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Review for c0rinne.net
I’m hit in the face by a really dark, big layout. [The Dark theme] I’m not sure what the image in the header is of, and I don’t quite like the colors. The entire layout looks off-centered and… big. I’m not particularly in love with the idea of having three navigations; there just seems to be way too much to see at one time. However, after looking around your site a bit longer, I discovered the wonderful world of themes. Personally, I love your Blix Redux theme, which is what I’ll be using for the rest of this review.
Information
Site: c0rinne.net
Type: Blog
Owner: Corinne
Reviewed By: Sanosuke
Date Received: 11/11/06
Date Completed: 6/27/07
Preview
Presentation
Aqua
The banner image seems rather obscure, and not quite clear. It also fades way too much into the background. A light but distinguishable border around the banner to make it stand out a bit more might be good. Also, the aqua horizontal line is too thick, and the extra space makes it seem awkward [see example]. A link in the top navigation directing visitors to the bottom of the page [something to the effect of “more navigation”] would be preferable and easier access. And since your navigations are on either ends of your page, a “back to the top” link might also work well at the very bottom.
Blix Redux
Like I’ve mentioned, this one is my favorite theme. It has brilliant color-combinations and it’s well laid out. I’m not sure though, why you need the extra navigation at the top of the page if you already have the same exact links to the left. Also, the white border you have around your entire layout is very thick and could be reduced by a few pixels. I’m not quite familiar with access keys, but I was under the impression that if you’re going to have them, you should make them visible. You have “access key: #” when people hover over links, but why would people need those access keys if they’re already hovering over the link anyways? Making those more visible might be a better idea, on both navigations.
Dark
The banner image is kind of obscure and it’s not quite clear what that is [even though you mentioned it was a flower in your description of the theme.] I don’t quite see the use of the thick, red line in the background, since it takes attention away from the rest of the layout. The layout itself looks fine without the red line, if not better. Or, perhaps a soft texture in the entire background might work better, if you don’t like having it a solid color. Your navigation links have this bright, white background that contrasts way too much with the rest of the layout; changing it to a softer, darker gray color would compliment the layout more. Or maybe a darker shade of red. Right now, it stands out way too much in contrast. Also, a “links out” or similar link might be useful in the top navigation [as mentioned before for your Aqua theme] to lead to the bottom navigation.
Skute
Your description in your themes page says this theme is called “Skute”, but your introduction calls it “Vegas Nights”; which is it? I’m quite fond of this layout, though it would be nice to see the same rollover links you used in your other layouts on the navigations of this one as well. The navigation and the entire layout could be moved up by a few more pixels, since the initial white bar at the very top is unnecessarily thick and leaves a lot of free space.
Content
There are a few pages in your navigation that lead to “outer links”; for example, your directory and your forum. Since these links don’t open in a new window, a suggestion would be to specify that they do indeed lead to somewhere outside your main site, either with a title attribute or with one of those arrows you have for all other outside links.
Home
The navigation for your entries is rather annoying. While I like the option of being able to go to the last page of your entries, I don’t like having to click on the actual page number to go to the next page. More often than not, people like clicking on larger links rather than having to line their mouse up with a tiny little number. Not to mention the fact that a “next/previous” link would be more helpful in the long run than a “last/first” link. [And why is it that the last page number is always in the navigation?]
About Me
The “Ask a Question” page doesn’t seem to be relevant to the overall theme of the page. Most of the questions asked have nothing to do with you, if they even have anything to do with your site at all. Adding the page under “Contact” or “Domain” might be more fitting.
I’m not quite sure why your “Bio”, “Favorite Rhyme”, and “School” categories are on the same page, but nothing else you’ve listed is. Its a bit weird to click on the “Bio” link and be taken to the middle of the page; at first, I thought it was a new page. It is also a little awkward to be thinking I’m reading only your bio and suddenly be looking at information about your school. These three topics also have little to do with each other, other than having something related with you. Why not just make new pages for them all? Or, if not that, at least add a “Back to top” link under each section to lead people back to the navigation.
You have a tendency of putting parenthesis in parenthesis, and they can get a little confusing at points. For most of the parts, you don’t need the outer perenthesis. For example:
(I say seriously because when I was a kid, I used to create dumb web pages on sites like AOL Hometown (I think that’s what it is/was called) but I never tried to make anything worth… well anything.)
would work just as well and fit into its surroundings just as well if you took out the first set of parenthesis:
I say seriously because when I was a kid, I used to create dumb web pages on sites like AOL Hometown (I think that’s what it is/was called) but I never tried to make anything worth… well anything.
