Project Two Preliminary Critique

[wendy_boddy]

I picked the Gilded Serpent website

It is a magazine style website for Belly Dancers and those that are interested in that world. And believe me that had a whole world in their website

http://www.gildedserpent.com

I found two different Arabic style fonts on dafont and used them for the two different logos. The I matched a sans serif font for the body. I used futura because it is easy to read when it is small and they have so much content, I though that was important.

Ideally, both these sites would be a mix between fluid and fixed. But I have to learn how to do that.

[aslychsm]

Wow, these are so cool! Having an animal print as the background was a good idea, it makes the overall website feel exotic and exciting. Honestly, I just love your emphasis on snakes in general, belly dancing is certainly a comparable activity. Although I think both of these would work nicely for this project, I think the second layout is more appropriate. It feels more light and fluid, and just sells the website more. My only suggestion - and it's more of my personal preference - is to justify the type, only because it feels a bit jagged compared to the rest of the design.

[lingling_chen]

Wow! Wendy
They are awesome! Great job on your roughs!

Lingling

[paula_b]

Hi Wendy!
Very cool start! I like the home page on rough A, the inner page on rough B, and the colors on rough A. Great idea using the scaled background! It's a little over-baring in the green rough. If you end up going with that one, consider lightening the opacity and give more emphasis to your header and content. Again, very cool start!

[Sierragirlnv]

Hi Paula,
I think you are brave to take on belly dancers. The one picture with the girl and the snake on her head is killing me...hahahhhaaa! I think you nailed it with the second layout the soft colors and the organization is great! The logo and the type you chose to go with it are perfect. I think the green is too much and it gives off a cheap vibe... Does belly dancing and snakes go hand in hand or something?
Anyways good job!

Sierragirlnv

[georgia_novotny]

Hi Wendy,
Wow! You weren’t kidding about a whole world on their homepage.
Visual overload and not in a good way, great find for a horrible website.

I like the snake feeling from both of your designs as the theme for the website.
I think the color schemes should be combined some how.
The dark green design is too dark and the gold and white design needs more color.
I like the gradients you used on the green design but might use a little opacity to make the text more dominant and more legible.

I like how you organized the navigation and made it realistic for the website which shouldn’t have everything on their homepage.
All the photos look good and I like both styles of arrangement with them, both are visually effective.

Hope some of that helps.
Nice Work!
Georgia

[recordd]

Hi Wendy!
Wow! These are awesome! I love that you used the snake skin as the backgrounds. I think it definitely creates a uniqueness to both designs and both look 3D which also makes them standout. Both of your designs are not only visually appealing but they are well balanced, clean, professional, & above an beyond better than the original! lol I absolutely love rough A over B because I think the color scheme is a little more elegant and I really like the simplistic layout. I love how you uniquely designed the name in the header, as well. One suggestion that I would recommend is to add the contact and location information somewhere on the homepage, maybe down in the footer. I cannot wait to see your final design!

[rrodriguez]

Wendy, I like both websites but the one that's easier to read and still holds it's creative design is the light background layout. I love the scales as the background because it gives the "Serpent" feel to it. You had the same problem I faced and that was dealing with so many buttons. I think the long vertical list is best in this situation. Your color scheme is calm and inviting to read. Your use of photos of the belly dancers is professional and organized. The innovative fonts bring it all together as one package. It looks pretty darn awesome.

[mlauc]

Hi Wendy,

Wow, these are awesome! You picked a doozy to redesign! I like the rose gold, reptile background the best. It really makes the colorful photos pop out. The side navigation makes sense with so much content. The logo in the green comp has a very slithery quality about it — that's got my vote.

Nice work!

[dboudinot]

Hi Wendy,

These are such fun redesigns. I like the layout from the top set and the colors from the bottom set, but I think either set would work. The scales create such a great texture that I was sold from the beginning. I also really like the gradient in the textboxes in the top layout even though I like the color scheme of the bottom more. You have so many good elements in each set! So, to recap my confusing reply, what I would change is to combine your colors from the bottom with your layout from the top, and maybe add a gradient to the text boxes which could be disastrous and make the type illegible, or could be awesome. Great Job on whatever you decide!