Please review Pixel Development

[pmj7]

Pixel Development

This is my new website, the text still needs some work. Most effort has been against the main, gallery, portfolio and RSS/RSS help pages, so far.

Most will find the Gallery and OIP Edit interesting. The gallery is a fairly sophisticated combination of DHTML and server-side scripting.

When viewing a gallery, clicking on the OIP Edit button allows you to change the appearance of any image, making it brighter, sharper, or even black and white or sepia! These changes are kept and are instantly reflected back in the gallery when you click 'save', other users see these changes as well. Don't like the way it looks to you? Change it again! Try it!

Touchup allows you to play around with the image as well, but these changes are non-permanent. When you select Touchup, another button is added to the Gallery - Mac Gamma. If you are using a Macintosh, selecting this button will adjust the gamma of the displayed image to compensate for the Macintosh's different video gamma. You'll see the images as they were intended to be!

The main page has numerous controls to customize the site to your preference and viewing conditions. LCD laptop screens are frequently easier to read with light text on a dark background, vice-versa for video monitors. Larger text, wider pages, links to a new window - all your choice!

The Portfolio page has a brief description of other sites and projects, and has a small scrolling thumbnail area for most. Clicking on one will take you to a gallery with full size images.

I'm particularly interested in hearing how it works on various browsers. I've tested on Windows XP with Firefox 1.02, Mozilla, Explorer 6, Netscape 7 and Opera 7.5. I've had a few people do a cursory look using Safari under Mac OS X.

All comments are welcome!

Peter

 

[StudioWorks]

Regarding this issue, contrast i mean, i think it's OK the way it is.

I really like the Preferences feature you implemented. Well done!

 

[pmj7]

Thanks!

The page text header now uses same background as the side, eg: "Gallery".

Now, it's your chance to vote! The second style (the black 'T' on a white background) button shows a new item separator, orange that fades out from the centre. The other style buttons remain the same so you can compare. Prefer the new one?

Peter

 

[StudioWorks]

Hey Peter,

You did a great job. I like the second style becouse you got rid of the black & white gradient. Well done!

I love when people listen to my suggestions :P

Let's move on

Second style ( blue one ) :

- well, here we have the same problem, grandients. The gradient under the menu is too big. A nice stylish one will do just fine. Also the text area would look better if it was white. Or you can use for the content area a nice faded background ( white and gray ). And again, gradients in the content area are just too big.

- photo in the header looks awesome! good job.

- if you add some nice borders with shadows on this blue layout.. it will improve it's image.


Overall nice work! Well done Peter

Cheers,

Studio:wave:

 

[krustie]

I love the css prefences bit you have :P GOODJOB.

 

[aween]

if not noted yet: it loads everything twice and then it shows up correctly:s

 

[acortez]

nice work! : )

 

[pmj7]

I'm trying some new CSS for the Portfolio page, bye bye horizontal scroll bar.

Commenters have a love/hate relationship with with sidebar background textures. So, I'm experimenting with alternatives, and trimming down the page size. The first and fourth styles now use a plain background with a shadow edge, and plain navigation menu. Finally, thumbnails on the home and gallery page are now clickable.

Peter

 

[Petter]

I don't like it at all. The background looks unprofessional, the banner doesn't look nice and the font used on it isn't nice either, I don't like the colors used, the small black/gray markers don't fit the rest of the layout and the layout setup doesn't look to good either IMO. Needs alot of work! :imho:

Best of luck! :wave:

 

[pmj7]

As noted in my previous post, I've experimented with new background options. The final gradient is gone. Also, the header logo has been reduced and reworked. You may have to do a Ctrl-Refresh to clear your cache and see the changes.

Peter

 

[StudioWorks]

Hey pmj7,

Looks much better with this new background. You could use a smaller border size on the main layout tho.

Good luck

 

[pmj7]

Thanks! Increase the default content width (reducing the sidebar area as a side effect), the lengthy text lines become more difficult to read. In any case, another 30-40 pixels and I'm at the maximum width for 800x600 visitors.

I've switched things around a bit for the backgrounds. If there's something you like/dislike please say which style you are using (1,2,3 or 4), the default is 2.

The default style now includes a shadow gradient along the outer border of the content area.

The content pages (everything but the Home page) have more whitespace along the sides to make it look better, and make it easier to read. Studies have shown than you only want to have something like 10-12 words per line to make text easy to read.

The display gallery and edit image pages now remember where they were called from. Closing them returns the visitor back to where they started. Naturally I'm referring to the non popup window approach.

Peter

 

[StudioWorks]

Hello,

Like i said before - you did a preety good job with it. Keep up the good work and good luck developing it

Cheers

 

[pmj7]

Here are the most recent changes:
- reduced size of header
- moved the site search into the navigation menu bar
- reorganized the home page to fit as much as possible 'above the fold'
- added serif font preference option
- slightly changed the layout look
- renamed/reorganized the menu
- added large thumbnails to online image processor description page
- re-worked the services page
- reworded some of the portfolio page, added new thumbs
- added to the about page

I guess it might have been easier to say that just the Gallery page is unchanged!

How's it look now?

Peter

 

[Veolus]

Definitely a great site! :D I love the colour usage and the design itself. Simple but elegant and professional The thing i like most about your site is the Preferences area, I must say i have never seen something like that in all the sites i've visited in the few years i've been using the internet.

Good job! :tu: Good luck with your site

 

[pmj7]

Recent changes:
- second reverse style has been removed
- 3 column style (which will be default for new visitors) for home page
- revised icons on main page
- new 'Articles' section on main page
- the first article, of course!
- fixed the switch between blue and orange backgrounds when loading

Article:
Saying goodbye to Tables

In progress:
Gallery with Google Maps hookup

I'm still working on this enhancement to my gallery. It adds Google Maps directly into the gallery, instead of in a new window. I've added a centerpoint to the map, along with coordinate readout, zoom, and area dimensions below the map. I've got a single thumbnail image on top of the map, clicking on it gives you the full size image. I still have to work on the shadow/border for the thumbnail and put in the others. This is a work in progress, and is not currently hooked up to the rest of the site.

Google Maps is a very powerful tool!

Peter

 

[Mark]

This is my first time seeing it - But I like it - I noticed on your Index that the Babel Translate Buttons are kind of just lingering over a border - Not alligned in a particular area. The addition of Google's Map is nice - But that page is not centered in my viewing area.

Overall the site looks very nice - like the Earthy tones and Sun Scenes :tu:

 

[DJ-Sound]

looks good, Only thing I would change is the background.

 

[pmj7]

First-time visitors should now see the backgrounds as intended. This also corrects the babelfish translation overlap. The gallery's main image is left justified to leave space for larger images, and to better support visitors with lower screen resolutions.

Peter