Please Critique Me :-)

"rf" <rf (AT) invalid (DOT) com> wrote

"Jamie Allison" <jamie (AT) BIGjamieSPAMallisonBUCKET (DOT) co.uk> wrote in message
news:2PKdnQYI0P4csCHbnZ2dnUVZ8tWnnZ2d (AT) bt (DOT) com...

Hi All,

Er, G'Day.

looks at web site

I have been designing a web site for my dads photography business

Ah, then that answers my first question: Who is this Robert person anyway
:-)

You start up front by saying "Robert has been..." and "Robert is...".
It's like you are talking about somebody else, like those tribute sites:
"Abba was a pop group that...".

You confuse me more in the second paragraph when you say "our ... studio"
and "give us a ring".

Is this Roberts personal web site flogging his snapshots or is it a web
site *about* Robert the photographer or is it a site about Roberts
photgraphic company or is it a third party site selling Roberts pictures?
I can't quite tell from the first page. You should identify exactly *who*
you are on that first page.

It's either _I_ or _we_ or _they_. Never mix them up.

Yeah neither of us are very good at the writtting part of it, we are going
to get someone to look through it for us.

potters through site

Ah yes, your dad has a photgraphic company (I presume) that also fiddles
with other things like framing etc. The site should probably say "we". You
could then say "Robert, our cheif photographer..." and "our framing
department". Make it look big and smart.

do with a critique of it please. There is still a fair bit of content to
be added but I would like to know that the design seems ok before I go
too far.

It's looking mighty fine so far.

:-)

You may wish to rethink XHTML. IE simply does not understand it. Treats it
as tag soup and error corrects it back to HTML. HTML 4.01 strict is the
way to go.

I'll take a look at changing it over.

I am currently not too happy with the background but that's what he has
decided on. I'm still trying to steer him away from it.

Don't ever ever use dark red text. Ever. Especially on a dark grey
background. Especially for links. It is hard to read and for the 5% or so
of us blokes who are colour blind it's totally invisible.

How is the red on change of background colour? Or still not use the red?

Also I seems to display fine in IE but in firefox the navigation pictures
at the top have a red line sort of behind them, any idea why?

Another thing I am still working on is the META tags for the pages, is
this necessary these days or will search engines just pick up on the
pages content?

Forget meta tags. Put your keywords right there on you page for everybody
to read.

Will Do.

He is wanting a little flash slideshow on some of the pages to show
examples of work.

Aaarg. No. Use thumbnails like at all of your competitors sites. Don't
force your viewers to watch a movie.

We are going for thumbnails now.

BTW there are some might fine photos in there. Tell you dad he's done
good. More pictures of the prom though :-)

aside
I also "repaired" some of my mums old photos, getting the creases etc out
of them. I got them looking almost as good as yours but it took me bloody
hours! Is there at trick there or is it just painstaking
smudge/airbrush/whipe/pen/whipe/draw/smudge?

Yeah thats pretty much it, phtoshop is very good at it, it now has a
restoration tool which helps a lot. Practice makes perfect.

/aside.

--
Richard.

Jamie Allison wrote:

He doesn't generally use any colours, his letter heads are on a cream colour
paper but apart form that he generally displays stuff on which walls.

How about this? FFFFCC

Or,
color: #ffc;
which is equivalent, if you're feeling parsimonious.
I seldom find use for six characters to find a color I like.

Jamie Allison wrote:

"Bergamot" <bergamot (AT) visi (DOT) com> wrote in message
news:5ihqbiF3ps7cvU1 (AT) mid (DOT) individual.net...
Jamie Allison wrote:

http://new.the-picture-gallery.co.uk

I don't especially like the new background color - it doesn't really
show off the photos well.

How about this? FFFFCC

Too bright, I think. A paler shade of that might be better, maybe more
cream or wheat colored than yellow.

You're not limited to the old "web safe" colors, so feel free to go
crazy!

--
Berg

"Jamie Allison" <jamie (AT) BIGjamieSPAMallisonBUCKET (DOT) co.uk> wrote

"rf" <rf (AT) invalid (DOT) com> wrote in message
news:RfXvi.19918$4A1.17835 (AT) news-server (DOT) bigpond.net.au...

Yeah neither of us are very good at the writtting part of it, we are going
to get someone to look through it for us.

Here is a hint:
Print the page. Then gather a couple of people and read it out loud to them.

How is the red on change of background colour? Or still not use the red?

Looks fine to me.

--
Richard.

"Bergamot" <bergamot (AT) visi (DOT) com> wrote

Jamie Allison wrote:
"Bergamot" <bergamot (AT) visi (DOT) com> wrote in message
news:5ihqbiF3ps7cvU1 (AT) mid (DOT) individual.net...
Jamie Allison wrote:

http://new.the-picture-gallery.co.uk

I don't especially like the new background color - it doesn't really
show off the photos well.

