Any bored web designers here?

Technology and Gaming Help and Support
#1

ultradude25 over on the steam forums noticed some coding issues with my personal website and has offered to make some corrections for me. Someone here on these forums pm’d me not too long ago offering to recreate my site, but of course I don’t have the pm anymore. =(

BUT just as I threw this out there for ultradude25 on the steam forums, I figured I would throw this out here as well. In short, I am now bored of my website and wouldn’t mind something new and prettier. If there is anyone here that would like to take a stab at it, I say go for it.

Feel free to either recode the existing site to make it “compliant”, OR redesign my site completely. Green and purple are my favorite colors, and a small bit of flash would be nice but is not a must. (I know enough html coding to be able to make basic changes to my site, so please don’t present me with something that I can’t edit in notepad.) Other than that, keep in mind the click buttons on the left, and the drop down “infinite menus” originally made available by https://www.opencube.com/.

Anyone bored and wanna take a stab at it?

#2

Prior to looking at design, you should think about the content, and not just from your perspective, but mostly from the user’s perspective. First you think about what you want people to find on your site, then you look at what people want to find. So the first questions you have to ask yourself are “why do I want a site” and “why do people want to view my site?”.

After a quick look through your current site, I found that like 80% of the available sub-items in your menus, are links to external sites. Why? This is your site, you need people to stay on your site and check out things about you, not lead them away to other sites. People that want to know the weather will go to proper meteorology websites, people that want to see how Denver looks will google it, so i see no use of those on your site).

The way I see it is that you should split things up in 4-5 main categories:

  • Blog (which also functions as a guestbook)
  • About

[list]
[*]Bio

  • Resumé

  • Interests

  • Family (optional, info/stories about your family could be offered through the blog)

  • Believes (optional, stories about Christianity could be offered through the blog)

  • Music (optional)
    [/:m]
    [    ]Voice acting

  • Info

  • Portfolio
    [/:m]
    [    ]Contact[/:m]
    [    ](And maybe a bunch of links appropriate links)[/SIZE][/*:m][/list:u]

That way you’ll make it a lot easier for people to find specific things, and you’ll have cleaned up a lot of the confusing and disturbing clutter on your site.

Thing to keep in mind: autoplay video/audio on websites is one of the most (if not the) annoying experiences on the web. Same goes for non-functional animated gifs/flash.

General rule: don’t use something for the sake of using it… Use it because it’s functional (this includes Flash, GIF, Audio, Video, annoying javascript events, etc).

And oh yea…

[COLOR=‘Red’]STAY AWAY FROM COMIC SANS!!![/SIZE] angryface

PS: I like the Google Map and I think it could be a neat thing to integrate in the design (a lot like this (it’s in dutch, but it’s a poll to find the ugliest building in Belgium))

#3

^What he said. I’d like to help but I’m still learning website developping.

#4

what is wrong with comic sans? I like it. :frowning:

#5

Well, it’s not very pleasant to read a text written in Comic Sans. Plus, it looks a bit “noob”. :retard:

#6
  1. Eye strain. For long stretches of text on a screen, the best (and imho the only) options are Arial and Verdana. For short bits, you can go a bit wilder and touch fancier fonts through JPG titles or default-font titles (I wub Georgia for titles). Long stretches of text in Comic Sans makes the lines wobble/dance, there’s no clear line and it really asks a lot of your eyes to read it for longer periods of time.
  2. If you want to look like a complete unprofessional tool, use Comic Sans (I don’t even enter stores that have home-made posters in Comic Sans)

All in all, there’s nothing good about Comic Sans. It’s ugly, it’s hard to read in texts, it’s unprofessional. There’s way better alternatives to get the hand-written effect (but again, only for short sentences or single words, not for texts).

Anyway, I know it’s a bit extreme, but i’m sure you remember Geocities. Well then, see what Geocities would look like on a nice/proper website like this one: https://wonder-tonic.com/geocitiesizer/content.php?theme=1&music=2&url=blackmesasource.com

Things to note: bad color use, comic sans, autoplay audio, animated gifs, too much junk all over the place. The things make bad websites. Stay away from them.

#7

sigh. fine. comic sans = no.

How bout Century Gothic?

#8

Stylish for titles, but again not for texts + not every computer has it (not default on OSX for example) :stuck_out_tongue:

#9

but I hate HATE Arial and Verdana. Are there any other options?

Would tahoma be ok for long textual webpages? testing testing 123…: Victoria Teunissen - Voice Actor :. Voice acting is a hugely underrated aspect of any public facing project. I hope to provide quality voice acting for games, radio, training projects or any public facing project. My start was with the gaming community with a little PC game called “Black Mesa”. From there my work became a bit popular with a couple of other PC games and I have since branched into the real world with some recordings for several companies. Here is a list of the equipment I use for my work:

GAH! crap I dont like that either.

#10

It’s a bit better, but Arial looks way better IMO. And as Bolteh said, not every computer has it. When creating a website make always sure to use a font that everyone has.

If you want your website to be ugly, yes, there are plenty other options.

#11

:huff:grr:

Ok so is this any better? (please dont hunt me down)

#12

The presentation is better, but the design seriously needs to be changed.

#13

Yes.

A lot. Especially the text. The design itself is far from ideal.

#14

:bangs head on the desk:

#15

To be fair, and no offense, but your way of seeing the web fits your generation. My boss has the exact same opinions as you when it comes to our company’s website and everything related to the web.

#16

:whimper:

Well… I guess we can let this thread die till I figure out the PURPOSE of my site first and then font next right?

In the meantime, do any of these templateswork as a ‘resume’ site?

And I assume you guys have an actual valid skill at web design and you aren’t just yanking my bra strap on me right?

#17

I prefer original designs over templates, but if I had to choose from those: BeautifulCurves, Contaminated and TheHobbit.

And to answer your other question, I’ve enjoyed an education as Graphical Designer since I was 11, graduated from high school as a Multi-media designer, and went to 2 colleges for Digital Media and Digital Design. Now I work as a digital designer (mainly focussed on webdesign) at the marketing department of a multinational software and hardware company that offers solutions for the print- and packaging business.

#18

I’d love to help out within the design and whatnot, but on the coding side of things, I’m not so good at that.

#19

Bolteh, my respect for you went up 10 fold. You wouldnt happen to have any old templates laying around that you dont need anymore?

I am a template person myself cuz, well… I don’t do design. But trying to hunt down templates that are free is rather difficult. googling ‘free templates’ gets you plenty of sites, but most of them give you maybe one free template and the rest you have to buy.

Bah. Now I remember why I didnt wanna do this myself!

#20

Silly woman, you can’t multiply zero :<

But thanks anyway :slight_smile:

And no, I don’t have anything lying around since I generally design sites with a purpose, not just generic designs that could for everything. I’m also having troubles getting my own online portfolio sorted out atm :< Currently working on the 16th idea/iteration of a design I somewhat like, but not quite content with yet.

Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valve’s Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.