i posted here instead of drawing and design because i think the people here would have a better idea of what is and isn’t professional. so what is it that makes something professional? is it the color scheme? the use of shapes and blurs? fast movements?
im working on the layout for my site but i want to stay away from things that make it lame. any help would be appreciated. thanks 
*Originally posted by hojo *
**so what is it that makes something professional? is it the color scheme? the use of shapes and blurs? fast movements?
**
Well you’re right about the color scheme, color is one of the many factors of good design.
Here are some characteristics of a professional site:
Design and content relate to it’s name, it has a consitent theme or subject that is geared towards a specific demographic.
Graphics are well designed and high quality, meaning there’s no blurry text, no pixelated images, consistent typography…etc.
Proximity is important as well, this is how your content is laid out. A lot of sites have content that is scattered every where so this causes the viewer’s eyes to contantly move around so they lose focus from the message or info the site is trying to present.
Color scheme is appropriate and works well with the subject or theme.
Userfriendly is important so that everyone can navigate the site without hardship. (This one is broken a lot, there are many sites out there that may look professional, but they’re really hard to navigate.)
Now you’re probably wondering about my site and what it’s purpose is.
I chose the name Electrongeek to represents who I am as a designer, my design style consists of futuristic looking graphics.
If you came to my site and saw the title “Electrongeek” and noticed that there is a nature theme to the site. That would be totally wrong.
I hope that gives you a better idea as to how to go about with your site. Good luck. =)
thank you so very much eg. you’re my new hero=)
haha no problem. =)
Some things just work - they do or they don’t.
I personally think that regarding the more abstract aspects of design - colour, shape, layers, how much is going on - etc, it’s impossible to say whether it will work or not. Yes, consistency is important, and using poor material will often produce poor results but then not always. On a minimal site just using three inconsistent but bold images might look superb and there’s a place for messy text and blurred imagery too. Whether it looks good or not is, like EG says, whether or not it hangs together well as per your concept.
I reckon the best way of doing this is to sit down with a blank piece of paper and write down the words that have to do with your site, then write the words and things that are associated with them, then write down any particularly cool bits of imagery, styles or tricks that you particularly want to include and ruthlessly cut out what doesn’t work together - until you are left with a few neat ideas that feel right. Then stare at your computer screen a lot until you can sort of see it, then do it.
approx how long would you estimate staring at your computer would be involved? i’ve already done ALOT of that and haven’t produced much…
That’s why you would want to draw it out on paper to prevent yourself from just sitting there with a blank face staring at the monitor.
why not make it shake around frantekly.
when shaking blur it
And then make it stand still
and ten let some particuls fall from the letters. that’s prittie cool
um…T-O, what are you talking about?
DRAW IT!! , the best way to work. I have paper that is for story boarding , so it has blank rectangles drawn on it already , and then space for writing on the side, it the best way to work, first you draw your concept, and on the side , have notes to yourself explaining what each part will do, it might seem stupid at the start, but the little notes to yourself will work your brain a bit, make you remember what you wanted this particular part to do.
then from there you can finalise your drawing , think of a colour scheme, and jump right into the computer and render out your work, you will be amazed at how much faster you can work with this method. Not all drawing will be exactly how the final site will turn out, but you will have a good understanding on what you are trying to achieve, which will lead to a better overall look and feel to your site. in other word much more professional 
Well… it kind of depends on what kind of professional look you are going for. (in my case there are a lot of professional looking style) Quite possibly all of the above matters when making a professional look. I really like sites with a type of p"pixel" look, with clean lines and fonts. (UNFLUX’s site has that)
why not make it shake around frantekly.
when shaking blur it
And then make it stand still
and ten let some particuls fall from the letters. that’s prittie cool
this is the best advice, I like it
when i look for good sites to give awards out to i jugde by this:
design 45%
content 20%
navigation 10%
user friendly 15%
and effects and graphics 10%
Keep the design to the point don;t make me load 500kb to c some unnessary effects. The design should have a theme. make sure that your colours flow and don’t constrast too much. It really depends on the design. Design your page first decide where everything goes then add the colour and effects on.
Content: content depends on your layout. You should never have a big layout with all these effects to find out you have one picture to show to world.
Navigation: make sure its easy to understand. I don’t want to spend 10minutes trying to understand your navigation system.
User friendly: everyone have different connections, screen settings and resloution… try to keep the site working for all. OR make different verisons of your site to suit them.
graphcs and effect: just 10%? well its 10% not too easy to get from me. Graphics and effects should suit the theme. dun mater if 2D or high tect 3D just make it look good…
most improtantly trust your own opinion. You know what looks good and what looks bad.
thats some good points dreamer, i agree, though you could group navigation and user friendly together. About the colour flow, very true, I read somewhere (cant find the link) that your design should not be based around the colours, yes you can work on the colour scheme later, though your design should really be legible to a colour blind user, so even the colour-blind user would now the difference between what is what in the layout. Colour comes after layout, in my opinion.
yes… very true… you have to plan the site out first then you add all the little features
Test you wesite on all browsers possible, a website is not professional when you open it in IE and it looks fabulous but when you try to view the same website in netscape, opera, kde or any other web browser and it doestn perform or look the smae way it does on IE, navigate your site make sure all your rollovers and links are working getting a 404 error doesnt look professional, imagine a possible prospect client browsing your site and BAM 404 error webpage not found not good.
User friendly very important not only make text for navigation use visual images that go along with the message your trying to get to the user.
Ease of use this is like the biggest element like our fellow members said you have to make your website easy enough so that any user can look for the information hes looking.
Be up to date, i use www.webmonkey.com as reference, they do alot of research on user habits like how many seconds a person actually waits for a website to load, trust me they dont wait long if your user is on 56k and he has to wait more than 30 second say goodbye to that user he will never go back to your site. Not everyone has dsl or cable theres still alot of us who have 56k either because they cant afford a faster connection or because like in my case its not available in my area.
Look for statistics of what are the most used resolutions, browsers operating systems and so on this is very important so you can have a guideline as to how youre going to desing your website.
Good luck and keep up the good work
Grim
i didnt even think of about half of that, thank you very very much for bringing it up again. im in the middle of working on it and all of that will now become a factor in the sites design.
again, thanks 
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