What do you think of my website?

Hi everyone,

I've been working for the past year trying to get my website together. I put it together using Dreamweaver.

I'm definitely not a web design pro and tried to teach myself the program as much as I could in order to

put the site together. I was wondering if you could please take the time to give it a quick look and tell me

what you think of it.

http://www.owlphotography.com/

At first, I just wanted to have a website showing my portfolio, but then decided to turn it into a stock

photography website to try and sell those thousands of photos that I took while traveling.

I first designed it in frames; showing the image in the centre and small thumbs at the bottom that the

viewer has to click on in order to see the whole image. Now, I'm thinking that perhaps this is cumbersome

and it would be better to have bigger thumbs that show the whole image and when the viewer clicks on

them they can see an enlarged image.

http://www.owlphotography.com/frontpage_bio_etc/test%20santorini%20page.html

I think this is better, but I'd like to ask other people what they think as it will take a long time to apply

these changes to my website.

any criticisms that you have about my site would be most welcome; I'm not lucky enough to be in the

company of other photographers/designers and so don't know where to turn for critiques or advice.

thank you very much for your time!

First, the bad.

Impossible to read. Blue text on black background? Like reading a book in a darkroom while loading film (safe lights off).

Then the good, great photos, interesting bio, self portrait, very communicative.

Might want to make the pictures click-able as well as text that you now do.

Good Luck

Jim

In addition to the difficulty of reading blue text on black, the only way to navigate from photo to photo seems to be by clicking the thumbnail. I found no "Next," "Previous," or "Top" buttons.

<Chas>

I would also add that the images on your main page should be links so you can click the text or the image to get to the image pages. And maybe it's just me, but why do you need the first page where the user has to click "Enter"? Why not just set the 2nd page as your opening page and save the user a step? Use a header on the pages with your company name and phone number.

Joe

Some personal observations. I don't have a problem with the blue letering on black

background, it's only takes a moment to adjust. I agree the front page (enter) isn't

necessary, but if you want to use it, why not add an interesting (inviting) image to tease

the viewer or add a navigation bar there instead of enter?

Since most viewer usually look for the navigation tools very quickly, yours in the upper

right corner take time to find, where they're usually across the top or bottom, down one

side, and/or embedded in the body.

The link to license isn't obvious unless you mouse over "here". Perhaps change color of the

text or underline it?

I agree to make the images linkable. Stock doesn't have an image? One's view of the

second page (portfolios) is drawn to the empty spaces below the top row (first and third).

Maybe some balance with them like two per row or something?

Frames are, as they say, old hat, where tables work better with javascript or flash for the

images. But if want frames, can you add the information to complete the header for the

Web page, eg. title, etc. And I would make each frameset scrollable since some bleed off

the bottom of the Web page with a lot of empty space below the image to the thumbnails.

Kinda' distracting.

Enuf said. Just some thoughts. I like it and the images. Good luck.

<p>It's definitely old school, Web 1.0, as they say. I'd highly recommend you visit <a href="http://www.templatemonster.com" target="_blank">Template Monster</a> and see what they have there. You can get a professionally designed website and then customize it yourself for $60. It will look head and shoulders above what you've already got. </p>

<p>I used Template Monster several times and most of the comments I've received so far have been very positive.</p>

<p>Hope that helps, Blake

Tina,

I too found the site to be very dated and hard to read. As for template monster and the likes, unless you are very good at coding you may just be throwing money away (even if it $60). I once bought a Flash website template for $75 and only after purchasing realized there is not much I can do unless I pay a programmer a bunch more to make it work :-(

If you are serious about your photography and want to give a professional impression, I would use a company like Photoidentities that specialize in templates for Photographers. Here is a link to their website http://www.photoidentities.com

Here is a link to their Photography website template http://www.photoidentities.com/template-special.htm

They have fully editable Flash websites that are really simple for you to maintain. No need for a programmer or even the need to learn yourself. And did I mention they are very affordable and nice to deal with. This way we Photographer types can concentrate on what we are best at, and that is taking photographs :-)

Anyway best of luck with the Photography.

Max

thank u to everyone for your responses, they have been very helpful. these forums are

invaluable!

Here are more web design mistakes you can learn from:

http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=13890