New Template Design For Gfxtrap.com

[Tramposch 1]

I think that colour might be a bit too dull though. I was thinking along the lines of grey with red, orange and/or green or yello. Bright blue can also be intergrated but with grey, it's just a bit... you know, not too colour protruding and a bit too "conservative". I think that a graphics site should be more graphical. And use more bolder and brighter colours.
Oh my god!!! I sound professional then!!! YEEESSSS!!! Haha, OK.

I was thinking the same about the dullness, usually bright exciting colours are less associated with gray, it can be, but as long as the gray is not a very dark gray. I am starting to like a Gray and bright blue theme.

Ill try to pick some colours and see what I think of those, and post them here shortly.

[xpress 0]

If you choose drupal, let me know. I can help you on administration and troubleshooting. Or any other help related to Drupal. Coming to the colors issue, my littel suggestion is choose colors somewhat creative. Mix up and play with them. Don't try to look professional, try to look creative.. because this is a GFXCrew website.. Don't go with grey, they look dull in my opinion. Mixing up colors like Blue, Green, Orange, Yellow.. will give a creative look..

[inverse_bloom 0]

Ok here is a basic mockup of a design we "could" use. Please give feedback. I was thinking we should use a custom font for the title logo as there isn't any thing suitable to represent gfx trap from Adobe, Corel or Microsoft products. I was thinking like a brush script for the fx and for the rest of the lettering something from the standard collection?

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

Also i have been a bit liberal with the white space, so it is definitely possible to bunch elements up a bit more (especially vertically). The style of the drop down menu i don't know... it depends on the styling achieved through photo shop/illustrator, though the drop down menu could be changed to something more traditional.

Also i thought it would be good to categorize some of the secondary menu to lean it up a bit -

Signatures	- Sig show off					- Gift Sigs					- Sig Battles					Collaboration SOTW		   - This Weeks Winner					- SOTW WinnersTournaments - Current Tournaments					- Tourney WinnersRequests	   - Sig request					- Banner request					- Logo requestTutorials		- GFX Tutorials					- Web TutorialsResourcesRendersTemplatesRSS Feeds

The font used for the page text is Arial is there something more suitable? The form the body text takes in the middle column depends if it has any accompanying pictures, otherwise should it span the entire column? Im not sure, considering whats currently on the gfxTrap site is quite modest if you know what i mean.

Also a 3 column design like this might be best designed for drupal.
Edited January 2, 2010 by truefusion (see edit history)

[Tramposch 1]

Ok here is a basic mockup of a design we "could" use. Please give feedback. I was thinking we should use a custom font for the title logo as there isn't any thing suitable to represent gfx trap from Adobe, Corel or Microsoft products. I was thinking like a brush script for the fx and for the rest of the lettering something from the standard collection?
http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

Also i have been a bit liberal with the white space, so it is definitely possible to bunch elements up a bit more (especially vertically). The style of the drop down menu i don't know... it depends on the styling achieved through photo shop/illustrator, though the drop down menu could be changed to something more traditional.

Also i thought it would be good to categorize some of the secondary menu to lean it up a bit -

Signatures - Sig show off
- Gift Sigs
- Sig Battles

Collaboration

SOTW - This Weeks Winner
- SOTW Winners

Tournaments - Current Tournaments
- Tourney Winners

Requests - Sig request
- Banner request
- Logo request

Tutorials - GFX Tutorials
- Web Tutorials

Resources
Renders
Templates
RSS Feeds

The font used for the page text is Arial is there something more suitable? The form the body text takes in the middle column depends if it has any accompanying pictures, otherwise should it span the entire column? Im not sure, considering whats currently on the gfxTrap site is quite modest if you know what i mean.

Also a 3 column design like this might be best designed for drupal.

I like it, the only comments I have is the colour theme, seems dull. I think more colour would be great.

Also for the like banner font, or what you were talking about, i think the font "Prototype" would fit very well.

[inverse_bloom 0]

Your easy to please Tramposch !, are you sure there aren't any changes you wish for in the layout ? Regarding the colors, its a mock up you are free to say what ever colors you want with it.

