JamesU

Ok, the layout is understandable and you've written it in CSS as oppose to using tables and at times people don't even understand how to do that when they are starting out so good job on that part.
 
Now the banner is pretty bad, I really don't like the font and the colours within it, it looks like something you created as a young kid using play-dough, they really don't go well together. Easy on the gradient as well, subtle gradients look a lot better, try bringing the opacity of it down a bit and you will see what I mean.
 
I'm not sure the font of the navigation bar is that great either. I get it, it's meant to be a fun website and not stick to the usual guidelines (hence the target audience) but you still want to make the company look professional and an activity you would want to undertake.
 
The mailto link will produce a lot of Spam, try creating a form in PHP, I find users like that option as well as an e-mail address, a lot prefer it in fact.
 
The footer font is also unreadable, try at least putting it into an easy to read font Arial, Verdana, Helvetica etc.
 
It's a good basis, just needs to be improved. Good luck.

You need to use PHP as the action to another file which has your email address and that keeps it secret.
 
There are lots of scripts to download, like
http://www.emailmeform.com/
http://www.jemjabella.co.uk/php-scripts-php-mail-form
http://www.formmail.com/
http://www.wickham43.net/formemail.php
 
Formmail is a favourite and well established but you have to pay for it. The first two are free but I've never heard whether they are good or not. The last link example shows the basic code but you will probably need to add some extra security codes when you get emails from a spambot. The first three have security features.

at a guess the fact that it's got "freebie jeebies" in there or "free ipad" etc etc that Google is ignoring it. How many sites like this are there?

Im no expert at all but i do find these tutorials very helpful as they go into a lot of detail and it is a wide range of things that they teach you. They also do some cracking video tutorials that you can follow.
 
Nettuts+

This muppet must be the biggest asshole on Facebook:
 
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?=743264506
 
I heard they post on webdesignerforum.co.uk!

http://www.flashfridge.com/

Basically,
In photoshop you need to represent exactly how you want the website to look.
There is a slicing tool in photoshop which allows you to create areas in the design to be withdrawn. You can even select every area in photoshop! and save for web.
 
What i will say is this ia a very horrible way of making a website and can lead to disastrous speeds.
What you need to do is first work out how to create the basic layout and colours using HTML and CSS.
 
Find a valid HTML template you can use to start with and then add DIV elements to create boxes or areas which will be used to contain data or images.
 
Secondly use CSS to style and alter the DIV elements to a particular size or colour.
 
Once you have got the template as the general layout and it looks the same except without images and text, you then need to start bringing in the images and text. Meaning using photoshop slice the images and typing in the text in HTML.
 
If you need more information on HTML and CSS, the best place for learning particular information is:
HTML : http://www.w3schools.com/html/default.asp
CSS : http://www.w3schools.com/css/default.asp
 
Gary.

That's how to make a design, a design needs to be broken up and coded.
 
Have a look here: http://dzineblog.com/2009/04/tutorials-psd-to-html.html

Check the tutorials out at this link:
 
http://www.1stwebdesigner.com/resources/psd-htmlcss-conversion-tutorials/
 
Many of them first of all detail how to create the design in Photoshop, and then go on to explain how to turn that photoshop file into XHTML and CSS. It is very much a 2 stage job; Design via photoshop, function via XHTML/CSS.
 
It is a bit daunting at first, but every aspiring website designer/developer has to start somewhere similar to this! Follow through 2 or 3 of these tutorials (pick the ones that look the coolest to you) and by the end of that, you'll be wondering what all the fuss was about. Trust me because about 2 months a go, I was in the same boat as you are now
 
 
Kyle

You need to look up the definition of localhost, and the definition of an FTP Client.
 
Filezilla is a good FTP Client. XAMPP is an application (utility) which allows you to run the Apache web server service (and MySQL service) on your local machine - thus the name localhost (local hosting). This allows you to preview sites and systems which use PHP. If you try opening a PHP script like you do an HTML file (just open in your browser) it won't work. You'd need to go to http://localhost/yourScript.php to allow it to work - and for this, you need to be running Apache. XAMPP is the easiest way of getting Apache running on a PC (Windows or Mac).
 
cPanel is an advanced, remote management tool which can be used by customers of large hosting companies to change server settings for their particular area of the server - i.e. their website root folder. Most customers won't have a server of their own - the company will put hundreds or maybe even thousand of accounts on the same server (VPS excluded), which is why the root folder you're given when you sign up for hosting is generally /home/account_name/. It's always best to do your building and development on your local machine (doesn't require you to upload all the time), then upload to a hosting account once you're happy with the entire system/site.
 
