Well my site is finally up and running * www.rescope.com.au *... actually it didn't take very long but I am not known for my patience... anyway I need all you guys to go there and find something wrong with it! Does it display correctly at your res and on your browser? IS the font OK/easy to read? Are the color schemes too much? Is the about page too wordy? If there is a pixel out of place I expect you to give me what for! BTW I know already that it does not display well in Safari; Maybe a Mac user has some advice on how to fix this? I still only have Frontpage at this point, but hopefully will get Dreamweaver soon.

I've already picked what nits I'm qualified to find, Sam. :D

It displays great at 1024x768 and works fine with my IE6. I'll go try it with Mozilla in a few minutes and update this comment afterwards. :)

Nice looking site Sam. I noticed that when your onMouseOver images change for the first time they have to load, so on slower internet connections there will be a long delay when the user places the mouse over the image (link) before it changes to the negative image (or whatever other color image it is that replaces it). This can be fixed by using a simple javascript to preload the images. javascriptsource.com is a good place to get a script like that as I recall, or if that doesn't work you can just google it. I'm sure one of the more experienced programmers around here can probably come up with a better solution to that problem as well. Perhaps the use of flash animation or something. Good work on the site!

One thing you may wanna rethink is displaying your E-Mail addy like you have, spambots & E-Mail harvesters will have a field day with that & you will get spammed too death.

You may find this article of use - http://www.outfront.net/tutorials_02/adv_tech/spam-proof.htm
(A good resource for you especially as you are a FrontPage warrior)

Also they have some very good advice for some other aspects/tricks you may find useful or interesting. =]

Having mooched your site in Firefox;

I gotta say, I really do not like the horizontal scrolling I had too do to view your galleries/works, this might just be one of my pet hates, but simple fact, my mouse has a web browser scroller that scrolls vertically not horizontally. & ya, I am a lazy surfer, then again so are most other people. Maybe considering changing that for a more surfer friendly page is an idea, cos I know many other people that dispise that too.

Site loads up fine (am on 512k though so they usually do). The layout (other than scrolling sideways) is fine, nice touches & design all around, however I'm not keen on the navigation set up as it has no continuity & the colour clash did my eyes in after a while, maybe settling for one design for the buttons is an option or is that just me being picky?

In I.E6;

Damn it took forever too load up. That is prolly I.E though.

Pretty much the same verdict as with Firefox.

As you have a very image heavy site (Your content is brilliant BTW) maybe opting for a minimalistic background & trimmings could be a good way too go if you develop the site more, least that way the punters on a slower uplink too the net won't leave before they get too see some of the stunning works you have.

& you are doing well with FrontPage so stick with it & save yourself some cash. ;)

Thanks guys. Torque I had noticed that problem but wasn't sure how to fix it. Now at least I have a place to start. POGT I wasn't sure about the horizontal scrolling thing, I really just wanted something a bit different from every other site. Eventually I want to add a scroll bar between the link menu and the images so you can scroll through the images that way. I also thought that loading time would be a drawback for som too so I might custom make some simpler faster loading backgrounds etc. Thanks so much for the feedback both of you, and Mary and Mum42 for all their help also.

I think the horizontal scroller thing is rare is cos it annoys the hell out of people, though it is good you are trying too find something unique to catch peoples attention. ;)

One thing though, your content *is* the bit that is different from every other site on the web, just present it in as simple a way as possible & you watch the hits & visitors roll in. :)

I'm still waiting for your picture to be posted somewhere;-)

The horizontal scrolling is not great but your mouse can be set up so that when you click the wheel you get bi-directional arrows and can auto scrolll around the screen. Works great for viewingvery large resolution images as well. Nice site Sam:-)

Hi Sam. The horizontal scroll would require, for me, some getting use to but wouldn't prevent me from viewing the site. The only other non-professional viewpoint I have is on the "about" page. The paragraphs for "Site" and "Author" both start out written in third party "The Author" then switch to first party "I" statements in the same paragraphs. Others may think they are reading about two seperate people maybe?
What I love is the way you categorized your themes. ;)

Thanks BJ. I wondered if anyone would notice that. I guess I will have to change it...

Sam - re change of *person* I noticed it also on my second viewing.
I think BJ is right - I would fix this. (I might be a pedant, but I am not alone ....key spooky music... )
I also tend to agree with POGT about the artwork being the focus - what I found distracting was the change of background with each link. Now as an arty person I liked it, but as a user I found it annoying. Can't really explain why.
Overall though the site is attractive to someone seeking interesting images, and it would hold my attention if I stumbled across it.
Happy scripting.....

hmmm POGT, makes me sound like some sort of Pokemon/Pog type thing 0.o

hehehe

Updates: Simplified and downsized backgrounds; change "about" to more first person language; changed email address and coding as suggested; added preload script from javascriptsource.com.

See how helpful you all were? I will look at the horizontal scrolling thing soon.

Go Sam.

Thanks Mum. I have submitted my site to Google and Yahoo, are there any other search engines that offer free registration?

Wise old man say "Google is all you need."

Once in Google who cares about all the other ones.

Google is god.

Bow down before Google & worship perfection. =}

Updates: Simplified look of all the buttons to fit in with themes; fixed problems with Safari and images not fitting correctly (there should now be three lines of image preveiws); Changed "about" page so is easier to read; Fixed tables so that all pages should now line up exactly with each other. *collapses from exhaustion*

Demanding things websites ain't they hehehe.

Now remember people, a webmaster is not just for xmas, they are for life, so look after them. ;)

*sings*

"...We're off to see the website, the wonderful website of Oz..."

LOL! I don't know if I'm a Wizard of webpages yet though Mum!!

