The concept of a 'light on dark' colour scheme is an aspect many web designers have used over the years. You don't have to look too hard through various website showcases to see examples of it. These inverted colour schemes create a distinctive feel to a website and put maximum emphasis on the site content. Probably one of the finest examples around currently is that of the Pixelmator website.
Composition started out life as a free RapidWeaver theme called Aperture, several years ago. It could be argued that Aperture was the first 'light on dark' theme ever created for RapidWeaver. The original Aperture theme received a rapturous response from many RapidWeaver users, and a large number of feature requests were put forward. In 2006, the 'Composition' theme was released; a paid version of Aperture with significantly more features. Since then, Composition has always remained a must-have for many RapidWeaver users, and its popularity has never dwindled. The Composition theme is especially popular with bloggers, artists, film makers and software developers.
Starting with the basics, Composition provides a bountiful array of theme colour settings. These allow you to change just about every colour of every theme element. So if you don't like the default colour scheme, you can change it to something more preferable. Several logo placement options are provided, so you can bring existing corporate branding into the theme.
Like many other ThemeFlood RapidWeaver themes, Composition provides options to customise the theme width, body background, sidebar width and position, heading fonts, content fonts and general font styles. A careful balance of theme settings is included, to provide enough basic functionality without turning the theme into a complicated monstrosity.
Starting in recent versions, Composition is now fully responsive. The theme displays content beautifully on large, cinematic monitors. On tablet devices (like the iPad and Nexus 7) the page layout scales smoothly to fit smaller screen sizes. Aspects of the design like the horizontal navigation (which would traditionally start to break on smaller screen sizes) reverts to a user-friendly toggle menu. The theme continues to scale down on smaller devices like smart phones, whereby stacks, columns and grids dissolve into a single column. Composition makes use of my RAFT plugin, so you have the option to adjust how aspects of the page behave at different screen sizes. Just about everything you need to build a cross-device-compatible website is there.
The theme header is probably the most striking part of the theme design. It can be used to incorporate some gorgeous graphics, to grab the attention of website visitors and show-off products and services to their maximum. Honestly, you could so some incredibly inspirational things with the header in this theme. The header utilises FreeStyle technology, so it is basically a blank canvas to do whatever you want with. Static images, sliders, carousels, slideshows and even video can be embedded into the header. The banner is fully responsive and expands vertically to incorporate your content. As a bonus, a banner content container (ExtraContent4) provides a useful space to incorporate written content, within a semi-transparent box.
To further promote your website, Composition includes a useful tagline container (ExtraContent1) at the top of the page. Into this you can include important information (like contact details), links and social networking or bookmarking icons. Options exist to adjust the height and position of this tagline container. Navigation is also an important factor in website design, and Composition provides a choice of simple navigation positioning options. Choose to have navigation links at the top in split-navigation format, or within the sidebar as a block navigation layout.
For semi-expert RapidWeaver users, Composition provides a treasure-trove of options to take your design skills to the next level. To start with, Composition incorporates complete support for the entire Twitter Bootstrap Toolkit. This instantly empowers you and opens up vast avenues to incorporate various embellishments and page functionality. Have a look through the Bootstrap website to see what's feasible, and then download the free Bootstrap snippets pack, to use in RapidWeaver. Composition was also the very first RapidWeaver themes to incorporate the complete Font Awesome pack of icons, so you can spice-up your page designs with simple scalable icons.
Composition has always been a strong RapidWeaver theme to work with. The simple two-column layout means the theme works reliably on all modern web browsers from IE7 upwards. Cosmetic embellishments like shadows and rounded corners render lightning-fast on newer web browsers (without the need for complicated Javascript code) and degrade safely on older versions of IE, where they're likely to not be missed.
A free demo version of the theme is available for you to download using the button at the top right. This lets you install the theme in RapidWeaver and test it against real content, play around with all the different settings, throw the theme against different page styles and demonstrate the theme to clients. In the demo version, links between pages are disabled and some graphics may be watermarked. The theme is backed by expert customer support (you'll normally get an email response within 12 hours) and I can provide assistance with customising the theme, setup of banner containers and testing of your completed website in different web browsers and handheld devices.
Composition started out life as a free RapidWeaver theme called Aperture, several years ago. It could be argued that Aperture was the first 'light on dark' theme ever created for RapidWeaver. The original Aperture theme received a rapturous response from many RapidWeaver users, and a large number of feature requests were put forward. In 2006, the 'Composition' theme was released; a paid version of Aperture with significantly more features. Since then, Composition has always remained a must-have for many RapidWeaver users, and its popularity has never dwindled. The Composition theme is especially popular with bloggers, artists, film makers and software developers.
Starting with the basics, Composition provides a bountiful array of theme colour settings. These allow you to change just about every colour of every theme element. So if you don't like the default colour scheme, you can change it to something more preferable. Several logo placement options are provided, so you can bring existing corporate branding into the theme.
