Female Celebrity Site

wrmineo · #1 (**permalink**) 09-29-2005, 07:24 PM

I need the help of the WPW Peer Power please.

I am redesigning my female celebrities website.

I am modifying the CSS to change up the colors, headings, link behaviors, etc.

I am tweaking many of the images to render in sepia for a classier look.

I have added a drop down box to different celebrity sections to hopefully make navigation easier and allow for knowledge and promotion of a plethora of different celebrities.

Please let me know what you think of the new look of the homepage at [url]http://www.freshdames.com/[url]. If this seems like it's going to work, I am going to begin to modify other pages to match.

I'm asking for your feedback, comments and critique so I can apply the necessary changes and render the changes throughout the site.

Thanks!

Steve W · #2 (**permalink**) 09-29-2005, 07:45 PM

Hi wRm,

Not sure I like the sepia, my reason being it's the photos that sell your site, and with the sepia your home page is the equivalent of broadcasting black & white tv. Are you using GD or ImageMagick to create those sepia tones? Manually it will get tiring pretty quickly I'd have thought... :o)

**brian.mark** · #3 (**permalink**) 09-29-2005, 09:17 PM

I'd have to agree that the sepia, while making it "Classier" and more "Artistic" also makes it lose some of the appeal of the celebrities. There aren't any blue eyes, blond hair, etc. that make the stars really shine.

I'll have to go on record saying I liked it better the other way (full color that is.) The rest of the site seems much cleaner than I remember it and I like those changes.

The only other comment I have is that this looks great at 800x600, but when I get to 1280x1024 (my native resolution) or hit the "Maximize full" button (3840x1024) it looks really light on the content. Some sites look great across my monitor like that, but most just look weak. Even at 1280x1024, your site is starting to look pretty thin on content. I don't think I'd do a 100% width on your site for that reason.

Brian.

wrmineo · #4 (**permalink**) 09-29-2005, 09:43 PM

Notes about the sepia well put and fully appreciated - change will happen tomorrow to revert back. One of the goals was trying to get the pictures to better blend with the page color and look more "artsy" ... but your points are valid.

Brian, I actually had nearly 1000 words of content on the front page at one time and was trying to "lighten" it up so that it didn't seem too busy and allowing for better keyword saturation. Your points are well taken and appreciated - I need to find a "happy-medium". BTW - does this http://www.freshdames.com/jessica_simpson.html fill the page any better?

Back to the drawing board - stay tuned please, it'll be undergoing more changes as I get good ideas like these and more eyes on the changes with feedback is always appreciated.

**brian.mark** · #5 (**permalink**) 09-29-2005, 09:51 PM

It sort of fills it better. The page feels off-balance, though. Your block of pictures being centered move well over (when I'm at extreme res) from where everything else sits. Having the content more formatted (more line breaks and quick facts) sure helps it to not get quite so choppy.

A few changes I'd consider for that page.

1) Make the cells the buttons on the left sit in a fixed size. They grow pretty big very quickly.

2) Set the block of images to float a certain amount from the side - centered sure makes them move a long ways on a wide screen, and with the set formatting they don't really fill up the page any better.

This is why many sites (ours included) use fixed width for 800x600 screens. On my wide format, our page just centers itself. Left aligned works nicely, too. Stretch just ends up being a mess, but then again most people don't run 3 screen widths like I do. ;-) We do see our share of 1280x1024 and higher, though.

Brian.

wrmineo · #6 (**permalink**) 10-03-2005, 08:54 AM

I've changed the images again, removing the sepia tone pics and went back to full color. Yes, it was apparent that the site's visitors are coming there for the pictures, not an artsy look or for content, expect in rare occurrences.

janeth · #7 (**permalink**) 10-03-2005, 12:29 PM

First thought, the header needs some pictures added to it to spice it up a little.

It also needs a logo.

The background color needs to be different from the text and the rest of the site.

A lot of really great information on the site.

I really like the site.

But when I clicked on Jessica Alba and then went to Britney Spears I got a page with no headers and a lot of banners.

I would try and keep the look of the site the same through out the site.

wrmineo · #8 (**permalink**) 10-03-2005, 01:20 PM

Thanks for the positive comments and honest critique Janeth. Yes, there are still a lot of old pages that need to be brought into the fold, meaning a consistent look/feel of the rest of the site.

This is my first website and it's been one big lessons learned project, but, it's almost gotten out of control too.

Thanks!