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Well, it's been a long time coming, because I had thought of going another direction, and later backed out of that when I realized I wasn't ready to take all the steps that were in my court at that time. But this past winter I finally started up another serious push to decide on a designer, get a general theme & a few other important structural decisions made, & take the plunge.
Joe Diaz agreed to help me with the project & has not let me down with his willingness to try all the appropriate things I wanted to see, advise me if I had less appropriate ideas that didn't fall within the limitations of flash, xml, html, or my budget... and most of all, to follow my encouragement to let his design sensibilities bring my site to the next level by incorporating his own ideas on top of the ones I would throw his way.
Another shout out goes to Jon Aston of Marketing Partners. I've sent up my praises for Jon's consulting services many times because we have worked together on and off for several years now & have had some fairly detailed discussions of my website going back almost 2 years. Jon has been a valuable sounding board & source of constructive criticism during the design process, but even more importantly, he was integral in helping me visualize the essence of my web sites message, it's target market, it's specific objectives, and it's functionality.
Over the years of working with Jon, his ideas have educated me so well that I have to give him credit for some of my own ideas now too! Jon has countless hours of discussion and feedback into this web site. Of course Joe has countless hours too. (well, he's a pretty sharp business man... so he probably counted them)
Anyway, I'm sure both of these guys will enjoy showing off the new web site almost as much as I will, and I'm sure they know I want them to chime in on this thread.
Before I forget to mention it, the site is not completely done. I thought it would be good to start showing it off here before it's done, but be aware there are a few things incomplete. If anyone wants to advise me to scrap it & start over ...well, all opinions are welcome ...but there are a few things I already know I need to fix... and there may just be a killer suggestion I wouldn't have thought of, so please feel free to offer any constructive critiques. It is a flash site, and some load time trade-offs have been made in favor of "bells and whistles" I realize this won't align with everyone's view, but I'm OK with that trade-off.
You will also notice a blog link. That area will need a lot of my personal attention, but it exists as a magnet for my SEO concerns. My contact page is a first draft after my first day of exploring "Constant Contact" I am not at all satisfied with the first draft of my verbiage, as well as the exact look and feel of the interface, but I am confident the advantages of "Constant Contact" will be worth the effort, so tweaking that area, and all the incomplete areas of the blog (FAQ, etc) are my personal responsibility.
With those qualifications of the incomplete nature of this first unveiling out of the way...
...please feel free to check out www.islandsign.com and let me know what you think! I put this in the "portfolio" forum, because the main focus of this web site is to show off my work, so don't miss the Gallery. Joe went beyond the call, to give me the type of gallery I wanted & I've never been more proud of how my work looks all in one place!
""Good judgment comes from experience; and a lot of that comes from bad judgment" - Will Rogers Posts: 3485 | From: Beautiful Newaygo, Michigan | Registered: Mar 2003
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My mind wanders. And that's not a good thing, 'cause it's too small to be out there alone. Posts: 3129 | From: Tooele, UT | Registered: Mar 2005
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When I opened it for the first time, the Island Sign Logo appeared up in the left corner of the monitor along with the birds. After paging through I closed out and came back here.
I read Russ' post about the Gallery and went back to take a look, since the first time I just glanced and did not wait for it to open.
When I did your logo was centered. I closed out and re-opened a couple of times and could not make it appear in the corner.
Maybe just a glitch on my end.
It sure is a nice site. Doug you have done some beautiful work.
-------------------- Sam Staffan Mackinaw Art & Sign 721 S. Nokomis St. Mackinaw City, MI dstaffan@sbcglobal.net Posts: 1694 | From: Mackinaw City, MI | Registered: Mar 2004
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Only critique is that for me, on dsl, the image transition for the main web page is very slow... the gallery took a while too.
Design critique, which I'm sure you've already considered, is that it might have been nice to actually, somehow, have the 'island' image rise up out of the water verses showing in the sky above the water. To me, the island configuration within surrounded by water makes more visual sense, and could nail the visual reference home.
Just a thought....nice job overall though.
-------------------- Todd Gill Outside The Lines Potterville, MI Posts: 7792 | From: Potterville, MI | Registered: Dec 2001
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My first visit also had the same results as Sam's...but subsequently has loaded every time properly...very very nice site...I love it...my only critique...and it could be only personal preference because no one else has mentioned it...but I found the wavy effects as the portfolio pics came forward to be bothersome...maybe I'm too used to having things appear so immediate on the web...although a great effect...I began feeling a little sea sick while viewing and soon wanted them to appear more immediate and without the effect...just one opinion...of course the wavy effect goes with the water theme...which was your intention and that's a pretty neat idea in and of it's self.
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Thanks for all the feedback everyone. I appreciate all the comments & the feedback.
The centering glitch has appeared sporadically during the design process. The fact that it is less likely to occur twice, makes it more challenging to troubleshoot. Joe is the expert here on everything except my concepts an content, so he knows all about this & we hope it can be resolved.
Todd, you are correct that the animation approach you mention was thought about from my earliest vision for an animated flash intro. Budget is the limitation to blame on that one, and therefore an area the site can evolve in time, if I wish to do so.
Rusty, your comments point to the area of most concern. Kelly also mentioned that when I pasted the link on Facebook, and a number of similar comments resulted from posting for the signs101 crowd. One other person did think it was intentional, as part of the watery theme. In actuality it is an anomaly I have little control over, related to the way Flash handles the moving images. I haven't asked Joe if there are tweaks to consider because the Diaz web site has a bit of that as well.
I guess my intentions to include all the same content on the blog site, www.islandsignmaui.com will be one way to offer viewers an alternative. Joe's gallery pics(Diazsignart.com)are smaller & seem to be a bit less wavy, so I suppose that could be another option to consider.
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Thats a killer site. That is something to be proud of.
-------------------- Charles Borges de Oliveira Borges Lettering & Design Snohomish WA Posts: 352 | From: Snohomish WA | Registered: Mar 2003
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In the services section the little scroll bar button thingy didn't really catch my eye... first time through I thought the first three services were it. Second time through I was studying the moving water effect (starting to become annoying after a few minutes)and caught the scroll button out the corner of my eye... hey, more services.
-------------------- Compulsive, Neurotic, Anti-social and Paranoid ... but basically Happy Posts: 2677 | From: Rochester, NY, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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Thanks Jon... got a few typos etc, on the list... that is one to fix for sure
...another cool feature that probably won't see a lot of action, and is sure to be overlooked by many... but is cool anyway... did anyone check out the full screen mode? Top right side of control panel...
I clicked on your services page and read the first three and thought it was done. Just as I was going to go to the gallery, BAM, more services! I think it should be more apparent that there are more pages of services.
Overall though, I think the site is awesome! The layout is very interesting, but not distracting from the content. That is definitely a top site in my book.
-------------------- Dan Beach Cylinder 9 Designs 1650 Glassboro Rd Sewell, NJ 08080 Posts: 625 | From: South Jersey | Registered: Sep 2008
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It's a very beautiful site! Personally I do not enjoy all the bells and whistles on sites like this, I'm probably too impatient, and I can only take so much moving things on the screen, then I just want to get out of there. But that's me, and not to say there's something wrong with it. I wish you best of luck with it and much success. It's great to see your ambition and business sense!