Also what photo shop effects could be used for it? Are there any existing ones on websites that people think would be suitable? Ive come up with some alternative ideas for the banner logo - http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

[Tramposch 1]

Im liking the Prototype one with the GFX Trap, and the very bottom one on the right column. As for styling, for the Prototype one, it tends to look good with a kinda dark colour, but not too dark, like a shade of red, with a large border. as for the bottom right one, I think that should be the same but the FX part be very crisp, and sharp with a thin border, and and the same colour fill.As for the website colours, let me think about those more.

[inverse_bloom 0]

Ok, here is the two styles for people to look over and comment if they wish.

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

Regarding the colors i thought a deep navy blue and an intense orange for highlighting such as title bars would be interesting. Actually surprisingly i found a link very similar to what i'm talking about quickly (but i was thinking more saturated blue in it making it luminous) -

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

Edited January 2, 2010 by inverse_bloom (see edit history)

[Tramposch 1]

Ok, here is the two styles for people to look over and comment if they wish.
http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

Regarding the colors i thought a deep navy blue and an intense orange for highlighting such as title bars would be interesting. Actually surprisingly i found a link very similar to what i'm talking about quickly (but i was thinking more saturated blue in it making it luminous) -

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

The first link of yours does not seem operable.

The Deep blue and orange looks dang nice. I think we should go with that, any other opinions?

[Xalor 0]

Whatever the CMS you are integrating, make sure that someone can design the skin.
It's all good and nice when you talk about this is better, that is better, but when no one can design a spiffy looking skin it's all worthless. People who talk a good game often cannot finish the job.

Again, whatever you guys decide KEEP IT SIMPLE. Let's not design half working or half good looking skin for Wordpress, drupal or other CMS. And mentioning my first decision to go with flatfile CMS--it's NOT mySQL dependent. Remember, gfxtrap.com is also hosted with free hosting account servers. That means there's going to some down time. Majority of times SQL may be down but HTTP request are still accepted. This keeps the uptime higher than of SQL based sites. It's a strong suggestion but not the final solution. Just keep that in mind.

You may choose any CMS as you wish. But if you cannot redesign skins for that CMS let's not use that CMS. And purchasing the skin is not an option right now because I don't know who's going to pay for it

Honestly, if you are going to purchase a "theme" then why have GFX Crew?

True, no point in buying a theme if you have a whole GFX Crew! Um if we aren't logging in, wouldn't it be the same if we just have plain HTML page, and have the feed from the GFXTrap section on this forum going there? Just saying if we aren't logging in, that might be more interesting, and especially if its just a page to learn about the team and Xisto? I really like gray-silver gradients, and maybe a couple of solid colors? I like the color scheme that was posted.

[truefusion 3]

If the new site (design) will be mostly dependent on RSS feed, i feel complex menus are not required. From the current site from the main menu horizontally placed, the only one that we would "need" is either the "Web Hosting" one or the "Xisto Network" one—which will be mainly for SEO reasons. All the others are unnecessary, redundant and will serve no purpose. Concerning the "GFXTrap Menu" vertically placed on the left, depending on how the RSS feeds are implemented will (should) decide which ones exactly should be considered. Unless mistaken, one of the purposes of the site is to lead visitors back to the forums (specifically the GFXTrap section).

Before deciding on a template, we should first figure out how exactly the RSS feed system will be implemented. Content shapes the design, and there is a lot of content that can be generated through RSS—which may or may not be necessary to display. For example, for certain there should be an area on the main page that informs us on the current GFXTrap news. But how much of the news is required to display to the visitors? Topic titles only, which link back to the original topic? Perhaps show a small spoiler and cut it off with a "read more" link? If the current news are not always updated (i.e. if there is rarely anything new), then its publicity shouldn't be much.

If the current news doesn't require much publicity, then what should we show along side it to take up the remaining space? Again, how much of that is required to show? Technically, no sub-sections of the site itself is required, so everything can be placed all in one page. However, i don't think that will do much to provoke the user into interacting with the forums, especially if they feel overwhelmed or intimidated by the content. A good design should make the user feel comfortable with what is shown.

The website, if you think about it, if all goes well, will eventually be dropped by the visitor and will head directly to the forums instead—which is one of our goals, i believe. The current website doesn't do much promotion or "advertising" to cause any visitor to want to interact in the forums. It's dull and if i were a user, i wouldn't dive further into the navigation and probably wouldn't think of returning. In both instances we would have a visitor dumping the GFXTrap site, but only in one of them would we have a new user.

