College Project - What do you think?

[markforbes130113]

In college, I'm doing a higher web development course. The topic for this website is a Catering Company.
The website url; Clicky Here!
What do you think of it? improvements?

[farscapeone]

There are a lot of thing you should consider changing. Let's start with colors. What was the general idea behind the colors you used? Why did you use dark gray for the background? Why #cecbb9 for "Offers" and "Contacts" block background?

[Jennacide]

Well, lets start with what's right with it!

It's simple, relatively easy to navigate (not much guesswork involved) although it took me a min or two to realize that the "menu" the waiter is holding is actually a real link instead of simply part of the graphic. I can easily read the text, so that's good. The page fits my screen nicely course I am running 1600x1200 on my main monitor. Viewing it on my secondary monitor with a resolution of 1024x768 still displays the entire page pretty well.

Now, onto what needs attention and I'm going to try to be as constructive as I can.

I do agree with leviathon, the colors are not only not my first choice, but I'd never have gone that route. They are dull and uninspiring. If you're going to create a site that represents a catering company, perhaps using more reds, blues and other notable colors to grab the eye and invariably the user, are not only important but very possible one of THE most important choices. When I design for a company for example, one of the first questions I ask is, "Do you have an existing logo and if so, what colors did you choose and why?" This is very important as the business requires branding that everyone (or as much of the everyone you can grab) can relate to. We're talking the everyday Joe here, not designers and other artists. The colors chosen for this page are dull and frankly, they help to make me want to run away.

The links under the "menu" content do not make your cursor display a "hand" icon and this can be very confusing for the layman. Since Microshaft entered the scene they made the pointy hand icon a universal image, when users don't see that, they quickly move on as they think there's no link. So yeah, you'll want to ensure that's updated asap!

The text at the top of the page (logo if you will) is another uninspiring portion of the site. It's getting there but it's not finished, keep plugging away at something that both serves it's purpose and is also eye catching. A main title is almost always a totally different font from the sub header text below it. This is done on purpose in order to distinguish between the two. Granted we can, but can the layman? You see, you have to design a page that even someone's grandmother can navigate and understand. If you can accomplish this, then you're almost there!

I'd like to see far more images on the site. It has this feeling of isolation and desolation, neither are good and so you'll want to add in more graphical content, even if it's a scene of a couple eating at a table obviously enjoying their food stuck somewhere toward the bottom of one or more "pages" within your div there.

You're certainly not a stranger to the code, but that doesn't matter at this point, now you've got to prove you're an artist too. You can do it and I really do hope this helps and doesn't make me sound like a bi#ch... ya know?

[alincastre98]

hmmm

[vv.bbcc19]

In college, I'm doing a higher web development course. The topic for this website is a Catering Company.
The website url; Clicky Here!
What do you think of it? improvements?

Certain characters in the page "http://www.mark-forbes.x10.mx/dignans/about.php" are not rendered in mozilla firefox and IE8
May be you are using chrome but for me the characters on the page are showing up with ? in black rhombuses which means the browser does not know how to render them.
Please give a look

[sankalpgarud98]

hey mate, you can improve on a lot of things. The only thing that seems good at the moment is the typography( your type images) and your header, looks good and illustrative especially your targeting little ones, but its your college project.
Anyways, my point is you may want to select a better color scheme. That doesnt work at all. And give the site a more catering feel, it has a lot of earth color which generally represents tradition and culture.
Well these are my suggestions,
cheers and toasts,
contact for any graphic design help,

[emichael2465]

Hey, the website looks dull. Can u brighten it a bit.
Also the entire arragement could be better

But nice effort all the same.

Well done boy

[steven27]

Looks awesome, i agree with everyone else I would use brighter colors, but not too bright as people with ADD will get distracted with the...oooo Pretty Colors

[cybrax]

http://www.colorcombos.com/ is a good place to bookmark. This will get you into the swing of using complimentry and contrasting colours in your designs to achieve a more professional look.

Fancy Fonts... use sparingly. Remember search engines have no eyes and humans are accustomed to reading text in a certain style especially on-line. This is why few sites use black pages and white text or headers in fancy italics because folk are simply not used to it. IF you do feel compelled to use them beyond the confines of a logo then use CSS to embed the font as this makes it readable in the source code to passing search engines.

Colour Theory is also something worth Googling, reams have been written about how use of colour influences people at the subconcious level, with but mere seconds to impress a visitor you need all the edge you can get.

Know thy enemy, or at least the competition. Study what other sites in the same niche and related fields look like, what type of customers are they trying to attract and how are they achieving this. After all not all catering firms are the same, the difference between a five dollars a head buffet (clowns and balloons optional) and a two hundred dollars a head plus silver service yields very different styles of website.

[r.alex.bridges72]

A lot of web designers I've talked with have said that menu tabbing across the top of the page is a tricky animal. Personally, I think it's nice to see something different than side-tabs, but I also understand their argument that it might not translate very well between browsers.

I think it's a good first effort, but more or less agree with what the others here said about colors and what not.

Good luck!