Personally, I suggest putting off thinking about going freelance for a long while yet. You seem to have a lot of things to learn - you'd be getting ahead of yourself and could end up getting into something you can't actually complete; this could lead to legal cases etc.. HTML & CSS is all great, but you need to learn about Web 2.0, the upcoming Web 3.0 (i.e. semantic web), and the 'new' (2004 onward) dynamic way of the web (which tends to be dealt with using PHP or similar programming languages).

A few tips to start you off:
 
Dreamweaver is a code editor (one of many) which you use to write HTML and CSS, then when you get more proficient, Javascript and programming languages such as PHP.
 
Photoshop and Fireworks are image editing/manipulation applications which you might use to create and manipulate imagery that you use on or as part of a web site. Again Adobe products are just some examples, there are many others.
 
Some people choose to use an image editor to "mock up" site components such as logos, boxes, icons, buttons, gradient backgrounds and so on. You don't have to use an image editor for a mockup stage, some folks prefer the "wireframing" method - it's really your choice how you approach it but i suggest tryingboth methods to see which suits you better.
 
In my opinion you should first learn the fundamental building blocks, eg HTML and CSS, because everything on the web is based on these and you won't get very far if you don't understand how they work.
 
Final tip: When you "design" always always always do your designing around your real content. Far too often I've seen people start with a graphical design first then end up trying to shoehorn in their text, images and so on, which inevitably ends up with a shoddy/poor looking site.

I've used Mac, Windows and Linux OSs extensively, and I present to you my analysis.
 
Windows: generally horrible but getting better as the years go by. a sad must for web devs due to IE, thank god for virtualisation. Of course, good for finding software easily, there's lots of it about.
Mac: very pretty and user friendly. Not as good as the fanboys make out, but in truth not far off. More reliable system than windows, and although there's less software, it tends to be of good quality.
Linux: the underdog, but arguably the best OS of the three. Predictable, reliable updates, more software than you can shake a stick at, stable as anything, and loads of fun. Slightly steeper learning curve but well worth it IMO.
 
In summary, it doesn't really matter what system you use if it works for you, but if you're a windows user looking for a change and you don't want to spend big bucks on a mac, download some linux. It's free FFS!!!!

Nice site. Works ok for me, Loads fairly quick.
 
Some load time stats Chrome captured were as follows:
 
Document - 418ms
 
Stylesheets - 635ms
 
Images - 3290ms
 
Scripts - 353ms
 
Total Load Time - 9.85 seconds
 
Dom fired after: 4.52 seconds
 
On of the biggest offenders was images, So compress the images down, use an image matrix where appropriate.
 
The real slow down comes from here: Your twitter feed took 5.11s to load, from a total of 9.85 that accounts for over half the loading time.
 
http://www.twitter.c...832276299595833
 
Also this may be of some interest: http://code.google.com/p/minify/
 
Additionally you might want to download yslow too, and test your score. It'll explain where you can increase your score, and performance.

Found stonehenge!
 
stonehenge

Set up a Facebook 'Page' for your web design stuff. It seperates your personal profile from your web design profile.
 
See mine for example: fb page
 
You can do this by going to facebook.com and near the bottom it asks to create a page for a business, you will need to login as your personal profile but then people can 'Like' (join) your web design fb page.
 
Hope that helps.
 
Like above - you will need to set your personal profile to private just incase they do figure out you are the owner of that page.

Never too late to become a web designer! I was (still am for the record) in my 30s when I started learning web stuff, and within 3 years found myself employed full time as a web developer.
 
I have no formal training, all self taught through online resources including much help from the more experienced members of this forum.
 
Get yourself a good portfolio and learn the basics really thoroughly. The take one aspect of web design/ development, and learn to do it exceptionally well - this will give you the best chance at landing a web job.
 
Best of luck

Not sure about off-putting but it's very much in your face when you open the page. Might not be to everyone's likening. But I understand about the branding - that's obviously very important.
 
I've look at the website in firefox, IE7 and Chrome. They load on all and look the same.... Only thing i noticed that in Chrome the "Submit Form" button is cut in half.
 
What is the problem you are having in IE?
 
Cheers
 
James (ps. good name by the way )

Hi Sturg_Clan,
 
Personally i'm not a lover of the colour... in my browser I have to scroll to the right to see the listed bullets down the side.. you need to try and fit it in a width of about 800 pixels as this would fit in most users screens.
 
