Please Redesign the Banner? June 21, 2008

Please Redesign the Banner?

By Guest Contributor
June 21, 2008

I’ve read the 38443523 complaints about the banner at the top of this page.

So, I’ll leave it to you. Because I (obviously) don’t do design.

If you’d like to redesign the banner (assuming I approve of the design), I’ll make the change 🙂

It doesn’t have to include any pictures of me. Please just make it look all nifty.

In case you need to know, the dimensions are 760 x 132 pixels. And it’s a *.gif image.

You can send final products to email.JPG.

…

***UPDATE***: This is the comment I made below:

Well, let me be more specific. I would *love* an entire site redesign. Because, while it works, it’s not unique. And the banner up top is quite grainy.

I don’t have the technical knowledge to fix any of this. And every time I try to play around with major things on the site, it shuts down completely.

If you’d like to help, please let me know! Ideally, you have an idea of what would work and enough time to help me change it! (I’ll send you a signed copy of the book as a thank you…?!)



[tags]atheist, atheism[/tags]

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  • EKM

    What sort of complaints have you been receiving? It looks okay to me.

  • I’ve read the 38443523 complaints about the banner at the top of this page.

    Is this one of the 59.3% of statistics that are made up?

  • About a month ago, I switched from a plain text header to a graphic. I definitely did not expect to receive as many complaints as poured in. Well, people who don’t know me tended to like it; those who have met me in person were nearly unanimous in their dislike for the image.

    It’s odd, because I don’t think it’s a BAD header; it’s just perhaps a bit cuter than I am in person (or on my blog). I offered to PAY for a new and improved banner designed by a reader: none have materialised.

    All of this is to say that you should not fret about complaints about your banner. I think it’s a good one.

  • Your banner is fine. So consider this one of the few lowly compliments.

  • Can you supply us with any photos of yourself that you like or where you’re in an interesting location? I would resort to facebook stalking, but the images on there are low quality, and that’s the number one thing that annoys me about your banner =P

  • There are multiple design issues with this site. I think a new theme is in order.

  • Rob

    Don’t use a GIF — GIFs and photos don’t go together. That’s why your current header is so grainy-looking in the first place.

  • There are a few issues with this website in different browsers. In Firefox there is a strange line all the way down the page on the right that goes through all the sideboxes. Some of the sideboxes are missing the curves at the top of bottom. This is present in other browsers like Opera. I’m assuming it looks ok in Internet Explorer, but then the code used is probably flawed and was created *for* Internet Explorer rather than adhering to any standards.

    As Rob pointed out above, GIF’s shouldn’t be used for photos. They are useless at displaying anything other than simple images and transparency. Having said that, if you need transparency then PNG’s are much better suited. In the case of the banner, a JPG is probably the best bet if images are used.

    A new theme would be nice (perhaps a wider one).

  • Danny Keith James

    It ain’t broke. Don’t fix it.

  • Well, let me be more specific. I would *love* an entire site redesign. Because, while it works, it’s not unique. And the banner up top is quite grainy.

    I don’t have the technical knowledge to fix any of this. And every time I try to play around with major things on the site, it shuts down completely.

    If you’d like to help, please let me know! Ideally, you have an idea of what would work and enough time to help me change it! (I’ll send you a signed copy of the book as a thank you…?!)

  • Xeonicus

    I never had any complaints, but after reading Adrian Hayter’s comments I now notice all the problems. I guess I just don’t pay attention to such little details as much. Maybe most of your complaints are from web designers, you know how those folks are. 😉

  • Other than perhaps rejiggering the theme so that it looks correct on Firefox and Opera, about the only change I’d recommend would be to save your original copy of the banner, which I guess would be a high-resolution TIFF or something, as a PNG. I suggest PNG because the banner has both a photo and a large block of color, and JPEG’s lossy compression handles the former better than the latter, while PNG’s non-lossy compression should handle both just as well. The PNG will likely be bigger than the corresponding JPEG, however.

    I don’t recommend changing the overall style of the site, though. It’s nice enough as is.

  • Beth

    I would certainly not take any design criticism from Joey.

    I concur, the problem is that the header is a gif. It should be a jpg. Yes the site may be a tad plain and that line in the sidebar is kind of weird, but I think overall it is just fine. It works and I come here for content not eye candy.

    Except maybe you, you cutie. 😉

  • Actually, that line running down the right side is present in IE (7) as well, and the bottom doesn’t look too good either. This kind of crap is the reason I stopped doing web design – plus I’m not good at graphics design.

    Personally, I like the overall design, and like said above it’s just some minor stuff that needs to be done. Since I do have some experience in this area I’ll take a look at the site’s source in my spare time (of which I have varying amounts) to try and see if I can fixerize the “line” issue.

    For the banner, I agree that it is rather grainy and should be updated. But like I said, I’m terrible with graphic design, so if you’re looking for a completely new banner style then someone else might be able to get you something intriguing. On the other hand, if you want to maintain the same style of banner, I can do that for you in about 30 seconds; all I’d need is a similar picture (maybe even the same one), but I’d need the original source picture (since most digital cameras do JPEG, that would be fine).

    So if any of that sounds like something you might want, you have my email address.

  • With WordPress, in theory, you should be able to change the theme (look and feel) without any problem. That is unless you have customized some of the non-theme php or template pages in the site to get certain effects. Be careful, though, on giving out the admin password to the site. It might be best to get advice and then do the changes yourself.

  • Xeonicus,

    I’ve been designing websites for years so I notice things pretty well 😛

    Hemant,

    I’d be glad to do a spot of “fixing” for you. As people have said, there is nothing wrong with the layout, so the best thing would be to just go over the code and tidy it up so it works for everyone.

    I believe you have my email, so contact me if you want me to start working 😛

  • David D.G.

    I don’t see anything wrong with the banner — just a friendly atheist looking all friendly and athy. Nothing wrong with that.

    ~David D.G.