Website Concept Review

Dave1975

Active Member
Hi everyone,

Some of you may have seen my thread concerning my new logo design and development in the Logo section - http://www.designforums.co.uk/logos-identity-branding/522-updated-logo-identity.html

I've finally had time to put together an initial concept for my new site design and would love some feedback on it, I'm pleased with it overall but keen to get input as worried it's just been me seeing it and don't want to get caught in 'the zone' too much!

Here it is: http://www.gregfindley.com/private/greg.png
I had it as a left aligned site to start with but this made your eye wonder to the dark grey background on the right and didn't really give space for the logo to breathe, so switched it to centered with a bit of spacing at the top.

Thanks in advance for any replies!
Greg
 
Looking good Greg. I really like that. The only thing I don't like is the drop shadow (maybe because it only has a drop shadow in the top, just looks a bit strange) on the image of yourself and the placement of the image. Maybe have the same border style as on your blog entry images. And then move it a little to the right so you get a bit if space and move the intro text slightly to the right as well to line up to the right side of the logo? Apart from that I think it's a brilliant and original design.
 
Thanks for your feedback Soren, only noticed after I posted that all the text had moved out of line a touch so fixed that and re-uploaded :)

Yeah the areas I'm not too sure on are the little photo and pencil icon down that left hand side, good idea with the photo though will give that a try - thanks!
 
Oh just another thing as well. Have you tried aligning the menu items to the Pencil instead of having them near the middle? Then if you decide to move your self portrait a bit to the right it would all line up?
 
Thanks Soren, this is what I have now: http://www.gregfindley.com/private/greg2.png
Beginning to wonder if I need the little images of me and the pencil icon at all?

The idea of the menu text positioning is that it continues the line down from gregfindley in my logo at the top... will give it a go and see how it looks.

Thanks for the feedback :)
Greg
 
Yeah I don't really know about the pencil icon. But I guess having an icon there does draw attention to that area and what you offer. Hmm.. I don't know. You could ditch them I guess and then just have an image of yourself in the 'About section'?. I personally think the icon creates too much white space on the left side of the 'what I can do for you' list and think it would look better if you aligned your intro text, menu and 'what I can do for you' list to the left and make them line up.

If you want to keep the icon you could make it smaller and put it just to the left of the 'what I can do for you' text and move the text a bit to the right so it still lines up with the rest? Hope that makes sense.
 
You're welcome Greg :). Definitely prefer greg3.png. Think it looks a lot neater. I'd still move everything in the left column a tiny bit to the left but that's just me. Wicked design Greg! Love the cut out 'G' . And I like the layout of your content as well.
 
Really superb work Greg. I really dig how clean everything looks, and your layout and spacing is just about perfect in my book (which is rare for me to say!).

When I first saw #1, I definitely didn't like the picture/icon positioning and styles, but once I saw #2, I felt it was perfect. I'll disagree with Aarlev and say that I prefer #2 over #3. I think the photo and icon add color to the side-nav and break-up the monotony and plainness of just text. Without them, the left side bar just looks boring and missing something to me.

Overall though, really nice job, can't wait to see it live.
 
Thanks for your feedback Todd, that's great! Really pleased it's going down well as I was a bit worried I was liking it - as I've been seeing it so much over the last few days!!

I was quite set on #2, but now quite like the cleanliness of #5
Good to have options I guess :)
 
Greg if you're going to go without the photo and icons, #5 looks a lot better!

I missed #4 before so I'll comment now. I like the new icon for #4 (pencil and mouse) as I thought just the pencil was a little too simple previously. I do not like the juxtaposition of the text in #4 though with the headings and sub-text, it just looked really awkward.

#5 is definitely on the right track with no images though. Although I still prefer #2 with the icon from 4 :)
 
Great, thanks for the feedback Todd, and sorry for confusing things with the variety of numbered PNG file links in this thread! :D

I'll try #2 with the mouse icon from #4 and then decide between that and #5 I think.
Thanks for the feedback guys, very helpful indeed.

Greg
 
Greg, I like #6 with a couple of changes. This is my curse of a few pixels being off. The icons don't really line up down the left visually with the photo at the top.

I've included a screenshot showing what it looks like if you currently extend lines down the page (left) and then on the right what I would recommend to make things more in balance.

greg-test.jpg
 

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  • greg-test.jpg
    greg-test.jpg
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Thanks Todd, and now I see what you mean by your 'pixel eyes'!! :D

I had originally aligned the right side of the photo, not the grey border, but the photo itself to the blue sections from my logo, then aligned the other icons below with that line, if that makes any sense? Your screenshot does look much neater having it lined up with the photo border though, so will give that a go, thanks! :)
 
Yeah I like that. And on second thought I think it does make it a bit more interesting with the icons. Love the twitter icon, so cute :).

Maybe move the picture of you down a little bit so it aligns to the text?
 
I don't like the pencil icon a lot, the mouse icon looks sweet though. I also preferred the version where the mouse cord went till the absolute border. Your border for your about me picture is a little wide for such a small image, maybe cut it down 2 pixels?
 
@Aarlev - thanks Soren, got that lined up now, looking better :)

@Onartis - thanks for the feedback, I can't decide on the mouse cable either! I like it both ways so not sure what I'll go for yet! Will probably be changing the pic in any case so will try a thinner border as suggested, thanks!

Uploaded a more recent version of the design here: http://www.gregfindley.com/private/greg9.png

Thanks all!
Greg
 
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