Era

Era

****- (Rated by 5 people, viewed by 180 people)

Just my little part of the web for myself.
No visitor content really. I'm thinking about putting up articles to read, though.

Added by kinza in Personal

Era has 5 Reviews

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

  1. [img: avatar]
    arrowsmash gave it ***** on 2nd Aug 2010 and said:

    Hello, Kinza :). I will be reviewing your site using Internet Explorer with a screen resolution of 1024px by 600px.

    > SITE NAME
    I like the name of your site very much. It's short and simple, but it also rolls off the tongue nice. "Era" is a unique and rememberable name.

    > LAYOUT
    Though your layout isn't full of complicated coding and graphics, it's a very simple and nice layout. I like how your sidebar isn't cluttered with useless words and navigation and things like that. It's small and leaves space for the main attraction: your content area. Your font is readable, and I like the fact that it isn't in complete black.

    > CONTENT
    >> HOMEPAGE
    Not much to say here. It's obviously your blog.
    >> PORTFOLIO
    I really like your designs :). You have a talent! Anyways, I also like that you're using Lightbox to display your images instead of making me open a new tab every time I click on one of your images. This adds to the sleekness of your layout, and site overall. Very nice. Your first design under "April 2010" is missing.
    >> ABOUT KINZA
    I haven't found any errors on this page (grammar, spelling, etc.). You seem like a very interesting person :). I have a personal love for Phantom of the Opera as well, especially the 2008. ♥. Anyways, nothing wrong with this page.
    >> PAST LAYOUTS
    Nothing to say here, though I like that you've kept it short and sweet.
    >> ASK & ANSWER
    It's organized, good job. Nothing much to say here.

    > ORIGINALITY & CREATIVITY
    Your website is original, and I like that it's just your blog. :) Your portfolio works are very original, and I like that as well. You seem to be walking to the beat of your own drum with Era. Good job.

    > ORGANIZATION
    Your website is organized very well. I do think that you should have a page about Era, and a credits & contact page for anyone who would like to contact you. Most websites do have a credit page to credit anyone/any websites they use during their webdesigning time. But this is only needed if you actually have websites to credit, which I'm not sure you do? If you do, I'm sure they'd appreciate the credit.

    Other than that, I'm quite happy with the current organization of your layout and website.

    > OVERALL COMMENT
    I really like your website and I think I will visit again some time to comment on your blogs :).

    Review by: Katarina @ Arrowsmash

    Using MSIE on Windows | Report This?

    kinza's Response:

    Thanks!
    I've been kind of neglecting it xD I haven't updated in a while, but I figured I'd update when I was in the mood.
    Hm... the portfolio seems fine to me. Try refreshing?

    Thanks for the review, Katarina (pretty name, by the way)! :*

  2. hypnotic gave it ***** on 29th Jul 2010 and said:

    I will be reviewing your website with a 1280 X 800 screen resolution, in Firefox.

    First impression:
    The simple but fancy look makes it amazing for the first impression. I really like the colors you used and the way you managed to use them. The layout is really good, it def. would make me come back again.

    Layout:
    As I stated before, your layout is simple and fancy at the same time. Everything looks neat and the structure is perfect. My only suggestion would be to make the font bigger, maybe just a size bigger? I really like what you did with the header, it really goes with the simplicity idea.

    Pages:
    Homepage: The way you organized Fanupdate is great. It is easy for the reader to know when it was posted and to leave a comment. The only things would be the font size and maybe, for easy navigation, try adding pagination to it.

    Portfolio: Your work is great! And you have great ideas, my only suggestion here would be to classify your creations by categories instead of dates, this way your visitors will know what they want to click.

    About Kinza: It's great that you share about you because people feel more confortable when knowing about the website owner, or maybe they just like to know about them, like I do. Also, I find it great that you share ways to contact you with us.

    Past Layouts: Well it looks like this is your first layout, and by looking at your webdesigning skills, I can't wait to see your new creations!

    Ask & Answer: I've always though this was an interesting thing to put on a website. My only suggestion would be to make the question more visible, since you can easily miss it because of the same color you use for the answer.

    Conclusion: You have a nice website, everything is so neat. Maybe if you added some graphics or updated your portfolio more often, people could have more to come back. Good luck!

    Using Firefox on Windows | Report This?

  3. [img: avatar]
    shavigh gave it ****- on 28th Jul 2010 and said:

    Reviewing at 1920x1200 resolution in Safari on a Mac.

    Main Features

    Site Name: Simple, unique and magnificent. It reminds me of old times for some strange reason. It makes me wonder if you named that because the website is your era, which is an era all about you.

    I would give it a 5 out of 5.

    First Impression: When I first glanced at your site I fell in love with the simplicity of the layout. It makes me feel calm while looking at it and uses colors that don't pop right in your face, which I dislike.

    I would give it a 5 out of 5.

    Design: The simplicity of the design is what I like most. The header of the layout reminds me of the header Alex Evan has on alexevans.net which looks remarkably delightful.

    I would give it a 4 out of 5.

    Coding: Everything seems to be in good shape except for when I go on your portfolio page. When I click on any one of your works, I have to scroll for a long time and find the work all the way at the bottom, I think you should have a check in that. You should also have a more popping header for your blog posts and pages because the one you have is too plain. Your layout should be a little bigger so you could make the sidebar larger because it's too small, in my opinion. Also the copyright part should be more noticing because it's too plain and the width should go fill up the whole container, or whatever you specifically call it.

    I would give it a 2 out of 5.

    Pages

    Homepage: I think it's good the way it is, but for some suggestions you should have your own customized "Previous" and "Next" buttons or have them numbered (e.g. Pages: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5). Another thing that bothers me is the "main archive feed" you should have that removed in my opinion. You should also have your search engine for your site on the sidebar and a little customized, but not over the top. I would also suggest for you to switch to WordPress, not only is it easy to post blogs, but you could add a little fun stuff like plugins, custom pages, custom links and media. I used it since the start of my website and I would recommend it to anyone.

    I would give it a 3 out of 5.

    Portfolio: As stated above you should check your content on the portfolio page, but anyways your portfolio improves throughout the months. I without a doubt have liking for your "Apologies Endless" layout and your "Phantom of the Opera" typography. I once again love the simplicity and spark they give off.

    I would give it a 3 out of 5.

    About Kinza: It's good to hear that people that are 13 or younger find a thing in the internet world. I was about 10 when I started graphic and web designing, I turned 14 on May 3rd, but enough of me. I wonder how you got Kinza as an alias. I think it's original and superb even Madeeha. I also do like the beginning of the school year, but hate when Summer vacation comes to an end. I am too from the Middle East, well I'm Armenian, but born and still reside in California. I find space truly interesting. When we learnt about it in science in eight grade I kept wondering and asking questions about it because of it being so interesting. Well I never seen "Phantom of the Opera" so I don't know what to say about that.

    I would give it a 5 out of 5.

    Past Layouts: Even though you only have your current layout on this page, I think you would have tons of great layouts if you make any other.

    I would give it a 5 out of 5.

    Ask & Answer: In my opinion, the ask and answer page is too messy. It's readable, but hard to find what you were reading if you glance back at it after looking away. It should be at least numbered, different colored by odds and evens or moved farther apart. I also recommend for you to have more noticeable and fun to look at input bars.

    I would give it a 2 out of 5.

    Etcetera

    Grammar: It's good to see that you have a sophisticated vocabulary at your age because some people even older don't know most of the words and phrases you include on your site. Your grammar, as far as I know, seems to be perfect from correct spelling and capitalization.

    I would give it a 5 out of 5.

    Conclusion: Even though your site is great the way it is, except for some coding detail, you should try and add some content. There's some room for improvement, but practice is all you need and little bit of learning. I think that later on you will be really talented in HTML/CSS and other coding if you just practice and take the time to learn them. It was a pleasure reviewing your site, hopefully you'll do the same :)

    Your overall score is a 4 out of 5.

    Using Safari on Mac | Report This?

    kinza's Response:

    Thanks so much for giving me an in-depth review ^^;
    I'm not sure what the problem is with my portfolio for you, but I'll definitely look into that x3
    I will be sure to add some more visitor-oriented content as soon as I find the time (: I'm too lazy to do it right now >8D
    Thanks again,
    Kinza

  4. [img: avatar]
    Cindy gave it ***-- on 27th Jul 2010 and said:

    Hey Kinza, I'm Cindy and I'll be reviewing your site. I use Chrome with a 1280x800 resolution on Vista. :)

    COMPOSITION: It's a clean layout, very easy on the eyes. I dig the overall look and feel, so I'll point out a couple details that could use some tweaking.

    - The aqua is a bit too bright, especially on those links against the white background. Even if you picked a slightly darker shade, the color would still pop out in your layout, which is the effect I think you were going for.

    - The hover effect on your links is hardly noticeable; it took a while for me to realize that the background of the link turned light grey. One suggestion would be to have the link turn a different color altogether. I know hover effects seem pretty minor, but it's easier for the user to distinguish the links.

    - Whenever I go back to your blog archives, your pagination reads as: "Next page » « Previous page". This would get confusing pretty quickly, since the order is counterintuitive.

    - The "SOLOST.NET" on your header image is pretty hard to read, because you have the thin white text competing against a bright aqua square.

    - I'm slighlty confused to why your headers are a few pixels off from the rest of your content. (Did you add extra padding?) The lack of alignment doesn't quite add up. :

    - I also find your bolded text unreadable (the uppercase Georgia). Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of Georgia (especially styled in small caps!), but that styling works much better in small doses, such as a heading or a navigation link. It's hard to read spaced-out 9pt Georgia (uppercase, no less) as actual text.

