My first website I need critique! :)

[Richard Abear]

Hey guys, im pretty sure this site may look unprofessional at the time being, but im interested to get your oppinions so far, take note this site is hosted on a free website host and so it may not be as fast a load as other websites. and the coding by far hasn't been maximized to its full potential, but i want to know things that i need to change in the site.

take note: this is a work in progress

this is full on HTML/CSS/PHP.

[thepaddyman123]

Hi Richard,

Site looks great, well done only few things I would add:

Link up the rdesign logo to your home page.

The nav text on the footer seems a little small.

Regards

Patrick

[Richard Abear]

thanks Patrick! i will get to work on those as soon as possible

[TheGAME1264]

I don't normally comment on web designers' sites because I'm not in the target market or anywhere close and because most designers are hypersensitive. However, I'm going to break my rule and I'm going to post two objective comments here that have very little to do with design as such.

1) A spell checker. Get one. Fast. If you can't spell "excellence", you can't truly strive for it. Make that your motto.

2) Contrast ratios. Run a contrast ratio check on the colors in your site. If they're too low, then people will have a difficult time reading your site. Yours are too low, and it's past the point where one could consider that statement subjective.

[Richard Abear]

Thanks for the critique TheGame! Much appreciated. I will be taking in all of this when creating the final design for my portfolio site.

P.S. The contrast ratio checker was really usefull info. thanks a lot for that.

[SeanMS]

I see that you speak three different languages, but your site definitely needs to be checked for grammar, punctuation, and spelling errors. I say this from an objective point, because I know that you're trying to promote yourself. Keep in mind that those errors are taking away from the "professional" feel of the website.

Also, the color contrast (as stated by TheGAME1264), is not enough.
Additionally, the slider under your navigation bar does not seem to stay on the current page (it slides back under the "home" link, even if you are still on the "about me" or "contact me" page.

[Peter Lewis]

very nice use of white space but no footer on the about me page? the "vision design develop please" menu is vague, i did not realize that it was a menu until i clicked on it to see what it was. you should use the nice typography of your other pages to style the contact form. the line under the main menu would look nicer if it was aligned to the end of the logo (they overlap).

[NewAmbition]

Hey Richard,

The flow and minimalistic style to the site is quite a big plus in my books.
However, you need to find someone who majored in English and literature to help format your information and terminology.

Every paragraph starts either with 'I am', or 'I have'. I already know the basis of the site is about you, so there is no need to draw more attention to it. Also, try write out what you want to display in Microsoft Word, or something similar to take full advantage of the spelling and grammar check. I think nothing is more off-putting in a professional site than a sentence that makes no sense, or doesn't start with a capital letter.

Your site looks more like a resume', rather one that shows off web development. If you want people to take it seriously, you need to show off some skills, rather than say what you can do. Anyone on the internet can boast about what they can do, but much fewer can show it.

You advertise that you can 'design and develop', but then go on to say that you are 'more attuned to developing than designing'. This isn't what a client wants to see, as I will convey doubt on what you really can do.

Back on topic - an altogether well designed site

[Phil Abi-Najm]

A few things:

• Not sure how your navigation is supposed to flow, but the header nav and subheader nav don't flow at all... And the footer menu seems to be misaligned requiring horizontal scroll on viewports that are 1024px wide.
• Some of the textual content are images, and not accessible via screen readers, therefor not SEO friendly.
• Though the single page site can be easy to rank SEO wise, Google will not see any of the content when display: none; is being used.

Keep iterating over the design, you'll get it!

[Richard Abear]

Thanks guys for all the comments and suggestions. i will keep them all in mind when releasing the finished site. as of now, yes i agree that there a lot of things i need to work on, from content to overall styling, and of course i have to make the site more SEO friendly.

@NewAmbition, thanks for the heads up, i was not aware that saying i was more attuned to developing rather than designing would give off that kind of message. i will change that when I release the final site. Also i agree i need to brush up on my english. :P

@Phil, thanks for the heads up on the compatibility issue of the footer.

@Peter, thanks for suggestions, i was actually going for that style on the horizontal ruler, i didnt want it to go all the way, but thanks for pointing out to me that it would look nicer if i set it 100% width.

Again thanks everyone for the reviews these help me a lot.

P.S. with the current reviews now, i can start working on the actual final website. Thanks to everyone who took the time to review and comment on the site.