Grey Lemons has 4 Reviews
Below are the reviews left by other members on Grey Lemons. Jump to review form?
yuwenchang gave it
on 23rd Dec 2009 and said:Hey, I'm Becca, and today, I'm going to be reviewing your site using Flock on a Mac, with the screen resolution of 1280 x 800. I'd have to say that my first impression for your site is that it's a bit dull, but then again, so are 'grey lemons'.
Site Name
Your site name is an interesting choice, though not the most appealing, it's definitely very unique and original, so kudos to that.Layout/Design
As I said before, your layout seems a bit dull, but otherwise, the colors go well with each other. And personally, I think that it'd look better if the background was fixed and so that only the main section scrolled. You have an interesting choice of a header image (in a good way) but, maybe it's just me - but your title text seems a bit tilted, perhaps you'd want to use something more, rigid/stable? And no offense, but I really don't like the hover color for your navigation links - but otherwise, I think you have an interesting design style.And also, the friends + credit link seems to be very, well, in the way of your main content perhaps you could make it smaller, or perhaps slightly less obvious, because I can tell you that the visitors to your site would rather concentrate on your content than see your links out.
Content
Photography - As for your photography, I think that you could edit them before you put them on, because they are labeled 'photography' and not 'stock images', but otherwise, I like the angles that they are shot from. And also, I don't think you need download links, and perhaps you should try displaying them like on a portfolio, with just thumbnails so you won't need the boxes behind them.Tutorials
Your tutorials seem detailed enough, but it would wonderful if you made more, especially for different programs such as Photoshop, PSP, Photofiltre or GIMP. I used to use Paint.net but switched because there weren't many features.Writing
There's only one, so there isn't much to comment on. It's an interesting concept, but I think that it could be more developed, so good luck with that.Coding
I know that it's not your coding, but I still have to tell you that there are a few errors and warnings, so perhaps you could fix that up. Oh, and there were also a few errors in the CSS.Overall
You have listed your site under 'graphics' but I don't see any on your website, so I would have to say that, to me, it seems to be more of a 'personal' site. After fixing a few things up, and perhaps adding more content (graphics, icons, layouts, articles, stories, etc), I'm sure your site will be back on track. Good luck though.Using Firefox on Mac | Report This?
silentstorms gave it
on 5th Dec 2009 and said:Hi, I'm Anouska and I'll be reviewing your site using Firefox and a resolution of 1440x900. I hope this review is helpful for you!
First Impression
The layout is not very appealing. The photo in the header is not one I personally would've used, it's very dull but then again, so are grey lemons, I imagine. The font you use for your sitename "Grey Lemons" in the header is quite boring, and the scratches around it, well, it looks like you didn't mean that to be there, but I'm not sure. The navigation is clear.Style/Design
The background image isn't seamless, but it's not too distracting.
Your text looks a bit squished up against the sides, so you might want to add some padding there. Otherwise, centered text doesn't read very easily for large amounts of text such as on your blog/updates and story. You might want to align the text left instead.
Hovering over the navigation the blocks of background color don't look very nice, I think it'd look better if you made the text color a different color instead of having a block of background color when hovering over the navigation items.Coding/Scripts etc
I'm not sure why you're including your stylesheet the way you do. Why not make one external stylesheet? That way it'll be much easier to update, too. I'm not going into the validation stuff as it's been said before.Content
Blog
Why post about not posting, and about not having anything to post about? People don't care reading such things. Just blog when you have something to blog about, or don't. I didn't mind reading your blog post about volleyball up until the point where you said "Sorry for ranting about volleyball". If you're sorry you're posting something on your blog, why post it? Going back over older entries, you seem to apologize a lot. If you don't like what you blog about, maybe you should find something you would like blogging about?Sitely
A page about why your site is called Grey Lions and what the site is about would be nice.Photos
You have a nice selection of photos here. I like that you use only your own photography.Tutorials
I don't personally use Paint.NET but the Opening Different Windows tutorial seems very simple and useless as people can probably figure that out themselves.
You say yourself the picture you used on the Black and White-Color Infusion tutorial isn't the best, so why did you use that picture? Perhaps re-do it with a better picture? Otherwise, it's well written and easy to understand.I didn't have the patience to look at the video tutorials to review them.
