Members A_Gitarman Posted October 2, 2012 Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 As I've been severely slacking on maintaining the website for my cover band over the past several months, I decided to trash the tired old one and went to work on an entirely new one using Joomla (did the old one in DreamWeaver, FWIW). I've updated our logo, added some (IMO) cool Google calendar integrations, a facebook feed w/ comments, embedded some of our MP3s and YouTube videos, copied over our online pics (I've still got to go review/ upload pics from the past 1.5 years ), added a new guestbook, a nice contact page, and even threw up a rudimentary discussion forum. Anyways, take a look and let me know what you all think: www.chainreactionfl.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members stratotastic Posted October 2, 2012 Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 FWIW, my initial impressions. Get a new logo. The current one is eye catching, but in a bad way. It looks like someone wrote CHAIN REACTION in Microsoft Word and played with some WordArt settings. Hire someone off of craigslist for $25 to make it look more polished or come up with something entirely different. You don't need a paragraph to describe what the website is (here you will find photos, video, etc). I think everyone knows what a band website is for. Use it to describe your band instead. Describe what you do, who you serve, what your performances are like, etc. You need a menu bar that neatly lays out all the links rather than making someone read through the aforementioned paragraph for the links. I would update the band photo once you get the lady in the front to wear something that doesn't look like she just walked out of the diner with her grand kids. No offense intended. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MikeyParent Posted October 2, 2012 Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 OK, I am a real stickler for this stuff so try not to take it too personal. The Good- Well, it's an improvement for sure. - I like the Google calendar integration- The site navigation is clear and simple The Bad- I feel the logo takes up too much valuable screen real estate. I don't care for the logo much either to be honest. It looks very dated. You might want to have one professionally done. It does not have to cost a lot.- The Guestbook and Forums pages seems extraneous.- The Facebook stuff seems to have some permissioning problems? (getting "This page can't be seen by the current user. Please check page privacy and visibility settings."). Regardless you should ask yourself what the purpose of it is. If you are on FB most people will interact with you on FB, not through a FB page on your webpage. Honestly I was surprised when it did not just take me to your band's FB page. - Speaking of which the link to your FB page on the home page does not appear to go there.- The Photos section is a bit of a hot mess. Looks like two different ways to view them depending on when they were taken? They are both challenging, not very "inviting" and break the visual continuity of the site.. If this section is going to be a big part of your website, I would seriously consider scrapping this completely for something else. Big overarching comment I would make is just because you *can* do something and/or you think it's "cool" doesn't mean you should. It has to add value and there is a lot here that I think is questionable in that regard. Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MikeyParent Posted October 2, 2012 Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 I would update the band photo once you get the lady in the front to wear something that doesn't look like she just walked out of the diner with her grand kids.No offense intended. What's truly funny is on the splash pic for the old site she is posed in exactly the same way in equally horrifying clothing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Potts Posted October 2, 2012 Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 I didn't even notice the nav bar...drop that under the new log that you'll create. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mstreck Posted October 2, 2012 Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 The upcoming shows list is great! I'm guessing that most of your gigs are going to be on the weekends? Is there a way to just show that? A calendar that takes up a large amount of screen real estate but only has dates on Friday and Saturday (and not every Friday and Saturday) looks "empty" to me. You have three (out of 42) possible dates filled up on the October calendar grid - lots of wasted space. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members A_Gitarman Posted October 2, 2012 Author Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 The upcoming shows list is great! I'm guessing that most of your gigs are going to be on the weekends? Is there a way to just show that? Your'e right - the full calendar looks very blank... perhaps I'll just ditch that and just keep the 'upcoming shows' list. Thanks for all the input guys. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members A_Gitarman Posted October 2, 2012 Author Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 What's truly funny is on the splash pic for the old site she is posed in exactly the same way in equally horrifying clothing. I hadn't noticed that In her defense, the 'old' pic was taken from a Christmas shoot that we did for the local music rag & the 'new' one was done before we played a class of '72 reunion, so she was dressed for the occasion, I suppose Here's our original 'promo' pic (taken before we opened for The Lovin' Spoonful in 2008): *Almost the entire back row is no longer in the band She's normally not quite so 'colorful': Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Potts Posted October 2, 2012 Members Share Posted October 2, 2012 BTW..I've used Joomla for years and there are a ton of great things you can do. Let me know or PM me if you have any questions or need suggestions for things you may want to do. Feel free to browse... www.justdarrell.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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