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

 

[alegend]

I think it would loook better with a better background The rest of the site is looking nice!

 

[BuLLDoG]

with the domain being related to pixel, I think it would look cool with some pixel art going on, on the website design although looks decent at the moment!

 

[GJ]

Looking good! I like it!

 

[iDeviseFlash]

lose the gradient seperators, and do something about the bg, so it doesnt appear the content was just slapped on top of it, make it fade into the bg or something.

 

[Quicksilver]

looks pretty nice to me =)

 

[briman1970]

The banner/logo at the top doesn't live up to the rest of the site IMHO. There are some pretty good designers at NP (and cheap too). Maybe someone here could help you out.

Bri

 

[sufi]

Looks nice, great work.

 

[weblaunch]

Very nice site overall. Easy, intuitive navigation structure. I would not mix serif and sans-serif fonts, however.

 

[Rowan W]

Excellent coding and design work. It couldn't be easier to use.

 

[ammo]

I love that top banner, good work, and good luck!

 

[pmj7]

Thanks for the comments, here are a few changes I've made:

- The gray background on the sides has been replaced with something that better complements the header image
- Narrowing the home page sidebar leaves more room for above fold content
- The main navigation 'hover' effect is more pronounced
- Galleries can now be shown in the same window, or in a popup window
- Extra hints on the gallery page "800x600 visitors should display galleries in a new window, or hit F11 to enlarge viewing area."
- Portfolio page reflects the new same page vs new window style for galleries
- Traditional Chinese now available as a translation option
- css file cleaned up
- galleries now have the option of coming up in the same window or in a popup

Thanks!

Peter

 

[StudioWorks]

Well done pmj7 ! You did a great job.

A few observations :

- I would get rid of the white&black gradients on the main page .. they are so useless and ruins the look of your site. You could use a CSS customized <hr> instead of that.
- reduce the size of the shadow under the menu .
- on the portfolio page - bad idea in using frames. I know that frames gives you the possibily to show multiple photos of a certain project but you can also use a nice slideshow instead.

Last but not least i want to congratulate you on the your good writen code.

W3 Validator says : This Page Is Valid XHTML 1.0 Strict!

Congratulations and best of luck!

:wave:

 

[danBoT]

looks pretty nice

 

[pmj7]

StudioWorks:

I would get rid of the white&black gradients on the main page .. they are so useless and ruins the look of your site.
Tried it without, while designing and now and it doesn't look as good.

You could use a CSS customized <hr> instead of that.
They are.

on the portfolio page - bad idea in using frames. I know that frames gives you the possibily to show multiple photos of a certain project but you can also use a nice slideshow instead.
I don't use frames on my site, it's css. There is a slideshow if you click on a thumbnail or click on 'larger images'.

Congratulations and best of luck!
Thanks!

microdude431:

Overall a nice site . I think the banner would look good with a font that matches the rest of the site
Originally I used a font that was closer to that of the text, and didn't give it much thought. Several comments prompted me to take a closer look. There's no reason that a site title/logo should match that of the font used for the text of the site. The font used for the body of text has to be readable at a relatively small size, and partly because of that it doesn't look that great when shown at a much larger size. Plus, plain old Verdana isn't exactly known for being distinctive and memorable. There's my $10 answer, and I'm stickin' to it!

Thanks guys! :wave:

Peter

 

[StudioWorks]

No problem :D

It would be nice if you will make the changes we suggested. Keep developing and improving it.

Best of luck :D

 

[bhyraj]

Best site. I like background. good job.

 

[pmj7]

Latest changes include a new side background to match the alternate header (the snow covered mountains), and better printing through css.

Peter

 

[StudioWorks]

Im not seeing any changes..oh well..

Peter Check your text in the footer.

This text :

© Copyright 2004-2005, Peter Jones, all rights reserved.
Pixel Development: RSS, XHTML, CSS, 508
May 11, 2005 2:39:01 PM (PST)

...apears to be WHITE :D

Cheers.

 

[pmj7]

You may have to hold down the Ctrl key and hit refresh (or clear your cache) to load the changed CSS file. The footer text is intentionally white, since you brought it up do you feel that there is insufficient contrast?

Peter