Hi all,

 

My Vets project is nearly finished. I'm just waiting on a couple of pictures (for the staff page) and I need to do the SEO.

Just thought I'd post it up for you guys to rip to shreds or generally comment upon.

 

www.hjssolutions.com/sites/orchard.

 

A couple of pages don't validate at the moment, but they're easiliy fixed.

 

I've not tested it recently in FF as it keeps hanging at the moment (on all sites, not just this one), so I guess I'll need to reinstall it.

I like it but what's with the lime green slime colored background. I think you should tone down the green quite a bit. It hurts the eyes and hurts the overall design which is really simple and nice.

this color combination is too irritating eyes view. and menu color also same in Dark Green .

 

OK . that is my point of view...

I like the dark green nav bar, but I think the background page colour should be toned down somewhat. Also, the little kitty icons for your list is really nice, but it would be even nicer if the nested lists had a different shade of that icon, just to give a better visual cue that the list is nested, and not just indented.

 

Your document structure is lovely

I viewed the site in lynx (browser for terminal in linux) and it looked very nice. Well done!

Thanks very much for the constructive feedback. Yes, the green background colour is a bit striking isn't it. I wanted to have the site reflect the colours in the logo.

 

I'll tone it down a tad and see how that looks.

 

notbanksy - great idea about the nested lists. I'll definately do that. Many thanks.

I love the puppy-dog image - it's great!!!

I think with some tweeks your site will look really good.

 

 

I agree with everyone else that the background is overpowering and, as usual, I'd like a more minimalistic and freer look. To my tastes I'd make the background predominantly white (perhaps fading in from a more subtle green at the edges) and remove the border around the main content. This would give your logo and puppy-dog more room to have an impact. You could then move the logo to the left edge of the main content and the top puppy-dog image to the right (they're too close together at the moment). I'd make the logo a bit smaller too.

 

The nav bar is too crowded with menu items and there are no links in the main content. I'd recommend moving some of the menu items down into the text with some explanation around them. At the moment the reader reaches the bottom of the text and has to go back up to navigate. Embedding some links into the content allows people to 'break-out' to relevant pages without reading through the entire text and then having to search the nav bar.

 

Going for a white background would give more room as the main content elements are cramped. But I'd also increase the padding of the main text and decrease its width to around 12-15 words for better readability.

There is a lot of bold text going on in some of the pages - consider toning down the text colour of 'strong' text down to a dark grey.

 

The lists look a little lost too far on the left of a page - consider indenting them.

 

Hopefully this helps - it seems like there's a lot wrong, but they are only minor things and it's always the minor things that take longer to explain. It'd be easier if the site was terrible - I could just write "it's rubbish - fix it"!!!

 

I've swapped the colours around a bit now, so that hopefully users will not get eye strain from the bright green.

I toyed around with a more pastel shade of green but I didn't think that it complimented the sharp green in the logo.

I love the puppy-dog image - it's great!!!

I think with some tweeks your site will look really good.

I agree with everyone else that the background is overpowering and, as usual, I'd like a more minimalistic and freer look. To my tastes I'd make the background predominantly white (perhaps fading in from a more subtle green at the edges) and remove the border around the main content. This would give your logo and puppy-dog more room to have an impact. You could then move the logo to the left edge of the main content and the top puppy-dog image to the right (they're too close together at the moment). I'd make the logo a bit smaller too.

 

The nav bar is too crowded with menu items and there are no links in the main content. I'd recommend moving some of the menu items down into the text with some explanation around them. At the moment the reader reaches the bottom of the text and has to go back up to navigate. Embedding some links into the content allows people to 'break-out' to relevant pages without reading through the entire text and then having to search the nav bar.

 

Going for a white background would give more room as the main content elements are cramped. But I'd also increase the padding of the main text and decrease its width to around 12-15 words for better readability.

There is a lot of bold text going on in some of the pages - consider toning down the text colour of 'strong' text down to a dark grey.

 

The lists look a little lost too far on the left of a page - consider indenting them.

 

Hopefully this helps - it seems like there's a lot wrong, but they are only minor things and it's always the minor things that take longer to explain. It'd be easier if the site was terrible - I could just write "it's rubbish - fix it"!!!

 

 

Cracking advice as usual wizely. I've just changed the background color to use the brown in the tree trunk of the logo, but I don't like it.

 

I'll revisit this tomorrow as it's 12:30am and I've been staring at a monitor all day!! I should be able to post up some changes tomorrow. Many thanks.

Many thanks to everybody that's left comments thus far, I really appreciate it.

 

I had a quick tinker with it last night and have changed the slime green colour to a more subtle shade, made it a bit wider too. I think it now looks a lot fresher and a tad more professional, so thanks for your great advice everybody.

 

This has caused another couple of minor issues that I need to sort out (with the top left image on the Newsletter page for instance), but I'll iron those out this weekend.

 

Thanks again.

Oooh I think that's much better. It's much easier on the eyes and looks a lot cleaner and more professional now.

Well, it's 01:15am and I (think!) I've finsished tinkering with the layout and stuff now.

I just need to add some small links to the footer for a site map, terms etc and need to add my meta tags for SEO.

 

Does anybody have any comments to make on the final (I hope) design??

Thanks to all those that have made comments already (both on this thread and the old one)....your advice has been invaluable to me.

I suppose no news is good news! :-)

Very nice, I like it.

 

Only thing I can't figure out is - if you bought the images from istockphoto.. why are you linking to them? Once you've paid for them they're yours to use without credit.

Very nice, I like it.

 

Only thing I can't figure out is - if you bought the images from istockphoto.. why are you linking to them? Once you've paid for them they're yours to use without credit.

 

Thanks Eggman. I was toying with the idea of giving credit to iStock for the images that I bought, but decided against it...the link you saw shouldn't have gone on, I'd forgotten to remove it (it was only on the homepage).

 

Anyway, the site is finished now and I'm quite pleased with it.

In no way shape or form should you give Istockphoto credit for the photos. YOu bought them. They're yours. It's that simple no credit needed.

In no way shape or form should you give Istockphoto credit for the photos. YOu bought them. They're yours. It's that simple no credit needed.

 

What do you think of the new design?

I like it alot! Did you use tables or pure CSS?

I like it alot! Did you use tables or pure CSS?

 

All done with CSS.

Nice! RU on Twitter

I like the look of it, I just think you need to do something with the footer, as it seems out of place and is just floating there. Also it might be good to look at adding just a little more space between some of the sections as it all feels a little squashed together.

Nice! RU on Twitter

 

No, not at the moment.

I like the look of it, I just think you need to do something with the footer, as it seems out of place and is just floating there. Also it might be good to look at adding just a little more space between some of the sections as it all feels a little squashed together.

 

Thanks Dizi. I might see what it looks like with a background color and font-change.

Thanks Dizi. I might see what it looks like with a background color and font-change.

 

Arrgh! I've become Americanised! I meant of course Background coloUr.

Then use the edit button and change it to a u instead of double posting

Then use the edit button and change it to a u instead of double posting

 

Point taken! lol

Hmm... quick things. Move the logo up off the navigation bar.. it's too close to it. Move it like 10 pixels up.

 

And I don't like how the two yellowish boxes are misaligned with the text (on the home page). I think you should get rid of that second dog picture, and align the boxes with the text above them.