iPodsForAll.com - How does it look?

[insanefishposse]

Hey everyone. I'm doing a site for someone, and want to know what other people think of it so far.

http://www.geocities.com/insanefishposse/lws/index.html

No, it will not be hosted on geocities for very long, it's just a temporary thing. We're getting someone else to make a decent-looking banner for across the top, seeing as I have minimal photoshop skills.

Let me know what you think. I'm open to all comments/suggestions/criticism. Thanks.

[ronaldb66]

Hmmm... not too bad, I guess; a bit on the boxy side, and slightly greyish.

I'd recommend strongly reducing the dazzling number of different font styles, sizes and families used: it makes the whole page look rather messy and confusing. Stick with a couple of styles / families and use them consistently for identical or similar page elements (think navigation / headings / main text, etc.). Also, if you apply contrast using colors, sizes etc, make it obvious; don't make it look like a mistake.

Then, the layout feels a bit crowded: I think you can open it up some with a bit of whitespace here and there.

Lastly, your page coding is a strange combination of fairly semantic and no so semantic markup (table for the top menu!); go the extra mile and replace classes paragraphs with real headings, turn that last table into a list, etc.

[ionsurge]

I think it is atrocious... the menu is poorly made, and the fonts and colours are in no way complimentary to each other making it have a naucious feel of the old days of tabular designs. The fact that you've used a whole array of fonts simply makes it feel broken, having no fluidity in it.

I don't find it appealing in any way and wouldn't want to stay on the site, never mind browse the different subsections.

The code is however somewhat better, although there is a lot of room for improvement on that too, e.g. you could use paragraph tags instead of breaks and add a little indenting to make it neater.


Sorry it just doesn't do anything for me.

[insanefishposse]

Thank you both for your input.

Hmmm... not too bad, I guess; a bit on the boxy side, and slightly greyish.


Do you think that it would be better if I gave the main <div> rounded corners? And I think the site will look at least a little flashier once a good banner is added.

I'd recommend strongly reducing the dazzling number of different font styles, sizes and families used: it makes the whole page look rather messy and confusing. Stick with a couple of styles / families and use them consistently for identical or similar page elements (think navigation / headings / main text, etc.). Also, if you apply contrast using colors, sizes etc, make it obvious; don't make it look like a mistake.

I don't know where I got the idea to use so many different fonts, but I'll cut back on them.

Lastly, your page coding is a strange combination of fairly semantic and no so semantic markup (table for the top menu!); go the extra mile and replace classes paragraphs with real headings, turn that last table into a list, etc.

Replacing the classed paragraphs with real headings never occured to me, for some odd reason. Thank you for your review.


I think it is atrocious... the menu is poorly made,

Can you expand a little more on why you don't like the menu? Are you referring to just the actual navigation menu, or the whole left side panel?

Sorry it just doesn't do anything for me.

No problem at all. I know I'm far from being a great web designer, I'm just looking for criticism and suggestions in hopes of becoming better. Thank you for giving your input.

[ronaldb66]

Do you think that it would be better if I gave the main <div> rounded corners?
Hmmm... rounded corners have their uses, if they tie in with the rest of the design; I doubt if they would help much here. Rather, try different backgrounds and somewhat more subtle dividers between page sections (like header, main content en navigation) instead of strong, encapsulating borders.
You could look at some of the sites your linking to for some inspiration.

And I think the site will look at least a little flashier once a good banner is added.
I wouldn't rely on advertising sombody else's site; rather think about a nice heading of your own, holding the site title and tag line.

[ionsurge]

Can you expand a little more on why you don't like the menu? Are you referring to just the actual navigation menu, or the whole left side panel?

I am referring to generally the whole appearance of the design, I said that the menu was poorly made, because you have used tables to make it, when it can very easily be made using CSS.

I don't mean to sound harsh, but the design shows a lot of inexperience. Although, you say you are new at this, so it can be forgiven.

The design just needs a lot of work and stating where and how would just take a lot of time to do.

Have a look through sites over at www.csszengarden.com, or www.favouritewebsiteawards.com for some inspiration. You'll see how the site title's are made the main focus of designs, letting the user know where they are and what they are looking at.

Fonts are generally limited, generally with only 2-3 used at most. One for content, one for titles, and one for quotes, or menu's and content.

[l3vi]

... I think it could use alot of work.
First off I dont think you should keep that gradient background. Its distracting and it makes me not want to read the text...
The dark red on dark grey is not a good mix of colours, and the dark blue in the menu makes it even worse. The colour choice makes it very dull. Try chosing two main colours you want (maybe a brighter shade of red and a not so dark grey?)
The border between the left side and the main content really makes it look bad.
The small headers on the left side navigation thingy need to be changed. You really shouldnt use the red to purple gradient on the text...
The navigation needs to be changed too. I wouldnt recommend the grey background on the text when you hover a menu item. I also wouldnt recommend the bolded, italicised, underlined text that says Navigation ;)
Here is a short summary of what could be changed with the design:

Change the colours
Get rid of the grey gradient backgrounds
Fix the headers
Fix the navigation
Get rid of all the grey

Now on to the coding:
This is such a simple layout, you honestly do not need tables.
I would highly recommend indenting your code to make it more organised.
You should get rid of the style="" things. You can easily do the same in an external CSS stylesheet ;)

[insanefishposse]

I don't mean to sound harsh, but the design shows a lot of inexperience. Although, you say you are new at this, so it can be forgiven.


Don't worry about sounding harsh. If I were offended by things like this, I wouldn't have posted in the first place. I posted here wanting criticism. Again, I know I'm not a great web designer, but I posted here because I want to know what I'm doing wrong and how I can get better.

l3vi, I'll try making a few changes based on what you've said. Thanks everyone for your input.