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My personal site redesign, please critique.

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MOFNY

Active member
Aug 9, 2008
4,789
1
East Greenwich, RI
Hey there everybody.
Recently I decided to modernize the look and feel of my personal site.
Old Site: http://royoswalt44.com.
New Site: http://mofny.github.io.
Firstly, I have a new host at Github Pages (highly recommend).
Secondly, I used a new layout technique.
If you are using an older browser, the site might appear as a complete unreadable mess.
If you are using a mobile device smaller than a tablet, then it will also not be perfect.

But I would like feedback from the laptop/desktop crowd.
Please give me a critique.
Because it's in development, not everything is guaranteed to look/act perfect.
The header image, for example, needs a lot of work.
The images in the image slider need help too (not working well in Firefox or IE10).

For an optimal experience, please use the latest version of Chrome.

Please note that this has taken a few weeks with many hours of hand-coded work, so "this looks terrible" is not a good critique.
I didn't go out and using an existing template. Almost everything, included interactivity, was created by me.

A couple notes on how to use the buttons in the various pages:
Firstly, the floating bar will remember which you've opened. You can open/close any of them or all of them.
Secondly, if you hover over an opened button for a second, it will take you to the top of that year.
Lastly, you can stop any of the scrolling animations at any time by simply scrolling, using the mouse wheel, or clicking anywhere.

Thanks again for your time.
If anyone ever needs help in the realm of web development, please let me know.
The site in question: http://mofny.github.io/
-Chris
 
Last edited:

Dilferules

Well-known member
Aug 10, 2012
1,945
1,738
Auburn, WA
I'm using Chrome version 36.0.1985.125, no idea if that's the newest or like 2 years old. Site looks cool, certainly better than mine. Few suggestions:

The links to the different types of cards are a little difficult to see over the header image, as in some people might miss that there are links there.

When I move the cursor over "The Definitive Roy Oswalt Collection" wording in the header it slowly shifts and changes size and color (and somehow "vibrates"), going from 2 rows of text to 1. Not sure if that's what you were going for or if it's a glitch with my browser but it's off-putting.

Then I went to the autograph page to take a look and after viewing a couple the page started moving around on its own, scrolling to the bottom and bouncing around, and it didn't settle down until all of the images loaded.

I've never been a fan of the "floating header" that follows you up and down a page and takes a second to bounce back to the top when you scroll anywhere. Speaking of the links to each year on the autograph page.

Coupling the floating header with the fact that the card images shift everything on the page down when you put your cursor over one to increase the size, I feel like there's too much movement on the page. But then again I'm an old crank who remembers the internet from 1997 so maybe my opinions aren't shared by many others.
 

jeff_bichel

New member
Nov 4, 2010
1,463
0
Houston, Texas
Excellent look and feel. Good job! Only thing I can suggest is that it is a loooooonnnnngggg scroll to the bottom of the page. Less Blank space (I know it's in development). But overall it has a nice look.
 

MOFNY

Active member
Aug 9, 2008
4,789
1
East Greenwich, RI
I'm using Chrome version 36.0.1985.125, no idea if that's the newest or like 2 years old. Site looks cool, certainly better than mine. Few suggestions:

The links to the different types of cards are a little difficult to see over the header image, as in some people might miss that there are links there.

When I move the cursor over "The Definitive Roy Oswalt Collection" wording in the header it slowly shifts and changes size and color (and somehow "vibrates"), going from 2 rows of text to 1. Not sure if that's what you were going for or if it's a glitch with my browser but it's off-putting.

Then I went to the autograph page to take a look and after viewing a couple the page started moving around on its own, scrolling to the bottom and bouncing around, and it didn't settle down until all of the images loaded.

I've never been a fan of the "floating header" that follows you up and down a page and takes a second to bounce back to the top when you scroll anywhere. Speaking of the links to each year on the autograph page.

Coupling the floating header with the fact that the card images shift everything on the page down when you put your cursor over one to increase the size, I feel like there's too much movement on the page. But then again I'm an old crank who remembers the internet from 1997 so maybe my opinions aren't shared by many others.
The title header has two rows of text? That I haven't seen before in my testing; it should have one. The vibrating can be fixed.

As for the bouncing around, that is a known bug but usually only occurs at a very specific instance. I'll take a look. Did you happen to click the "open all" button then hover over the buttons before scrolling? That's the only way I can duplicate what you are talking about. And I have it set up that you can stop any animation by clicking or using the mouse wheel.

I also don't like how things shift when you hover expand. That will be fixed.

Would it be better if the floating bar simply stayed in place and didn't have a delay to snap back into place?

Some good suggestions though. Maybe you could take a screen shot of the two row header? The font-size is supposed to shift based on screen resolution, so it doesn't make sense to me.
 
Last edited:

MOFNY

Active member
Aug 9, 2008
4,789
1
East Greenwich, RI
Excellent look and feel. Good job! Only thing I can suggest is that it is a loooooonnnnngggg scroll to the bottom of the page. Less Blank space (I know it's in development). But overall it has a nice look.
Yea it has been the way I've displayed them for a long time. If I find another good way to display them I might go with that.
That's why I developed the buttons: to quickly get to different sections and navigate around the page.
Thanks for your reply!
 

