Starting Out.... Portfolio Site critique

[bugeye1]

Hi there,

I have done a bit of design here and there over the years but nothing serious. I would like to begin to learn to design web sites to support me for college so I started by designing my own portfolio site for practice even though I have nothing to put in it yet. Before I create the actual site, I wanted to check with you guys to see if I am on the right track with the design. Also, I would like some suggestions on how to learn how to do this kind of thing. I know HTML and CSS pretty well, plus a bit of JS.

Click here to see the basic design as it is. Thanks in advance for your careful critique.

-Jeremy Olson

[peter77]

The layout seems fine but the right block of the header doesn't fade away like the rest of the pictures and graphics on the site and I think it would make the site look a lot better if all the images faded.

[Mr C]

I think I'd prefer the header text to be right aligned. The design seems to have to much weight towards the left and needs balancing out.

When you convert to html, be careful with those fonts you have used in the text. They probably won't come out as you expect on others machines. Alternatively you could keep to graphics but that would make the page heavy and invisible to those using screen readers.

Who are you aiming your services at? Clients directly or other design firms you can contract to? If other firms (not directly to clients), make sure your code is good as well as the graphics. It's the second thing I look at when looking through portfolios.

[bugeye1]

I think I'd prefer the header text to be right aligned. The design seems to have to much weight towards the left and needs balancing out.

When you convert to html, be careful with those fonts you have used in the text. They probably won't come out as you expect on others machines. Alternatively you could keep to graphics but that would make the page heavy and invisible to those using screen readers.

Who are you aiming your services at? Clients directly or other design firms you can contract to? If other firms (not directly to clients), make sure your code is good as well as the graphics. It's the second thing I look at when looking through portfolios.

Thanks for the input, I made those changes along with some changes to the layout and text. You can view the latest version http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/4297/site137iw.png

Who am I aiming it at? At this point I am aiming it at myself... I am making it as the first of probably a number of practice websites that I will make for people to teach myself professional web design in order that I can, after a period of time, begin to use the skills I have learned to develop websites professionally so that (hopefully) I can have a debt free college education.

If you all have any suggestions on how to go about learning the trade, I would be glad to hear them as I am eager to start learning.


Update: just got some suggestions from another site, http://img36.imageshack.us/img36/9633/site147ci.png (revised version.)

Another one: http://img196.imageshack.us/img196/227/site154yh.png

[peter77]

There are a lot of website designers about but their are a lot of bad designers about.

Most clients are more concerned with cost instead of quality, which in the long run could even be damaging to their business if their site is poorly designed and hasn’t been optimised for search engines correctly.

I suppose my tip is to stay up to date with current technologies like flash and design techniques and scripting languages and remember to update your site/s regularly.

[bugeye1]

Here is the latest version: http://img271.imageshack.us/img271/6...15color7by.png

Added color and different fonts.

[bugeye1]

Okay, I've done a bit of work more work on it, some balancing and solidifying. Are the changes for the better or for the worse? Click here to see the new version.

[Mr C]

I like it myself.

[bugeye1]

I like it myself.

Thanks. Any suggestions on how to make it better?

Here is another practice site I worked on today. http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/3...mockup31vm.png

It is designed for a company that develops games for the Palm OS platform. I will start development once I get the design on the right track. So please constructive criticism.

Enhanced version: http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/3...mockup68mv.png

Is this any better?

EDIT: Okay those colors were terrible. Here is another version. http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/336...mockup68hw.png

EDIT: Oops, wrong one. Here is the real one: http://img282.imageshack.us/img282/6...mockup82le.png

[planetgman]

I think the color adds the pop you need to make your site stand out.
For sure, the site looked pretty bland before. With a bland design, it is hard to get customers to visualize how great their site will look....not that you can't overcome that. It just makes it easier to paint the picture.
You want customers to say "I want a website that looks as good as yours".....does that make sense?
Also, I have a question. In the middle part of your home page, what do you mean by basic web development? Web development (to a casual viewer) a lot of times means the same thing as web design.
I would lose the word basic, at least for your title. You can always go into it with your description or services page.
The site has some tweaking for sure, but I think you are on the right track........especially with your willingness to take advice and help you.
Good luck......