It’s June 6 and I’ve kept my promise. Now, let’s never leave each other for that long ever again!

Welcome to the new Otaku Journalist. Same as the old Otaku Journalist, I’m happy to say, but with a few upgrades for the better. For one, we’re now running on a completely custom WordPress theme that I have creatively named, “Otaku Journalist.”

Otaku Journalist’s theme is based on Sandbox, a great skeleton theme for anyone who is learning how to build their own WordPress theme. I spent nearly two weeks hunkered down on my localhost with Sandbox, MAMP, and my handy list of WordPress tutorial links… but eventually I realized I needed some help. Luckily, Mara K. came to the rescue! As you can tell by her fully custom blog theme, this lady knows what she’s doing. Thanks again, Mara, for helping me make this happen on such short notice.

The origin of the design is a hand drawn wireframe in my Moleskine. It went through a few iterations on paper before I got brave enough to test it out on the computer. (This is one of the later versions.)

Next, I built up a design concept using Adobe Illustrator. I knew I wanted to keep the blog’s signature bright blue, but I wanted to make everything bolder. I used 960.gs to design it so I wouldn’t have to worry about it looking good on a variety of screens and browser windows.

Then, I spent some time ruining CSS divs. They can be pretty tricky, and I’m totally self taught in all things computer. While I learned a little more every day I worked on the site, I knew there was no way I was going to meet my June deadline going at it alone.

Here’s the site starting to take shape under Mara’s skillful hand. Starting to look familiar!

Finally, here’s a screenshot of how the website is intended to look, give or take — we’re still fixing a few last minute snafus. (If it doesn’t look this way to you, send me an email ASAP and I’ll do my best to troubleshoot!)

Now, let’s go over some of the new features:

• Big ol’ content space, perfect for more in-depth articles and bigger, sharper pictures.
• A welcome page that lets you know just what this site is about.
• A projects page. If you’ve ever been interested on working on a collaborative fandom-driven project with me, check here.
• New copy on all my existing pages, too! Check out my bio* and archives.

*I’ll update this post when the bio is up.

Let me tell you what else this means: regular updates three times a week, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday! I’ve had over a month to write up sparkling new content so I won’t be falling behind anytime soon, even if I do sprain my ankle again! It feels so good to be back on track.

What do you think of the new Otaku Journalist? Let me know in an email or the comments.