Stunning. No other words could describe the scenery. After the heavy darkness of last week’s hit, stepping into this job’s location nearly knocked Harry off his feet.
He stood in the doorway, the sun streaming down through wide-open skylights. The black bag with the C4 and charges dropped from his hand, thudding at his feet.
How could he destroy this?
Both Pen Men had figured it was time to bring in heavy-duty explosives. They were looking forward to complete demolition, especially after the last few hit jobs they’d had.
They had come prepared, with explosives in hand and set for an implosion worthy of Las Vegas crowds – and Harry just couldn’t do it.
Today’s hit is for McAWilliams Photoblog. Here’s what the site looked like on the day we drove by:
“My gods, James, this place is nearly pristine.” Harry ran his hands over the smooth, creamy browns, the natural textures of suede, wood, and buttery-soft leather.
“Very classy.” James nodded in approval. This place matched his tastes for finery.
This is one of the best design jobs we’ve seen in a long time. The banner is absolutely beautiful, and the theme matches perfectly. If you chose this on your own, well done. And if you had it designed, kudos to whoever took the task to hand.
The warm browns and gradient shading are very appealing, and the additional cream of the furniture blends right in. The font for the banner is a perfect choice, and nothing is cluttered at all. It’s clean, it’s sleek, it’s suave… Oh yes.
One small suggestion would be to clean up the tagline slightly. It sounds a touch awkward, and we suggest adding a verb to smooth it out and clarify it a bit. “Let my vision reach inside you,” or, “Let my vision touch you,” would be better. Keep in mind that’s subjective preference.
“Classy indeed,” James narrowed his amber eyes at the décor around the room. “But far from perfect. Tell me what’s missing.”
“Damn. You’re right.” Harry had been so enthralled by the beauty of the place that he’d totally overlooked the fact it lacked something.
A navigation bar.
Now, a navigation menu bar isn’t necessary, as your Pages are on display at the right. It’s easy for the theme to pull off a lack of navigation, though. The very design and use of color makes one want to linger, and we’re sure people would find their way. Still…
The Page titles aren’t clearly labeled and it’s very easy to be confused about what we’ll see if we click through. What is Connect about? And what will we see if we click Darkroom? Equipment is clear, but adding a pronoun would help the links look less cold. Add a Contact page, too.
The theme wasn’t designed for a navigation bar or main menu to stretch below the banner, and it would take some fancy coding to make that happen. We’d suggest a drop-down menu to maintain that clean look. It isn’t impossible to add navigation, but it is a job for a specialist.
By now, people with monitors that are more average sized, like 17″ or 19″, may be wondering what Pages we’re looking at. They can’t see the far right sidebar unless they scroll right.
(In fact, James worked on the drive-by to the end without even realizing there was another sidebar there. Harry was smarter and switched computers to view the whole page.)
Reducing the width to 960 would let more people view your full site without having to fiddle with resizing.
“Alright, I have to focus,” Harry told James, ripping himself away from the beautiful design. He had to look deeper than the surface. They had a job to do.
James was still scrutinizing, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. Although the design had the sleek sophistication that suited Jamie’s style, a few things just didn’t sit right. “Yeah, focus.” He reached down and snagged the bag of explosives. “I’ll start setting these out.”
“Are you kidding me?” A panicked look crossed Harry’s face, and he snatched the bag away from James. “You are not putting anything anywhere.” He clutched the bag to his chest.
“Harry.” James looked firm. “This is a hit. Give me the bag.” He held out a hand.
“No.” Harry’s expression dared James to test his resolve.
James sighed and raked a hand through his hair, the blond strands tumbling back into his face. “Alright, fine. Do your thing. What’s this,” he nudged the brown square with his toe.
The RSS button is clear and visible, but it could be larger and more apparent. The color matches the theme perfectly – almost too perfectly. You have a neat side effect going on with it, so don’t change that, but do try to increase the size and help it stand out a bit more.
Harry peered at the list that hung from the wall. “What is this? This is a photography blog, isn’t it?” He checked with James, who was scanning the list of Irish blogs.
“Doesn’t fit,” James shook his head, then he tapped the paper. “Look here. Photography links are way down on the list. They should be up here,” he pointed to the top. “And man… That’s a hell of a list.”
