30 November 2008, 23:24:15
1 December 2008, 14:40:58
*stretches and puts on her reviewershat*
Here we go.
First impression:
It's been a while since I've been on your site, and I must say - I like your new layout. It's calm - not too busy, easy to the eyes, seems good to read.
Layout:
Your layout looks good on both IE and Firefox, and also in high and low contrast. I really like how you aligned your content with the header image (the photo), making it look "right". I think the background image fits the layout.
The colors go well with eachother, the spacing's good, the font size seems big enough - you've got the basics.
After looking at your layout for a while I get annoyed by the "CSS" and "HTML" buttons at the top. What are they doing there? Are they so important they should be so big and so overruling visible in the layout? I think you'd be fine with a textlink in the footer or in the menu.
I also found out that they're not positioned correctly in Firefox, which makes it look like they were cut out of the header.
You took a very plain photo for your header. From one side, this helps the layout look calm - from the other side, it gets boring. Did you take this picture yourself? If so: It's okay. If not: You might want to consider making layouts more "you". A unique photo will make the layout itself unique aswell, making visitors more likely to be impressed. I think a image-rotation script (ie: everytime you view a different page it picks a different photo for the header) would make things more interesting already.
The style effects (CSS) seem very neat. Everything matches. Menu and content headers are clear and look nice. Same goes for the navigation and the navigation hover effect.
I do miss some kind of hover effect on the normal links though. You can't really tell which text is a link. No special underline/color, no special hover.
Size:
The width seems a bit off. It's just a bit too wide for 800x600, but its kinda small for 1024x768 resolutions and up. Most people who view your website will have a 1024x768 or higher (Statistics), so I'd advice you to make your layouts slightly bigger.
If you really want to make your side look good in 800x600 resolutions - do it properly.
Content:
The thing I really miss on your site is some "About" info. Who are you, why did you make this site? When? What does the sitename mean, why did you choose it? Why this layout? What were your past layouts? Etc etc.
This also creates confusion about your websites content - It's not clear what you made yourself because there's no info about it.
On that subject - Where are your credits? In your latest update you tell your visitors you got inspiration from deviantart - which artists? Or the Deviantart homepage? And where's that photo from? And these fonts - you make it seem like you make them yourself, yet you didn't. And why do visitors have to link back for fonts you didnt make? This is wrong.
Myspace content: I think you've got some nice goodies here. I like your contact buttons the most. I don't know much about myspace and its users, so I'll wait for someone else to judge this content.
Resource content:
Textures: I like these! It shows you put effort in making them.
Cursors: These don't work in other browsers than Internet Explorer. If you want non-IE users to see your cursors aswell, you should put them as images and downloads on your site. Visitors will be able to use your cursors as default cursors aswell that way.
Website signs: Simple, but clean. Useable.
Avatars: It's spelled "Avatars", not "Avaters". Please give credit for the images you used to make these. You can't expect people to link you for using your avatars if you don't even link the resources you used to make them.
Color schemes: You spelled this wrong in the menu too. The schemes are nice.
Favicons: Did you make all of these yourself?
Quotes: These look great! Good work. The starting page looks very empty though. At first sight, it looks like there's nothing on it. You should show some (random or new) previews on that page to show something's there.
Fonts: See previous comment about this subject.
Overal comment: I think it's a good idea to give visitors the opportunity to download your graphics and host it themselves. You don't give any easy download links for favicons and cursors.
Coding:
You mentioned you're still working on making your website HTML valid. I won't say anything about that then. Your HTML already seems quite structured, which is good. I saw you were still using tables randomly through the content - I suggest you get rid of those when you make everything valid. Also, it's worth your time reading about SEO & coding for it. For instance, <div class="header"> are best converted to <h1>s or <h2>s, and so on. Search for articles like this one.
I hope you'll also structure your CSS file when you're gonna redo the HTML, because your CSS looks kinda messy.
Other:
http://www.exteanly.com/graphics/fonts/ - The "click here for the tutorial" link doesn't work.
I don't think "Support" is the best name for a page with your buttons. When looking for a button to give credit for using something from your site, I'd search for a page called "Link us" or "Buttons". (I do like your buttons though
)
I also think the menu order is a bit weird. It's common for "home" to be on top of a navigation, not somewhere halfway. I'd suggest putting the "Site" menu on top. If you wish to keep it there, I'd say it's a good idea to make your sitename clickable, so there's a homelink on top.
And a last note: I found this on your affiliate page:
Conclusion:
Please remember that you can't just take stuff from websites and use it without crediting. If you decide to put something on your website you didn't make, but think is useful for your visitors (like those fonts), put some extra info on the page itself. (Something like: "I didn't make these fonts, but hope they will help you. I found them on website.com").
You can't tell visitors to credit you for something you didn't make, it doesn't make sense.
Overall, I think your website is on the right track. Your layout design might be simple, but it shows you know how to build visitor-friendly layouts.
Your recourses/designs seem to be quality over quantity, which is good. Try to keep up the quality and be original.
Please make those extra pages (about the site, about you, credits) and your site will be alot more professional already.
Best of luck!
3/5 stars.![[Image: star.gif]](http://forum.conquestofelegance.com/images/icons/star.gif)
![[Image: newbiestar.gif]](http://forum.conquestofelegance.com/images/icons/newbiestar.gif)
Short rating explanation:
Because of the lack for crediting, and confusing info about what you made and what you didn't make, I'm giving you the most negative points. Fixing this will make me respect your site way more.
The most positive points are given for your clean design. Your website is easy to use and nice to the eyes.
*Please note that this review is written on my PERSONAL opinion.
Don't be afraid to ask or correct me if you feel it's necessary.
Here we go.
