Our new site

It doesn't matter if you do all the error checking in the world, or if you have the most beautiful graphics, if your site or application design isn't usable, it's not going to do well. Get input and advice on usability and user interface issues here.

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Luke
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Our new site

Post by Luke »

We just unveiled our new website. I'll admit it's a little marketing-y, but we're a marketing & design firm, so that's sort of inevitable. Let me know what you think. Be brutal.

http://www.mc2design.com
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aaronhall
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Post by aaronhall »

The background gradient isn't blending smoothly -- using a gif or png should fix that. The only other thing is that I might make the copy a bit larger, but everything else looks nice.
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JayBird
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Post by JayBird »

Overall...me likey.

Negatve points...the mass of white space above the page heading. The white space to the right of the body copy.

I think the body copy is probably an ok size, but to improve readability, i would increase the line spacing
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Chris Corbyn
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Post by Chris Corbyn »

I love it :) Clean, easy to navigate, easy to read and w00T it looks good in lynx too (apart from the weird missing "C" in copyright which I think must be a lynx bug):

Code: Select all

* Home
     * The Q
     * Contact Us

   MC2 Design Group Inc. 
     * Company
     * Portfolio
     * Process
     * Capabilities

Portfolio

   We like the fruit of our labors to make a splash, that splash that covers your audience perfectly.

   We are currently working on getting a fully functional portfolio page up, but in the mean time, you can check out some samples of our work by
   downloading a pdf of

   Some of our recent work [5.49M PDF]

Here are a few of the clients we've done work for

     * Peet's Coffee
     * Butte Community College
     * Butte Community Bank
     * Macromedia
     * OSRAM - Sylvania
     * City of Phoenix , AZ
     * City of Lincoln , CA
     * State of Washington
     * Norfield Industries
     * Chico Chamber of Commerce
     * Overland Equipment
     * OllyDog LLC.
     * Bailey Creek Golf Course

     * Home
     * Company
     * Portfolio
     * Process
     * Capabilities
     * The Q
     * Contact

    opyright 2007 MC2 Design Group Inc. - 647 Flume Street - Chico, CA 95928 - 530.893.4623 / tel - 530.893.1940 / fax



Commands: Use arrow keys to move, '?' for help, 'q' to quit, '<-' to go back.
  Arrow keys: Up and Down to move.  Right to follow a link; Left to go back.
 H)elp O)ptions P)rint G)o M)ain screen Q)uit /=search [delete]=history list
I wonder how easily you can fix this in lynx:

Code: Select all

* Home
     * The Q
     * Contact Us

   MC2 Design Group Inc. 
     * Company
     * Portfolio
     * Process
     * Capabilities
To this:

Code: Select all

MC2 Design Group Inc. 
 
     * Home
     * The Q
     * Contact Us

     * Company
     * Portfolio
     * Process
     * Capabilities
:D Nice work!
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Oren
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Post by Oren »

Yeah, I like it too. The only thing that you need to fix is, as aaronhall said:
aaronhall wrote:The background gradient isn't blending smoothly
Nice work :wink:

Edit: I've just checked "The Q" (= the blog), don't open it in a new window. Second, when you resize the text on the blog, the menu links stop from being aligned to the center (vertically) of the menu. Try to fix that by specifying a line-height equal to the height of the buttons.

To do that, you'll need to change the buttons - which are just <a>'s to be block elements and that will make them appear on a different line so you'll need to fix that with float: left, so here is pretty much what you'll need:

Code: Select all

#navigation ul li a
{
	height: 37px;
	display: block;
	float: left;
}
37px is because that's the line-height you already specified for the buttons. I'd change that to something with ems and not pxs. If you do so, change both the height in the code above and the line-height in your current CSS so they will match.

To learn more about how to make a menu using unordered lists with valid CSS and which works on any browser even when the user resizes the text, read this: http://www.webcredible.co.uk/user-frien ... menu.shtml

Second edit: I've just noticed that the buttons in the blog's menu send you to a page with this message: "Error 404 - Not Found".
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Post by nickvd »

IT SUCKS!!!!


LOL, just kidding!!! It looks great! The only thing I would like to see would be a solid (and constant) colour for the header navigation, one colour per menu item looks a little hap-hazard and un-thought out...

Just a thought!
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Oren
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Post by Oren »

nickvd wrote:The only thing I would like to see would be a solid (and constant) colour for the header navigation
I'll second that.
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Luke
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Post by Luke »

aaronhall wrote:The background gradient isn't blending smoothly -- using a gif or png should fix that. The only other thing is that I might make the copy a bit larger, but everything else looks nice.
It's very strange. I've tried a jpg, I've tried a gif, and I've tried a png. None come out smooth, so I look at the image in photoshop, and even within photoshop, there is some inperfections in the gradient. Very strange... have you ever seen photoshop incorrectly calculate a gradient? :?
jaybird wrote:i would increase the line spacing
Done :)
d11wtq wrote:I love it :) Clean, easy to navigate, easy to read and w00T it looks good in lynx too (apart from the weird missing "C" in copyright which I think must be a lynx bug):
Thanks :)
d11wtq wrote:I wonder how easily you can fix this in lynx:
Probably not rocket science, but I don't really have the time to mess with it at the moment. I will definitely give it a shot later though.
Oren wrote:I've just checked "The Q" (= the blog), don't open it in a new window.
Done :) As far as the blog goes, I'm changing the theme asap to match the rest of the site, so for now I'm not going to go through the trouble of fixing that one. Thanks though. (and thanks for the comment!)
Oren wrote:Second edit: I've just noticed that the buttons in the blog's menu send you to a page with this message: "Error 404 - Not Found".
Thanks... fixed.
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Luke
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Post by Luke »

nickvd wrote:The only thing I would like to see would be a solid (and constant) colour for the header navigation, one colour per menu item looks a little hap-hazard and un-thought out...
Can't do it. That's our brand, and it's what the boss wants. Take a look at our portfolio and you'll see that the different colors on the bar match our branding. Thank you though.
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Oren
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Post by Oren »

The Ninja Space Goat wrote:
nickvd wrote:The only thing I would like to see would be a solid (and constant) colour for the header navigation, one colour per menu item looks a little hap-hazard and un-thought out...
Can't do it. That's our brand, and it's what the boss wants. Take a look at our portfolio and you'll see that the different colors on the bar match our branding. Thank you though.
Yeah, I checked the portfolio and I liked it - very nice :)
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pickle
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Post by pickle »

I've seen Photoshop make non-fluid gradients before. I'd suggest making your gradient 3 or 4 times bigger than you've currently got it (in Photoshop), then shrink the image down. That might help.

I love the gradient, colours, shadows & all that. Fixed width, though, is a pet peeve of mine. I realize the chance of that changing to dynamic width is pretty much 0, but I thought I'd sound off anyway:)

Tell your boss that the links are absolutely NOT working out the way they are. A number of reasons.
  1. Two of the links are the same colour - which immediately made me think the other 2 were broken.
  2. One of them is white, which blends right in with the background. That leads me to believe it's the current page.
  3. There is no indication in the navigation of which page I'm on. That's a biggy.
The logo was designed as a logo, not a navigational colour scheme, your boss shouldn't be trying to re-use it.

That said, bosses can be bosses & he/she probably won't listen to you unless you've got a better idea. Why not make the whole background of the navigation that charcoal or green colour, and put little bars of colour under all the links. I don't think it would be a problem if the little bars duplicated the pattern of the logo - they'd be highlight colours at that point.

The font for the navigation looks...off. I can't think of a common replacement font, but it just doesn't seem to jive with Verdana & that college block font that's used (which looks sharp)

It might be nice to have some of the portfolio work right there in the page rather than in a PDF. Even if it's just a screenshot of sites or promotional design you've done - it'll seem more straightforward.

For the most part a really well done site. The navigation could use some work though.
Real programmers don't comment their code. If it was hard to write, it should be hard to understand.
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Oren
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Post by Oren »

pickle wrote:One of them is white, which blends right in with the background. That leads me to believe it's the current page.
Yeah, it happened to me... I thought it was the current page too. At least try to tell this to your boss. Tell him that real people (we :P) said so, so he won't think that this is just your opinion. It's based on real user experience with the site... :wink:
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Luke
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Re: Our new site

Post by Luke »

We are going to be doing a minor redesign of our site, attempting to fix all the little nit-picks we've gotten about our site. Mainly we want to move it more in the direction of a sales tool. Currently it is not easy enough for potential clients to see what we do. I'd also like to integrate our blog and website pages SEAMLESSLY. They are currently pretty close, but there are some places we could improve.

Since it's been months since the original critique, what I'd like you guys to do, if you have a minute, is go through the site again and REALLY critique it. Be a total nitpick about it. I'm looking to soak up WHATEVER complains this community can muster.

Thanks!

http://www.mc2design.com/
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Re: Our new site

Post by josh »

Where do you find stock photos
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Luke
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Re: Our new site

Post by Luke »

I think we use istockphoto and photo.com... not 100% sure though.
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