Moonkitty.NET

Version 6

3rd February 2004 - 5th April 2005

I can't believe it! My little Artemis shrine has finally reached the 5 year mark (well it will in March anyway).
In celebration of this landmark I decided to really shake up Moonkitty.NET but designing a completely new layout, rethinking my method of posting news (editing html and uploading it) as well as simplifying the site for when I move to Japan for a year to teach English.

The first step was implementing Blogger so I can post news updates immediately simply by filling in a form. Another advantatge of Blogger was that I could set up accounts for other users to post news as well! So along came the first two Moonkitty.NET staff members; Alycia (a fellow Australian) and Sailor Mau (Long time Moonkitty fan) to act as field reporters to help keep the site active when I don't have access and really boost it's activity in general.

The second step was to come up with an original layout, something challenging that I hadn't done before. I went through MANY ideas, one of which was to make a design around the Tuxedo Mirage ending theme from SailormoonS with the animated projector, however when checking out the other ending theme graphics from the other Sailormoon movies and series I came across the S Movie ending with Artemis, Luna (very Moonkitty), Usagi and Mamoru (Serena and Darien) watching the sun set. What was really nice was that as the credits progressed, the background changed from sunset, to night. That's when it occurred to me: How cool would it be if the site's layout changed as time in the real world passed? Of course I had no idea how to do this so I had to Google like crazy and find tutorials and forum entries that wold show me how. Not only did I have to change EVERY image according to time of day, but also the font colours, background colours AND background images! From concept to finished layout it took me about 6 hours all up. Something that I think adds that extra something is having the part of the scene with the Moonkitties animated (as it was in the credits). Throw Moonlight Destiny on in the background.... BLISS. ;)

The third step (which I'm still in the middle of as I write this) is getting all the content converted to fit the new layout. The reviews are back (which were missing in the last version due to shere laziness) as is the Gemini Interview (which I actually LOST for a while).

It was very tempting to design a layout featuring Luna and Artemis from the live action Pretty Guardian Sailormoon show, but after watching a few eps of the anime, I realised that this is where the magic started and I wanted to continue that in Moonkitty.NET's layouts.

Moonkitty.NET

Version 10

5th April 2005 - 27th September 2006

Wow. It actually took me almost a year after uploading this layout for myself to write about it! It's early Feb 2006 and Moonkitty.NET's almost 7 years old!

This new layout idea came about when I thought I'd think up a different aim for the entire site. I thought I'd scrap all the content and make it an announcement board. That idea didn't seem to do well with visitors so I've since added everything from the old sites and am in the middle of making individual mini sites for the Moonkitties, the first of which has been completed; "Pink Kitty".

Something else that's new with this layout is the episode guide for the live action tv show and the anime. Though it's obviously in it's begining stages, I'm very excited about it!

I guess one of the major new features is the site feed and feed based newsletter which really helped make the site more "modern" and also easier to checkout for visitors who are in a hurry.

That's about it really. I really love this layout and will stick with it for another year. It's just very easy to use and navigate as well as update around the php files. Hope you like it too and thanks for visiting!

Note: Layout titles jumped from 6 to 10 simply due to me counting all the Artemis layouts with these ones. Sorry for the confusion (if you noticed) and hope it makes sense.

Moonkitty.NET

Version 11

27th September 2006 - 4th May 2009

Things really picked up in late 2006. I had decided to stay in Japan for a much longer time and became inspired to build the ultimate Sailor Moon resource site due to a lot of the classic original Sailor Moon websites going offline on almost a weekly basis.

I had already started the episode guides and these quickly expanded into attack guides, more product reviews and more regular news updates.

The whole site was expanding in every direction and I needed a site look that would represent Sailor Moon to the regular fans but also appeal to more casual fans who had only seen an episode or two and were interested in getting more into it and finding out more information. I realised that the Sailor Moon transformation is one of the most powerful images of the series and designed a layout around a screencap I took from one of my Region 2 DVDs.

Pondering the possibility of making a living from the site so I could spend more time on it, I incorporated several differet ads into the layout and surprisingly I don't recall having any negative feedback from it and thankfully the site quickly began to pay for it's own hosting and domain expenses. While it didn't (and still doesn't) pay my rent (not by a long shot) the extra cash allowed me to purchase more Sailor Moon DVDs, CDs and manga which in turn I reviewed and wrote about, giving more content back to the readers / visitors. It's a system that pleasantly surprised me and that I've continued to adapt to this day.

An aspect of this layout that I was most thrilled with though was the random episode and attack box at the top. Took a lot of research but it was well worth it in the long run. Visitors liked it and personally I loved the fact that every single page you would go to on Moonkitty.NET would change the episode and attack completely randomly. Very cool.

Other features that started during this layout's time were the weekly Sailor Moon Roundup and Moonie Music Monday and more implementation of the site feed.

It wasn't all good though. While I loved the layout I had constant issues with the colour of the menu on the right hand side and the site constantly seemed a little cramped. Over the next two and a half years I would fiddle with the settings but ultimately never really got it as good as I thought it should have been. Perhaps my standards are just too high though as this layout received a lot of positive feedback.

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