Seventeen Seconds

Seventeen Seconds

***-- (Rated by 6 people, viewed by 252 people)

Seventeen Seconds has got some Resources, Tutorials and a small blog that I often forget to update :( I know my site is far from the best, but it would be great to know what others think.

Added by Petey in Graphics

Seventeen Seconds has 6 Reviews

Below are the reviews left by other members on Seventeen Seconds. Jump to review form?

  1. roz gave it ***-- on 15th Jan 2009 and said:

    First Impression:
    My first impression of your website name was that it's pretty unique and kind of cool and hip, so I'll give you points for that.
    I like your color scheme and how you focused on two accented colors. However, both of those colors are quite bright and can be hurtful to the eyes, so I would suggest to "tone" it down a little next time perhaps?

    The Layout:
    I like that your layout is simple and mostly text-base. I also like your header coding with the blue thick border under the text. I would suggest darkening your body text color a bit to a darker shade of grey for more contrast and for better visibility and readability.
    I notice on your sidebar under "network" that your links have some "_" or ";" before or after the words.This was probably done for style but it does not look very professional. I would suggest removing it and just having normal links with text. This also applies to the "affiliates" section, where you have, e.g. "sop :)" as the text for your link.

    Content:
    In your "downloads" section, the "color palettes" are quite unique. One suggestion would be to provide the hex codes for your visitors? Your "bullets" seem a bit unnecessary though, since they are merely arrows that are text-based.

    Your "tutorials" section, aside from your icon tutorials, seem pretty ordinary. Most of your Photoshop tutorials are not that unique, and some of them are very simple and do not seem to need their own tutorials to explain!

    On a structural note, I would suggest not having a separate "updates" section from your blog. You might as well blog about your updates and tag the entry or categorize it under "Site Updates."

    Overall:
    Overall, I like the layout and design of your site. I really enjoy the color scheme you've got going. I love that you provide a variety of graphics for your visitors. Something you could work on improving is the quality of your tutorials. Teach something most people wouldn't know how to do! Write about things YOU know specifically, that is not offered on other tutorial sites!
    One more comment: WOW, you are fourteen years old? You are so young! I must say, as a 14-year-old, you are an excellent web and graphic designer. My websites when I was 14 were pieces of dung! Keep it up, and never stop improving. Good luck!

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  2. sassa12489 gave it ***-- on 4th Jan 2009 and said:

    Viewed in: Safari
    First impression: Not very impressed. The box is very big, the body text is centered. The color scheme is not very good to say. However, I like how the site is laid out. I like the header, that immediately grabs my attention. Yes, yes I want to hear your side of the story.
    Resources: I don’t like block quotes. I think they look weird on a page such as this unless it’s an updated edit or something on a blog. Already talked about the colors…
    >>brushes: your quick explanation to install is pretty poor. Some beginner is starring at your brushes probably wanting to use them and trying to figure out what you mean by copy to your program. Your brushes aren’t bad. I think text that’s neatly written should be removed. Not good compared to your other brushes. I’d remove the 3rd brush set as well. That one is just plain bad. Your other brush packs overshadow it by miles or kilometers :D
    >>color palletes: I don’t know how useful these are because I never use them but I don’t think they’re very good. You color pallets contain beautiful pastel colors but that’s the problem. A lot of the colors are light with only one dark one. I’d probably cut the colors down to three and make a greater discrepancy between the color shades too.
    >>I like your icon textures. I don’t know how I feel about your color icon numbered bars. I think it would be safer to make it all one color matching the layouts. Your second page has some but they’re faintly visible.
    >>paper stock: nice. I especially like the article.
    >>scripts: these are some nice scripts. Very nice. Might download a few.
    >>smilies: theres only 10 and theres so many human emotions.
    >>textures: nice. Lots of them to choose from. The black scratch texture sucks. Remove it. I really love this one: http://i278.photobucket.com/albums/kk107/88avenue/Textures/LightTexture002.png.
    >>Layouts: its okay but plain. Love the css though although the header could be better.
    >>bullets: cool. I could see someone using these
    >>desktop: hm... I might take the texture opinion back. I see you used it for the last desktop and it doesn’t look bad. I like the middle one the most. The first one isn’t all that interesting. These desktops are kind of boring actually. Spice em up.
    >>the best one is the red one. The rest are boring and plain. Why don’t you use your own photoshop actions to spice em up.
    tutorials: I think what you did for your icon tutorials, you should do for your coloring tutorials. There’s 1783273737 ways to do a blue-green tint. I haven’t met one person yet who likes clicking through 16733276 links to see they don’t like the effect. The only problem I would note with your icon tuts is that you should show what the original unaltered image is and then where the tutorial is going to take them. Also, I’ve noticed the use of your green against your grey which is bad because the green is way too bright. Maybe use the green as an hover effect for a link. For the most part while reading some of your tutorials, they’re easy to follow which is great. Nice job.
    www: very organized. Nice. I love this text you have and the >>site.
    >>advertising: what is wos? Besides, you offer advertising but where? I don’t see any place for it.
    >>affiliations: your smily face looks weird with the font you used after teh rules which I’m guessing you meant the. Reasonable rules. Nice.
    >>b.t.n: I’d say develop this section a bit more. Maybe add history on this page too. There’s barely a paragraph here.
    >>credits: I need to do that: organize my credits like that. Nice!
    >>linkage: I love the 2nd button. I also like the very big one.
    Updates: nice page. Very useful.
    Peteyz: nice pic. Nice style. You’re my type of boy ;D (except you’re so young lol) Just one inquiry, if your yahoo account is private, why mention it?
    Ending Notes: You have a pretty good site. Just work on adding more content vs. changing the layouts lol. And get rid of the centured blog.

