75% Finished, Awaiting All Comments!

SherylT · #1 03-11-2007, 04:12 AM

Hi, everyone!

Well, I've been plugging away at redesigning my website so that I can switch my nameservers over to VH.

All my main navigation pages are complete, and if you go to "Cartoon Designs", then "Kids", the top row of designs takes you to their order page. I'm still working on all the other product pages.

I've used the "gallery" feature so you can click on any image and see an enlarged version. I've learned .php and created menu, footer and blue bar at the top so I can make changes easier.

I anxious await all your comments, good or bad. (I can take it, just let me go and get my Pina Colada first!)

Can't wait to move this site over to VH . . . I'm getting really close!

Sheryl Tupa
http://cust-m-cartoons.custmcartoons.com
Personalized Cartoons for All Occasions

larazovich · #2 03-11-2007, 05:00 AM

I like you site alot, Sheryl. Lots to look at, bright and cheerful and fun to look at. Good Job.

Here are a couple of comments.

I am not a fan of page transitions in general, though the one you have chosen is the least objectionable in my opinion. If you really want to use them I would make them as short a duration as possible, so that if other people are annoyed by them, as I am, they will at least tolerate them. (Understand that I may be in the minority here - this is just my opinion..)

The only other thing is the listings of SPORTS, MILITARY, etc that are around the pictures of personalized things -- I think they should be links. I realize that after you click the start to shop they are right there, but I think making those words links would provide another way for folks to 'get to the goods'

Good luck, Sheryl

SherylT · #3 03-11-2007, 06:24 AM

Thanks, Liz. I appreciate the input. I do intend to make the words you mentioned on the home page links. Just hadn't decided which exact picture to "link" them to yet.

I didn't think the transition was too slow, but I'll experiment on a couple of new pages, to see the difference. If I'm going to change it, I should do it before creating all my product pages.

Sheryl
http://cust-m-cartoons.custmcartoons.com
Personalized Cartoons for All Occasions

Bethers · #4 03-11-2007, 06:41 AM

Sheryl,
I think you've done a great job - you've got your title tags and h1's in place :)

A couple things - in BV - occasionally it shows a line with extra space between it - look at the space between the last 2 lines in your footer. An easy fix - after the last character on the last line always put in another space or enter - and it'll not do that. Not sure why it does, but that easy fix takes care of it.

And, personally, I'm not a fan of that green background you're using. Maybe a darker green or a pale yellow or even red - but it just doesn't have a happy effect for me - and your site should project happy! The green in your name works, but not in the background.

See what others think - if it's just me - then ignore my feeling there.

Personally, I like the transition and it's fast.

Liz - you should use firefox - then you won't get the transitions!

Karen Mac · #5 03-11-2007, 07:03 AM

<waving> Hi Sheryl,

I agree with Beth on the green, unless maybe you can do something to break it up with .. i dunno cartoons or something on it. I know its there cuz it goes with the green in the name, but it kinda clashes with the blues of the menu etc. Other than that I think it looks great. You do good work anyway.

Karen

SherylT · #6 03-11-2007, 07:20 AM

Thanks ladies . . . no sooner said than done! Switched home page to pale yellow background. Whatcha think?

Think I got the footer fixed too.

Bethers · #7 03-11-2007, 07:34 AM

Well, darn - I don't like this yellow either. I think you might want to try some bright colors - like the yellow in the middle of the page - or the blue color you use on the home page - with the white text on it.

Usually I don't say to use bright colors, but try it and see if it works?

SherylT · #8 03-11-2007, 07:40 AM

Good thing I'm not trying to change this in SOI or Dreamweaver!! Home page is now "bright yellow" and if you click on Personalized Items, I did that one in the same blue as the banner.

Collectors-info · #9 03-11-2007, 12:50 PM

Hi, your site has the right feel to it & makes me smile.
But most of the thumb nail images are fuzzy. Sorry to put this on a downer on this side of things. But if you’re selling a form of art, the images should be the most important & of the best quality. Its hard to reduce this type of image without some problem. But have you tried having just 2 columns with the full size image? Or are you planning to have many more on each page?

Beth might give you some advice on the next part. Using the .php method, you may have to be careful on your m/tags & all this side of things, so you don’t end up with 2 lots of conflicting tags.

SherylT · #10 03-11-2007, 04:06 PM

Chris, thanks for input. I agree that the thumbnails are fuzzy. The images are supplied by my distributor on a Web Disk. The reason I didn't go just 2 across is that there are soooo many images on some of the pages, that I didn't want customers scrolling down, down, down, forever trying to find a picture they liked. That's the reason that I used the gallery feature so each could be enlarged when clicked.

Not sure what you mean by m/tags. Beth didn't mention anything about that in her earlier message. BTW -- what is your feeling on the background color? Beth and Karen didn't like the green, and the more I look at it now, I guess I really don't either!

Collectors-info · #11 03-11-2007, 09:07 PM

Hi, I think the images are one of two things. If you are using the BV picture gallery, you have to be very careful on using the blue tab handles for sizing the gallery after you have loaded the images. I haven’t used this part in BV before so I have pinched some of you images to test it. & found that you cant squeeze the gallery inwards to make the images smaller as it distorts the images badly.
If you put 4 images in the gallery, you have to pull the blue tabs out top & sides slowly until the images are no longer getting any bigger or distorted. You can see what the difference is if yours have been squeezed inwards.

You can make your pages load a lot faster by reducing most of the images that are shown on the web, but not the ones you sell. Here are a few I reduced http://www.collectors-info.com/testing/imagetest.html to test the gallery. The only thing is that you wouldn’t be able to use the gallery using reduced images. You would have to manually link the small images to the large ones.

As for the yellow part, I like yellow but that one is a bit bright & distracts you from the goods. Maybe try a boarder around the center panel like the one on the link above. This one is set at 10.

On the boarder side of things! I think a lot of the images actually look better with boarders, only because most of them have a lot of white space near the edges.

The other thing I noticed is that the pop ups work fine with IE7, but don’t seem to work with firefox. I get a full page open on my machine. But let someone else confer this 1st.

The m/tags? Just to make sure you don’t put any keywords & alike on your .php template/menu page, or you will have 2 lots on each page.

Good luck.

SherylT · #12 03-11-2007, 09:20 PM

Wow! You did a nice job on the pictures. So if I understand you right, I shouldn't use the "gallery", but there is a way to put a link with each image to make it enlarge for viewing? I know VH has what is called a Pix Resizer? Is that what you used to reduce the image sizes?

Before I get too far into this website, I could change pictures on the category page to just 3 across. The most pictures on one page that I would have would be 49. So if you don't think scrolling down 17 lines would be to awkward maybe I should try that to get a cleaner look on the pictures.

SherylT · #13 03-11-2007, 10:12 PM

Chris, could you give me the steps you took to resize images? If I'm going to redo them all, I might as well get it right?

Bethers · #14 03-12-2007, 05:55 AM

Using the gallery shouldn't hurt the pictures at all. I use it on all my products and it doesn't distort them, because the gallery feature will NOT take them out of proportion. The regular image one will but the gallery one always keeps them in proportion, even when you resize them by making them bigger or smaller.

And you do NOT want to resize the images down - then it does no good to use the gallery feature - because if you click on them you'll get the same size. You want to use the largest image you can.

What you do want to do - is make sure you are checking on the box to use "thumbnail" in the gallery picture.

If the pictures aren't of the best quality- the other won't help.

However, if you use the regular image for a picture you want to size the picture first so that you can display it at the size you put in.

Bethers · #15 03-12-2007, 06:04 AM

And on the colors - I like the blue. :)