Portfolio Version 2

Hey all,
I'm in the process of rebuilding my blog/portfolio and have came up with this design so far:



I'd like to get some of your guys' thoughts on this. I'm still debating what to do with the center area (blank area) I know there will be blog posts there but not quite sure how I want to format it, etc...

Let me know what you think!

No one cares to critique?

I like it, but I would change the banner.

Originally Posted by mike.fro No one cares to critique?

too many cliches. how exactly do wood and gloss/plastic pill buttons (or the titles) share a theme here?

overall it's lacking structure. there's no focal point:

there's a menu (with terrible contrast), the it immediately dives into a secondary menu of what i assume is the portfolio, the it jumps to blog posts/listings, with unrelated content off to the side, then it goes into about you, then back to the blog?

where are people supposed to start? how do you want them to use this page?

why are people coming to this site? to read blog posts or look at work? you only get 1 primary reason so you need to pick one.

when building landing pages that are supposed to direct people to specific sections, you have to section pieces off and use a sense of hirearchy. theoretically your service/portfolio list shouldn't be on a high level then your blog post list. also, use a grid. it's organized and people will be able to view the content in sections.

the typography is also very plain. html text has its limits, but you can do more with it than change it's size and colour.

i have seen a view sites using wood on the background, and i like them all.
Including this one, but using glass? i dont know about that.

Good luck

Looks good, i'll agree with whats been said - slightly unsure with the glass. Maybe a darker wood finish would give it the contrast that it needs?

Okay...this one needs some work.

Here are my thoughts:

- Wood is a lot more difficult to use then many people think. Simply slapping on a pattern doesn't mean its good, despite the current trend. Find a wood pattern that is much more simple and clean. What you have now is way too busy and distracting with all sorts of lines and curves.
- Why are you using glass effect? It doesn't apply here, especially when applying it on top of more of the ugly wood pattern.
- Give your users something to look at. All I see now is boring text.
- In addition to my previous comment, give your users a line of sight. Tell them what to look at first, what to look at second, etc. Give your information some architecture, alignment, and focal point.
- Work on your typography. The leading is horrible on the content.
- The urban footer/vector along with the wood background and glass pill buttons don't work with each other. Pick one style, and work with it. Don't try to do too much with too little.
- The rounded edges on the sidebar widgets are blurry and not sharp. Kill the drop shadow, or execute it better.
- Give the site title/logo whatever it is, some more presence. Right now it's just lost.

You've got to have a solid understanding of the direction that you want to head into. It seems like you sat down, and simply started designing whatever, whenever, wherever. Or, if I'm mistaken, you made this layout over the course of several sessions, and each session you added something completely new and random that doesn't match with anything else.

Design, especially for websites, is a lot more then simply opening up photoshop, following some tutorials, and hoping it looks good. You have to plan ahead of time, put some thought and research into it, and have a clear, set direction of where you want to take it...otherwise, you'll get a result like you did ... something that looks like a mashup of various tutorials and styles.

I'm not being harsh, and forgive me if I am coming off that way, but it's important that you receive honest feedback so that you can improve.

Hope that helps!

The lack of font smoothing is really turning me off as a viewer. I know that's how Windows (by default) renders the fonts, but the larger fonts are very unattractive when un-smoothed.