Acid Rain Designs

Site Name: Acid Rain Designs
Date Ordered: July 22, 2008
Date Completed: July 26, 2008

Screenshots

First Impressions/ Layout

At first I was a little confused by the splash page. I didn't know which your main site was. Why couldn't the link to your network be inside your website? Don't you want people to see your main website before one of your networks. Entering your main website.. The banner is a bit big, but you blended the pictures very nicely. The execution of your layout is flawless and it looks almost perfect. The only thing that sticks out to me is the rectangle flower image on the right. To me, it just doesn't fit with the rest of the layout. I also don't understand why you have your site name twice on your layout? Seems a bit redundant. I'm also a stickler for a layout whose content and banner is centered, which yours obviously is not. There's something about it that doesn't sit right with me. I think it might be that I feel like your content frame is not wide enough. If you were to want to put anything 400 px or more wide than your iframe is will be stretched out. As a visitor I know I hate scrolling horizontally. I love your navigation. It's so cute and your colors match well. But the order on you navigation is totally out of whack. It should be something along the lines of 'updates, you, tutorials, interact, site, www'. A tip when ordering navigation: Your most important content (or what your site is about) should be first. You have 'www' first (excluding updates). Do you really want to send your visitors away without them seeing your content? I don't think so.

14/20

Content

WWW: Link Us

I really like the buttons with the swirls on them. Those are probably my favorites of all of them.

Site: Awards and Gifts

This section could be organized better. Why not have it like:
[Picture of Award]
Site You Received the Award from (with link to the site)
Season Award was received

This would make it a lot easier on your visitors. No one wants to click a bunch of links just to see an image with really nothing on it but your name and the category you won.

Site: FAQ

On your answer to the first question you misspelled 'that'.

You

This would be a good place to put that entire network that you have linked from your splash page. There doesn't need to be a whole network devoted to graphics, textures, pixel text, bullets, and psds. Most sites just have these items in the 'You' section. It's a waste of your server space to have a whole network for these. I know you want a network but strive for quality not quantity. Just because a lot of sites are getting networks now doesn't mean you have to. My point is that you only have one link in the 'You' section. All the content in your network could be moved to this section so all your visitor content could be consolidated into one place, making it easier for you and your visitors.

You: Brushes

Your third brush set links to a photobucket image that says the image has been removed. Check on that. I really don't like any of the ones that you have made. They are all a bunch of scribbles. I can not say that I would use them. Basically, the average brushes you would find on any design site.

Tutorials

If you don't have any tutorials for Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro, Layouts, etc. then why have these listed? Delete them until you have content for them. This will make the page more organized and look better.

Tutorials: Advanced Pictures

So some, well most of these were made in Paint Shop Pro. Why can't you put these in the Pant Shop Pro category? Because there are so many tutorials I think it would be a good idea if you were to make thumbnails with the finished image and link them to the corresponding tutorials. This way someone could scroll through easily and if they liked the effect on the image they could click on the tutorial and learn how to do it. Overall, your tutorials are good and they are explained well enough.

Interact

This is a prime example of what I was talking about with the layout. The content box is way too small for this section. I don't want to scroll to see the 'that' picture to vote.

5/7

Graphics

I haven't seen any real examples of your graphics. Your layout is good and so are your tutorials though.

6/10

Organization

You could stand to be more organized. If I was a returning visitor and I wanted to go back to a tutorial I liked it would be such a hassle for me to click all the links to find said tutorial. Also I don't want to have to visit two different places (the main site and your network) to see graphics that could be consolidated into your 'you' section.

11/15

Niceness

You seem very nice. I like when webmisses/masters respond to people on their tagboard.

10/10

Creativeness

Right now, nothing about your site is extremely creative. I say this to most design sites that I review: They are run of the mill. They really are. They aren't like fan sites where you can add different networks and content to spice your website up and they aren't like personal websites where the uniqueness depends upon the blog. For a design site, you really have to work at how creative you are.

5/10

Updates

I think it's kind of funny that you think not updating in two days is a long time. But you update a lot which is good.

To answer your question about skinning..

I've never skinned a website before, but there is a tutorial about skinning on tutorialtastic. You can view it Here I think your site has to be converted to PHP.

5/5

Colors

I like the colors. Blue's a favorite of mine.

9/10

Extra

You have a lot of tutorials which is good thing. However, as I stated before, you really have to work to make your site unique. Right now your site is like every other design site.

4/10

Bonus

Link button on sidebar and in updates!

5/5

Overall/ Final Thoughts

Love the layout but the content box is too small. Layout headers should be centered with the sidebar and content centered until it. Also, don't make your visitors do any extra work. Either put your 'brushes' in your Goodies network, or better yet move the goodies network to the 'you' section. I also really recommend you take my suggestion to organize you tutorials. It would be so much easier for your visitors and they would be more likely to use them if they were organized. Overall your site is ok. Work on giving it that 'it' factor; the one that makes your visitors want to check your site everyday. If you find that your site will be golden.

74/102