards. We can say it’s a matter of having a sixth sense for our clients’ businesses and we are very good at realizing our plans. Aside from that, we kick ass in all those fancy words such as xhtml/css/is/actionscript/web2.0/etc.