How about this? FFFFCC

Too bright, I think. A paler shade of that might be better, maybe more
cream or wheat colored than yellow.

You're not limited to the old "web safe" colors, so feel free to go
crazy!

:-) Since when was this the case :-) i must have missed that memo.

--
Berg

"Jamie Allison" <jamie (AT) BIGjamieSPAMallisonBUCKET (DOT) co.uk> wrote

Hi All,

I have been designing a web site for my dads photography business and
could do with a critique of it please. There is still a fair bit of
content to be added but I would like to know that the design seems ok
before I go too far. I am currently not too happy with the background but
that's what he has decided on. I'm still trying to steer him away from
it.

Background now changed

Also I seems to display fine in IE but in firefox the navigation pictures
at the top have a red line sort of behind them, any idea why?

Sorted this now.

Another thing I am still working on is the META tags for the pages, is
this necessary these days or will search engines just pick up on the pages
content?

Not done yet but i'll probably be just removing them.

He is wanting a little flash slideshow on some of the pages to show
examples of work.

Got rid of the flash slideshow idea but now we have put a few galleraies on
to show his work.

I would like to know a few things about it. Anyone any ideas how to
centerize the images vertically, i can't seem to figure it out.

Another thing is i would preffer when an image is click for it to open in a
new window which will be resized to the size of the image with no buttons
etc. Anyone any ideas how to do this? I also know that the images probably
need optimizing better but i'm not sure as to what to do to them to get them
best optimized. I saved them all through photoshop CS with compression of
4. Should i make this lower or should i be using a different program?

http://new.the-picture-gallery.co.uk/weddings01.shtml

http://new.the-picture-gallery.co.uk

Thanks in advance

Jamie

"Jamie Allison" <jamie (AT) BIGjamieSPAMallisonBUCKET (DOT) co.uk> wrote

http://new.the-picture-gallery.co.uk/weddings01.shtml

I stopped that page downloading when I had reached 5 megabytes. And it was
only half way down.

Do *not* do this to your visitors please :-( Anybody on dial up would have
long since gone.

Your thumbnails are 10 times bigger than they need to be and there are far
too many of them on that page.

As to compression, they should be compressed to at least 50%. I would expect
three or four K per image, not the 50 or so K they are now.

--
Richard.

"rf" <rf (AT) invalid (DOT) com> wrote

"Jamie Allison" <jamie (AT) BIGjamieSPAMallisonBUCKET (DOT) co.uk> wrote in message
news:1_ydncYP85BMeFbbnZ2dnUVZ8vmdnZ2d (AT) bt (DOT) com...

http://new.the-picture-gallery.co.uk/weddings01.shtml

I stopped that page downloading when I had reached 5 megabytes. And it was
only half way down.

Yeah i understnad why, i hadn't realised that when i uploaded the compressed
ones they hadn't overwritten them.

Do *not* do this to your visitors please :-( Anybody on dial up would have
long since gone.

Your thumbnails are 10 times bigger than they need to be and there are far
too many of them on that page.

Shrunk them to 1 to 3 k per pic now.

As to compression, they should be compressed to at least 50%. I would
expect three or four K per image, not the 50 or so K they are now.

Compressed them all but still left as many images on the page but maybe i'll
make it so only 20 or so per page?

--
Richard.

"Jamie Allison" <jamie (AT) BIGjamieSPAMallisonBUCKET (DOT) co.uk> wrote

"rf" <rf (AT) invalid (DOT) com> wrote in message
news:g0Syi.24290$4A1.6776 (AT) news-server (DOT) bigpond.net.au...

"Jamie Allison" <jamie (AT) BIGjamieSPAMallisonBUCKET (DOT) co.uk> wrote in message
news:1_ydncYP85BMeFbbnZ2dnUVZ8vmdnZ2d (AT) bt (DOT) com...

http://new.the-picture-gallery.co.uk/weddings01.shtml

I stopped that page downloading when I had reached 5 megabytes. And it
was only half way down.

Shrunk them to 1 to 3 k per pic now.

Much better :-) The page now comes in at half a megabyte. Still way over the
top but better than 10MB.

Compressed them all but still left as many images on the page but maybe
i'll make it so only 20 or so per page?

Have a look at my ski lodge album: http://mulubinba.com.au/pictures.html

Chapters. Several of them. Some of them (construction) have grown too big
and need splitting/culling. Not so much for download time, but for
usability. Your page has just too many images to comprehend at once.

Also, there is a lot of almost duplication, like the many images of the
bride and her bloke on the beach. For a wedding album fine, but to flog your
dads photography it's too many. Choose the one or two best ones and publish
those. And I just noticed the several images of them appearing to wander off
into the distance, as if bored with the proceedings and wanting to get on
with other things :-)

--
Richard.

"Beauregard T. Shagnasty" <a.nony.mous (AT) example (DOT) invalid> wrote

-bts
-Motorcycles defy gravity; cars just suck

One cannot fit ski racks on a bike :-)

--
Richard.