My new portfolio site

[TheGAME1264]

Hi guys,

I just relaunched my portfolio site. For the most part, it should be okay, but there may be some odd goofiness since I just put it up.

There also will be an addon at some point in the future (a blog of sorts), so this is part of the reason for the redesign.

Anyway, leave your thoughts as usual. I may adjust a couple of things this weekend, but I actually think it turned out kind of sort of maybe okay for the most part.

[George Dolidze]

For now, the only thing I dont like is that the bottom scrolly part is a little cramped on my resolution. The header takes up top half of the screen. You might want to spread out the phone number and the contact form link horizontally.

[Andrew Yurlov]

For now, the only thing I dont like is that the bottom scrolly part is a little cramped on my resolution. The header takes up top half of the screen. You might want to spread out the phone number and the contact form link horizontally.

I think your header is way to big. Its cool that it doesn't move but its takes up too much of my screen. Every time I look at it I fell like I want to move it out of the way like a window lol. Oh and when I open it it loads painfully slow. The first time my internet crashed. I don't know if its because of your site.. maybe just a coincidence.

[Andrew Yurlov]

Also, when it starts loading the only text I can see is the navigation at a standard font but when the rest of the page finishes loading the font an size change.

[smoseley]

Ok, Adam, put on your thick skin... I'm gonna tear it apart a little.

1. Portfolio Scroller in the header.... doesn't make sense there, really, from a branding standpoint. Is the site called "view my portfolio"? That's what stands out the strongest as a "logo" of sorts.

2. When I click a link on the scroller, I get a .net error. Lots of the site, actually. I understand it's in development. Just make sure when it's done, they're all gone.

3. When rolling over the arrows, I get a 1999 single-speed scroll effect, with no accelimation. Forget about having any control over how fast I move... it feels clunky and old and isn't usable.

4. Now let's talk about those borders on the scroller. Whoah contrast! How about turning down white to a medium brown tone? Will still be noticeable, and will not hurt the eyes. Better yet, go with thicker solid borders to match the content of the site. You're not doing a double border anywhere else.

5. Hate the font you used for your name/logo. Maybe if it was 2-3x bigger, it would "feel" playful.

6. Why, with Google Web Fonts, are you using Cufon for the text in your header and menu?? Cufon is dead! Didn't you get the memo?

7. And why is the header area so tall? You could easily lay out the contact info horizontally and make better use of that space.

8. The fixed header is WAY too tall. On my widescreen laptop, it consumes more than 1/2 the height of the browser. That's very bad. I can't visualize an entire page of content at a time, and I have to scroll twice as much... A fixed header shouldn't be more than 50-60px. Yours is about 400px.

9. The actual content isn't really designed well. It's very text heavy. No iconography. No typography to indicate importance. Again, it feels like 1999.

10. The colors, textures, and fonts chosen are all really nice. But they're not combined together into a harmonious package. Everything feels "incomplete" (missing a buff, and then some polish, if you will). Start with some of the broad-stroke changes I suggest (e.g. fixing the header disaster), and then go through and start adding formatting to the "incomplete" bits. I know that content design is the annoying part, but it's what makes a website great.

[TheGAME1264]

I f**king hate the three of you.

Steven: I'm not using Google Fonts until they actually come up with some way to anti-alias fonts properly, and if they have it, I haven't seen it yet. Until then, I'm sticking with Cufon. I have no problem switching if/when that happens, though.

I have absolutely no idea what accelimation means (never heard the word before). Either tell me or show me what you're talking about.

Not sure which borders you mean. Be more specific.

The font...you never like any fonts, so that's staying.

It was tall because when I tried to put the contact mail button to the right, I couldn't get it to look right. I'll mess with it again on the weekend, though. It's going to stay fairly tall for a reason, though. If anything, I may unfix it and recap the menu on the footer. It's 324 pixels, not 400. I did try to keep laptops in mind, though.

And where exactly would I put icons (more importantly, what) in the layout? I'm going to rewrite some of the pages anyway, but I'm intentionally trying to keep the use of icons to a minimum 1) because I can't draw them worth a crap, 2) because the free ones almost never fit with what I'm trying to do and 3) because that's not what I'm going for. I'm also not just going to stick them in unless they work.

If I'm going to do anything, I'll stick pictures into the pages (not the articles because they're going to get moved in the long run) to illustrate various things, and I was thinking about that anyway. Just to be clear, this is not the end point, but a starting point.

The scroller is where it is intentionally for now. I'm not going to get into the reason (mostly because I don't expect it to make a lot of sense to anyone in the web community but me at the moment), but I have one.

Andrew: the site was in a debug mode, which may have been the reason why you saw what you saw. Try it now. it's also why there were .NET errors.

[Andrew Yurlov]

I f**king hate the three of you.

Steven: I'm not using Google Fonts until they actually come up with some way to anti-alias fonts properly, and if they have it, I haven't seen it yet. Until then, I'm sticking with Cufon. I have no problem switching if/when that happens, though.

I have absolutely no idea what accelimation means (never heard the word before). Either tell me or show me what you're talking about.

Not sure which borders you mean. Be more specific.

The font...you never like any fonts, so that's staying.

It was tall because when I tried to put the contact mail button to the right, I couldn't get it to look right. I'll mess with it again on the weekend, though. It's going to stay fairly tall for a reason, though. If anything, I may unfix it and recap the menu on the footer. It's 324 pixels, not 400. I did try to keep laptops in mind, though.

And where exactly would I put icons (more importantly, what) in the layout? I'm going to rewrite some of the pages anyway, but I'm intentionally trying to keep the use of icons to a minimum 1) because I can't draw them worth a crap, 2) because the free ones almost never fit with what I'm trying to do and 3) because that's not what I'm going for. I'm also not just going to stick them in unless they work.

If I'm going to do anything, I'll stick pictures into the pages (not the articles because they're going to get moved in the long run) to illustrate various things, and I was thinking about that anyway. Just to be clear, this is not the end point, but a starting point.

The scroller is where it is intentionally for now. I'm not going to get into the reason (mostly because I don't expect it to make a lot of sense to anyone in the web community but me at the moment), but I have one.

Andrew: the site was in a debug mode, which may have been the reason why you saw what you saw. Try it now. it's also why there were .NET errors.

It loads a little better and I haven't seen any .net errors yet.

[TheGAME1264]

Yup.

I guess I should probably have waited before I went to the gym. heh

[George Dolidze]

I f**king hate the three of you.

Mission accomplished

[TheGAME1264]

Okay, you bastards, I figured out how to get the contact email link on the same line. It looked like a bag of *** the first time I did it, but it's okay now.

I'm still leaving the header fixed for now, and I'm still leaving the portfolio at the top. The exact height of the header is 266 pixels, and I'm okay with that for the time being. I'm going to see what happens with this.

I think I know what's making the home page load slower than I would like, and it should be fixable tomorrow. I'm going to have to mess with it to make it happen, though.