Writings
You have one story. It's a very short story, that seems to be written almost in a hurry. Try adding a bit more to it, make it a fuller story.Overall
To be honest, even with a few changes to your design your site just doesn't do it for me. There's currently very little content, all of which could use some polishing up. I personally liked your photography section best. You need to make a few changes to your design, as well as put more effort into your content. Try going for quality over quantity, for example your tutorial on opening different windows seems to be just a space-filler. Get rid of such content and focus on adding quality content.Using Firefox on Windows | Report This?
shockwave gave it
on 3rd Sep 2009 and said:Hi, I'm Alice (Allie) and I will be reviewing your site. I will be browsing your site in Mozilla Firefox with a screen resolution of 1280px by 800px.
First Impressions and Site Name
Grey Lemons. It's not really an appealing site name, though yes, it IS unique.
When I first enter your site, I'm greeted by a lot of citrus-y colors in your background. It's quite cheery, really, though it's almost TOO bright. The main body has to fight for the limelight, it seems. I also expected something that would fit a bit more with your site name. But I suppose the orange and yellow is a bit lemon like.. ?Layout
As I already mentioned, the background distracts the visitor's eyes from the main body. My eyes dance back and forth, not really sure where to focus. Maybe you should use more pastel-y colors in your background instead of the bright orange. I also suggest adding a bit of gray to sort of even out the brightness.The blue you used looks like the same color as when you highlight something. So at first, I though I accidentally highlighted something. You should try using a blue-green color like the color of the sky in your header. The same goes for the background of the navigation. Yes, blue and orange are complementary colors on the color wheel, but the shades you chose don't really go well together, especially when you hover over a link in the navigation.
Coding Validation
Your HTML has 11 errors and 12 warnings. Since you are using HTML, not XHTML, you do NOT need to end thing with/>. So in the code for your favicon, you can delete the extra space and slash.You also need to include character encoding in the head. Put this:
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">in the<head>.You should also include type="text/css" in the
<style>so it looks like the following:<style type="text/css">You must also include an alternative attribute in the image code, like so:<img src="IMAGE LINK HERE" alt="ALTERNATIVE TEXT HERE">You do not need to put text into the alternative attribute; you can simply leave it blank. But all the same, you must include it.You also have CSS randomly placed in the middle of the page. You can take them all and put them with the other CSS in the <head>.
The W3C CSS Validator could not find your stylesheet.
Content
Visitor
Banners - Animals, Cristian Artists, and Female Artists:
The banners are okay, but all you really did for most of them was just plop on the site name and a few words on to an image. For a few of them, you added effects, but the effects don't make the banners any more appealing. Some of them are in bad quality as well. Though the animal banner at the top is adorable, I must admit. :)
By the way, using celebrity images are illegal. Check this article for more information.
You should also credit the people and/or sites you got them from.
Icons - Female Artists and Nature:
The icons of the female artists are just cropped images from a bigger image. For the nature icons, you added a bit of effects, but it's still pretty average. You also posted the same nature icon twice.
Backgrounds:
Eh, nothing too special. The second background with the butterflies on it doesn't look like it will tile.
Blends:
The blends are okay, but it doesn't look like you put much effort into it. :/ Once again, the use of celebrity images are illegal.
GIFs:
They're pretty cute, actually, though the in the first one, the cheerleader's head looks deformed. xD It's a bit too small for the body.
Button Templates:
Your button templates are pretty useless, no offense. All you've done is re-size the pictures. Anyone can do that with a graphic editing program.Tutorials
Paint.NET - Black and White Color Infusion:
It's pretty helpful, and you've explained everything well enough so people can understand what to do.
Paint.NET - Opening Different Windows:
I am pretty sure people can figure out how to open different windows in paint.net without this tutorial. Also, at the top of the page, the heading says "Tutorials/Paint.NET/Black and White-Color Infusion". You should change that error.Sitely
Apply for Affiliate:
It should be re-worded as "Apply to Affiliate" or "Apply for Affiliation." In the second rule, you forgot the period after "same" and before the smiley face.
Credits:
I'm glad to see you are crediting people, but crediting "Google" for images isn't really crediting the people who took the pictures you used. Google is just a search engine, and it leads to other sites. You should credit those sites.
Link Us:
Okay, just a few buttons. However, I do have a comment to make about what you named the page. It's only one person running this site, right? So wouldn't the correct way to word it be Link Me? You can also name it "Link Back" or "Link the Site."
Request and Request Pick Up:
You should probably move this to the Visitor page, since it's for the visitors.About Me:
In your second paragraph..
"My hair's color is" should be "My hair color is"
"which I am definetly NOT" should be "which I am definitely NOT"
"when its wet" should be "when it's wet"
"(ha.)" should be "(ha)"
In your third paragraph..