The photography links should show up first at the top of the site, and the Irish links should be at the bottom. Otherwise, visitors become confused and wonder about the relation between the Irish and photos.
Trim down the number of links you have on your blog, too. That’s quite a long list. If you do want to display all the links, try to create groups of three, five or seven that are relevant, and title them well.
Do the same with Categories as well. There are too many there, and a drop-down menu would resolve the issue. At the very least, you have enough space and a clear, legible font going on to make it easier to read the long list.
Harry began taking things down off the wall and rearranging them. “I’d put this here,” he switched the Photo Blogs with the Irish Blogs.
“Then I’d put this here,” he exchanged the Community widget with the Pages, put Recent Posts and Recent Comments closer to the top with Categories underneath and Archives below – and took a step back.
“Not bad. This guy’s been here a long time.” 2005, the scratch on the wall revealed. But that left a lot of archives to dig through, and the sheaf of papers took up space. Had the archives been simply boxed by year, they would’ve been easier to work with.
“I don’t know, James. It’d be a shame to blow this one up.” Harry crouched on the floor, observing the room from another angle, and he squinted up at his partner. “Save it for the next hit?”
James scrutinized the room carefully, thinking over the risks of letting someone get away. “They’re going to think we’re going soft,” he commented absently.
“They’re going to think we know a good thing when we see it,” Harry responded. But he knew he’d made his point and James would cave.
But he never caved easily…
James grabbed the edge of the desk and heaved. It tipped over and landed with a resounding crash. Photographs flew up and scattered across the floor. Some film rolled out and memory cards clattered onto the ceramic tile.
“Boom,” he said softly and turned to leave the room.
Want more? You got it. Check out the lineup of upcoming hit jobs:
August 3 – Prin’s Links
August 10 – Abundance Blog
August 17 – Your Writing Cure
August 24 – Yes to Me
August 31 – LitGuides
September 7 – Miramar Mike 2.0
September 14 – Green Plan(t)
September 21 – Fawnskin Flyer
September 28 – Forty Plus Two
October 5 – The Enhance Life
October 12 – Creative Texture Tools
October 19 – Ulla Hennig’s Weblog
Want your blog shot down? Sign up in the comment section for your free drive-by, and we’ll schedule you in.
Or hit us up for a private drive-by via email. It’s only $30, and you’ll get your shoot-out within a week.
Come on. You know you wanna.
I would love to have a drive by on my blog http://www.simplisticthoughts.com. I hope I make the list. Thanks for all of the helpful tips.
nick’s last blog post..Wealth and Riches part 2
Wow, really beautiful aesthetics going on over there at McAWilliams Photoblog. If I’d run across it on my own I would have tagged it in Del.icio.us under my inspirations for good web design. Really lovely, John.
Loved the (non)hit too. Flipping the desk – hilarious! I do so look forward to Sunday Drive-Bys.
Nicole’s last blog post..What Comes Around
I agree with all your expert commentary on this review. I especially appreciate your focus of first impression (curb appeal), ease of navigation, stickiness, and likelihood of viewer return. However there were a couple of things I noted not mentioned in this drive-by.
I have a cable modem connection to the Internet so loading the page was not time consuming but I did notice a slight lag. I do remember having a dial-up connection and many people still have this type as their only option. If I had a dial-up connection I would have to really want to view this page. I’m curious about your take on this “problem” and how you work with your clients on this matter.
Also as a personal preference I would elevate the search feature closer to the top of the page.
Do you have any stats on your drive-bys like number of demolitions, remodels (major and minor), and rearrangements? I’m new here so I was beginning to think it was only demolitions.
@ Mark – I was on dialup recently trying to load the site to take a look. It was impossible. I got frustrated and gave up, so you do bring up a good point.
One problem is that we’re on lightening fast high speed usually, so page loading time isn’t something that we tend to take into consideration on our drive bys. Don’t mean to exclude people, but it’s not part of the focus of this service.
For before and after cases of our drive bys, we do have two that we’ll be featuring next week. The problem is that many of our free consults here on the blog don’t result in the blog owners making changes. The private drive-bys that we do often do result in people making many changes and there are positive results.