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  3. [img: avatar]
    spockish gave it ****- on 2nd Jan 2009 and said:

    layout
    I really don't mind simple, mostly CSS based design. I don't really know why some people seem to have a huge problem with it. A couple things that would make your design stronger I think would be to:

    1.) "do you want my side, my side of the story?" -- I'm not exactly sure the point of it. It's nice text, but your site name isn't anywhere else on your layout so maybe you should consider replacing "do you want my side, my side of the story?" with "Seventeen Seconds" or even have Seventeen Seconds in large letters and other words smaller slightly overlapping. Sorry if that's a bad description

    2.) For the most part, I think your color scheme is fine. It's nice. It's not too bright or too dull... except the rollovers. White on yellow is hard to read. How about instead of yellow, use a slightly more vivid green?

    3.) Your typography is mostly nice. I don't mind the large "comment" or title. Although I'm not really certain how to fix it, the date position bothers me a little. The blog title, comment link, date look a bit jumbled together. I wish I could be a little more helpful than just saying it looks jumbled. Sorry. I like what you're attempting though. It's unique and kind of reminds me of I Love Typography.

    4.) What is the point of having a blog if you only make very short posts maybe twice a month? Maybe try updating twice a week. You could blog about things on the 'net that interest you, what's going on in your life, or use a writing prompt. Slightly longer blog posts
    (but not novels!) are nice too because they give your visitors something to say.

    5.) Resources/Tutorials -- really nice. Your content is well organized and you have nice use of previews. (gah. I should use previews). I know it's a lot of work and kind of a pain to do, but have you thought at all about using screen shots for you tutorials? Makes them so much easier to follow for the newbies.

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  4. [img: avatar]
    Liz gave it ****- on 2nd Jan 2009 and said:

    Layout and overall design

    Your layout is rather plain and I feel your site name should be the focal point of a layout but you don't even have your site's name on there. Pull your layout up quite a bit as well. The colors are a bit boring but they work except for when I roll over your navigation that yellow color ughhD: not enough contrast between the colors and it hurts my eyes.
    Going sans sidebar is okay because you have all that stuff at the bottom. The titles on these like "The Affiliates" it's quite small and hard to read so instead of spacing the letters out just make them bigger. You don't really have a footer "copyright blabhalhb" at the bottom would be nice and of course powered by wordpress.
    Looks like your blogs are shortD: in future reference no one wants to read a novel or 2 sentences for a blog.

    Pages
    Content- Ooo this looks all neat and organized nice use of blockquotes.
    >Brushes I like these not too many scribbley word ones but most of them look useful.
    >Color Pallets I really don't find use for these most people pick out their own colors for layouts and I don't think most people use 6 different shades of blue in their layoutsD:
    >Icon Textures I love the light textures in particular set 4 on page one.
    >Textures The light ones are gorgeous
    >Scripts FINALLY!!! Someone who uses stock photos for previews instead of celebrities!!! YESSS
    >Icons You used your own photography! Great job
    >Bullets if you have hardly any of something like these don't bother putting them up.
    I basically like the majority of your resources great job(: just keep doing what you're doing here.

    Tutorials- a good collection of basic photoshop technique and all are quite useful.

    Site- I don't see a history of your site/history with webdesign. A sort of history "behind the name" but it's too short for my taste.

    Peter- Your about me is organized and a good amount of information.

    Overall
    All of the criticism I have for your is about the layout and maybe adding a site history or lengthening things. Great job you have some great resources.

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  5. [img: avatar]
    Chien gave it **--- on 1st Jan 2009 and said:

    Hey there Peter, I'm here to review your site. Please bear with me while you read this and forgive me if I may offend/insult you and/or your site later on in the review.

    I'm using Mozilla Firefox on Windows Vista and viewing your site in a 1280x800 resolution.

    First Impression & Design
    Urgh. The "urgh" actually came from the content being center-aligned. Not to mention the horrible colour contrasts that hurts my eye (It's 4.30 am and I haven't had a wink of sleep for the past 16 hours). I also dislike the style of the posts.

    It would be nicer if you had a bit of a bottom margin for your main container. You failed valid xHTML standards. You don't need a lot of line breaks before your main container starts. You can use CSS to add margins to it. The colour of your texts (strong, bold, italics, emphasis, etc) is too light. There isn't enough contrast between the text and the background so it makes it hard to read.