First impression:
It's been a while since I've been on your site, and I must say - I like your new layout. It's calm - not too busy, easy to the eyes, seems good to read.
Layout:
Your layout looks good on both IE and Firefox, and also in high and low contrast. I really like how you aligned your content with the header image (the photo), making it look "right". I think the background image fits the layout.
The colors go well with eachother, the spacing's good, the font size seems big enough - you've got the basics.
After looking at your layout for a while I get annoyed by the "CSS" and "HTML" buttons at the top. What are they doing there? Are they so important they should be so big and so overruling visible in the layout? I think you'd be fine with a textlink in the footer or in the menu.
I also found out that they're not positioned correctly in Firefox, which makes it look like they were cut out of the header.
You took a very plain photo for your header. From one side, this helps the layout look calm - from the other side, it gets boring. Did you take this picture yourself? If so: It's okay. If not: You might want to consider making layouts more "you". A unique photo will make the layout itself unique aswell, making visitors more likely to be impressed. I think a image-rotation script (ie: everytime you view a different page it picks a different photo for the header) would make things more interesting already.
The style effects (CSS) seem very neat. Everything matches. Menu and content headers are clear and look nice. Same goes for the navigation and the navigation hover effect.
I do miss some kind of hover effect on the normal links though. You can't really tell which text is a link. No special underline/color, no special hover.
Size:
The width seems a bit off. It's just a bit too wide for 800x600, but its kinda small for 1024x768 resolutions and up. Most people who view your website will have a 1024x768 or higher (Statistics), so I'd advice you to make your layouts slightly bigger.
If you really want to make your side look good in 800x600 resolutions - do it properly.
Content:
The thing I really miss on your site is some "About" info. Who are you, why did you make this site? When? What does the sitename mean, why did you choose it? Why this layout? What were your past layouts? Etc etc.
This also creates confusion about your websites content - It's not clear what you made yourself because there's no info about it.
On that subject - Where are your credits? In your latest update you tell your visitors you got inspiration from deviantart - which artists? Or the Deviantart homepage? And where's that photo from? And these fonts - you make it seem like you make them yourself, yet you didn't. And why do visitors have to link back for fonts you didnt make? This is wrong.
Myspace content: I think you've got some nice goodies here. I like your contact buttons the most. I don't know much about myspace and its users, so I'll wait for someone else to judge this content.
Resource content:
Textures: I like these! It shows you put effort in making them.
Cursors: These don't work in other browsers than Internet Explorer. If you want non-IE users to see your cursors aswell, you should put them as images and downloads on your site. Visitors will be able to use your cursors as default cursors aswell that way.
Website signs: Simple, but clean. Useable.
Avatars: It's spelled "Avatars", not "Avaters". Please give credit for the images you used to make these. You can't expect people to link you for using your avatars if you don't even link the resources you used to make them.
Color schemes: You spelled this wrong in the menu too. The schemes are nice.
Favicons: Did you make all of these yourself?
Quotes: These look great! Good work. The starting page looks very empty though. At first sight, it looks like there's nothing on it. You should show some (random or new) previews on that page to show something's there.
Fonts: See previous comment about this subject.
Overal comment: I think it's a good idea to give visitors the opportunity to download your graphics and host it themselves. You don't give any easy download links for favicons and cursors.
Coding:
You mentioned you're still working on making your website HTML valid. I won't say anything about that then. Your HTML already seems quite structured, which is good. I saw you were still using tables randomly through the content - I suggest you get rid of those when you make everything valid. Also, it's worth your time reading about SEO & coding for it. For instance, <div class="header"> are best converted to <h1>s or <h2>s, and so on. Search for articles like this one.
I hope you'll also structure your CSS file when you're gonna redo the HTML, because your CSS looks kinda messy.
Other:
http://www.exteanly.com/graphics/fonts/ - The "click here for the tutorial" link doesn't work.
I don't think "Support" is the best name for a page with your buttons. When looking for a button to give credit for using something from your site, I'd search for a page called "Link us" or "Buttons". (I do like your buttons though
)I also think the menu order is a bit weird. It's common for "home" to be on top of a navigation, not somewhere halfway. I'd suggest putting the "Site" menu on top. If you wish to keep it there, I'd say it's a good idea to make your sitename clickable, so there's a homelink on top.
And a last note: I found this on your affiliate page:
Quote:Rules:Isn't this a bit unfair to ask when your site doesn't get that many visitors either? Ah well, that's just what I think and thought I should add.
- Your site must get 2,000+ unique visitors daily.
Conclusion:
Please remember that you can't just take stuff from websites and use it without crediting. If you decide to put something on your website you didn't make, but think is useful for your visitors (like those fonts), put some extra info on the page itself. (Something like: "I didn't make these fonts, but hope they will help you. I found them on website.com").
You can't tell visitors to credit you for something you didn't make, it doesn't make sense.
Overall, I think your website is on the right track. Your layout design might be simple, but it shows you know how to build visitor-friendly layouts.
Your recourses/designs seem to be quality over quantity, which is good. Try to keep up the quality and be original.
Please make those extra pages (about the site, about you, credits) and your site will be alot more professional already.
Best of luck!
3/5 stars.
Short rating explanation:
Because of the lack for crediting, and confusing info about what you made and what you didn't make, I'm giving you the most negative points. Fixing this will make me respect your site way more.
The most positive points are given for your clean design. Your website is easy to use and nice to the eyes.
*Please note that this review is written on my PERSONAL opinion.
Don't be afraid to ask or correct me if you feel it's necessary.
1 December 2008, 14:41:14
1 December 2008, 15:15:57
damn:P you have a lil bit to much time hehe xD
xoxo
xoxo