A Site In Progress

[rspassey]

A friend of mine, and myself are pretty new to web design. We know HTML (decently) and are just a little out of practice. A while ago, I asked for some help 'fancying' up a webpage, and while playing around with that I got more and more interested into web design. We have read some guides and think we know the basics, so we though... it might be a good idea to make a site about web design from the beginners point of view. Somewhat like a blog, where we can share the info we learn about coding and design as we learn it. By far, we aren't experts, but we found many of the popular guides out there to be over complicating for something that seems pretty basic. We have the resources like PhotoShop CS2 and we will probably try our luck with CSS, but first we will get a standard HTML site up and running to play around with things.

Here, is what I have designed so far, and was looking for some suggestions.
Check it out so far

Keep in mind that I have made it for 800x600 res, and will be working on a logo and adding in the rest of the stuff later on - this is just the basic design so far.

Thanks,
Ryan

And remember, I am open to any and all suggestions - Fire Away!

EDIT - after a few minutes of playing around I changed the text slightly, (liquified it)
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a7/...liquidcopy.gif

[Statica]

While it is difficult to critique a design without even seeing a basic template - so you really need to show us what you have in terms of UI and UX, this is what my opinion is - if your site is going to show your expertise in the field of good clean web design, usable fonts and in showing off your expertise in good graphics with photoshop etc then what I've seen is not very encouraging. It does not show me that the author is using photoshop to its fullest extent and that warped text is something that a plugin did and not an author.
I guess I get pet peeved at graphic designs that are "just cos'" as in just cos I have a plugin I am going to give flames to my text or have lightning shooting all over. It does not brand the site effectively at all.

Weelllll you did ask for an honest opinion. Good luck with your new venture!

[rspassey]

Thanks Statica, I appreciate people's honesty. I do see your point, we aren't experts, and we aren't trying to be. Obviously much more time will be spent on the design, UI and what what not, but perhaps I should sit down with my friend and discuss how exactly we would go about this. I mean, sure, both of us can use PhotoShop Plug-Ins, but can we design a nice site? Basically, at first, we thought it would be a neat idea to show our progress while learning the principles of webdesign and development, while sharing the knowledge with others.
For ex: One weekend we are playing around and find some site with a great tutorial on CSS, then we could verify that we may link to the tutorial, and post a link in the "Saturday, Month, ##" display or something and link to a couple dummy sites with which we created after reading and applying the knowledge we learned in that one tutorial. Perhaps, even after, offer a code download or something like that.

For sure, I will work more on a nice logo, and templet. IMO, I kinda like the warped text, even though (obviously) it is made with a plug in.

Again for your honest opinion - Do you even think this site for noobs by noobs idea is one that could be helpful to other people, or just one where my friends and I can share between us what we are learning and show off our own progress with each other?

Thanks,
Ryan

[blue60007]

I do think a site for noobs by noobs is a good idea. Even if you don't go super in-depth with the material, I think writing about web design from a beginner's point of view is much more effective for beginners than writing from an expert's point of view. I know what you mean about some sites over-complicating things. When I first learned HTML I found sites that made it hard to grasp things until I found one site that put everything simply and did one thing at a time. Once you learn things, then these "expert" sites come in handy for reference.

I can't really critique your graphics because, honestly, I couldn't do any better.

One word advice - learn CSS now; it's a great tool to have. It makes life a lot easier. If you want to edit the color of text across a page or a whole site, you just have to change the color in the style sheet.

[rspassey]

Yeah, I have a little knowledge about CSS and am planning on learning more & using it. Hard part right now is designing site layout... I need to set up some sort of flow chart or site map first, so I know how to make the buttons and menus.

[blue60007]

Yeah, that's another thing to do. What I've learned to do is get a piece of paper and at the top you put your Home page, then from there you branch down to your 2nd level pages. From each of those pages you would put any 3rd level pages under that, or break that page down into sub-sections that you would actually have on that page. Keep in mind not to put just *too* much on one page (things need to be broken up some), yet you don't want 100 pages with 2 paragraphs on each page (which is really annoying). I wouldn't put too many sub-subjects [of HTML] in each subject, but if something is only going to take a paragraph or two, you might want to combine it with others smaller areas (and you don't want a zillion buttons/navigation items). What I really like about that one website (that made HTML simple) is they had it broken down into broader categories to make UI items out of, and then once you got into that page, it was broken down into more narrow categories.

[rspassey]

Also, out of curiosity... what would you think a good logo would be? I was thinking some sort of paintbrush or something...

[Cricket]

I don't know anything about web design but I do have a degree in fine arts...I hope you're going to add some colors to that page, it's pretty dull and boring right now. And that black bar is too thick and heavy...it's overpowering your title.

Cricket

[blue60007]

Originally Posted by ryan124712 Also, out of curiosity... what would you think a good logo would be? I was thinking some sort of paintbrush or something...

The only thing I can suggest is just try a few different things and see what looks best.

I agree - you need some color.

[rspassey]

Aight... thanks again for the suggestions. I will have an opertunity to work on it through the week, then post back next weekend with an updated design. The black bar is where I am going to have my general links (Home, About Us, etc.). Color will come.

[Cricket]

So, how's this web site progressing?

Cricket

[rspassey]

Actually, it is going pretty well. I have most of the general layout finished on my PC, but will have yet to include actual content like basic tutorials, and the about us page and stuff. Later today I can host it from FreeWebs or something if you guys want to see what I have accomplished so far. I have it sized for 800*600, but I keep thinking that I have messed something up, because it still looks too small (but size is right).

Anyway, you guys were right CSS makes things a lot easier, and while I haven't implimented it in for everything, I have done what I can as a noob with it.

[rspassey]

Alright.. here is what I have so far.

http://www.freewebs.com/securepc/Cra...rn%20Home.html

I just put in all that blank space in the 'main' table so everyone can see what it would look like theoretically with more text, various images, and what not. I have yet to come up with a logo that I like, so I have still left it out, but I think (IMO) that the site is coming together alright (for a noob). Some stuff has delayed me on getting more progress down, so it will take a while to get it completely finished.