As mentioned, you’ll see a before and after next week
Almost forgot (and I don’t recall it being mentioned in the hit), I love how the little man changes position on each page. Is he you? It adds another level of interest and made me click on every page just to see where he’d show up next. Brilliant way to get people to explore the site. Bravo!
Nicole’s last blog post..What Comes Around
@ Nicole – HA! We never noticed that one! (We tend to load the page once and shoot it out.) Now I’ll be clicking all day lol
@ Nick – You’re on for October 26. Cheers!
And look there, I let some ER code slip through on my comment. Whups! Ah well you get the point.
Nicole’s last blog post..What Comes Around
@ Nicole – lol I do it all the time myself these days. Fixed.
Wow! This guy knows what he’s doing. And I agree with Nicole – I like the moving man.
Also, I really liked the review… the suspense on whether you were going to blow it up or not was great!
J Adamthwaite’s last blog post..Glass Half Full
I think this is a fine hobby blog. The header image that changes is fun although it slows the loading. The Irish thing — I’m just surprised the whole site is not green.
One minute item — I don’t like the big vases right in the center. It divides the header image. Can we moved them to the left end?
Akemi – Yes to Me’s last blog post..Gratitude Friday, Week 7, Gratitude From Akemi’s Inner Child
God, I love these Sunday posts!! This one was top-notch, James.
The tagline. It might have been just me, but the first thing I did was laugh. It sounds dirty. Please, for the love of God [giggle, giggle], ditch the “let me inside you” kind of line! At least the “inside you” part. [chucke!]
James, where’s that link to your tagline advice? Was that on Copyblogger? After having read some of the posts, I’m still not entirely clear on the site (is it simply sharing his photos? Is he a photographer for hire, too? It is a hobby site, but it seems so professional at the same time, you know? It seems much more than a hobby site with such a spiffy design), so I’m having a hard time coming up with suggestions. Initially, even though the name includes Photoblog, I I thought it was an interior designer’s site! It is indeed beautiful and looks as though it belongs in Canadian House & Home…
I like the suggestions you guys made about moving things around to clear things up, make things more relevant.
As a copy editor, my thoughts were that the text, at least the “about”page (which wasn’t what I expected) could be much clearer and polished up. Again, even if this is simply a hobby site, the professional design and photos may attract people wanting to turn his hobby into a little something more, if he wanted. If John does end up attracting people who want to hire him to take photos, I think that text could more effective and refined to suit the design.
I could be way out in left field here, regarding the point of the site and my suggestions. These are only my first impressions. I’ll have a further look around…because as you said, it really is beautiful.
steph’s last blog post..In Other Words
There’s a part of me that always rather likes seeing you gents go “soft,” when it’s warranted!
Hmm, I’ve considered adding myself to your hit list, and, if Oct 26 just got taken, that puts the next hit right near my birthday … I wonder if that would be a good thing or a bad thing??
–Deb’s last blog post..Open House
me: Does James REALLY have amber eyes?
harry: he’s got hazel eyes
me: must be amber during the low light conditions needed for a drive-by, huh?
harry: they’re sorta light golden brown
me: OHH! Then they’d match McAWilliams Photoblog perfectly!! YAY!!!
harry: lol
RhodesTer’s last blog post..VidCast # 2 today.. copout? Yeah..
@Rhodester: If I had known I was giving an interview I…well, I don’t know what I would have done. Suffice it to say it would have been something incredibly witty
Hm…you know, I wonder why no one utilizes IM for interviews. I’d think that would be kind of cool. I’m crap at coming up with interview questions, though. James, I think I had another idea…(and if anyone sees an IM interview crop up in the next few days other than on MwP, remember, you heard it here first!)
@Deb: It’s usually me that gets all mushy. When I see a really good design I’m pretty much loath to rip it apart and blow it up. James has a tougher shell.
@Steph: Yeah, that’s almost as bad as the associations people see when they first glance at Men with Pens.
@Akemi: good suggestion. It doesn’t have to be moved totally to the left, but further away from center would be better. Number one rule of design is offsets and odd numbers of figures or images are always far more interesting.
