I think we have seen this design before in one shape or another. What makes this stand out for me is the mismatched levels you placed the logo and navigation on. Your alignment is off and I think that makes it interesting. I think you need to try and do something different with the interaction. I'm not sure how you plan the portfolio to work, but I would recommend some jquery to expand or contract the design's canvas and really let some creativity come out in that viewing experience.
Also this is really a simple website. You potentially 5 pages of content. Maybe you should make the entire site one page and use some code to jump around the browser window. Perhaps that gradient leads the user to someplace else. Like the clouds, sky, ground, roots concept.
All and all I love the simplicity of it and how clean it is. I really like the HOME, Grid 2 comp and the Home, Big and Thumbs. Nice use of color and varied type faces to separate the boring white. You should pick one and start building.
I have two favorites.
What I like - it's clean. It shows me a lot of designs, so I get a sense of your range. It's warm and friendly, and it makes me think you have a lot of depth.
What I like is the striking and bold design. As someone who looks for designers to work with, it's intriguing and captures my imagination. It makes me think you're creative.
I hope these comments help.
Hi there Eric,
You have a lot of ideas going on in these concepts but only a few of the concepts look like they've been given a lot of thought visually and the rest look hastily thrown together. For that reason, it is hard to work out which ones are working for you and which ones are not since the more visually finished ones are obviously standing out as better right now even though some of your other ideas in the way you are showing the image gallery may work better.
You have a business card showing NEAT and so for this reason am unsure why you have some of your websites without this on.
Visually the only one which is really working for me is the first one - NEAT Website, Bold and this one to me stands out quite clearly above all the others.
The second concept is interesting in it immediately says who you are and has more images but your logo name bit is floating at the top not aligned to anything, the drop downs look disjointed and one of your images is going to white so your grid of images is starting to break up.
I'd like to see your ideas refined much further and then pick out three or four to refine to a more finished standard.
Otherwise start with wireframes and post those first
I know you said they were drafts but even drafts need to have things aligning etc
I'm not going to totally disagree with you Emma, but I think eric's style here lends itself to breaking a few rules. Anyone can use a grid and drop in objects or set strict alignments. I think eric should just go with what he has and experiment as he builds it. Besides real web design is created in the code not in the wireframes or a photoshop psd. This is especially true when creating a portfolio site. Its an organic process grown out of the concept phase.
Eric, if you want a polished look then buy a wordpress template that will keep it all together. If you want something personal with all the flaws and insights you bring to your work then start building and see were it takes you. Remember a web designer is only as good as he can code. Anything is just print design from the 90s.
I'm always fascinated by the design/code argument.
Clear Left is one of the world's top web design agencies with Andy Bud as their managing director - he of great css fame. Their agency do not let their web designers touch code and they do not let their front end builders touch the design. They expect the designers to know how to code but they let designers do their job and code people do theirs.
Personally I have been writing html since the early to mid 90s and I do all kinds of tweaky things when building out my pages to make them work visually as I go along. But I have worked also where I just do the psd and hand it over.
Of course rules are there to be broken but a design has to be exceptional to break them.
Anyway these are just roughs from Eric and not finished design. I just find them a bit confused because there is so much going on in design terms and ideas terms hence starting with wireframes - get the content right first and then move to how it's going to look
Emma and max i appreciate both of your comments. I will say though Emma that your note that i "threw the designs together" is not realistic. I really do love a more wabi-sabi look, and breaking of whatever "balance and grid" rules there are interests me. In terms of tension and the unseen triangle of the layouts, i'm pretty happy with them in general. Again they are drafts - your request to see wireframes or more finished proofs is great, but this is where i am at the moment, so I was looking for "this design has potential" rather than "where's the finished layouts"
Fair enough and I understand wanting to push design beyond the normal boundaries. For me in the second concept, it looks like a mistake rather than done on purpose where the logo is placed. Normally in a design which breaks the grid rules but works none of the elements look as if they were placed without thought. This logo looks just out in a bad way.
There are just too many ideas and visual ideas going on to be able to narrow it down and focus on what works and doesn't for you. The only one which stands out to me is Concept One and possibly concept Three with a large image to hold the page. If going for the smaller images, I prefer just to go all out with something like this: http://www.calango.nl - keep it very simple and strong. The logo I think you have to use NEAT as you have that on your card, you've made the decision to use it so go with it and be consistent - otherwise it's confusing.
"Besides real web design is created in the code not in the wireframes or a photoshop psd." Really Max ? is that what you think ?
Well i totally disagree ... I would love to see a web site that has a good design(not a great one a good one is enough), good usability and clean code that was build without making some wireframes and design layouts in photoshop/illustrator or similar programs.
Maybe I didn't get your comment but this is what I understand from it.
"then buy a wordpress template that will keep it all together" again I don't get it, I received this suggestion my self on a project. Getting negative feedback makes you see what you are doing wrong and how to improve as a designer, that is great ... but saying buy a template it's like saying you suck go do something else with your life, without explaining why, why in the hell would someone post a design here if he or she would be better of buying a template, and what kind of designer is he or she ... and where is all the fun ...
seriously are you a designer ? or do you buy "templates" all the time ...
the concept you took is great .. slightly do some changes it will look good.
first the logo.. please change the color of the logo according to the design if can't then do change the colors in website according to Logo. secondly navigation is nice but its too common.. look if you can do something better. & Top right part of the header, i actually dont know what you putted there .
number 3 I think is the one you should work with, be aware of screen resolutions, because if you have the big image cover the first fold, users will probably not see the scrollable under the big image.
your work is very good and that is way the website is engaging but:
I don't like the drop downs, the logo should be bigger and should be the hand font "Vento" because the blue NEAT is not cool for me, I don't like it at all, I don't like how it looks the design part not the text "NEAT"
however what I like in blue are the links and the small "creative" text under the logo "Vento" on mockup 7, maybe you could say this is NEAT under the Vento logo ?
One more suggestion, I think you should consider using very light gray color for the background, because this white is to much in your face or brake it with some texture( but it's better to let it simple and just try some gray).
hope this helps, Cheers
I like #1 (NEAT Website, Bold) & #3 (Venuto Home, Big and Thumbs).
I think the layout works for #3, but per other comments they're right - the big photo could end up taking over the entire fold, its huge. I'm definitely into the concept of highlighting a spotlight and having a few gallery thumbs below.
I like the VENUTO Home, Bold White the best. It will be interesting to see how you will design the rest of the pages.
I agree. I'd even say if jQuery expand/contract isn't your thing, think about doing it in anchors. I like the 1 big site page concept, I'd say the only issue is loading larger images. Multi-page sites are overrated