SM-Radio New design

[upthevale]

Hey, i showed you guys my internet radio a few months ago and we were using a bog standard free html layout, our team have now created our own ready for release soon im rather proud of it considering our last layout

Points to remember before shooting us down,
The content hasnt even been considered yet and will be changed alot to remove the ugly text blocks
compair this to our old layout and its a big jump
in no way are we looking for a expert finish we are a small community with a smal goal

Current layout http://www.sm-radio.com/v1

New layout: http://www.sm-radio.com/v3/home.htm

thx

[deathshadow]

Wait, hang on -- my bad -- I just went through the old site not the new one on my review. One minute.

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Ok, the blue links are illegible on black - so that needs to be fixed. Marquee was never adopted into the standards for a reason so I'd take a giant axe to it - remember the rule that cutesy animation on text distracts more than helps.

The neon blue background could use some toning down - and that's coming from someone known for garish textured backgrounds. Sometimes a fist in the face is good, but not when it distracts from the content.

Usually I say don't use PX, but up top where you have the "on air" text SHOULD be in PX since the 'music' part gets cut off or sent over the currently playing text in some browsers.

I'd also be worried that the outline fonts on the menu are illegible. Maybe brightening the backgrounds so the black part shows up more, or using a more legible font is in order. I'm also seeing some wierd spacing issues between them in FF where you can see through to the body wallpaper.

Designing without a doctype means it's going to be broken cross browser or you are resorting to unneccessary hacks... Though since you are working in Dreamweaver and fireworks you are already saddled with that - as evident by the use of that mm_ javascript nonsense to do CSS' job, spacer .gif's and tables for layout. Shades of 1997, though that's entirely what I come to expect from 'tools' like dreamweaver/fireworks.

To be honest, I think you'd be better off cleaning up the old site than going with this new one... supported by the 13k of markup when you don't even have 1k of page content, or that it's 75% larger in images with a simpler layout.

Or at the very least, design up what you want for appearance, and then have a template coder go through and clean it up for you - and if they say make changes for accessibility, listen.

[upthevale]

as always a very detailed and destroying review haha. but your advice is alwasy taken on board. As you see from our layout our skills arnt great hence why we designe in this way using dreamweaver and fireworks,

i agree the songs area needs sorting out and we will be working on that shortly,

Im also not too fussed about ppl taken away from the content as its not really important, infact the top bar would be surfise for the site to carry on due to it being an online radio but i will attempt to make a suggestion to tone down the background.

iv not had any cross browser issues myself but i havent really had time for much testing thx for flagging this and ill attempt to fix asap.

[deathshadow]

(Jan-06-2010 12:37 AM)upthevale Wrote:  Im also not too fussed about ppl taken away from the content as its not really important, infact the top bar would be surfise for the site to carry on due to it being an online radio but i will attempt to make a suggestion to tone down the background.

Have you considered then not making it one of the smallest elements on the page? I mean, instead of the marquee, or maybe along with the marquee make the title of the currently playing span the whole site width, with oversized play/pause/volume buttons above...

I mean, if it's the reason for the site to exist, make it loud, proud and in the users face, not tucked up into the 'cold spot' of the upper right corner.

[RegDCP]

ARRRRGHHHHHH! MY EYES !!! MY EYES!!!!

Please tone down the bg. Pretty please?

Flashing ! SCROLLING! blinking! Hard to read anything!!
If you made on air and currently playing wider and not scrolling it would display the same info.
You could also add a photo to the on air display


Menu across the top is "invisible" until actively searched for.
Needs more definition.
"Click here to dl plugin is UGLY and does not work in FF.
"Click here popup player is hard to hit -but works.
I would turn the link into an image of a 50's radio and link it to the popup.

Make 'layout color' and 'download plugin' menu items.
Did I say make menu brighter?

Underneath the distracting sm radio banner, you have the 2nd and 3rd repetition of "welcome to".

Good thing you explain about the name.. I Was wondering what kind of music a Sadomasochism station would play.

Why not link the request with the request page?
While you are at it send the user to the actual shoutout request and add the text and phone info to under the form?

Do you really need the banner flashing on all pages?
Do you not think that we KNOW where we are already?

Why the big blank space at the end to the recently played?

The blue links are impossible to read.

SEO needs major work on title, description and keyword tags need adding.

Use of h1/font for determining keyword hierarchy is not evident.
SEO semantic structure weak/fail
You need to tell us what kind of music is 1) playing and 2) available. (and when)
You also need to tell me what the station time is.. It is 12:00 here and Ryan is on - the schedule shows me "no show and ryan is not on until 19:00

[Rye]

Wow this is nice on the eye and an improvement on the previous. Did you do this yourself ? The media player etc at the banner in the top is good. You're improving!

[upthevale]

was created by our site manager ryan and tweeked by me as we go along

but yer i think a defo improvement and its what iv been after for a long time

Tune into the launch show monday 11th 6pm

[Pixel Art]

i am going to about how much you had improved who is a manager of it? surely you should not be responsible for it!

[upthevale]

what do you mean surley i should not be responsible for it?

[upthevale]

sorry for double post but since the release of v3 sm-radios hits have increased by 300%