Diving Lore Review Request

Im currently using FF in 800x600 test mode, some images overlap (some images that are important, the map overlaps over the google ads, a diving lore grahics on the bottom left overlaps the frame containing it.

As for the speed test, it took about 45 seconds on dial-up and a modest 15sec on cable...

As for the look, a bit dark for my taste, the menu and links placement is good, but the red and dark blue combo doesnt look very good as it is an overused contrasting scheme...

White text on black is very hard on the eyes, if you have to use a black background use grey text.
As mentioned at 800x600 the globe is covered by the ads, bit of a bummer as it's hiding my country.
"Choose a Dive Region and explore the lore" is in dark blue, which on the black is nearly impossible to see on an old CRT screen. same as the "Lore Seeker" above form input.
Is the search or seeker working? there is no result page showing up, I did a search for 'nz', 'new zealand' and 'usa' and got nothing.

IMO I think you should go lighter background, maybe a pale blue or even white. Sure it's dark at depth (under the water) but if you look up is always light, plus your torches always lighten things up.
Some of your pages have a whole different look and feel, and way to many images (like commerical)

On a different note, keep an ear open as they are talking about sinking the boat used in the King Kong movie Peter Jackson just made, they want to make it a marine reef for divers, bit like the old navy boat they sank a few weeks ago.
Some useless info on the king kong boat - it nearly sank twice during the making of the movie, the hull has past it's use by date and they had to stop filming twice while it was repaired enough to make her water proof again.

Under Opera at 1600 x 1200 things look weighted to the left, so the Google ad on the right simply looks bizarre. Then if I draw the window size down the world image starts to overlap the Google ads.

That logo is not good, it either blends with the site too much or not enough. Actually it's more of a banner than a logo, sort of off-putting as it looks like it can't decide whether to be an advert or a logo. Something that's often said in the critique area of this site is that logos need to look good without colour (you may need to send a fax), at any size (e.g. letterhead or business card) and on any media (e.g. side of a van, poster). What you've got there isn't fit for purpose!

On the plus side, the content is good: Well written, well informed. I like the images too, there's something about diving pictures always makes the child within me yearn to don a diving costume!

Can see that you're trying to achieve an underwater theme for the site, but how's about taking that a bit further? Personally I always look to other sites for inspiration (but don't copy!) the CSS Zen Garden is naturally a good place to start, managed to find the sea themed category for you (just wish there were some better designs in there but one or two are good).

I'm finding that text too spread across the page (I know there are many arguments about liquid layouts) and the design overall is lacking structure, you seem to need a theme/design to wrap it all in. Make the place look a little more friendly and welcomming, and makes you want to surf far enough to see those lovely images!

Hmm,

All opinions welcome lets analyse and see whats what...

All in all I feel the layout cannot be messed with any more than it already has Its on the third (and final) template. It is optimized for standard 1024 x 768 resolution (I have changed the colour of this now so it is visible to visitors).

Am I wrong in saying that 800 x 600 is an old and redundant resolution in this day and age? Even some top websites are written take only one resolution to display correctly.

I've already looked at colour combos but its impossible to keep everybody happy, the dark background works because I can high-light the text more in white, it'll loose its impact should I state paling down colours.

The 'logo' as it is referred to is actually the title, the logo is the circular symbol down the bottom with the dolphins and anchor in it. Hmmm, confucious conundrums in it all.... I'll have a go at revamping the title 'banner' tonight...

The 'lore seeker' is still inactive I know! I have nobody who will point me in the right direction for configuring the 'search' to work in the site, any magical commands or clues are welcome.

The pictures I agree do take a little while to load-up and it is something I'm working on speeding up, but guys all text and no pics makes for a dull site...

As a standard, you should be visible at a minimum resolution of 800x600, if you dont decide to comply, then put a text at the top indicating best viewed in 1024x768 resolution. But if you do still fix the overlap... The colors you chose depends on you, however you still need a lighter hue, read color psychology. However you need to work out your logo make it less confusing and make it translate well in all medias,

Quote: Am I wrong in saying that 800 x 600 is an old and redundant resolution in this day and age? Even some top websites are written take only one resolution to display correctly.

