Another website critique

[Bob Fischer]

I have been working on my site for so long!! After months of surfing and getting ideas, I think I have finally found what I am looking for.

First a little insight. My main priorities were to keep the site fast loading (which means little or no flash), keep the design simple so it won't detract from the images and to make it easy to navigate.

Basically just clean and simple.

Site is not wquite done, still have one gallery to populate and need to come up with some wording for the Services page. Just wanted to get some insight from others.

www.bobthephotoguy.com

Thank you for looking and any comments
Bob

[Daniel Buck]

One thing that looks out of place to me is the logo. The animals looking at the sign with the lensflare? Just seems really out of place and cheesy looking. Is it a place holder?

[John Thawley]

Well, Bob... be ready for opinions... we got 'em. LOL

Please don't take this as bragging... but just to give you some background, I've been developing commercial web sites since 1994 (Detroit Lions, Penske, Rockwell Automotive, Trans-Am to name a few). So, I'd like to offer some qualified criticisms.

Daniel is right about the "clever" header. It immediately reduces the professionalism of the presentation.

More importantly, you've given up a ton screen real estate with the size (height) of the header. Remember, it's not YOUR screen real estate... it belongs to the person visiting your site. Use the available space efficiently, elegantly, and effectively.

Frames and boxes... you got a lot of boxes. And... you're into four colors.... at some point "clean" left the building.

Choose grey or black for your background and one color for your text... For your navigation, choose a slightly larger/heavier font than your body text. Same with the section title.. is you're using a Title style font, it shouldn't require a box to define it.

You can also separate your navigation links/buttons with a nice simple single rule spaced below them.

Feel free to look at http://www.johnthawley.com or http://www.wheelsonwalls.com - and http://www.c2group.com

[Bob Fischer]

Thanks Daniel and John!!

The Meerkats banner is a holdover from when I was doing a lot of photogtraphy for the Zoo. I made it on a whim one day and it was so well liked it became almost a logo. So I didn't even think twice about putting it up there, but it is time to move on.

John, my comments regarding keeping the site clean and simple were directed more at the idea that so many photographers seem to want their site to have so much flash and other garbage, that it takes the attention away from the images and the first impression is 'What a pretty site!'. I didn't want that, I wanted the first comment to be a response to the images.

Now that I have gotten used to such a simple site, I see where your (John's) design is taking that one step further and it doesn't seem so stark.

I'll plat around some more with it.

Thank you
Bob