Creating a Unified Look
Published May 11, 2009 | 
When visitors come to your site and go from page to page (hopefully, they will stick around that long!), do they know that all the pages they visit on your site are all part of your domain? Your web site should have a consistent look and feel throughout all your pages.
Color schemes
If you are not an artist, you may need assistance in picking the colors for your site. If you are a complete novice or know that you tend to match stripes with plaids, you are probably better off using a predesigned template. If you do have color sense, you will still need to keep a few “rules” in mind when designing your site. Stick to a few key colors: three to five are best. Complementary color schemes work very well, e.g., blue and orange. Monochromatic or analagous color schemes will also work. See Kuler article for more on picking color schemes. Continue reading
Posted in Web Design | 
browser compatability, color schemes, fonts, page layout, type, typefaces | 
Leave a commentLimiting Your Content
Published May 5, 2009 | When developing your web site, it is very important to focus on what you know. Keep your content relevant to your anticipated users. When planning your web site, narrow your focus and then stick to it.
Limiting Design
Your web site design should help people find the information they are seeking. This is really two separate categories. First, you will want to make sure that you have a consistent design throughout your site. This can be accomplished through a template or cascading style sheet (more on this in another article). Secondly, you will want to keep your pages short, less than 1,000 words.
Keep vertical scrolling to a minimum — a sales page and blogs seems to be the accepted exceptions. Horizontal scrolling, however, is never acceptable. The “standard” width is currently designed to work on a 1024 x 768 monitor resolution. This amounts to about 960 usable horizontal pixels. Keeping your design narrow is ideal as it is difficult to read across wide columns of information. There’s a reason newspaper columns are so narrow! Continue reading