Website Critique

<p>Hello,<br>

I got my website loaded about a year ago. It has a cross section of my work. My main focus (what I enjoy and want to do) is documentary and fine art photography. I am taking on more projects and am focusing on expanding that aspect of my portfolio.<br>

To "pay the bills" I have also done weddings, portraits, and music photography.<br>

I want to put more focus onto my documentary work, while still showcasing some of the other types of work to potential clients.<br>

I am looking for critique on my website, and any feedback towards how to "brand" myself better. I know that I need to do some reworking of this site, and am having quite the creative block... any feedback is much appreciated.<br>

Thank you in advance!<br>

http://www.katehphoto.com</p>

 

<p>Hi Kate,</p>

<p>Pretty clearly layout. Loads fine in all browsers (FF, IE, GC, S - all latest). Somethings to consider from my eye:<br>

(1) The black background and white title is too contrasty, clinical. It can even hurt your eyes to read (white on black). I would change the background, still keeping it simple though.<br>

(2) Your website needs a clearer focus. You say documentative photography is your real drive (and your photos show this), but you need to make this stand out more. The slideshow does this, bar one (?) music photo, but the galliers below distract slightly with them being big thumbnail links. Consider a navigation bar of sorts which links them (with text only) to the seperate galleries.<br>

(3) You need a dedicated contact page. Simply leaving your email on the homepage isn't the best method - you should put this seperately and with different options (contact form, phone, post, skype etc).</p>

<p>Just passing thoughts, I hope they help and you don't take them the wrong way.</p>

<p>Thanks Richard, that does address some of the concerns I have had. Part of it is I am also not very skilled with web design! I am using SmugMug as a host and learning how to customize things as I go. I really appreciate the feedback, and I wouldn't ask for critique if I was going to get insulted by people's suggestions :)</p>

<p>Try the dgrin forum for help with customization on smugmug. It can be a real challenge... trust me, I use smugmug too, it's largely been a hate-hate relationship!</p>

<p>http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=41252</p>

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<p><a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=41252" target="_blank">http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=41252</a></p>

 

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<p>This link does nothing to help the original poster. In addition, I tried the web testers in there, one gave me an error message, one timed out, one only tests in two browsers unless you pay. One worked, but it didn't allow me to test the scrolling, which I know has problems on some browsers, and is the only thing I really wanted to get more information about.<br>

<br />In the future, try more relevant posts. And give us your web address so we can test with that, since they must have worked for you.</p>

<p>Coming back to the original question that was asked, I think Richard's #2 is really important. It's not clear what you want to do. I would suggest two entry points, either from the home page, or even having two home pages with different domains. Combining the commercial work with non-commercial work (which most documentary photography is these days) doesn't work well for the branding you want.</p>