One of the things that i would believe would make a new visitor consider interacting would be if they saw that things are still active. While on some lower level we may be trying to at some point advertise to the user some form of web hosting, the site, at least on the front end, is geared toward those who are into graphic design. So in thinking like a graphic artist, one of the things that would catch my interest is knowing that there is a place for me to show off my work. Personally, i would only be interested in other people's designs if i were looking for motivation or to perhaps see what is the current trend people are into now-a-days, et cetera. Therefore, unless otherwise stated, i feel a link to the Show Off forum should be emphasized. We shouldn't need to display topics or topic titles for this.

Following from that, unless otherwise stated, i feel this forum's gallery should be somewhat disclosed somewhere on the GFXTrap site. As mentioned before, one of the reasons for viewing someone else's work would be for motivation and other reasons. I feel there should be some integration with this forum's gallery, at least a thumbnail view, which displays images at random. If this forum's gallery is currently "out of order," it should be brought back up. I don't think these thumbnails would require much emphasis, therefore they should do fine somewhere in the bottom of the page.

Also following from what was previously said, competition is something any one of us would be interested in, as it is part of showing off. Therefore the SOTW should be showed on the main page. I feel this one would require displaying at least the first post of the topic, so the user would have a quick glimpse of the requirements for that SOTW. For interaction-provoking reasons, right under that "post" there should be at least two buttons: one that says something along the lines of "View other entries" (which will take them to the topic directly) and one that says something along the lines of "Add your entry" (which will take them directly to the "Add Reply" page of that topic—in other words, it would be as if they had clicked "Add Reply" in the forums). Since older SOTW is of little interest, we shouldn't need to display more than the latest one. Therefore a small link that says something like "View past SOTW competitions" should be placed below, which will direct them to the SOTW forum. Placing emphasis on the last SOTW winner should be okay, but i wouldn't say it should be to the extent that is shown in Tramposch's rough draft.

If i were a graphic designer, making sig or logo designs for others would be nice, but i would probably consider it on a lower level than the other areas mentioned, as it is advertised more for those who can't design or do not have the time to design things. Therefore this should have a spot somewhere on the side, which implies having at least a two-column design. But i also feel this should have some place near the top of that side, at least above what is considered "the fold."

Since a graphic designer would be interested in learning new tricks of the trade, the tutorials and resources section should have their own emphasis, but this i'm not entirely sure how to go about in implementing it—and perhaps some other things. So i'll stop here and wait for feedback.

The Deep blue and orange looks dang nice. I think we should go with that, any other opinions?

I'd vote for that color scheme too, assuming we also follow how they were implemented in the image.

[rvalkass 5]

If the new site (design) will be mostly dependent on RSS feed, i feel complex menus are not required. From the current site from the main menu horizontally placed, the only one that we would "need" is either the "Web Hosting" one or the "Xisto Network" one—which will be mainly for SEO reasons. All the others are unnecessary, redundant and will serve no purpose. Concerning the "GFXTrap Menu" vertically placed on the left, depending on how the RSS feeds are implemented will (should) decide which ones exactly should be considered. Unless mistaken, one of the purposes of the site is to lead visitors back to the forums (specifically the GFXTrap section).

If the RSS feeds will form the content for the site then I think the index page should feature the latest 2/3 items from each feed (News, SOTW, etc.) if they have teaser text, or more if we just have titles. Links to a few archive sections could then just link back to the relevant forum section. The RSS content draws people in, and shows the site is active (especially if we could get some AJAX to update the page live with the latest topics/posts) while a few select archive links send people to the forums where hopefully they'll stay. While this is somewhat similar to the current design, I'm thinking about something more streamline and minimalist in terms of navigation.

 

Before deciding on a template, we should first figure out how exactly the RSS feed system will be implemented. Content shapes the design, and there is a lot of content that can be generated through RSS—which may or may not be necessary to display. For example, for certain there should be an area on the main page that informs us on the current GFXTrap news. But how much of the news is required to display to the visitors? Topic titles only, which link back to the original topic? Perhaps show a small spoiler and cut it off with a "read more" link? If the current news are not always updated (i.e. if there is rarely anything new), then its publicity shouldn't be much.

