james_giordano Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 Please check out my new website and post your comments. Thanks www.finespunwedding.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timberwulf Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 Takes far, far, far too long to load. I gave up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
austinphoto Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 It's beautiful. Very few photos, though. I would like to see more samples of your work, which is excellent, from what I see. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timberwulf Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 Ok, left it loading in the background for a while (most consumers would have wandered off by now). Then a bunch of music and noise slammed through my speakers. My boss wasn't amused, so I closed the site. Ooops...another customer just left. :) If you must have the music, leave it muted and flash the play button - don't force users away from your site because they're taking a few furtive moments at work to look for a wedding photog. Lose the loading and other sound effects completely, they don't add anything and are just inflating your already over the top file size. Three songs isn't helping the file size either. I'm not here to listen to music, I'm here to see if your services are worth the amount you're asking and are in my price range. As a user, I'll listen to the radio or a CD if I want music while I'm looking for a wedding photographer. Your interface is way too large (unless perhaps this site auto-resizes depending on users screen resolution??). Flash sites should fit within a maximized browser window at 800x600. Yours won't even fit vertically for users running 1024x768 - that's going to inconvenience 75% of the users of your site. The script you're using for your nav items is a little hard to read for me. Something a little more straight might be better. About: Why are there flyover effects on the portraits of you, the other photographer, and the picture of the bride's midsection?? Clicking them doesn't do anything, I'm confused. :) Portfolio: The left and right nav item in the lower right corner is ok, but it doesn't tell me "you can get to see those three selections you saw a moment ago by clicking this". Clicking Portfolio again doesn't get me that page either. Where did it go? :) I'd replace that tiny nav item with something more clear and obvious, maybe a link to all three sections as a secondary navigation item somewhere in the upper left part of this page. As it stands now, that nav item makes me think there are three pages of this particular gallery, it doesn't make it clear that there are three galleries and this is how you see them all. Pricing: Again, there are useless flyovers on the images. This is distracting and disappointing to someone who has been trained in your gallery to think they can see a big detail of an image that lights up like that when the mouse goes over it. The images of the services are so small that if I didn't already know what those were, I'd probably be disappointed I couldn't see them larger and with more detail. The images used to describe the packages are dull and unexciting, they don't scream "I'm worth it" to me. Images that are more vibrant and bright and beautiful (the center package's image is really not appealing at all - it's so dark I can't even see what it is!) would be much better here. You're marketing your packages and demonstrating how they're worth the money, make them all look spectacular! Contact: The text on this page is mottled and hard to read for some reason. Would it make sense for you to register the customer on pictage and send them their login information? I'm paying you thousands of dollars, why do I have to do your work for you. :) Do you really have a partnership with Pictage? One that they would know about if someone asked them? Or do you just contract with them for their services? I'm not sure I like the wording here, it implies a relationship that may not exist. Footer: Very hard to read this font. The yellow text is ok, but I had to strain to read the grey text underneath it, and the email address is very difficult to read for me. Don't make this part hard - the contact info and trade/servicemarking should be the most readable, obvious thing. This footer is below the bottom of the screen for your users at 1024x768, and the footer AND the navigation is in a place that users at 800x600 can't even find it. An ok start overall, but there are some significant usability problems that are going to lose you potential customers and business. Get those taken care of, and I think this site has some real potential. Good luck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
james_giordano Posted August 17, 2006 Author Share Posted August 17, 2006 Thanks for that feedback, that's exactly what I was looking for. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bdp Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 It's a really slick site, but flash is getting way overused in my opinion and your screens are huge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
david-m Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 Just a few friendly comments.... The script is quite difficult to read and kinda ye-olde-fashioned The music is distracting and eventually irritating. It takes an age to load, and would have lost me if I wasn't doing a crit for you. You have some good images but I would like to see more. I think it needs some tweaking and would then be a really nice site - good luck Regards David (UK) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmichaelc Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 James... Was this a template that your purchased? If so, i almost went with that exact on about 6 months ago, however, i couldn't plug in the custom designs myself. I like the functionality of it a lot, and for my connection, it is very fast navigating through the images. If you don't mind me asking, if this is a templete, who is customizing it for you? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kevin_lindeque Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 i really like it, the music got on my nerves very quickly, the loop was too short. I liked it a lot, it didnt take long to load for me! I personally think that "some" of the images were a little ordinary, but hey thats just my opinion. Put it this way when i do get a site i would be stoked if it looked like yours Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brandonhamilton Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 I didn't find the site that slow to load at all. I actually read some replies before I visited, so I timed it. From the "enter" button to when the "loading" stopped and I got the home page, was right inbetween 4 and 5 seconds. The site size looks great to me, but I run 1600x1200. To your average user who is running 1024x768, might it be too large? While I understand the concept of using music on a site, and sometimes I don't mind it all that much (neither does your average web surfer) the music you chose is pretty obnoxious, and doesn't fit the site! And to everybody that doesn't like it, just freakin hit the "sound off" button at the top of the page. I also found the "shutter click" sound that plays as you choose different images to be kind of obnoxious. If it were me, I would remove that one alltogether. Like stated above, there are some bugs, like hoverovers all over the website that don't actually do anything. Also, when you click on portfolio, you get a nice screen with 3 choices. When you choose one, you get a series of images with thumbnails, and you get 1->3 pages to nav through. But alas, each page is a different section. (kind of silly) but, you now lose the "portfilio" button and you can't go back to the original "portfolio" page where you made your first selection. Last but not least... the gallery samples are a bit lacking. I would roughly double the number of samples. Great start however! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kelvinphoto - arlington, t Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 Sorry, but I hate FLASH Site. The reasons are fancy & waiting to load, and heavy on those that still use dial up. Just ask yourself a few questions; Do you design the website for yourself or for your customers? Are your customers smart enuff to browse your site? Just KISS! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmichaelc Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 You know Kelvin, i did ask myself that question when i went through the process. And it occurred to me that my market of customers can, and more than likely do, obtain and afford broadband. That decision proved itself correct. If i catered to a different market, then the dial up issue is something to consider. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timberwulf Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 hmm..my load time may have been due to some network latency. As to dial-up vs. broadband, while broadband is gaining more mainstream acceptance, for many people that aren't internet junkies, dial-up is still a reality. And if you're saying "I'm not marketing to those people", are you really saying that when the bride calls up her mother/father and says "I found this great photographer, check out his web site", do you want the mother and father of the bride to be able to see the site and get excited too - perhaps allowing them to open their wallet a little wider? I work with real estate agents that make 6 and 7 figure salaries each year that still use dial up because other than for their work, the internet isn't that important to them. Google and Yahoo and their local MLS web sites still work fine, and most sites still load reasonably well on dial-up. When it comes to the dial-up vs. broadband debate, I still maintain that marketing to certain users or not, I wouldn't want to lose even a single wedding to some folks that just feel that dial up is adequate to their needs, yet still can afford my services. Affluence and internet connection aren't necessarily directly connected. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
james_giordano Posted August 17, 2006 Author Share Posted August 17, 2006 Thanks again for all the responses thus far. I will incorporate many changes tonight. One thing though, I have Google Analytics run data on my site and almost 99% of the viewer all have High Speed internet, I don't recall seeing any dial up. Google Analytics is a great feature for anyone who has a web site... it tells you quite a bit about your viwers, from location, to browser version, speed, what verison of flash you use and much more. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kelvinphoto - arlington, t Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 Jammey, Well, like I said. If you think your customer is capable of browsing your website, then it is good for you. I just want everyone to know that you are design a website for your customer and not for yourself, so think as a customer's view. What do you expect from a photographer website if you are a B&G looking for a photographer and view their website? Do you really like waiting for flash to load, play sound, and do others really fancy stuff for every page load, intro, exit, etc? Do customer really like fancy banner, flying animation, etc? Do customer really want to be able to access your works ASAP and find out what your works are all about? Just keep in mind that when you design a website, you are design for a customer. Every photographer has a DSLR, but not everyone own a DSLR is a photographer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmichaelc Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 "What do you expect from a photographer website if you are a B&G looking for a photographer and view their website? Do you really like waiting for flash to load, play sound, and do others really fancy stuff for every page load, intro, exit, etc? Do customer really like fancy banner, flying animation, etc? Do customer really want to be able to access your works ASAP and find out what your works are all about?" I don't know.... I'll ask the next bride that says to me "I cried after looking at your website" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kelvinphoto - arlington, t Posted August 17, 2006 Share Posted August 17, 2006 They cried after looking at your website because of your photography works, not because you have a fancy website. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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