First Website - Advice and Critique, Please

[pauland]

You can't get a virus from a xara file. It's not executable, nor is it like a zip file.

[gsthunder]

Ok Paul if I get the wild monkey virus you get to fly across the Atlantic and fix my computer.

Frank - I did take a look and I like what you have done. The header/logo is very good. I guess my only issue would be there is too much pink. I know that makes me sound like a hypocrite after telling the other guy he had too many colors and to stay with a theme but to me there is too much pink on your site. It makes everything blend togther and get lost and look a bit bland/boring.

I played around with it a bit and one thing I hit on that really helped was the background area that displays around the site. Currently yours is white( on my system anyway ). I actually used some different textured background gif's( marble, materials/carpet, paper, etc... )and with the right one(s) it made your page pop right out at you and it made it much more elegant. Various offerings in gray, purple, and maroon worked well( to me ). Black marble with a fine grain looked pretty good as well. A textured background vs a plain one is appropriate for your site as you don't have a lot of images on your page itself. Just adds something to break up the flatness.

I have to say something is needed to break up the pink haze effect if I am being honest with you. The right color border/background made your site almost look like stationary. The wrong color was awful but the right one, to me, made a big difference in visual appeal.

Only other thing is I might try a different frame/box for your text. Something a little fancier maybe.

Overall well done.

[Frank Edwards]

Hi gsthunder,

Thanks for taking the 'risk' of opening the file. I understand your concerns on that one (and thanks, Paul, for the reassurance on that score).

More good advice, thank you. This is very generous of you all.

I agree with you on the pink (which was my friend's request). It was originally blended whiter at the top (to make the header stand out more), but I had increased the pink in case the customer didn't scroll down to see the increased colour at the bottom. But on seeing it 'in the flesh' it does kind of make it all too bland and uniform. I'll be attending to that when I re-jig the header.

The surrounding background was also bugging me, so I have a couple of ideas on that, which includes your textured suggestions. Thanks.

Thank you, all, for your encouragement as well.

Frank

[Frank Edwards]

Hi Paul,

Don't worry about being too picky. Different perspectives are what I need. I can always choose whether to take your advice or not. So, pick away :-).

Frank

[pauland]

Ok Paul if I get the wild monkey virus you get to fly across the Atlantic and fix my computer.

No problem. Wire my ticket money.. ;-)

[BQ]

Hi Frank,

I don't quite understand the reasoning for all the layers on a simple one-page site like this. I think it would have been easier to create the page if you had all the information on one layer (MouseOff) instead of having to create and name all the various layers.

Just my opinion. If this method works better for you then you should stick to it.

[Frank Edwards]

Hi BQ,

I was just treating it like a Xara drawing, rather than a web page as such. As it's a work-in-progress, 'brainstorming' file I created layers as I went along to try and keep the elements separate for selection purposes and to try and give it some structure. I'm pretty inexperienced, undisciplined and disorganised and so have no tried-and-tested workflow method. I'm willing to take any advice on that front as well :-).

I can see I'm going to have to work through some tutorials rather than just jumping in feet first.

So, is the Mouse Off layer the place to put all the elements in a page like this?

Frank

[BQ]

So, is the Mouse Off layer the place to put all the elements in a page like this?

Frank

Correct.

I've attached your .xar file with everything on MouseOff layer except a couple of elements that I added to "locked" background-images layer.

[Frank Edwards]

BQ,

Many thanks. I'll download the file soon. Have had to shift focus to work.

Frank

[Frank Edwards]

Hi there,

After a hiatus brought about by work I've re-jigged a few things and we're almost ready to publish. Everything relevant is now on the Mouse Off layer (thanks, BQ).

Managed to learn how to create a graduated fill background all the way across the window. Yippee! It's amazing how achieving something so simple can give one a boost.

I'm still not happy with the various relative sizes of text. It still looks amateurish, but my friend wants the body text to be large enough for inexperienced web users to see on opening the page without having to try and scroll zoom or go to menus.

I considered all the good advice on capitalisation and the wording - thanks again. In the end my friend wanted it the way it was designed originally, and as time is pressing I'm going to leave it at that and see what transpires, although I have tried to qualify the tagline with the pop-up wording on mouseover. She's just chuffed to have it at all. She's going to try and get feedback from customers to help us re-word it in the future.

I'm considering using iPage for hosting as they have a good offer on just now and their telephone helpline seems to be good from the limited experience I've had so far. Unless anyone wants to PM me to tell me different.

Cheers,
Frank