This happens twice in your bio.
- “As I’ve said previously, my time in school has opened my eyes to a lot of things that I was largely ignorant to in high school.” –> Actually, you hardly mentioned how your time in school affected you, at least not in your “Bio” or your “My School” information. Perhaps a little more information as to how school has opened your eyes?
Hosting
- “Hosting is open again Of course, paid hosting is always available.” –> So I’m assuming free hosting is open again? It might be good to specify that.
My Thoughts
It seems to me that some of these were part of your blog? Parts like:
I’m not perfect. But, if I think you are acting like a racist idiot (like the case was last week), then I will call you on it, ban me if you like, but I’ll still say it and say it loudly.
On Being Bitchy
seem as though they’re refering to other entries/essays/articles as well. A lot of the articles [especially under Other] seem to refer to others or have edits that are completely unrelated to the topic itself. Perhaps you could elaborate on some of these, or include an introduction of sorts on the main page to explain this.
- “My fist question is, why is Christmas not day 1?” (Two Turtle Doves) –> “First”, not fist.
Visitors
I’m not sure I like the way you organize some of your pages. Pages like Textures for example that have multiple subsections are simply organized by page number. However, that’s not very functional considering if someone started on the first page and kept moving forward, they’d eventually hit the end of one section and go on to the next section without even realizing it, and that becomes rather annoying to suddenly come up to a whole new section without warning. I think, instead of paging everything together, you should have separate subsections for each category.
It might also be wise to put your credits/crediting information in the introduction page instead of at the last page of each section. That way, people won’t have to scroll through every single page [which is highly unlikely] to read the crediting information.
- “Aside from that (and the terms in the domain section), ” –> Why put your terms of use under the “domain” section? It would be more easily accessed if you linked to the actual terms of use page instead of leading the visitor to the domain section and making them hunt for the terms of use link.
- Smilies3 on your smilies page has a broken image.
Backgrounds
Your navigation is a little confusing, seeing as nothing else in the section is numbered. It might be easier to just list everything at the bottom of each page so that it looks like:
Main List | Bold Stripes | Butterflies | Checkered | Flowers | Swirls
You also have a slight error in your navigation. The same error happens everywhere else on this section where there is a navigation of this sort.
Brushes
A border would be very nice to see around each preview, so we’d known when one ends and the next begins, especially since your previews are in black and white, and your background is white as well.
- “Right Click on picture and “Save As” to save onto your computer.” –> I’m pretty sure you don’t save brushes this way.
- It would be preferable if you indicated which version(s) these brushes were designed for, since some people don’t upgrade their Photoshop versions.
Bullets
- I think your first bullet for set four is white as well, and you failed to mention that.
Fonts
I don’t see the point of the red swirls in the background of your font previews, I think it distracts from reading the fonts themselves. In this case, it would be better just to have a white background and black text.
Your first paragraph is extremely wordy and hard to read through. If I were planning on just taking a font and going, I wouldn’t have bothered to read through the whole thing. The point of having terms of usage is to have the visitors know exactly what they’re allowed to do and what they’re not allowed to do. Usually, the terms should be short, concise, and to the point. In this case, you’ve presented a long, tedious paragraph for people to read through. Something like the following might be more appropriate:
The below font was created by me and I take full credit for it. You may freely use it for personal use, whether in graphics, layouts, or even for commercial purposes (in which case I expect a credit), but you may not redistribute it. I suggest that you read the readme.txt file within the zipped file before you try to install the font, otherwise you’ll never be able to use it.
It might also be nice to mention whether or not you’re demanding crediting for the font if its not used with commercial purposes.
- “Right Click on picture and “Save As” to save onto your computer.” –> I’m pretty sure that’s not how to save a font.
Gradients
- “Right Click on picture and “Save As” to save onto your computer.”–> They are in zipped files, which means that this doesn’t apply.
Miscellaneous Graphics
You’ve named the link “Miscellaneous Graphics”, and yet after I click on it, the heading for the page says “Lay Images”.
Final Statement
I enjoyed reading your articles and your thoughts on different aspects. The visitors section seems a little disorganized compared to the rest of your site, and it’s quite easy to get lost because of all your different navigation schemes and sub pages. Overall, your site has been interesting to go through.