Your bulk of text towards the end of the page could do with having some space so it dosn't hug the edge of the box.
 
I know I'm just being picky but in your image of the boy down the left - when the images end you can just see the top of his hair where it has been cropped? Also there is a little black dot in your header (above the "r").
 
I'm no way an expert but thought i'd pass on my opinion
 
I'm sure once you have made a couple of changes it will look a lot better.

It really depends on where in the UK you're thinking of moving to. London and its surroundings as you can imagine is very expensive. Renting is your biggest expense wherever you are. Have a look at this site findaproperty.com and look up the price of a house/ flat/ room/ whatever in the area you're looking to move to. Bear in mind the tax situation here too - you'll need to factor in council tax to your monthly expenses. Typically for a modest 2 bed house in my area you'll be paying about £110 per month in council tax.
 
As for where to look for work, when it comes to web work, some places are better than others. Have a look at Bristol - always seems to have plenty of web related jobs. Other than that, wages tend to be better in the South than the North, but then the cost of living tends to be higher too.
 
Good luck with the move

Flash is an obvious way forward forward, but it is a very steep learning curve. The 'gulp'says to me that you would prefer a shortcut(?)
Do you mean something similar to this http://www.aleosoft.com/flash3dslideshow/index.html .
 
A great bit of kit - followed by a kick-in-the-teeth price.
There are some free bits of code / sw that will do the same thing. Time to get googleing!!

You don't need to do 3d, and this can be done with javascript very easily (and free). My personal favorite is easySlider (http://cssglobe.com/post/5780/easy-slider-17-numeric-navigation-jquery-slider)
 
also check out http://blarnee.com/wp/jquery-image-carousels-for-slidehow/

So, I've only got letter of the month in .NET magazine, TWO MONTHS ON THE FREAKING TROT!!!
It's okay, you can touch me.

here's some things that i think would help sell your products more effectively
 
text is too large, quite large is good but that is too large
 
don't use all italics
 
split it up into short paragraphs
 
don't bother disabling right click: it's an accessibility issue and is useless at preventing image theft
 
the header looks a bit dated - if i have time i could work something up for you based around that idea?7
also the gradients on the background images make the red look washed out...
 
button text is too small (i am being picky aren't i at least for the top level ones, the bold one are ok.
 
also those buttons look quite dated (sorry but i'm being critical but i want to help i would consider using css menu with 'buttons' made with real text and a background.
 
what are the specks on the black top on the front page? if you need help getting rid of those email me the original image and i'll do it for you
 
some thumbnails (small images) of the products in the gallery would be good rather than having to flick through all of them, something like lightbox http://www.huddletogether.com/projects/lightbox2/ for example
 
what's an "Anklet" ? lol
 
i would be tempted to make your product images bigger - or crop them to show more of the necklace
e.g. Turquoise and agate necklace on http://zoriacreations.co.uk/turquoise_and_agate_necklace.html
 
you have some nice looking jewellery! and with a little polish your site could soon be showing it off to its full potential.
 
if you like, and if i find time over the next few days, i can show some ideas that i've outlined above
 
p.s. i forgot to add that splash/entry pages are a waste of time - just use the homepage as the first page for the site

can't get any easier than that
 
http://www.google.com/addurl/

Tutorials for CSS, XHTML/HTML & Javascript
 
Here is a list of links to external websites I've compiled that have answers to some of the most commonly asked questions in this forum. The list is not exhaustive, and will be periodically updated.
 
NOTE: These tutorials assume you have a basic grasp of web design (i.e. HTML/CSS). If you don't, then you should probably buy a book on the subject or go on a training course and learn the basics first of all.
 
Layout Related Tutorials (HTML/CSS)
 

How to apply specific HTML/CSS code for Internet Explorer browsers only
 
How to create a pinned-down fixed navigation menu
 
How to centre paragraph text, headings and images
 
How to create fluid CSS layouts
 
How to create indented paragraphs
 
How to create tabbed CSS boxes

How to define valid XHTML document type declarations
 
How to display single, repeated or fixed CSS background images
 
How to embed non-standard fonts in web pages
 
How to embed YouTube videos in web pages
 
How to make your website more accessible to disabled people

Javascript Related Tutorials
 

How to create a live clock on a web page
 

How to create image mouse rollovers
 

How to create popup message boxes
 
How to dynamically output HTML to a web page
 
How to use Lightbox 2 with images on your web pages