Much better, two tiny points -
1) little green line on the sky image page far RHS.???
2) Rescope motif still a bit big on the enlarged images. It just needs to be at the "just noticeable" level or I wouldn't bother downloading it. Maybe semi transparent too. I want the big pic to look at, not look at a free ad for you. (even if that's what you want!)
Otherwise Good.
A-

Thanks again Mum. I will check out that line. As for the logo, it was difficult to decide how big to make it, I don't want to make it -too- much smaller... maybe another 25% smaller? It is actually already at 25% transparancy also, but it is more noticeable on some images than others. I was thinking of setting up a registration that would allow members to D/L images with no logo at all, but I need to build up some traffic first. Anyway at least I have some idea of what others think now.

I am thinking now that maybe I should develop a more subtle logo to put on the images? Maybe get rid of the purple bit and just have the camera at 50% transparancy with the site address typed?

& after all that is done, you still have too contend with the W3C's webmaster spirit crusher...

http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http%3A//www.rescope.com.au/
As of this moment you have at least ..
[quote]Errors: 37[/quote]

That is when the fun starts, making a W3C compliant page is tough, but when you do you can display a tiny little badge showing you are an elite webmaster & page coder! ;)

/earned his first badge earlier this evening =)

Only a few hundred pages too recode before both my sites are fully compliant... =/

Interesting site... however most of it might as well have been in chinese as far as my knowledge of HTML is concerned. Maybe when I understand it better I will have another look.

That site is you're new dictionary & learning center, they are the people who define HTML, they are the ones who make the rules with regard too code etc.

while it may all seem like Chinese now, by using the page validator & reading what they say is wrong with your pages & cross linking between their guides/tutorials you will be amazed how much faster & better you will code, as well as learning much better practices.

I found out how badly my coding sucked recently when I stopped using I.E, & by using their site (W3C) I am now on the road too being a better webmaster & coder because I am trying to comply too the actual "laws & standards" of HTML from the people that set them rather than the sloppy standards that Internet Explorer & Micro$haft love too allow.

Pages worthy of checking are...
http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_reference.asp
http://www.w3schools.com/html/default.asp

Well worth checking out, because as you are creating in FrontPage you have too watch what it slips in, FrontPage is well known for adding unndeeded code which will generate errors on the validator & over the cross browser spectrum. Even Dreamweaver generates errors. However, should you want a new editor that is probably as good as it gets where compliance is concerned, W3C offer a free HTML editor called Amaya, look on their site for it & see what you think, I don't like it but then again I like the ease with which I can administrate my sites using FrontPage, which is why I am very reluctant too stop using it.

Nice job in the image-loading Sam, it makes a big difference. I also like what you've done now with a color scheme for each link for each environment type. It looks really nice that way.

Nice looking site. I couldn't see any meta tags in the code to enable web bots and spiders to catalogue the site. e.g.
<meta name="keywords" content="art, digital, photography,blah, blah">
<meta name="description" content="Rescope is a site where you can blah-de-blah.">
<meta name="author" content="Sam">

And so on... I desperately want to redo my site - I haven't uploaded anything to it in months and I haven't changed the design in years and frankly I'm embarassed. If you're not sure about any of the coding, give me a shout.

Thanks guys! CH I will endeavor to add those keywords today. Thanks for the offer of help with coding, I am sure I will take you up on that at some stage.

Adding this one at the start of you pages wouldn't hurt either

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd">

I was looking at that but I didn't know what doctype to put! Thanks.

No worries, as CaptainHero said, any help you need, just gimmie a shout, only too happy to help.

Added the meta tags and the doctype. I also had another look at the validator again POGT, I managed to get it down to only 3 errors, but then when I checked it out in Safari the formatting was screwed up; of course I didn't know which change had caused this to occur, so I had to start again from scratch. In the end I gave up...

[quote]the W3C's webmaster spirit crusher... [/quote]

Very nicely done Sam I really like the lay out well done. You really put a lot of effort into this site. You should be proud of the job. You net friend Clayton ( Prism)

Thanks Clayton! Haven't heard from you for a while. BTW I have updated all the full size images with a smaller and hopefully less offensive watermark.

Sam I think you should replace the camera with a actual image of a camera instead. I think that would bring it more to life. and put more depth to the banner.

Well maybe I will, now that I have one!!! :-)

Had another look at the site - Sam - very smooth now!

I have updated the site with some new images, and also removed the unpopular side scrolling thingy. Is it better now?

Removing the side scrolling is a huge improvement. My only comments are that the site is slow loading, and not suited to 800x600 resolution, but that's not a major problem if your target users are people with broadband and higher resolutions.

Normally when I design a site I try to cater for the lowest specs of a user (slow connectionm and low resolution), but that's just me! Great job.

The site seems more 'user friendly' now Sam, but I do have 800x600 screen resolution & it is annnoying to try & view at this res......in addition, your watermark is still a sticking point. I keep analyzing why & IMHO, it detracts from the beauty of all images a lot.The eye is drawn to it immediately (at least mine are). I understand the importance of a watermark, but this one just doesn't agree with me (maybe size?,maybe the address?). Hope this helps you Sam....good job though. I wouldn't begin to know how to do what you are doing, so congratulations are in order from me!!! :))

Thanks guys. I must admit I am already growing tired of the sites format and will probably completely change it within the next few months; it just seems old to me now... mimi I know the watermark is offputting but as I am not sure what I want to do with the images yet I am going to leave it there for now. Ideally I want to print and frame some of the better ones in the future, and I don't think anyones going to pay for something they can download for free... ;-)

You are sooooooo right Sam...free is free! I understand better now! Good luck!!!!!!!!!!