old site versus new site

holzphoto

spent all freakin day on saturday and a lot of sunday redesigning and implementing my photog site.

feel free to give me some feedback:

old:

http://www.holzphoto.com/landscape

new:

http://www.holzphoto.com

denisegoldberg

I think the new site has a much cleaner look that the old, and I (much) prefer the new look. It's a nice improvement.

A couple of comments:

• With your navbar below the photos and the breadcrumb removed, it appears that there is no easy way to get back to select a different gallery to view. This is at least partially because the navbar is off the screen; depending on the viewers screen and window size, it may be necessary to scroll to see the navbar. I think that it is better to always have a visual cue of how to get to the next spot in the galleries.
• I dislike sites that open up with music. You've done well by keeping the music to your home page, but if you are going to have music there you should also have a prominent button that allows viewers to turn it off. I know there are many people who like music on web sites, but I also know that there are quite a few others like me who don't. My initial reaction when I encounter a site with music is to turn it off immediately, or to leave the site if there isn't a way to stop the music. In this case, the only reason I didn't immediately leave your site is that you asked for feedback, and I wanted to look at your site to see if I had anything to contribute.
• It looks like you have embedded quite a few lines of spaces to essentially hide the smugmug footer. That sets up a scroll bar on pages that normally wouldn't need one, and the bar grabs my eye and forces me to scroll down to see what I'm missing. I don't really think that this is necessary. Obviously that's a personal feeling though...

--- Denise

~Jan~

I think it's a huge improvement!! I agree--the navbar at the top is nice because then everyone, even those w/ small screens, can see it. I used to have a small, low-res. monitor, and I couldn't see some navbars and would be confused about what to do.

I also think turning off the music is a nice option. I think your home page is very good and very professional looking. Your other pages are looking very "Smugmug"...so maybe work on adding the same class to the rest of your site that you did to the home page.

RustingInPeace

Huge improvement
The new look is a major step up. I also like the music. It sets the mood well.

You will most likely get lot of people here here that "don't like music" on the sites. I did a little informal research. I queried 125 prospective and past clients on music. I had 103 prefer the site with music. I did pull it off my site recently due to issues with the code I was using, but hope to have it back soon. You might want to do a little survey of your own to see what your target market feels.

holzphoto

so far 7 out of 10 like the song i picked. it is actually a playlist that i put on there, but it was big and bulky, so i resized it to be a 1 x 1 pixel.

If you look at the bottom left of the flash, you can barely see it!

but i can change the song as often as i want....

Pupator

The new site is a huge step up - it's far more professional and elegant. That was a good use of a day for you - well done!

I do, however, hate sites that open with music. It might be nice the first time I visit, but it's not going to be nice any visit after that.