Jack Michaelson's new personal site!

Jack Michaelson's picture

He has: 1,733 posts

Joined: Dec 1999

I thought I'd try something new Smiling

The url is:
http://www.ruudonline.net/new

There are still some padding/margin issue's in IE and Safari, which will be fixed soon. Should be fine on Firefox though.
How about download time? Is it too heavy?
In case you're wondering what language that is (besides english): that's dutch Wink

Shakespeare: onclick || !(onclick)

Renegade's picture

He has: 3,022 posts

Joined: Oct 2002

The load time was quite long on dial up.

Although I like the design of the page, I think the black text on the background of leaves is actually quite hard to read. Oh, I take that back, the background for those has just loaded. :S Maybe you can try preloading those images? They seem to only load when the user toggles that page.

Nice site, keep up the good work. Its very original, I don't think I have seen a similar design.

BTW, you might want to set a default background colour for the page as well, not everyone has white set as default Smiling

Busy's picture

He has: 6,151 posts

Joined: May 2001

load time on the first page is a little slow on dialup - doesn't fit 800x600 very well
hmm the background isn't showing on the websites link, ok spoke to soon, its just slow to load. the contact box is slow to load too, took 3 attempts to get the border to show
neat idea

Abhishek Reddy's picture

He has: 3,348 posts

Joined: Jul 2001

Yes, it does take a while to load on dialup. I viewed it across two sessions, and only on the second try did the backgrounds load.

It's a unique design. I like the imagery and look of everything in the green area, but somehow I don't think the white background works. The whole thing might be better centred as well. Smiling

This last part is more an academic note than a criticism. You've clearly designed this with good knowledge of the content you're presenting (which is why the design works) but I'm curious if you think it'll last long. It seems too deeply optimised for the content you have right now. What will happen if you want to add another section?

It's a nice, compact site. It looks good and is easy to use, just too bad about the download time on dialup. Good work. Smiling

Megan's picture

She has: 11,421 posts

Joined: Jun 1999

Oooh! I like the green. Very striking. I am getting horizontal scrolling with window width at about 850 px. A lot of scrolling too. That should be fixed. I also think that the logo area here needs a better font. That's a pretty boring sans you've got there.

Are you sure you're going to have enough room for your content in those little boxes? Doesn't elave a lot of room for the site to grow...

Looking at the old version, this is way cooler and IMO suitable than the old one. Using show/hide for navigation is really innovative. I haven't seen that sort of thing in a long time. So good job!

Jack Michaelson's picture

He has: 1,733 posts

Joined: Dec 1999

First of all: thanx all Smiling

Abhi and Megan really pointed out the weakness of this design: it doesn't really have space left for growth. This page is step one of eventually three steps of which I hope all three will be taken. Basically this design doesn't have to grow. When I think that more sections are needed, that means it's time for step two and that's a new site (with same graphical - recognizable - elements). That's lot's of work, but I think it'll keep it 'fresh'.

Another weakness (oh no?! another? Wink) is the loading time. Especially people on dialup will have to wait. You are right, preloading is definately an option, no a must here.
On the other hand, in the Netherlands most people have (access to) ADSL or cable and the target visitors are Dutch, so maybe that won't be a real problem for now.

The site's width is about 940px. I've decided to leave the standard 800x600 design behind, as most Dutch people have 17" (1024x768) or more.

Thanx Abhi and Renegade for pointing out the background color issue. I just went for white, without really thinking about it and didn't define a color. I'm gonna reconsider this... maybe let users define their own background color? hmmm...

Thanx again for the feedback Smiling

Shakespeare: onclick || !(onclick)

They have: 8 posts

Joined: Dec 2004

feels like i'm in the forest. quite refreshing. Fast download on 56K. If possible change the BLACK text into other readable fonts and colour.

Jack Michaelson's picture

He has: 1,733 posts

Joined: Dec 1999

Thanx Smiling

With some small adjustments I released it just now.

dojo's picture

She has: 87 posts

Joined: Dec 2004

I just love it Smiling I'm not at home so I don't see it on dial up, but it's refreshing. Great effort Smiling

Jack Michaelson's picture

He has: 1,733 posts

Joined: Dec 1999

thanx!

heebiejeebieclu's picture

They have: 527 posts

Joined: Aug 2004

First of all, i hate reviewing sites when there's already a lot of people reviewed it; anyway i really lilke it, but i don't like the way that the green bar near the bottom sticks out, fading. I think that all of the site should be contained within that one box.
Like the favicon BTW

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