Building Ocuole: My First Web Dev Project
February 22, 2025
Hey, I’m Leo. If you’ve stumbled onto this blog, welcome! I just started this little corner of the internet (ocuole) and I decided I would document my experience building it. I have zero prior experience with web development (outside of some no-code, wix-type of websites), so this has been a journey of learning, experimenting, and breaking things before figuring out how to fix them.
What is Ocuole?
This is a question I've struggled with myself, actually. For the time being, it's a personal portfolio that showcases my work in design, motion graphics, photography, and storytelling. The goal is to create a minimalist yet engaging space to share my projects and thoughts on creativity, design, and tech. Now, I’m focused on getting the core functionality in place while refining the brand identity. I see Ocuole as my bridge into the creative world; a space where I can share my work with the global community of designers, filmmakers, photographers, and immerse myself fully within it. In the future, I hope for it to be a space for connection, but I need to keep building!
Tech Stack & Tools I’m Using
I assume you're at least a bit curious, since you're reading this on a semi-developed website (at the time of publishing), so I wanted to share how I've been building it out. Since this is my first project, I wanted to keep things modern but also beginner-friendly. Here’s what I’m using:
- Next.js for the frontend framework
- Tailwind CSS for styling
- Framer Motion for animations
- Sanity for content management
- Vercel for deployment
I initially started with Firebase (Google's backend solution for simple apps), thinking it would be a great all-in-one solution for authentication, database, and hosting. However, I quickly realized that if I ever wanted to scale, Firebase wouldn’t be the best choice—I would also have to build the entire content management system from scratch. So for this next version of the site, I switched to Sanity, a simple CMS that integrates well with the site and already includes features for blogging and managing documents. Also, it scales much better!
Design & Branding Inspiration
While building Ocuole, I’ve been going deep into design inspiration. Here are some resources that have been super helpful in crafting the aesthetic and feel of the site: