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phobos · Aug 10, 2007, 08:03 AM

Well here is my new web page. I've been wanting to change my older site but couldn't be bothered with work and all.
As you can see the building aspect of the site is quite ancient... It uses images and rollovers but I tried to optimise them as much as possible so they would be quite light even on slow connections.
I need to also put a few more bits of my work but the bare-bones site is there.
So check it out and tell me what you think.

marvelous decay

besson3c · Aug 10, 2007, 09:41 AM

Well, aboutme renders incorrectly in Firefox. Make sure that your images embedded in hrefs include a "border = 0" either in the tag itself or the CSS to prevent those blue halos.

It looks like you put this page together using ImageReady? I'd *strongly* suggest that you learn to hand code, as you will be greatly rewarded for this within your Google search results. The coding for your homepage is not too bad, but you will rank much higher if you include some info about yourself in alt or title tags. You could simplify the design into a single image background with your links on top, this may make the page load a little faster and improve your ranking too.

andi*pandi · Aug 10, 2007, 11:54 AM

mystery navigation to get back home from "about me" as well. Should have at least a rollover or alt tag on the image being used as "home". Is the portfolio section not working? There was nothing there but a background image for me.

Oisín · Aug 10, 2007, 12:52 PM

The Portfolio section uses Flash (none too well, incidentally—while the effect it’s intended to make is nice, the movements of the pictures are jagged and choppy).

Other than that, I like the site, apart from the speed (it’s very slow here). About Me could incorporate actual text, as well, instead of a text image. But it’s very visually pleasing, as a whole.

phobos · Aug 10, 2007, 02:40 PM

I'm having troubles with the flash part of the portfolio. In safari it displays without a problem. But in Firefox and some versions of internet explorer it doesn't. That is a huge problem that needs resolving. But I'm not that html (or whatever that is) savvy to solve it fast....

sts24 · Aug 10, 2007, 02:59 PM

I really like the art style of the site. However, I would make that portfolio page load all the samples quicker. If it is still loading, then say so, but if not then make them all come in at once. Keep it up!

phobos · Aug 10, 2007, 06:53 PM

Thanks for your advice people!
The about me page has been changed and it now renders properly. I also got rid of the funny text which a lot of people I asked commented on.
Besson3c you are right. Metatags is the next thing on my list. Nut I will probably do it tomorrow. Too tired to deal with it now...
It seems that the portfolio issue is strictly limited to the mac version of firefox. Which is at least better than not working on all browsers other than safari.
I can't really do anything about it at the moment. This is a known bug. I have to figure out though a workaround.
Any ideas are greatly appreciated

besson3c · Aug 10, 2007, 07:03 PM

Originally Posted by phobos

Thanks for your advice people!
The about me page has been changed and it now renders properly. I also got rid of the funny text which a lot of people I asked commented on.
Besson3c you are right. Metatags is the next thing on my list. Nut I will probably do it tomorrow. Too tired to deal with it now...
It seems that the portfolio issue is strictly limited to the mac version of firefox. Which is at least better than not working on all browsers other than safari.
I can't really do anything about it at the moment. This is a known bug. I have to figure out though a workaround.
Any ideas are greatly appreciated

Just so you know, alt and title tags are different than <meta> tags.

Consolidating the images into a single image like I've described will not only help simplify the code, but it ought to also speed up the page load time. In addition, with this savings, another idea came to mind... You could preload some or all of your portfolio pics so that when the Lightbox effect is triggered, the page loads immediately.

(I'm assuming you are using Lightbox on the portfolio page)

Very attractive look though!

phobos · Aug 11, 2007, 09:40 AM

Thanks besson3c. I guess I have to look into all that. I'll do some net searching and see what I can find out.

Faust · Aug 11, 2007, 09:53 AM

You may also want to look into coding your design via CSS as CSS is meant for presentation. You now have a bunch of tables that are not meant to be used to hold images which also slow down your site. More real text (not in the form of imagery) for those areas where you actually do use text would be good. Using proper alt and title attributes also help (note, these are not tags but attributes) to describe and help identify your works. If you absolutely insist on using non-native fonts for your headings, you could use image replacement techniques (do a google search on text image replacement) or even sIFR which is a flash and JavaScript image replacement technique that is quite nice (though not perfect as none of the techniques are) and also crawlable by search engines.

There are tons of invaluable resources to get you started. You may want to try out Alistapart and - of course - the indispensable W3C. Another nice place for CSS beginners is CSSbasics.

shifuimam · Aug 11, 2007, 01:54 PM

It's arty, but it's way too graphics-heavy. Making images in Photoshop and then slicing them in ImageReady is an obsolete way to create websites. Try depending less on lots of graphics and more on text to design your site.

And, FWIW, the "Dimitris" on the name tag of the "About Me" page uses an extremely overused "handwriting" font - it's all over the web now, and using that particular one just makes it look a little more amateur. Just my $0.03.

iREZ · Aug 14, 2007, 12:47 PM

im using firefox and the portfolio isn't working for me. another bother for me is that there seems to be no continuity with your navigation links, leaving me searching for things that either have moved or aren't there.

phobos · Aug 14, 2007, 04:33 PM

iRez unfortunately the portfolio part doesn't work with firefox on mac. It''s a known issue and something I need to invest some time to fix.

leblancchris · Aug 15, 2007, 08:55 PM

i dont understand the portfolio page...i wasnt able to view anything.

phobos · Aug 16, 2007, 05:07 AM

Originally Posted by leblancchris

i dont understand the portfolio page...i wasnt able to view anything.

For the time being firefox doesn't work properly with the portfolio page. It loads all the images but doesn't display them.
Use safari instead.

Let's not repeat the same thing over and over again

adamfishercox · Aug 16, 2007, 03:29 PM

The portfolio page worked fine on mine, but it was too big for my Safari window, height and width wise. Even when fully maximized at 1400x900 resolution it is too big.

phobos · Aug 16, 2007, 05:20 PM

hmm this is not that good. could you grab a screenshot for me to see?
Thanks

adamfishercox · Aug 16, 2007, 05:31 PM

phobos · Aug 20, 2007, 02:23 AM

wow that is really strange!!
That is when you have clicked on an image or just when the page loads?

I did a quick test and the portfolio shows fine, with no cuts etc, on a 1109x792 window. So you are pretty much covered there.
The page doesn't resize the content automatically. Choose the browser window size you usually work with and hit refresh. The content will be resized.

Let me know how it goes

adamfishercox · Aug 20, 2007, 08:29 AM

Same thing, both before and after I click...