Something to bear in mind with using the RSS content is that topic titles, descriptions and post content will become vital to the site. Extra care will need to be taken to ensure the site ends up with correctly spelled, correctly formatted content. Everyone is pretty good at it anyway, but it's just something to bear in mind.

 

If the current news doesn't require much publicity, then what should we show along side it to take up the remaining space? Again, how much of that is required to show? Technically, no sub-sections of the site itself is required, so everything can be placed all in one page. However, i don't think that will do much to provoke the user into interacting with the forums, especially if they feel overwhelmed or intimidated by the content. A good design should make the user feel comfortable with what is shown.

A small number of items from each feed with a small teaser would probably work best, especially if the page ends up with a few different feeds on it. Hopefully that will hit the careful balance between providing the user with enough information to be interested but not so much they get overwhelmed,

 

One of the things that i would believe would make a new visitor consider interacting would be if they saw that things are still active. While on some lower level we may be trying to at some point advertise to the user some form of web hosting, the site, at least on the front end, is geared toward those who are into graphic design. So in thinking like a graphic artist, one of the things that would catch my interest is knowing that there is a place for me to show off my work. Personally, i would only be interested in other people's designs if i were looking for motivation or to perhaps see what is the current trend people are into now-a-days, et cetera. Therefore, unless otherwise stated, i feel a link to the Show Off forum should be emphasized. We shouldn't need to display topics or topic titles for this.

Good idea. It certainly needs to be more prominent than the other links on the page. A large, clear user-friendly button to show off your work. It'll depend on the overall page layout, but it's a vital element to making it a success.

 

Following from that, unless otherwise stated, i feel this forum's gallery should be somewhat disclosed somewhere on the GFXTrap site. As mentioned before, one of the reasons for viewing someone else's work would be for motivation and other reasons. I feel there should be some integration with this forum's gallery, at least a thumbnail view, which displays images at random. If this forum's gallery is currently "out of order," it should be brought back up. I don't think these thumbnails would require much emphasis, therefore they should do fine somewhere in the bottom of the page.

The gallery doesn't just contain stuff for the graphics section of the forums (I have review photographs and things for example) which would look somewhat odd on the GFXTrap site. I'm also not sure how easy the gallery is to interface with to get the images from it, but that's something that can be worked out.

 

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

+1 for that colour scheme. I don't think the blue needs more saturation - those colours work very well together as they are.

[truefusion 3]

The gallery doesn't just contain stuff for the graphics section of the forums (I have review photographs and things for example) which would look somewhat odd on the GFXTrap site. I'm also not sure how easy the gallery is to interface with to get the images from it, but that's something that can be worked out.

I can't tell if the gallery uses tags, but if it does, then we could use the tags as a way to differentiate between images that would be appropriate for GFXTrap and those that aren't. For example, if the image is tagged as a "sig," that would make it eligible for being displayed. Of course, this would require a more complex RSS feed and this would also require some user cooperation (since the tags would have to be specific keywords).

[inverse_bloom 0]

Sorry tramposch here is the proper link you were after -

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

Ok, i've looked at everyones input and ive put together a bit of a visual representation of what i think people are saying at the moment. Please let me know if i have forgotten anything -

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

Regarding the color scheme, if i did make any alterations they'd be small improvements. Similar design features but more graphic icons perhaps.

Also could people have another look at the "GFX trap" menu and discuss how we might go about cutting some of the details out. Do you want to use drop down menus such as similar form and linking structure as what i indicated here and in post 18 -

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

Or would you prefer graphic icons, which are well placed around the interface? (think cpanel)

Also as it is a portal do you think it necessary to indicate it so? As in "GFX Trap portal". BTW i agree with rvalkass's mention of AJAX as the way to go for automating the process. What are peoples thoughts?

Edited January 3, 2010 by inverse_bloom (see edit history)

[rvalkass 5]

This is what I was thinking along the lines of (excuse the fact it's rubbish, you can't read my scrawl and it's in blue biro...)The important things are clear and above the fold, and the site layout isn't cluttered. Anyway, just an idea.

[inverse_bloom 0]

Mmm... the link is saying i don't have permission to view the page the image is on. I won't have any problem designing an efficient interface if that seems to be the issue, just trying to get an idea of what form content should come in. BTW rvalkass, whos that picture of in your profile? Is that you or some English rock artist perhaps?

Edited January 3, 2010 by inverse_bloom (see edit history)