My new website

Mark1616

Hi all,

I've not been around for a while as I've moved back to the UK so been getting settled etc.

I've also been putting together a new website to hopefully add a more professional look. I would really appreciate thoughts, ideas, things to add, thinks to change etc so that I can make it better. If you spot any photos that just don't work or let the site down then please also let me know.

Any and all comments highly valued.

www.marksmithphotography.biz

Thanks a lot for taking the time to check it out and give me a helping hand.

Mark

BFauska

The site looks good. There are two things that seem like they could use some work to me though. The home page has the navigation choices all down the left side and the rest of the pages are across the top, I think consistency would go a long way in aiding the professional look of the site. I think that the side navigation of the home page looks better than the buttons across the top of the other pages, everything else about the gallery and about/contact pages seems well laid out though so if changing the nav buttons to the side screws that up maybe it's not worth it (I am on a 16:9 monitor too so it may work better for some people than others.) My other nit-picky thing is that the home page doesn't fit all on one screen (again my wide screen contributes to this, but they are becoming the norm) I don't think that the "recent photos" links or maybe even the facebook link need to be there, this would allow the whole thing to fit on screen, I think scrolling on a home screen is less than ideal.

I don't know how long I had to move around your site before I realized that you were in GB, as a not-very-worldly American I typically associate Plymouth with the not-very-creatively-named city here (we didn't even bother to add "New" to the name like we did with many of our others.)

Great pictures, good luck with the return to GB and the new site.

studio1972

BFauska wrote: »

The site looks good. There are two things that seem like they could use some work to me though. The home page has the navigation choices all down the left side and the rest of the pages are across the top, I think consistency would go a long way in aiding the professional look of the site. I think that the side navigation of the home page looks better than the buttons across the top of the other pages, everything else about the gallery and about/contact pages seems well laid out though so if changing the nav buttons to the side screws that up maybe it's not worth it (I am on a 16:9 monitor too so it may work better for some people than others.) My other nit-picky thing is that the home page doesn't fit all on one screen (again my wide screen contributes to this, but they are becoming the norm) I don't think that the "recent photos" links or maybe even the facebook link need to be there, this would allow the whole thing to fit on screen, I think scrolling on a home screen is less than ideal.

I don't know how long I had to move around your site before I realized that you were in GB, as a not-very-worldly American I typically associate Plymouth with the not-very-creatively-named city here (we didn't even bother to add "New" to the name like we did with many of our others.)

Great pictures, good luck with the return to GB and the new site.

I second that re navigation. Also it might be better to have a .co.uk site from an SEO point of view.

One other thing, personally I hate the way everyone seems to say they are passionate about everything these days, you see it all the time and it just seems false to me. Guess that might just be me though :crazy

Chris H

Good photos Mark, the thing that struck me the most is the time taken for the page to load and then waiting for the slideshow I'd try and do something about this if I were you. Just my tuppence.

Cheers
Chris

Mark1616

Thanks everyone. The menu system is corrected. I need to find out how to get the load time down as it is a flash template so possibly populating with slightly more compressed photos might work.

I've just put one photo in a folder called test with password 'forum' in case anyone has a chance to look at that for me. It seems to be working OK.

One other question, does it work better in the front page having the photos grouped per wedding shown or is it better to mix it all up?

Thanks again for your help.

Mark