These mugs are the lead image on my new website, at http://web.me.com/hatchvillepottery/Site/Home.html
I've been working on it for the past week, using iWeb on my iMac and a brief but very helpful conference last week with a young woman named Mindy at the Hingham (MA) Apple store. Nothing like a 30-year-old to explain the world to you.
Please take a look. I know that crowd-sourcing a critique of something like this can be dangerous, but what the hell ...
A few things I know already that need to be fixed:
- The background of the site needs to be consistent from page to page. Right now, the home page background is gray and the other pages black. I am pretty sure I'll stay with black, but I need to figure out how to change the home page background. (Mindy apparently didn't tell me absolutely everything in the 10 minutes we were together.)
- I know there are editing tweaks to be made in the copy, but if you see anything scandalous, please let me know.
- I realize that the photos in Gallery 4, the "recent pots" one, have a generally yellowish cast to them, as opposed to the other three galleries. That's a white balance problem in my Nikon SLR, which has never been as good as my earlier point-and-shoot. I need to figure that out, and I'll probably have to re-shoot those photos, but at least I still have those pots.
- I'm planning another page, of images made around the studio and the galleries.
- I'm still not sure if I'll publish this through Apple, but I pushed the "publish site" button and there it is. So you might as well look at it. It needs to find a happy home, minus all the web.me.com stuff, and it needs to be set up so that you can find it through Google. None of that is done at this point.
So ... do you find anything confusing? Unhelpful? Too helpful? Please let me know.
20 comments:
hey hollis, lovely red may i say!!!
K... the stinky mac setup is even if you get a new site name and redirect it, the address of the page always comes up with the iweb address...I'm looking to host mine somewhere else... you can still build on the iweb site...just move it later...it's a conspiracy i tell ya....
i dont mind the grey but its best to be consistent... maybe try playing in photoshop or yeh just reshoot...
a photographer friend of mind was telling me the other day about using a grey card to rebalance the white balance when your light source changed like you the auto on my camera is usually great but sometimes grrrr...the icky yellow pops up his head but you know all that :P
Thanks, Ang. There are all kinds of advantage to using the Mac setup, but you have to find your way around the disadvantages.
I need your girl to show me how to find your website- is there a click link I could follow?
I am not getting anything.
This is silly, but one of the first things that struck me as well, odd, were the hands with the red fingernail polish. Not yours right? If they are there's nothing wrong with that. ;)
MH, I just copied the address and went right there
http://web.me.com/hatchvillepottery/Site/Home.html
So very glad to see that you have all those photos back up. I used to love to go and just take a look at all the shinos that I will never make myself! The gray isn't too bothersome for me, maybe some black with the gray. Is it more proper to talk about yourself in third person on a website. That sort of bothered me because I know you and I know that you wrote this so it was sort of like listening to you referring to yourself in third person.... does that make sense. Again, that may be the proper way to do it, I don't know. I have a Mac and have messed around a bit with this iweb, I just don't really need a website at this point, but it's nice to know who to check in with when I get there. Looks nice and clean and it was very user friendly. Well done!!
Yes, Anna, those are my hands. Didn't you know????
No ... actually, those are the hands of the painter in the booth next to me at the Chatham show last summer. Handling one of my pots. Distracting, you think? Could be a little misleading. I'll re-think that. Tracey, thanks. I know what you mean about referring to myself in the third person, and I thought about that as I was writing the copy. It's a bit awkward to do that. I'll take another look at it. Meredith, hope you can get on it. Maybe there was a character out of place in the address.
Meredith, maybe you picked up the period at the end of html in the address. That might have made it impossible to get to the site.
I figured out how to make that address a hyperlink, Meredith. You should be able to just click on it and get over to the web page.
I'm in thanks to ang and now I see you have linked!
Links are important.
I wanted to come back to the blog and when I used the link on the home page it took me someplace else-check the link.
Otherwise I think it looks great.
yeh good point meredith your blog link on your front page has the wrong html address linked to it hollis...easy fixed though :))
Thanks, guys. I'll fix it.
OK, I think the link is fixed.
Looks good! Do you still own the hatchvillepottery.com domain? If so, it might be possible put your site there, though a supported solution like web.me or WordPress is always a little easier from a maintenance perspective. I host my blog as a WordPress site, but it's on my own (bought/paid-for) domain, so I can link directly there and it's still indexed by google.
Fun to be able to build your own site isn't it -instead of paying an arm and a leg to some IT guy huh?! I moved my to Blogger because now Blogger will host a dot com for free! you can build it just like to do a Blog (cascade format) but I like having more control and instant update/edit ability.
Just a couple of comments -since you asked :o)
-the images are great.
-instead of Gallery 1, 2 etc. can you name those tab headers as you have within each "Gallery?" Like "Bowls" "Recent Work" and instead of "Pots for Flowers" I'd say "Vessels"
-I'd like to see a couple of more "process" images or images of you working -you are very photogenic and lend a lot to your work. Or even that snowy studio door shot -it's wonderful and has a great feel.
really nice web side, Hollys !!! and nice pictures of your work.
I agree with what Cindy said, I also like the shot you had of your new upstairs studio, but definitely that snow/gallery picture and maybe some black and whites....
Thanks, all. I've got to work on that "location" page, I guess. Spent part of the day figuring who the website host would be. Jeez ...
Hi Hollis I love the site and I love the pots.
Great work.
Love it.
Wow! You worked on your own website? That's really cool! I love that there are a lot of web applications today that allow non-programmer people to create their own website. I clicked on the link above, but I think your website is not live anymore. There are many firms now that offer web design and development. Consulting the experts is a good idea, too, because all you have to do is talk to the developers and they'll do the job for you. Are you considering launching another website anytime soon?
Darryl Tay
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