Project 1 Preliminary Critique

[gr8ful1]

Hi everyone! Sorry I'm a little late to the party, I have been struggling through many unhelpful Adobe tutorials trying to learn Photoshop . I have only acquired basic skills so far, so I am anticipating much improvement in my designs throughout this class!

My first layout was somewhat inspired by the bridge picture, and how it is a man made symmetrical object traveling into a world of chaotic nature. Hence the symmetrical layout. I had many troubles finding a font color that fit the color scheme though, and that was still readable.

My second layout was inspired by the opposite, really, the cliff on the left side of the picture being a heavy, off-centered object. I'm sure some of you graphic design people know a name for that I haven't yet figured out how to edit an image, I would have liked to soften the edges of the picture of me somehow.

I found https://unsplash.com/ to be very inspirational in their open source photos, which helped me envision layouts. On http://www.webdesign.org I found many more helpful Photoshop Tutorials than were on Adobe's site, albeit a little too late for this stage of the project.

[rmiyashiro]

G'day Kristen,
My name is Ryan. I just realized that maybe I should start introducing myself before critiquing others' works. Thank you for the helpful Photoshop links. I'm in the GRC program but I like to have many references for these programs.

The concept behind the bridge layout is great. I love the photo and I love the symmetry, but some of the text is difficult to read. My suggestion is to shrink the photo a bit so you could have a title and navigation bar at the top that is easy to read and a bar at the bottom for the class info and your email. You could then shrink the body copy a bit so it'll fit on the bridge.

Your layout with the picture of the cliff is solid. The way the cliffs swoop down to the water then guide the eye straight to your name is terrific. I would consider making your name just a bit larger. The navigation lined up on the right side of the page is nice and even but you may want to move it in a bit so it's not right against the edge of the page.

[Joe_Morales]

Hello, Kristen,

welcome to the party! Now not bad for your a start in photoshop. I would avoid using green type on a green background to have better legibility for your first design and for your second Id watch your project placement its too close to the edge and is getting a little cut off. I like the perspective of the photo of your first design I think if you can fiddle with it a bit I think you could have a strong design.

[kaycee_weddell]

Kristen,

For having troubles with tutorials and stuff I think your designs actually turned out pretty well so good job! I like your imagery a lot. I think I am leaning more towards your bridge design. I like how you filled that background with a picture. However green on green is a little hard to read so maybe try playing with different text colors or maybe the opacity of your background to dull that down a little. Overall great start!

[KamiGurl]

Hi Kristen!

For someone who is starting off with Photoshop, I have to say you did well on these two layouts. I actually really enjoy both of them! The first one is very intriguing, I personally love nature photos and backgrounds, but the problem I have with them is the type getting lost in "greenery" backgrounds. Maybe try to put a background behind your text so that it doesn't get so lost into the photo... But beautiful picture! As for the other layout, I really enjoy this one as well. I love the imagery and colors you used. It has a welcoming and comfort feeling to it. So to me you could use either one... just the one with the bridge would need a little more work than the other one. You did well on both tho! Great Job!

[raoki]

I really like the first layout, I personally love nature and green a lot so.haha
Like some other people said, green type on the green background is hard to read. I understand that this is hard because the background has both lighter green and darker green. So here's what I'd do: just putting a dark green box with a low opacity on the back of the body copy so it stands more and still coherent

[lornrocks]

I think you're doing a great job for someone who has never touched Photoshop before!

I think your second layout is the strongest. I would advise that perhaps you should reduce the opacity on the white square layer over the photo just a teensy bit to add some nice texture behind it. Assuming that the square is on top of part of the photo and you didn't just crop the photo, of course. I like your color choices for that one and the way you laid out the text and the photo of you. What would make the layout even stronger is if you faked buttons like we learned in last night's class on your links on the right side so instead of just floating text, they're anchored to the composition and add depth.

The first one is nice as well but I feel like everyone is trying the "text over a whole photo" look and I think the second layout is stronger. If you are attached on the first layout, I would try putting a 50% opacity white square or even a really light green square behind the text to help push it out from the photograph. The bridge is a nice photo choice but it's quite busy so the text needs a little help pushing off to be more easily readable. You did find a good font color choice for that one.


Much luck on your progress learning Photoshop and I'm sure you'll do fine!

[Instructor]

Nice, those are some pretty good layouts for a first timer! The tutorials are taking, I see. You have a strong sense of layout, which will serve you well in graphic design. Most of the issues I see are in the details which will come to you in time (and with a few more design classes )

I'd say you have two sets of "good bones" here. That is, designs that will look good with a little tweaking and cosmetic surgery.

The first design is a nice clean layout. Surprisingly so given your professed lack of design and software training. Each of the elements is well placed and has good margins (distances between objects) with the elements around it. The justified paragraph gives a strong sense of shape without having any actual shape to it. The full background image is very evocative and does a nice job of setting the mood of the piece without dominating it.

Where the design runs into trouble is in legibility. The green type of the top of a green image blends in with your lush, forested background image. I would try making the type something other than green and adding some semi-transparent, or fully opaque boxes behind things to set them off. Take a look at some full background image websites and see how they did it. I think the layout works fine as is. Maybe enlarge the name at the top a bit.

Your second design is a much more traditional website layout, with a top banner, side navigation, and a traditional footer. I like the cool blue colorscheme, it gives it an oceanic feel to go with the nicely placed top image. The fonts are well chosen and the bodycopy is easy to read. The header image is strong and instantly establishes location and paints a mental picture of what you're about.

It's weakest area is contrast. The blues are a little too close and everything blends together. I think it would be served best by making the bodycopy darker, something like the dark blue on your navigation. I'd also make the footer text white and the header text bold, twice it's current size, and white. You can set it off from your image with a black outer glow. I'd also shrink your footer text and make the footer not quite as tall as it is now.

BTW the term you were looking for to describe your top banner was "asymmetrical balance"

All in all, a very good start! I look forward to seeing your final designs.

[dnorwood]

I like both of these designs. Either one would need only a little fixing to make them good.
Rough 1, the bridge: The layout is good and your choice of text colors works well. But, it is hard to read. My suggestion would be to lower the opacity of the picture to about 50% and then put a black drop-shadow under all of the text. That should allow the text to be more readable.
Rough 2, water: Here again, your color choices are good. The layout needs a little bit of re-arranging to make the composition balanced. I would suggest making your links area the same width as the picture of yourself, moving it to the far left side, and placing your links down the center of it. Then, move the picture of yourself to the far right side and place it so the bottom of it touches the top of the grey bar. This will balance out the heavy rock at the top left. Now center your text between the links area and the picture of yourself. All done!
NOTE: If you would like help softening the edges of your picture, I would be glad to show you how.

Happy Designing!

[dzynecin88]

I like both of your designs and I'm very impressed with your tenacity in working through tutorials. I've done alot of that myself and they can be tedious but very helpful. As a nature lover, both of your designs are appealing to me, but the bridge one has a little more grab for me. I had the same issue with legibility in one of my designs and struggled with color of type and ways to set it off the photograph. I still have work to do on mine, so won't pretend to know the answer, seems there's much tweaking to be done with opacity of text boxes to get it right. Your ocean design has a good layout and I love the banner image, but I think I would try for a little more contrast with your color scheme. Great job on both designs!