@Jenny A: I agree the narrative spin on the drive-bys works well. I know I have fun figuring out a scenario each time.
I’m one of those people who didn’t know about the far right column, and I think that’s probably the same for most standard (aka non-monstrosity) laptop users.
I will agree that the tagline seems a bit… ummm.. sexual? Made me giggle.
I love the color scheme. Very comfy suede living room feel to it. Congrats on joining the ranks of those of us who were targeted, but not killed!
Geek’s Dream Girl’s last blog post..Moradin’s Lass: Mielka Dawnhammer
James: Good Lord. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
[wipes tears of laughter]
Don’t tell me you don’t love it.
steph’s last blog post..Stumbling Toward Fantasy (and self-confidence)
Well it seems safe for me to show my face!
James and Harry many many thanks for stopping by I really appreciate it. All the things you guys spotted will go top of the list for things for me to fix.
So to answer some of your commenters queries.
Nicole thanks for spotting me randomly appearing around the couch, that was my pride and joy to get working.
Akemi a green site would be hideous, but yes in Ireland we have a small yet very close blogger community, and this had me proud to feel Irish but green with leprechauns – never, in relation to the vases I have plans for them for certain times of the year, think google, but I loved the idea of keeping the centered to allow for the title, but I may look into it
Geeks dream girl – I apologise, the size of the site did make me think long and hard when I changed it around recently, I wanted sidebars but because it is also a photoblog I wanted my images to remain a max of 800px across, it was only when I looked into google analytics that I saw very few people lower then 1024 resolution and this swayed me to go with the size I did. Thanks for the congrats I am holding my head up high ( do I get a badge????)
Thanks again guys for the critique I really appreciate it.
McAWilliams’s last blog post..My menwithpens drive by shooting!!!
Oh forgot to say about the speed thing I thought I had remedied that over the past 2 or 3 weeks with faulty or obsolete plugins, obviously not, well I am changing servers so hopefully that will make a difference.
McAWilliams’s last blog post..My menwithpens drive by shooting!!!
@McA: It was our pleasure. I fully understand the little screen/big screen debate. James and I have had frequent clashes over that since both of my desktop monitors are over 20″.
For now, a 960 width seems to fit the bill.
And your rotating banner? Sheer genius. I looked at it and I said to James, “He Photoshopped the guy in there, I bet.”
I should have laid some money on that. Very, very well done and to someone unfamiliar with the very subtle nuances of what a Photoshopped image looks like, it’s practically seamless. Your shadows are right on and he really occupies that space nicely.
What gave it away was the slightly harder line around the white of the shirt. If you feathered the figure by one pixel, it would be even harder to tell.
You hit the nail on the head Harry, attempting to get the lighting correct was a bitch, and relying on someone else to take the photos of me was also great fun altogether, I am glad my subtlety avoided your gaze at first but that you liked the banner anyhow, it made me laugh, I was sitting there wondering if you had noticed it should have put money on that! The feathering is something else for me to check out, glad to see you enjoy it anyhow.
Ooooooh 960 hmmm. Will check to see how I may be able to make it work over the next week.
McAWilliams’s last blog post..My menwithpens drive by shooting!!! and I survived!!!
I bet that photo session was a ton of fun! You could probably throw a warmer transparent layer of color over the figure too, the lighting is just a tad cooler than the background image. Maybe pull one of the lighter browns or golds out of the background and use that. But then again, not very many people will notice that at all.
Man, it’s so much fun talking graphics with other graphics people! Thanks!
What program are you using to alter your images? You might want to check out Alien Skin, they have some excellent plug ins for effects in Photoshop. I’ve been using them for years.
Yep using photoshop with no extra filters just levels, curves and a bit of good ole colour correction at work for those shots. Will check out those filters though they do look great.
Photoshop and web design/coding for me is all a learning curve at home, this is a hobby of mine at the end of the day, since my main job is sound engineering, so dont go all mega graphicy on me now lmao.
McAWilliams’s last blog post..My menwithpens drive by shooting!!! and I survived!!!
Please, have a drive on my blog http://www.positioningstrategy.com. Does I make the list?
Linas Simonis, PositioningStrategy’s last blog post..Freelance blog coaches and proofreaders are needed!