New Website...please offer input!

[PhilN]

Hi All,
Ive been really busy working on a new website which has taken so long!

I would really appreciate some feedback. Firstly not all the graphics are optimised yet, so some pages are a little slow.
None of the galleries are loaded yet, but there are quite a few images on "Most Recent"

What Im aftre are some opinions;
I initially used an image as a background, but then hit upon another version, so what Id like to know is which do you prefer visually?

The first is as my sig link bt just in case

http://www.philnortonphotography.co.uk

the second is:

http://philnortonphotography.co.uk/black

Im leaning towards the second, but would really like some opinions?

Thanks
Phil

[tracknut]

Hi Phil,


Very nice layout, I like it. I'm kind of partial to the first one, actually. The second one seems a bit odd with the really dark background photo in some areas, solid black in others. It doesn't look quite complete, if that makes sense.

Some other notes...

Yes, the pages are huge, I'm wondering if the program you're using for generating this site is putting a bunch of that javascript in, and whether it's really all necessary. There are also validation errors you might check - though if the whole site is built through a WYSIWYG tool, I'm not sure what you'd do about them.

I was intrigued by your comments about color quality, that's really a neat thing to have. I may "borrow" the idea if you don't mind. But I did have a couple edits here. Your first paragraph states that the images have been carefully balanced for color with photoshop, etc - but does not mention that you've calibrated your monitor. Then you go on to suggest that I might need to calibrate my monitor. I think you should add that your monitor *is* calibrated somewhere?

Also you then state that "...unfortunately MS IE does not color manage...". I'm not sure why you head in that direction. For one, I wasn't using IE, to view your site, and secondly as you say virtually no common browser does. So this is not an IE "issue". Then you go on to say that your images have an sRGB profile - doesn't that mean that the discussion about IE not being color managed is a moot point? (I actually don't know - I'm asking).

On your left side navigation, the little lozenge-shaped bullets are not aligned with the text to their right - they're shifted up 10 pixels or so.

Depending on the background color, at times your text is a bit hard to read. Maybe you could brighten it up just a skosh? (yes, my monitor is calibrated )

Dave

[tbisaacs]

Hey Phil, congrats on your new website. Here a couple of thoughts, take what you like

There are much cleaner ways (instead of tables and frames) to accomplish the layout you are looking for. Those iframes are completely blind to search engines.

The corners are a little weird, In my opinion, rounding them completely off would be better.

The gray text is a fuzz to dark, something closer to white (and a shade bigger) would be more comfortable to read. Also, the line-height is a little tight.

When looking at images, the page reload to switch images is really disruptive. There are tons of free javascript (or flash) libraries that you could use to load up and serve your gallery with no page reload.

Thanks!

[bakerbranded]

Phil, I love the website design, very good looking.
I'm defiantly partial to the 1st one.
The only thing that I could see that may improve it in my eye, but still great, is if the background image of the 1st layout would rotate may be. Or when you go to a different page, the photo would change. But overall great layout.

[PhilN]

Originally Posted by tracknut

Hi Phil,


Very nice layout, I like it. I'm kind of partial to the first one, actually. The second one seems a bit odd with the really dark background photo in some areas, solid black in others. It doesn't look quite complete, if that makes sense.

Some other notes...

Yes, the pages are huge, I'm wondering if the program you're using for generating this site is putting a bunch of that javascript in, and whether it's really all necessary. There are also validation errors you might check - though if the whole site is built through a WYSIWYG tool, I'm not sure what you'd do about them.

I was intrigued by your comments about color quality, that's really a neat thing to have. I may "borrow" the idea if you don't mind. But I did have a couple edits here. Your first paragraph states that the images have been carefully balanced for color with photoshop, etc - but does not mention that you've calibrated your monitor. Then you go on to suggest that I might need to calibrate my monitor. I think you should add that your monitor *is* calibrated somewhere?

Also you then state that "...unfortunately MS IE does not color manage...". I'm not sure why you head in that direction. For one, I wasn't using IE, to view your site, and secondly as you say virtually no common browser does. So this is not an IE "issue". Then you go on to say that your images have an sRGB profile - doesn't that mean that the discussion about IE not being color managed is a moot point? (I actually don't know - I'm asking).

On your left side navigation, the little lozenge-shaped bullets are not aligned with the text to their right - they're shifted up 10 pixels or so.

