neveronfriday Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 Hi everyone, as you know, a whole bunch of board members are working on the Basie website which is supposed to go live in August. The basic design has been completed and we want to ask you one simple question. Before answering, please read this post. Designing a site based on a cheaper (but excellent) Content Managment System (in your spare time) and having to collect all the content material from scratch both call for some design considerations: 01) The site is supposed to be as compatible as possible. That is impossible because the CMS uses some XML, CSS and lots of PHP/SQL), but one can get quite close. 02) Modern browsers still don't support all modern "techniques" so it's a choice between locking people out or resorting to programming techniques from years back. I chose the latter. Also because a time factor is involved. 03) The site will be text-heavy and not too graphics intensive. The reason is simple. It's supposed to look clean and because I'm hosting the thing, only images we have the rights to will be used. German law can be tough and if you have someone on your ass checking all your work, as I do (long story, but he causes trouble whenever it is remotely possible), you tend to be more careful. 04) Because modern monitors are often brightness-heavy (lots has been written about bright factory settings which most users don't even know about), I had to use some tricks to delineate the content area from the background without resorting to a darker background image which looked like crappola. I used a slight drop shadow around the main content area. 04) So, the way to go is adding a tiny bit of "fun". I've done so in the header by using a so-called "gradient" (the blue color is not solid but varies in shade) and another drop shadow for the Basie pic. Now the problem. Unfortunately, many people are still using a color depth of 16bit and with that, the header looks like a collection of pixeled blocks. What I'd like to know is which color depth you mostly use. To test, check this page: http://www.count-basie.com/index.php/pages/ [Note: Some server issues today because of backups in progress ... if the page doesn't load ... try again later] If the header looks fine, you're above 16bit, if it's blocky, you're at 16bit ot below. If you have any other input, please do post it here. I can't promise that any major changes will happen, but I'll try to take everything you say into consideration. Thanks for your time and help! Cheers! Volkher Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rooster_Ties Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 Not sure how to vote, cuz I discovered my settings were at 16-bit, but then I bumped them up to 32-bit. When I first saw the page under my 16-bit settings, the header looked like crap, but now under 32-bit, it looks fine. Frankly, I think the benefit you get from having such a slight gradient is so minimal, that I would just go with a solid color. Or perhaps you're just using that gradient to test your theory about whether people are running at 16 or 32 (and the real issue has to do with how you will be presenting other content that we're not seeing yet). In any case, I guess I'll vote "16", cuz that's what my settings were at when I first brought up the test page -- and if you hadn't said anything, I would have still been at 16-bit. Simpler is better, and more straightforward, in my opinion. We've all learned from the Allmusic changes this week, that change (and unnecessary complexity) aren't all they're cracked up to be. Just an unsolicited opinion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.A.W. Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 My settings are at 32-bit, and the header looks fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikeweil Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 My settings are at 32-bit, and the header looks fine. Same here exactly! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDK Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brownie Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 Deus, shouldn't the colour be red? We're talking about the kid from Red Bank The header looks fine to me... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mmilovan Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 (edited) I checked color scheme and it looks very fine to me (32 bit color); I like it very much as well as whole design - in fact it looks professionally polished and visually clear. Reducing to 16 bit color there are slight aura at the main header, but it is the case with that color bit depth, and in such settings it's not faulty. Edited July 14, 2004 by mmilovan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKE BBB Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 Great design, Volkher! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
couw Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 there is some pixelation going on around the writing on the blue, even in 32bit thoug. The drawback of the gradient is that you need a lot of colours in a gif, or make it a jpg. The latter tends to do this ecky-ecky-k'pow thing onya on lower resolutions... but who am I to complain if the public is satisfied! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
king ubu Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 I don't konw what all the others exactly talk about, but I see some sort of a blue-only rainbow in the header, around the text in the header, centered around the second "i" of "William", approximately. And that's the case with 16 and 32 bit. ubu Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
king ubu Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 Oh, and yes, the design's indeed good! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neveronfriday Posted July 14, 2004 Author Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 I'm at 1152 * 864. I'll check the page this weekend on all lower resolutions ... haven't had the time yet. That's part of the fine-tuning which I will do when I'm sure that everything is in place. I know where the problem is though, without looking. I compressed the original file by nearly 55% ... which is fine at higher resolutions, but not at lower ones. The image only has 12kb, so a lower compression ratio will only produce a marginally larger file. Nowadays, anything below 20kb is grand, so I can probably get rid of that effect. And, buy yourselves some bigger and better monitors, Jeez. BTW: One thing I notice at higher resolutions is this: Because of the arrangement of the text elements in the header image, the word "Basie" seems a bit off the base line. I know it's an optical illusion (especially on my old but good and trustworthy Nokia monitor), but I think I'll do sth about that. Just call me perfectionist. Cheers, and thanks for all the input everyone. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzz..... asleep. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
king ubu Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 And, buy yourselves some bigger and better monitors, Jeez. 50 cm diagonal - not large enough? May you have sweet dreams about Basie and about web-designing ... ubu Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
couw Posted July 14, 2004 Report Share Posted July 14, 2004 BTW: One thing I notice at higher resolutions is this: Because of the arrangement of the text elements in the header image, the word "Basie" seems a bit off the base line. I know it's an optical illusion (especially on my old but good and trustworthy Nokia monitor), but I think I'll do sth about that. Just call me perfectionist. not to nitpick, but it's actually the Count part that is drawn down toward the end by the years coming in underneath. Maybe drop another shadow from the letters as well? sweet dream webmeister.- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neveronfriday Posted July 15, 2004 Author Report Share Posted July 15, 2004 Nitpicker! In fact, if you draw a one-pixel white line just below the text, all items line-up perfectly! It's an optical illusion. I'll do some text re-arranging this weekend. Off to work ... Cheers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDK Posted July 15, 2004 Report Share Posted July 15, 2004 I'll do some text re-arranging this weekend. Can you do something about AMG as well? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neveronfriday Posted July 15, 2004 Author Report Share Posted July 15, 2004 I'll do some text re-arranging this weekend. Can you do something about AMG as well? Sorry, but that thing can't be saved anymore. Cheers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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