UK South-East "Mainly Under 5'11" Gossip Thread (5)

Kaben wrote in post #8317013
Can i ask you guys to do me a massive favour?

I need you to bug test/critique my new website.

Could you try and access most of the posts/menu's to see if anything is broken/bugged? Your honest opinions on the look, including colours and fonts chosen etc would be very helpful too.

I have currently populated the website with place holder text and images, so there is no real content to read through as such, but it should give a good idea of what is going on ( i hope!).

www.bridgensphotograph​y.co.uk

Sorry, one more thing. How are you going to manage your galleries when they get a bit bigger? I did see on your transport page the ability to post multiple images per "gallery", but it still seems like it'll get unwieldy after too long.

I do like the site however, and your summary here made me laugh.

huggles wrote in post #8317052
24 pages in three days? Spammers!

You haven't visited in 3 days? Slacker!

lemminglover wrote in post #8317062
Rob - honestly it's awful. Everyone has the right to be pretentious but you are beginning to abuse it. The best I can say is that of all the photography websites I have ever seen, this is certainly the most recent.

lol

Kaben, looks ok, I would comment that in your copyright I'd either say Bridgens Photography, or bridgensphotography.co​.uk. It's confusing as a url with a space in it.

I'm having download issues atm with my ISP (like being on 56k) but to me the navigation at the top looks messy, the vertical lines between the text and the drop-down arrow confuses things, unless there's a background image that isn't downloading for me.

I also feel that the image slideshow at the top is possibly a touch too large advertising the gallery if the front page is meant to be a blog. When browsing at 1024x768 it fills the screen and creates a lot of scrolling. Bearing in mind it's still a highly used screen resolution it may annoy people. I'd have used it as a smaller side block or shrink it to maybe a 200px banner style and have a title overlay on it.

Kaben,

Some feed back on the web page. Overall I find the layout and content a little repetitive. Theres about three different sections that link to your galleries (menu at the top, album list under the main image and again in the sections listed at the bottom) where as you probably only need one - or alternatively, a link to the other sections.

The main slideshow image is too big as it doesn't allow any other information to show on the screen (1024x768 ) - ideally this would be a banner in the order of 800x300 so that you can add menus, comments and other things without having to scroll. Theres also a 200px white space between the main image and the galleries which can be removed.

I guess the main point would be to ask what is its purpose? If its commerical, its far too confusing a layout to pass on information to the customer. If its a blog, the main slideshow image should be pulled. If its a photography gallery, then you need to remove the blog and other comments and put them on another page. At present, its trying to do all three, and I'm not convinced it works.

On the positive side, the images are throughly spectactular and its been an enjoyable 20 minutes flicking through the images.

Hope that helps

Hi guys trying to find that thread with the pics from the disused mental hospital you all went to, can anyone help?

How is everyone by the way lol

penfolduk wrote in post #8317656
Hi guys trying to find that thread with the pics from the disused mental hospital you all went to, can anyone help?

How is everyone by the way lol

This one?

Closed Hospital

or this one?

West Park Asylum - The Padded Cell

or this one?

UK South-East POTN Member meeting - 24th March 2009 - Hellingly Lunatic Asylum

Anyone here interested in a 400D? I got one that's a couple of years old - mint condition and not used since December when I got my 50D. Has the old 18-55 kit lens, all the caps, battery grip but no box. TBH - not even sure what it's worth (and can't e bothered with ebay right now). If interested, pm me an offer

Pete wrote in post #8317665
This one?

Closed Hospital

or this one?

West Park Asylum - The Padded Cell

or this one?

UK South-East POTN Member meeting - 24th March 2009 - Hellingly Lunatic Asylum

The last one, thanks Pete!

If you love cars, then this video recommended in Autocar Magazine this week is pretty awesome

http://www.youtube.com​/watch?v=edLnXzAwHVc

Ok, so with all this web development by so many people, I have gotten around to starting on my wedding site. I created a new sub-domain and have got as far as this so far: http://weddings.mikegr​eenphotography.co.uk/

(It's not a lot, I know, really just started!)

My old and unfinished one is here: http://www.mikegreenph​otography.co.uk/weddin​gs.html

I never got it finished and want to start again properly.

Oooh...

Nice mate.

And a nice pink placeholder icon...

Lol Mike, personally, I'd split the green line from the text part of the banner, make it one pixel wide then repeat it as a background straight across the screen rather than leave the gaps. Unless you are going to frame it, but an unframed floating horizontal line without a fade looks dodgy in my books.

Pete wrote in post #8317962
Oooh...

Nice mate.

And a nice pink placeholder icon...

I like it better than the MG Photo that was on the old version

Looking good so far Mike. How does the logo look without the drop shadow on the Wedding Photography? Something about it looks a bit off to me. Might be that I'm just not a huge fan of drop shadows...

Kaben wrote in post #8313150
I like it, but its slightely too casual for my taste- it doesn't exude the correct amount of proficiency or professionalism. I think it is very much selling you short.

In all "about" sections, i personally never like the " i found my calling to the camera X-number of years ago and have been going ever since" type comments. It gives the impression that this is a hobby that sits secondary to your life.
You want it to seem that you live, eat and breathe for the perfect picture.

I don't have any examples for this one (not feeling very creative this evening), but i would make its less friendly and more assertive.

State your name and a bit of background. Dont put things like "i guess by now", it sounds like you are nervous.

Generalising a bit (a lot :lol people think of photographers in stereotypes that revolve around the "brilliant creative" - someone who is a bit arrogant, beleives in his ability above all else and will do what he wants to bring his vision to life. Either that or the stereotype of the perv, which we definitely want to steer clear of lol!

Now im not saying that you have to sound like an arsehole, but you should sound assertive so that you at least hit on a bit of the stereotype so that they will subconciously think you know what you are doing.

EDIT: just read though this again - i don't mean to sound so attacking Matt! I just wrote this as the thoughts came from my head, obviously without engaging the part of my brain which controls being nice!

Ok, now I have had a chance to read that, your just being mean to me! I do take all your points there and after looking at it again on the site, it is way too thin for my liking!

Pete wrote in post #8317099
Spotted in another thread....

That's brilliant ..

Pete wrote in post #8317962
Oooh...

Nice mate.

And a nice pink placeholder icon...

Thanks. It's a rose from a bouquet. I quite like it!

SwitchBlade wrote in post #8317992
Lol Mike, personally, I'd split the green line from the text part of the banner, make it one pixel wide then repeat it as a background straight across the screen rather than leave the gaps. Unless you are going to frame it, but an unframed floating horizontal line without a fade looks dodgy in my books.

I hadn't thought to do that...I'll see if I can work that out!

souporman wrote in post #8317999
I like it better than the MG Photo that was on the old version

Looking good so far Mike. How does the logo look without the drop shadow on the Wedding Photography? Something about it looks a bit off to me. Might be that I'm just not a huge fan of drop shadows...

I'll try it...although I quite liked the look lol!

Mike wrote in post #8318069
I'll try it...although I quite liked the look lol!

It's definitely a personal perference thing.


ps: just going through and adding contacts in flickr. Need to use it to share a few photos, so I may as well take the plunge.

pps: I am still too cool for flickr however