Depending on the background color, at times your text is a bit hard to read. Maybe you could brighten it up just a skosh? (yes, my monitor is calibrated )

Dave

Dave thanks for the comments, yes I am indeed sing a wysiwyg prog called Mediator. Its a superb prog for an idiot like me who cant get his head around code, so Im not sure what I can do about it. I will be compressing the images more, so that will help.
No I dont mind if you borrow the idea of colour. I added it because so many people are using monitors not calibrated, tho most on here prob have. The page was just to give some general ideas.....Ive used other monitors to check and found that just altering gamma, contrast etc helped alot when viewing the tone bar i included, which I found online somewhere. Yes your right about comments on IE being moot.........Ive read that images for web sould have an embedded srgb profile, tho quite why when browsers dont colour manage I dont know. But I have found that images without any profile display erratic.
What browser are you using? Im interested in the validation errors, how can I chech and are they caseing a problem? Because of the prog Im using Im not sre if I can do anything about it.
The buttons being displaced are a problem. The software has a bug that means sometimes some objects can be displaced slightly......I had to move all the buttons up 6px because they were moved down to compensate in IE, but it seems your browser may be shifting them up a tad.
Thanks for taking the time
Phil

[PhilN]

Originally Posted by tbisaacs

Hey Phil, congrats on your new website. Here a couple of thoughts, take what you like

There are much cleaner ways (instead of tables and frames) to accomplish the layout you are looking for. Those iframes are completely blind to search engines.

The corners are a little weird, In my opinion, rounding them completely off would be better.

The gray text is a fuzz to dark, something closer to white (and a shade bigger) would be more comfortable to read. Also, the line-height is a little tight.

When looking at images, the page reload to switch images is really disruptive. There are tons of free javascript (or flash) libraries that you could use to load up and serve your gallery with no page reload.

Thanks!

Hi Travis, could you clarify for me your comments on iframes? The contact and guestbook pages use iframes, and the galleries will be loaded with iframes. Im using a wysiwyg prog, is the whole site using iframes?

Also is it the black site with the corners looking odd? They looked fine yesterday but now Ive had a break yes they do need attention.

Thanks
Phil

[tracknut]

Originally Posted by PhilN

What browser are you using? Im interested in the validation errors, how can I chech and are they caseing a problem? Because of the prog Im using Im not sre if I can do anything about it.

I used Firefox to check the site. I do that usually because FF is probably the best common browser in terms of following standards - it's really the first browser to develop and test a site against. Validating against http://validator.w3.org/ is the way to go, and it will give you any coding errors. But as you say, if you're not touching the actual code yourself, all you could do would be to report them to the developers of your WYSIWIG tool, which probably wouldn't get you anywhere. The validator will give you an idea of how critical the errors are - many errors will not turn into a bad looking web site, as HTML is a pretty loose language anyway.

Originally Posted by PhilN

The buttons being displaced are a problem. The software has a bug that means sometimes some objects can be displaced slightly......I had to move all the buttons up 6px because they were moved down to compensate in IE, but it seems your browser may be shifting them up a tad.

Yep, and this one could be a tough one to solve - again because you're not actually developing the code yourself. You may have to put in a table with the buttons and text in rows (perhaps they already are, I can't remember) or some other hack to try to get them to align. Again, test against FF as well as IE.

Dave

[photoguy6405]

There's a part on your colour page that says "Please not not all images on this site..." that needs to be cleaned up.

Seems it should read as "Please note that all images...".

[PhilN]

Originally Posted by photoguy6405

There's a part on your colour page that says "Please not not all images on this site..." that needs to be cleaned up.

Seems it should read as "Please note that all images...".

ooops thanks!

[PhilN]

Originally Posted by tracknut

I used Firefox to check the site. I do that usually because FF is probably the best common browser in terms of following standards - it's really the first browser to develop and test a site against. Validating against http://validator.w3.org/ is the way to go, and it will give you any coding errors. But as you say, if you're not touching the actual code yourself, all you could do would be to report them to the developers of your WYSIWIG tool, which probably wouldn't get you anywhere. The validator will give you an idea of how critical the errors are - many errors will not turn into a bad looking web site, as HTML is a pretty loose language anyway.


Yep, and this one could be a tough one to solve - again because you're not actually developing the code yourself. You may have to put in a table with the buttons and text in rows (perhaps they already are, I can't remember) or some other hack to try to get them to align. Again, test against FF as well as IE.

Dave

Hey Dave
I solved the problem with the buttons, instead of using my own custom made I used a "standard" button in the prog and customised it. Have not reuploaded it yet but did a test page just with the buttons and checked it in Firefox and its fine, so thanks for the tips on that.
You seem to know coding, how would yo go about buiding at site like mine?
Phil

[tracknut]

Originally Posted by PhilN

You seem to know coding, how would yo go about buiding at site like mine?
Phil

That's a bit wide open I do web sites for a living, so I have probably spent a fair bit more time on it than you. Frankly I'm quite impressed at what you've been able to do with this MatchWare tool, so I might not suggest changing the way you do it.