IUjapander

New member
Jan 28, 2011
1,003
0
Indianapolis
Always like looking at your site, and learning from you.

I really like the base, inserts, parallels page the best. I like how if you click on an image you have the arrow that will jump to the next image. I spend a few minutes just going through that.

My only two critiques have already been mentioned. The floating bar can't keep up and jumps around a lot. Looks worse when going up. If there was a way to lock it like FCBs think it would be better.

Also the "jello" effect of when the image gets zoomed in. With it moving at me, and everything in the background shifting it was making me a little sea sick.

Here is something that might need some tweaking

Untitled-1.jpg



Otherwise looks great.
 

MOFNY

Active member
Aug 9, 2008
4,789
1
East Greenwich, RI
Always like looking at your site, and learning from you.

I really like the base, inserts, parallels page the best. I like how if you click on an image you have the arrow that will jump to the next image. I spend a few minutes just going through that.

My only two critiques have already been mentioned. The floating bar can't keep up and jumps around a lot. Looks worse when going up. If there was a way to lock it like FCBs think it would be better.

Also the "jello" effect of when the image gets zoomed in. With it moving at me, and everything in the background shifting it was making me a little sea sick.

Here is something that might need some tweaking

Untitled-1.jpg



Otherwise looks great.

Yup I have been lazy and haven't fixed that. Thanks for the screen shot that is highly appreciated.

I'm thinking of moving to a fixed non jumpy floating bar.

The jello effect will be fixed tomorrow. It was intentional, but I can see now that it is too distracting.

Did you check out the redesign? http://mofny.github.io/
 

Dilferules

Well-known member
Aug 10, 2012
1,945
1,738
Auburn, WA
The title header has two rows of text? That I haven't seen before in my testing; it should have one. The vibrating can be fixed.

As for the bouncing around, that is a known bug but usually only occurs at a very specific instance. I'll take a look. Did you happen to click the "open all" button then hover over the buttons before scrolling? That's the only way I can duplicate what you are talking about. And I have it set up that you can stop any animation by clicking or using the mouse wheel.

I also don't like how things shift when you hover expand. That will be fixed.

Would it be better if the floating bar simply stayed in place and didn't have a delay to snap back into place?

Some good suggestions though. Maybe you could take a screen shot of the two row header? The font-size is supposed to shift based on screen resolution, so it doesn't make sense to me.

Here's what it looks like to me:

samplescreen.JPG

When I hover over the text it switches to one row slowly, turns blue, and vibrates.

The bouncing around on the autographs page is when I look at all years, and seems to happen when I hover over the Graded 2001 Bowman Draft auto when not every image has loaded yet, and it's large enough to cause the screen to move...which ended up sending the page moving out of control for several seconds until all of the images load, when it stabilizes and lets me have control.

I would like it more if the floating bar stayed in place and didn't have the snap-back delay, but it could be that it's a personal preference and perhaps other people don't care.
 

MOFNY

Active member
Aug 9, 2008
4,789
1
East Greenwich, RI
Here's what it looks like to me:

View attachment 39639

When I hover over the text it switches to one row slowly, turns blue, and vibrates.

The bouncing around on the autographs page is when I look at all years, and seems to happen when I hover over the Graded 2001 Bowman Draft auto when not every image has loaded yet, and it's large enough to cause the screen to move...which ended up sending the page moving out of control for several seconds until all of the images load, when it stabilizes and lets me have control.

I would like it more if the floating bar stayed in place and didn't have the snap-back delay, but it could be that it's a personal preference and perhaps other people don't care.

I'm guessing you have a large screen resolution? I have a max-width set at 1300px. I'll have to rethink that.
The navigation is also a bit off compared to my laptop.
I'm actually working on the floating bar staying in place right now. I think it's a great idea.

Overall it's so difficult to accommodate the myriad of resolutions that exist.
 

MOFNY

Active member
Aug 9, 2008
4,789
1
East Greenwich, RI
Excellent look and feel. Overall it has a nice look.

From a personal perspective I've never been a fan of open space either. As someone states looks like a long scroll to the bottom and that the site was designed for mobile rather than all systems.

Also-- again from personal perspective-the 1/1 2006 Ultimate logo. Its on your site- and being sold right now on ebay. Just wondering = do you notate picture attribution for stuff not in your personal collection?? I do=but that's personal choice though.

Again- great site !
Jeff

Anything in red is stuff I used to own. The fact that that particular card is up on eBay is news to me. Currently it's higher than what I paid/sold it for.
 

MOFNY

Active member
Aug 9, 2008
4,789
1
East Greenwich, RI
Ok so I have been taking some of your suggestions to heart.
For the Autographs, Base, GU, RCs, and 1/1 pages I have updated the floating buttons.
It no longer has a delay and snaps back into place.
The animation is more smooth and less jumpy.
I also reduced the file size by around 35%.
Some bugs still exist, and I'll be working on new way to rectify them.
 

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