If you want to be able to create the most demanded parallax scrolling effect that is all the rage now, you’re in the right place, right time and reading just that post you’ll say thanks for down the road. Hopefully that was not too arrogant, but seriously speaking the article covers a few ways of creating the super trendy parallax scrolling effect for your site. On finishing the article, you’ll know what to learn in order to be in the know and show your customer that you don’t live under the rock.
Note: I take it for granted that you already know HTML/CSS because you’re just illiterate if you don’t. No offence, but you really need that knowledge to be at least a bit competitive nowadays.
Being able to integrate the parallax scrolling effect in your client’s website is going to be the thing that sets you apart from the rest of the web developers who are not learning new stuff on a regular basis. What’s more, the good news is that people want that effect more and more. And the trend seems to be going up all the time, Check out the following figure that I got from Google Trends.
Flash
If you’ve been in web design and development for a while, your first guest may be Flash, because it’s animation and we are all (to an extent) used to see Flash when it comes to moving things, right? Well, perhaps it does not hold true that much right now but it was so definitely like 3-5 years ago.
You still can use Flash for creating this effect but your customer won’t really appreciate it because Flash is sucky for inbound marketing (SEO). And when I say “sucky” I’m actually using an euphemism because Flash content was never able to make real friends with the major search engines. So, I don’t really recommend going that route. The only way when you want to use Flash for creating the parallax effect is when you create Flash games. :)
jQuery
That’s actually the thing that you need to learn in order to be able to properly make the parallax effect that you can be proud of. Plus you’ll be able to show up your jQuery skill while searching for a new job, freelance of office one. The only string attached is that you actually need to learn JavaScript first because jQuery is a JavaScript library, which you won’t be able to use that effectively without knowing the basics of JavaScript. The good news though is that it’s totally worth it because people think of you as a pro, including your employers. And that’s a perfect reason to ask for a raise.
The Lazy Way
As in many cases in our day and age, there’s an easier way to add that effect to your site. You can check the parallax scrolling tutorial on Google for more info, but what it allows you to do, in a nutshell, is use an admin panel or an online tool (for lack of a better word) that you can play around with in terms of setting the parameters that you need in your parallax effect. Sure thing, using the tool won’t make you a jQuery guru or what not, but you may wanna use it if you need to add a simple parallax scrolling effect to your blog’s header or background real quick. Why reinvent the wheel if you can use that tool and make what you need in a matter of minutes.
Conclusion
Adding the parallax scrolling effect to a site is the skill that you will be respected for in the web development world. Let alone being able to earn money by freelancing. Though you definitely need to know JavaScript and jQuery if you really want to be a pro, but you still can take advantage of available online tools if you need a really simple thing and you need it real fast. And now you know how.
Ken is an SEO with a thing for web design and web development. He’s sure that inbound marketing and WordPress combined can work wonders.
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