When I do a site, my default presumption is that it will be html & CSS only. I will add Javascript and Flash only as needed for effect, but not when I can do the same thing with CSS. For example your navigation and many of the hot spots are graphics using Javascript for effects, where I would not consider doing it that way - I'd do this with CSS. It would be faster on the screen, with more compact code.

Actually, I'm not sure I see a single place on your site which couldn't be done with html & CSS. I would probably use Flash just on your galleries though, because it does make for a site that's easier to maintain (adding/deleting photos) than doing it with CSS.

Dave

Another thing I use sparingly is frames & iframes.

[PhilN]

Originally Posted by tracknut

That's a bit wide open I do web sites for a living, so I have probably spent a fair bit more time on it than you. Frankly I'm quite impressed at what you've been able to do with this MatchWare tool, so I might not suggest changing the way you do it.

When I do a site, my default presumption is that it will be html & CSS only. I will add Javascript and Flash only as needed for effect, but not when I can do the same thing with CSS. For example your navigation and many of the hot spots are graphics using Javascript for effects, where I would not consider doing it that way - I'd do this with CSS. It would be faster on the screen, with more compact code.

Actually, I'm not sure I see a single place on your site which couldn't be done with html & CSS. I would probably use Flash just on your galleries though, because it does make for a site that's easier to maintain (adding/deleting photos) than doing it with CSS.

Dave

Another thing I use sparingly is frames & iframes.

Thanks Dave for your comments...really appreciated.....Im quite technically minded, but code does my brain in.....tried a few books, even the "Dummies" guides, and have dreamweaver but I get lost just trying to figure out how to make a simple nav button!
The galleries are actually going to be built with jalbum, its an image library prog with lots of skins available, so the one I will use is Fotoplayer..easy to update, built in cart etc....and show it on the site with iframes.
Now I discovered Mediator uses iframes which is gonna screw me for browsers is there a way around it? I was thinking what if I had an entry page built that is browser friendly, and a link to the main site? At least I could get indexed, and users can always return to the main site, not the entrance page...just brain storming.
Phil

[tracknut]

JAlbum is a great tool, I'm glad you found it. I use it for my galleries too (www.pixf.com) as I need to push out hundreds of event photos at a time.

I have seen sort of a wacky solution for the frames issue (presuming you mean that you can't have a url for any of the "sub-pages" - only the main frames page), but it's not something I would recommend (and not simple to implement - I'd call it a hack). But as far as getting indexed, I don't see a need for an entry page - you should be able to put content on your current home page which will get indexed as usual. Maybe I'm missing your point though.

Dave

[PhilN]

Originally Posted by tracknut

JAlbum is a great tool, I'm glad you found it. I use it for my galleries too (www.pixf.com) as I need to push out hundreds of event photos at a time.

I have seen sort of a wacky solution for the frames issue (presuming you mean that you can't have a url for any of the "sub-pages" - only the main frames page), but it's not something I would recommend (and not simple to implement - I'd call it a hack). But as far as getting indexed, I don't see a need for an entry page - you should be able to put content on your current home page which will get indexed as usual. Maybe I'm missing your point though.

Dave

Hi Dave I had a look at your galleries, your pics are spectacular! Funnily enough the penny dropped, I looked at yours ages ago, think there was another thread we both submitted to, I remember the image of the greyhounds running towards the viewer.....incredible.
I trawled the net for days and used all sorts of other progs and jalbum is so good.....I couldnt bear the thought of manually arranging hundreds of images....and trying to make simple changes!
You understood right about the entry page, to be honest its not something I want to do, I hate entry pages. I can include keywords, but not really sure what keywords. Any tips?
I also discovered I can atomatically generate a site map which is uploaded, a new feature added to help search engine spiders........
I corrected the nav links, and updated the colour page.........theres so much info out there but found this to e usefull
http://www.gballard.net/psd/go_live_...Gprofiles.html#

Phil

[tbisaacs]

Originally Posted by PhilN

Hi Travis, could you clarify for me your comments on iframes? The contact and guestbook pages use iframes, and the galleries will be loaded with iframes. Im using a wysiwyg prog, is the whole site using iframes?

Also is it the black site with the corners looking odd? They looked fine yesterday but now Ive had a break yes they do need attention.

Thanks
Phil

Hi Phil, this will be a bit geeky, but take a peek at your source:

<body onUnload="PageUnloading()" onLoad="hist = new historychangeevent();" style="background:#2C2C2C;">
<table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="width: 100%; height: 100%;">
    <tr>
        <td id='maintd'>
            <iframe id="mainframe" src="" frameborder="0" scrolling="no"></iframe>
        </td>
    </tr>
</table>

Essentially, there is virtually no content in the page because it's all jammed into that iframe. That means that a search engine essentially sees no indexable content on your page because it can't peek into the iframe.

Since you are using a WYSIWG tool, there is probably not much you can do about it, other than write the HTML yourself.

Thanks!