"start of school....)" should be "start of school....)."
"music wise" should be "music-wise"
In the 4th paragraph..
"(its a book series)" should be "(it's a book series)"
In the 5th paragraph...
"And I have been on" should be "I have also been on"
"when its hot" should be "when it's hot"
"grandparents house" should be "grandparents' house"
"superintendant" should be "superintendent"
In the 6th paragraph...
"and much much more" should be "and much, much more"
"Sushi", "Art Class", and "Movie Theater Popcorn" should be "sushi" "art class" and "movie theater popcorn"
The music player turns on automatically. I suggest that you change the settings so it doesn't play as soon as the page loads because some people may have music already playing. I know I did. People may have several windows/tabs up, and they might have a hard time figuring out which site the music is coming from as well.Overall
Well, to be honest, your site really doesn't have that "wow" factor. It doesn't have that extra "oomph" that could totally change how your site is viewed. You need to put more effort into your content. Remember - quality over quantity!Using Firefox on Windows | Report This?
greylemons's Response:
Yeah, I am actually about to delete the celebrity images :) I am going to add my own photos.
UPDATED 06 Sep 09:
Also, they layout is in the middle of changing at the moment.UPDATED 06 Sep 09:
I have the layout that I do because I love orange.![[img: avatar]](/avatars/Vivace.jpg)
Vivace gave it
on 1st Sep 2009 and said:To start with, I see no grey and I see no lemons. I guess those yellow stripes are somewhat lemony, but I think that's reaching. It's not a bad layout actually - the header is a little more tall than my own tastes would go, but I like the color co-ordination of the image and the stripes, and the pop-art feel of the color saturation.
So if there's no grey lemons in the layout, it must mean something about the site or the owner, right? I'll just scroll on down and read the text... about water. Don't get me wrong, I like water. But I suppose this is some sort of personal blog, and maybe the name is just personally important to you.
Well, let's go into the sitely section to see what this name means, eh? Let's see, affiliate application, credits, link buttons, request form - how weird, I can't see your form in Firefox - terms and conditions. I guess the request form and terms and conditions suggest this is a graphics or layout site? Some sort of resource-sharing site, I'm betting. But it'd be even better if I didn't have to guess, and instead you just told me what sort of site it was.
Moving on to the visitor section... or is this the graphics section, as the title on the page says? Pick one and go with it. Out of the two, I'd suggest you stick with "graphics" since it's much more descriptive than "visitor."
I'm going to skip the standard rant about how you're using pictures that I'm 99% sure you haven't taken and then sticking your site address on their. Instead I'll focus on how unhelpful your fake thumbnails are. They take just as long to load as the full size images would, and have the bonus of looking awkward because they forcibly resize images. You should either make proper thumbnails (better) or just display the full-sized banners.
I don't really know who your target audience is for these. Are they for use in layouts? On Livejournal or MySpace? And who uses a 100x100 icon anywhere that they'd need an img link for it? I'm really at a loss. At least for the icons, why not just have the URL for posting into the LJ uploader or whatnot. While I'm at it, the second one from the bottom on the "Christian Artists banners"? Broken.
Let's head to tutorials. Your description of what I'd be doing in the "black and white - color infusion" tutorial is a little confusing. I think you'd be better off putting the final image up at the top as well so I can see what you're talking about. It'd help if the screenshots were larger as well; it's hard to see what you're doing in them now. The "opening windows tutorial" is... um. A little basic, don't you think? It also has the wrong title at the top, since it's purporting to be the color infusion tutorial. This section needs more to do, really.
And finally, I can learn about you.
... Did that just start autoplaying music? Really? No, you don't want that there. Take it off. You'll annoy far more people than you please.
Anyway, the writeup about yourself isn't too bad. You come off pretty young, but you say you're thirteen so I guess that's not necessarily bad. A lot of the details you share seem irrelevant - the flavors of juice you like? I think this page would benefit from either more detail or less.
More is what your site needs in general - more content, more tutorials, more explanation of what the site is for, more focus.
Using Firefox on Windows | Report This?
greylemons's Response:
Yah, about the name...the website was GIVEN to me. I thought that the name was good because I could do a lot with it in the future. Usually, I do not have a lemons themed layout BUT my dad is going to make a really cool one soon (I can't give any information...it is top secret). I appreciate your review and I will be sure to make any necessary changes that you mentioned in my site :) My website is a mix of graphics and blogging.
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