Am afraid old people with bad eyesight still insist on 800x600 even if their hardware can do better, also you can make perfectly good designs work at this resolution. No real need to get any higher, especially if you have a liquid layout.
Also you have to consider emerging technologies like pda's and mobile phones, you aren't going to get an amazing resolution from them!

What's putting text at the top of the page going to do other than make people angry at the designers ignorance, demonhale?

It's not up to the designer what resolution I - as a user - want to view sites at so why try to force this upon people?

Oh and the pitcures weren't slow to download for me, I liked them. Might want to ask Busy as he's on a dialup still I think.

Yeah I am still stuck on dialup ...
Most pages do take a while to load, but the ones I checked have a lot of text so gives you something to do while waiting, your also using the width and height tags (i thank you for that) so the page isn't jumping around on loading.

Have a look at this thread The best way to compress photos or search for other, might find something to help you.

As for your search, you need something to search, your text needs to be in a database so is searchable, other wise use a 3rd party like google or atomz etc and they store it for you.

BTW I forgot to mention your no right click script doesn't work

OK I took some time and check out your site.

1) 1024 = bad. Even if you say "best viewed at 1024 x 768" youwill still annoy people who have to scroll side to side
2) I think the title Diving Lore is good. If you remove the 2 pics on each side and make the table set to 775 , it would be cleaner looking
3) for me the globe is not in the center , it on the bottom, I'm using the most used browser IE. I think you could shrink the globe to fit in the center better
4) Not a fan of ads by goooooooooooooooooooooooooooogle but seems to be a trend.
5) The dark blue is fine, maybe make the text a light light shade of gray.
6) you should set the margins 0 so the top will be flush. It will make it look better.
7) To keep your look consistent (which people tend to prefer) you should have the Diving Lore banner on everypage.
The left menu could be more original instead of the usual table border set to 1 or 2.
9) Graphics do take a while to load but it could be server .
10) I actually like the background color on this page http://www.divinglore.com/Genesis/Otherpages/ResearchScientific.htm# better then the main. Easier to look at the white text.

my 2 cents

Ok, first of all I think you should really thank Lex. He did pretty awesome with the review which I will add to. I'm just a newbie to this site and will add to his comments. I really really liked the site, and am a great fan of the dark blue (just my preference). I would def make the site 800 wide like Lex said. On some links I thought I was sent to another website because of the different look. You may want to think about keeping everything the same? For the google, if I were you I would probably do it also since it can't hurt, you may just make some dough from it. I would also change the title of your website to something more apt to get the keyphrase for someone looking for your website. Just my two cents.

Indeed my thanks do go out to lex for his efforts!

However Brandon changing the name of my website is like performing brain surgery, very tricky to predict the impact that will have for SEO!

Tryin' to change the width and I've managed to get all the page to display without the gimpy little over-spill on Firefox browsers!

Eventually the whole website will look very similar to the homepage, I've only managed to make the USA and the UK to look the same so far...

Yeah I know the colours on the Future Diving page are highlighted better but the background is then too light! The dark colour works!
No rest for the wicked!

Hey jeeves, at least they know what they are getting into, at the top at the bottom, at least they know its supposed to be wider, older visitors sometimes dont notice the horizontal scrollbar, and letting them know the site is wide in whatever way is helpful to them...

I would say that you need to rethink your main header. It was the first thing that caught my attention, but it was mainly because it was designed so poorly. Other than that, your layout seems to fit the bill, its simple, but to the point. I don't know about browser problems, as I haven't tried FireFox.

i am using FF and 1024*768 resulation at the moment... despite this big resulation, i see horizantal scrollbar on the main page.. i think adsense ads may cause it.. :hmmm

wow that looks like a big site with many pages, how long did it take u to do that?
i hope you used CSS formatting

1)on FF and resolution 1280x1024 there are no horizontal scroll bars
2)you could pull site a bit togeather (not sure bout my spelling here), and a bit more frames
3)background color,although it fits the theme, could be a bit lighter
4)CDNN HEADLINE NEWS could be framed on the right side - I think that all content should be located in the right and the left, and leave the globe in the middle
5) there is much too empty space under the globe