    The comments link has too much emphasis on it. It is huge, italicized, and rather stands out. Your calendar date style isn't really in it's best position. I suggest moving it higher up, or dropping it completely.

    Your site title is really long too. Maybe you should keep it for the main page, but for other pages you should shorten it to something like "SeventeenSeconds.org » Page Title", but initially your site url is long too, so I'm not sure about that.

    Site Content
    Resources It came from a link named Resources but I get a page with a heading called content. There is absolutely no point in having a blockquote there. This applies to all the pages linked there too, drop the blockquote. I merely skimmed through those pages since you've a lot of content.

    Tutorials Again, drop the blockquote. You've quite set of tutorials there, though a person like me doesn't appreciate it, some others might, especially those in the beginner level.

    Site
    Advertising: The huge white "Packages" make my eyes burn. It's too light, change it to something more readable.
    Affiliates: Drop the center align for the labels.
    Behind the name: Since this is a short page, why not merge it with "Site"?
    Credits: Again, drop the huge white text and the blockquote.
    Linkage: Drop the blockquote. You can also merge this with "Site"

    Peteyz: Center align, again?! It's really starting to annoy me. Hovering over "Joined Fanlistings" gives me a blinding yellow colour with white text, an even more major turn off for my poor eyes.
    Maybe you've a specific style of writing, but I suggest the usage of brackets ( TEXT ) instead of these [ TEXT ]. Your contact detail for Yahoo should just be deleted off. It's pointless if you don't even list it.
    Ahh... finally the best reason to use a blockquote, quoting someone.

    Joined Fanlistings: The white text is back to haunt me, again. And the darn blockquote.

    Overall
    I didn't exactly enjoy my stay over at your site due to layout, but you have a set of tutorials that may be useful for some visitors and that's why I gave you two stars. You have the potential, but you'll just need to further improve on your skills.

    I'm sorry that I sounded rather harsh though >_<

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    Petey's Response:

    Hi, Thank you very much for taking the time to review me :)
    Harsh is fine, its better than saying its all lovely and then I won't learn. The layout was just a rush job, as I desperately needed a new one and I didn't really have much time to make one. I do, however, plan to make a new one reasonably soon.

    Thanks for all the hints and tips to help improve :)

  6. [img: avatar]
    Ricky gave it ****- on 1st Jan 2009 and said:

    Hello Peter my name is Ricky and I will be reviewing your site today.

    The Name

    Ugh! I hate sites with long names because they are hard to remember and typing them becomes a nuisance. However, seventeen seconds seems catchy, so it might just work out.

    The Layout

    DUN! DUN! DUN! This is the meat of your website, and unfortunately it is slightly boring and gives me a headache. It is so plain, and looks as if it is premade. Not sure, if it is, I don't make premade nor go looking for them. I see that you haven't put the name of the website anywhere, which is one of the most important parts of a layout. I suggest you take out, "do you want my side...." and put seventeen seconds. I say this cause a) that saying is a cliché and makes the site's ambiance tacky and b) you need to put the TITLE in.

    The font is plain and why is the comment link size big? It is not fitting with the size of the title. I suggest that you should make it a lot smaller. Also WHY is your body centered? This is not poetry; it is a blog post: left align please. Also, the DEC is clashing with 2009 in the mist recent post. I suggest a bigger line height. Also make the space between the title and the grey bar larger, it doesn't look right the way it is now.

    The colour scheme is fairly good. The grey and limey green seem to work, my only complaint is the colour of your comments, and those block quotes. The side bars are way too bright and my head is hurting looking at them. The same goes to the colour you choose as bold, as I cannot read them (I am referring to the colours used in your about page). Please choose a darker shade of the lime green.

    Also I just saw this now, when I click the link that takes me to the page where I can comment, the words "The Comments :]" are clashing with the grey bar. Please fix that.

    Coding

    Oh no! Your xhtml isn't valid! You have 62 Errors. Yikes. I am not familiar with xhtml, so I cannot help you with that, but I suggest that you get it validated, or you will be criticized for that, here. However your css is valid, so that is good.

    Content

    Your resources are fantastic; I love the variety and type you have up there. I will definitely come back here for your resources. Great JOB!

    Your tutorials are average. They are great for beginners if that is the audience you are trying to target; however there aren't any tutorials that make me go wow!

    Your pages in "the www" category are fine, except for the credit page. I don't understand why your headings are centered while your links are not. Either center the links or left align the headings.

    UGG!! Your font colour in the updates is that bright one. I can't read it without it being highlighted. Fix it.

    About Page

    Nicely written, cool England! I love visiting there. Wow, I wish I knew what I want to be when I grow up. Architecture is cool, took a course in High School last year.

    Overall

    Your site has great potential. Your resources are fantastic, just make your xhtml valid, and fix the aesthetics of your layout. The headings/text alignment and the colour choices and we are cool.

    Sorry if I was slightly harsh, but I really liked your site

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    Petey's Response:

    Thanks! I'm glad you like my resources :) The layout was made as a temporary one, I probably should of put up a new one before submitting for a review, but thanks all the same.

    Thank you for the ideas of how to improve my site, very much appreciated.

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