Like many other ThemeFlood RapidWeaver themes, Composition provides options to customise the theme width, body background, sidebar width and position, heading fonts, content fonts and general font styles. A careful balance of theme settings is included, to provide enough basic functionality without turning the theme into a complicated monstrosity.
Starting in recent versions, Composition is now fully responsive. The theme displays content beautifully on large, cinematic monitors. On tablet devices (like the iPad and Nexus 7) the page layout scales smoothly to fit smaller screen sizes. Aspects of the design like the horizontal navigation (which would traditionally start to break on smaller screen sizes) reverts to a user-friendly toggle menu. The theme continues to scale down on smaller devices like smart phones, whereby stacks, columns and grids dissolve into a single column. Composition makes use of my RAFT plugin, so you have the option to adjust how aspects of the page behave at different screen sizes. Just about everything you need to build a cross-device-compatible website is there.
The theme header is probably the most striking part of the theme design. It can be used to incorporate some gorgeous graphics, to grab the attention of website visitors and show-off products and services to their maximum. Honestly, you could so some incredibly inspirational things with the header in this theme. The header utilises FreeStyle technology, so it is basically a blank canvas to do whatever you want with. Static images, sliders, carousels, slideshows and even video can be embedded into the header. The banner is fully responsive and expands vertically to incorporate your content. As a bonus, a banner content container (ExtraContent4) provides a useful space to incorporate written content, within a semi-transparent box.
To further promote your website, Composition includes a useful tagline container (ExtraContent1) at the top of the page. Into this you can include important information (like contact details), links and social networking or bookmarking icons. Options exist to adjust the height and position of this tagline container. Navigation is also an important factor in website design, and Composition provides a choice of simple navigation positioning options. Choose to have navigation links at the top in split-navigation format, or within the sidebar as a block navigation layout.
For semi-expert RapidWeaver users, Composition provides a treasure-trove of options to take your design skills to the next level. To start with, Composition incorporates complete support for the entire Twitter Bootstrap Toolkit. This instantly empowers you and opens up vast avenues to incorporate various embellishments and page functionality. Have a look through the Bootstrap website to see what's feasible, and then download the free Bootstrap snippets pack, to use in RapidWeaver. Composition was also the very first RapidWeaver themes to incorporate the complete Font Awesome pack of icons, so you can spice-up your page designs with simple scalable icons.
Composition has always been a strong RapidWeaver theme to work with. The simple two-column layout means the theme works reliably on all modern web browsers from IE7 upwards. Cosmetic embellishments like shadows and rounded corners render lightning-fast on newer web browsers (without the need for complicated Javascript code) and degrade safely on older versions of IE, where they're likely to not be missed.
A free demo version of the theme is available for you to download using the button at the top right. This lets you install the theme in RapidWeaver and test it against real content, play around with all the different settings, throw the theme against different page styles and demonstrate the theme to clients. In the demo version, links between pages are disabled and some graphics may be watermarked. The theme is backed by expert customer support (you'll normally get an email response within 12 hours) and I can provide assistance with customising the theme, setup of banner containers and testing of your completed website in different web browsers and handheld devices.
Key Features
- A dark and distinct RapidWeaver theme, always popular with bloggers, artists and photographers
- Vivid, highly customisable header container suitable for static images and slideshows
- Numerous options for navigation style and position within the theme
- Composition includes a broad range of both style and theme colour settings
- Space-saving sidebar container in the header, makes a more unusual theme design
- Rounded corners are applied dynamically using Javascript
- Several Extra Content containers and an option for a bookmarking bar at the top
- Excellent cross-browser compatibility with all major web browsers and plugins
Updates for the Composition RapidWeaver theme are free for all existing users. Theme updates are periodically released to introduce new features and maintain compatibility with the latest RapidWeaver addons and and web browsers. You can tell if an update is available for Composition, by comparing the number shown next to the theme name in RapidWeaver, compared with the version number shown on the right. Generally theme updates are not sent out automatically, because previously it was found many of the emails went missing in junk or spam mail filters. Instead you are invited to check for Composition updates yourself, and download them at a time convenient to you. Updates also get publicised via the RapidWeaver Addon website, the RapidWeaver Central newsletter and the free iCentral app.
Theme updates can be obtained using the original download link, emailed to you when you purchased Composition. If you no longer have this download link or you require an expired link to be reactivated, please send a quick email, and include the following information:
- Name of the theme you need an update for (in this case say that you need an update for Composition)
- The name and email address used when you purchased the theme
- The purchase method used (was it purchased through the website or as a direct order?)
- Any other useful information like the date, or invoice number
Once your purchase details have been located, you will be sent a new download link. Theme updates are recognised in RapidWeaver as new themes, so multiple versions of the same theme can be safely installed alongside each other. This means you can selectively update certain projects to use newer themes, and any customisations you've applied like custom code or images don't get deleted. For more information on updating themes, please see the theme user guide.
You can use this comment form to ask general questions about the theme, put forward ideas, submit feature requests and post links to websites you have created using the theme. Please be aware that comments are moderated. It may take a few days before your comments show on here. If you have an urgent question, it is advisable to contact me directly.
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