Portfolio -- have a look

http://vpa.mtu.edu/~dc​nichol/

Yes, I'm a sound designer and do photography semi-pro. I just went through Hikin Mike's SEO page and edited a few of my tags. I did all the coding myself. What do you guys think?

Wow, somebody read my article...LOL! Looks like you still have to implement some of them, but it's a start.

Layout-wise, I wouldn't use tables. I would start learning CSS....much easier. I always like to see some type of "feedback" when I hover a link, maybe a different color or something like that. You have that on your 'Past Project' link, but no were else. When I hover on 'Past Project' and 'Resume' links, I see a 1-2px shift to the bottom. I would fix that (I'm using Windows XP and Firefox 3.6.13). I wouldn't use a 'mailto' for your contact link. Better to use a contact form, unless you like spam.

Hikin Mike wrote in post #11470573
Wow, somebody read my article...LOL! Looks like you still have to implement some of them, but it's a start.

Mike, you mention your SEO article in about 95% of your posts here in Presentation, or in Business. I'm surprised someone hasn't made a drinking game out of it yet.

David, you've got some great photos on there! Considering you coded it yourself, I think you've done an admirable job. I feel (strictly just my opinion) that the site isn't doing your photographs justice. Perhaps consider a gallery-site (flickr/smugmug/zenfol​io/etc) that you could customize a little bit for your needs?

I only say that because I really would like to see more of your photos! I just wouldn't want to scroll down for 4-5 minutes straight (and wait for the page to load!) if you added more photos to the existing layout.

Hikin' -- the tables are staying, at least for now. In the future, version 3.0, I might be ready for a complete re-do... but by that time we might be in HTML5/whatever, so who knows. I put a hella lot of work into it so far and I'm not ready to scrap it all just yet.

I'm trying like hell to figure out that pixel shift... I just can't figure it out. I noticed it as well on OSX/Firefox. The menu is a CSS implementation and i'm sure it's just a param that's off by 2.

Never had problems with spam from the mailto, but if it arises I will consider a contact form.

Brandon -- I appreciate the comments. IMO, the purpose of a portfolio is to showcase a small collection of my extremely best work, not a ton of work, thus I feel OK with only having a few pieces (IMO I have too many as it is). However, I am in the market for a more professional gallery site besides photobucket.

I understand. For the next revision, I would seriously consider learning CSS. I did that years ago, and it is soooo much easier....once you get the hang of CSS!

BTW, I'm using Firefox (XP), but I checked your site with IE7 and your drop-down links don't work.

I'm impressed by the photos but I'm not too impressed with the design of the website. I think it doesn't show off your content as well as it could.

Also the 'contact me' link is linking straight to an email address which is a bit annoying for some users like me who do not have an email client set up or may be using someone else's computer. It's probably a better idea to have a page with your contact details on them.

I don't like that background. I'm not exactly sure what you want the website to function as but if it's for making money as a sound tech or photographer get two websites. Also kill "photography is a great hobby" if you're trying to make money. If it's just a show case or a learning exercise for you then it's not so much of a problem. I dislike that your drop down menus move the content under them a little. Personally I would have a contact page with your email on it so people can copy/paste also.

To chuck in a few posotive comments I'm told orange and black is the easiest -or one of- to read background/text combinations. It's also been well and truely tried and has been sucessful. People's site tend to get better just by making new ones so you're doing alright.

The pickup truck shot has got to go.

The electrical sub station one as well.

The other shots are fine.

Love the flying faders...

.

Contact page is up, and the jumpy menu is fixed!

The space is my portfolio -- i am a sound designer and shoot photographs as a hobby.

Chippy569 wrote in post #11534961
Contact page is up, and the jumpy menu is fixed!

The space is my portfolio -- i am a sound designer and shoot photographs as a hobby.

Congratulations!! I tried but gave up. What was the "bug"?

Needed some cell margins

Well, I've spent all day laboring over figuring out HTML5/CSS3 and while I only embrace maybe 4% of the new changes, i do have an operational site.

Spent the afternoon with the W3C validator services, and got the green light on all the pages, yay!!! Only thing is, it looks really goofy on my ipod. No background image and the boxes are all over the place. Thoughts?

Don't kill yourself with the validator. It is there as a tool, not the end all be all for web compliance. Coding wise.. your CSS has redundant code.. ex. no need to keep defining margin as 0px.. you have cleared the margins in your first tag using * .. and no need for z-index your div(s) are not overlapping. But all of those suggestions are minute as it simply cleans up the file especially when it starts to grow!..

anywho, overall, I like the site.. more specifically the colors. However, I do have two suggestions.. the background is not too pleasing on the eye.. being in sound and photography maybe take a large picture that can be used in the background, feather the edges of a mask so it blends into a solid color (for the larger resolutions) .. etc.. . and a gallery for the photos.. I see you have used code from DynamicDrive which has simple jq/js driven gallery, flash based (plenty of pre-compiled flash galleries online), or if you have lightroom use its prebuilt gallery - HTML or Flash.. OR at least a lightbox so the user can click on the image to see a larger one!