SITE REVIEW: The Random Static

Ok, me and three good friends made this site. I am the administrator, the other two write the stories and poems, etc. and the third person doesn't do anything, but he has a lot of pop, lol. Anyways, tell me what you think. I know it isn't very good, but I can't figure out what to do to make it better. I know a lot about HTML, and graphics, but I just can't figure out what would make it look better. Thanks.

The website is http://www.therandomstatic.com

Did I do something wrong? Just looking for a little feedback, thanks...

Not at all Nathan. Sometimes a review just moves down the list and is overlooked.

Your site is very basic. It's laid out in a very straight forward manner and clearly displays the information.

For the aesthetic, it's not really my bag. The pig icon is cute, but the other elements are a bit...well...boring, to be honest.

A colleague of mine, and I used to joke that within your professional career you were allowed the mistake of using 'comic-sans' once and a page curl once. By that measure, you're still free to use the page curl.


If you are really interested in making this better, I would say you should first have a more cohesive design. Look at sites you like and observe the use of fonts and spacing.

For the sites organization, I would say move some of the content from sub sections to the front page. Just a little taste to encourage people to explore some more.

For efficiancy, instead of using image rollovers in the navigation, you might consider using CSS and Psuedo-Classes instead.

In Mozilla Firefox there is a substantial block of white at the bottom of the page. I don't believe this is part of what you were trying to accomplish. I haven't investigated the reason for this. It doesn't seem to be occuring in Vanilla Mozilla.

HTH!

I greatly appreciate your response, I think that will help a lot. I need to learn more CSS and other similar tools, but it's hard to find the time. As for the white space at the bottom in Firefox (the best browser in the universe), I have no idea why it does that...in internet explorer it doesn't, but for some reason firefox does it to my page as well as many others...I have investigated all my code and could find no consistencies to point out the problem.
I noticed that you didn't comment on color choice, as most friends do. Do you think it should be changed, or will font choices, as well as other organizational methods do the trick.
I know this is a very long response to your comments, but does anyone think that my idea for a new mascot be changed from the clipart pig of six months ago, to a hand-made photoshoped and airbrushed blue lobster?
Thanks again.

i just dont see the connection between the site name, the mascot (if a pig or lobster), or the design choices on the site. basically its a site to post random things, sometimes funny, that you and your friends do?

you asked what can be improved and say you cant add anymore coding, but i think if you dislike the layout now then you should just redesign it ya know? just make like 5 designs on paper or in photoshop and decide before coding it.

i hope im not being too blunt but, you cant ask for corrections to something that has no "right or wrong answer" to it. you seem unhappy with the layout so i say to just redesign a ton more and then choose

I was looking at this on my laptop. I'd want to look on my CRT before considering the color.

OK, first off, about the whole random theme, I will have to find something more fitting. Your second point I don't get though. I don't remember saying I can't add anymore coding... I can add as much as I need, my problem was I can't figure out what code is causing the whitespace in firefox. Now, as far as the layout - I wasn't too clear on that. My entire problem is I am on my second layout (my first layout was framed, the current one is a hand-made template) and I just can't figure out what to do to the layout to make it look better. What I am looking for is maybe a suggestion or two about good layouts.

yehhh. its already a designed layout, it cant change much from now on... just redesign more layouts! make lil thumbnails and redesign like 5. its not work, cmon, go, do some

i think you need a good banner on the top. but overall you got some good information in there

Informations are good, very intersting.
Mascot is really cute.

The grey colour you used as a template
and 3 rollers that you've used look very
amature, to tell the truth!

Everything's okay except... I would redraw
the template or buy one ))))

But what an intersing site you have.
good work and hope to see some
change soon and review again!

Good day friend.

After carefully considering your replies I have made a to-do list, and would like to know if you think these steps will make the difference.

=Photoshop a new update banner
=Turn all major page titles into images with a decent amount of color
=Albums page should be changed top show each album cover with a title and description, etc.
=Add illustrations to the main Wiggleman page
=Art and Literature main pages need images for each of the categories
=All the text in Corsair needs to be illustrated and text turned to images
=Ask Zach page needs Zach's "help" picture with each reply
=Countdown page needs to be expanded or deleted
=Kindergarten Dairies should have its own "special" font
=Issues with nonuniform code causing irregularities in other browsers should be taken care of

So, let me know if you think this will do the trick,.