CRITIQUE: www.BellesPhotography.com

[*Mike*]

Hey guys... My website has been evolving over the past few months and I could use some feedback. Strengths, weaknesses, and general impressions would be great. Thanks for the time, I appreciate it.

http://www.bellesphotography.com

[*Mike*]

Hello??? Somebody's gotta be willing to give me an opinion... come on people... The site looks radically different that it did a month ago. And so, I could use some feedback and observations.

[Outlaw]

Good looking site, Mike! Unique, simple, and full of white space.

Only a few critiques:

Your logo image looks like it might have been saved at too-low a quality setting - I'm seeing quite a bit of artifacting around the text.

I'll say I understand why you hold your viewer vertically with the scroll boxes for text, but it does make it hard to skim and/or spot desired information smoothly and easily. On that note, you might try to work your horizontal space to give you more room in your scrolling text box so more can be seen/read at a time.

I love your Home page, with the simple flash slideshow - you might try on your "interior" pages making your logo smaller, turning it sideways, or moving it to another position vertically to allow your photos/text boxes more room to breathe.

For example, on my site (http://outlawphotography.net/), I use a very large logo on my main page, but then on interior pages, I use only a small logo at the top of each page.

As far as your gallery goes, of course, would love to see more images.

Wouldn't mind seeing more Flash built into your site - your design is a good one for the visual depth and excitement some simple Flash navigation and transitions could provide.

I would suggest considering changing your "Benefits" link to read something a little clearer, such as "Why Belle's?" or "Why Choose Belles?"

I really like the fluidity of your site - it scales well to different sized windows/browsers/resolutions. The simple colors and design are awesome for concentrating people's attention on your art and message.

[simon]

Just a quick look at the site, I like the clean lines and lack of clutter. The example photos cycle too quickly for my taste. It is aesthetically jarring the your top row of links is not aligned the same way on secondary pages. For example, from the main page to `gallery' the top row seems to jump upward. This was viewed with an up to date firefox on OS X.

Hope that helps....
Simon

[*Mike*]

Thanks guys, I really appreciate it. I'll go back through and try to browse the site with fresh eyes. Maybe some tweaking is in order... The album is just a JAlbum skin - I never noticed the navigation bar jump, that's an easy fix.

As for the flash, I'm still learning. As I figure it out maybe I can integrate some more into the site... I'll keep playing.

THanks again!