    - On your blog, the "Powered by Fanupdate 2.2.1" link looks out of place. It seems like something that would belong in either your footer or maybe a "credits" section, but right now, it just seems to blend in with the rest of your blog text.

    - The smiley images on your blog posts are broken.

    CONTENT: Portfolio: My main gripe is that you have to drag the images to the address bar in the Portfolio section. I spent a few good seconds frantically clicking the thumbnail images because I seriously thought my mouse wasn't working. Also, it's annoying to drag the images because I have to manually go back to the portfolio page and drag the image for every single work of yours that I want to view. I agree with Chien's suggestion of Lightbox; it's quite easy to use and works like a charm! This is also a link that you might want to look into. :)

    It'd be great if you added alt="" to your image tags. What if my browser was being extraordinarily slow and the thumbnail image didn't load? How would I know what to expect when clicking the thumbnail?

    One suggestion would be to elaborate more on your portfolio. What programs do you use? Maybe explain some of your designs? I love learning more about the backstory behind a piece of work, and I'm sure you've got visitors that would love to hear the same.

    About Kinza: Short but sweet, I like! :)

    On your email/twitter/last.fm/Neopets/etc., you put a colon after "e-mail" but you didn't add any to the rest of the fields, which looks inconsistent. Also, it would be mighty convenient if you had actually linked your email, Twitter, last.fm, Neopets referral, Tumblr, and Deviantart. It makes it much easier for those that want to check out your other sites!

    Past Layouts: I feel like this page would be more appropriate under your Portfolio? I mean, it's nice to have a page just for Era's layouts, but since you've only got one layout thus far, the page feels like a placeholder for the time being.

    The other sections look good, as far as I can tell!

    CODING: You've got a valid HTML 4.0 site (props), but I would really recommend coding with XHTML. HTML 4.0 is a bit outdated, and XHTML is semantically cleaner and organized. I'm not a fan of the unclosed tags or the non-self-closing tags.

    I'm milling through your code right now, and you've got this:

    div id="back"

    which should be taken out.

    Also, there's no need to specify a color and style of a border if it's 0 pixels wide.

    border : 0 solid #ffffff; (from your stylesheet)

    HTML 4.01 is a step, but I'm really not kidding when I say that you should look into XHTML! Yes, the standards are more rigorous but it's honestly a great way to improve and streamline your coding.

    CONCLUSION: You have a very cute site on your hands! Visually, it's a clean layout but there are couple tweaks that could be made. Content-wise, it's slightly lacking. I get that your site is fairly new, but think about ways you can develop your site's content and make it more memorable to the visitor. For example, I see from your Deviantart that you like to make illustrations of animals (which are completely adorable, by the way). That's something you could totally play up; it's something you're good at and something that could potentially be your signature. Your site doesn't necessarily have to be catered towards visitor content, but ultimately, people have short attention spans and you'll have to find a way to make your site catch somebody's eye. Good personal sites establish the owner's identity and personality. You've got a great start, but I'd love to see how you can further expand upon your site. :)

    Using Safari on Windows | Report This?

    kinza's Response:

    Thanks Cindy for giving me such a through review :-)
    D: I was worried about the blue! It looks fine on my computer, but I understand laptops adjust to the owner's preference, so it must seem pretty bright.
    Haha, XHTML seems so intimidating to me. I don't think I'll ever have the energy to close all my paragraph tags and change the endings to all my image tags. I suppose it's something to think about, but I think I'm too used to HTML 4.0 >3
    I would have used my little css-art for others, but it's not really probable because they aren't at all valid. /hangs head in shame

    Thanks again for the review!

    UPDATED 27 Jul 10:
    I changed the portfolio to Lightbox and made the images into thumbnails so that the visitor doesn't have to wait forever >3
    Thanks for the link!

  5. [img: avatar]
    Chien gave it ****- on 24th Jul 2010 and said:

    Reviewing at 1280x800 resolution in Firefox. Windows Vista.

    First Impression
    ====================
    Simple and clean, I'm starting to feel a good vibe from it :) The colours are nice and they're beginning to make me feel calm. :)

    Design & Coding
    ====================
    CSS & HTML Valid. B'awwww. Now I can't criticize :P Just kidding, I'm actually glad since I don't have to point out too many coding flaws. But! You lack a HEAD, BODY and HTML tag. This is a major no-no.

    <head></head> should have the title, meta, link and javascript tags within it.

    <body></body> should have everything else.

    while <html></html> should have both the head and body tags inside.

    Design wise, I don't have much issues aside from the huge space at the bottom. It feels a bit off. Decrease that space and I think it'll be just right.

    I think the copyright notice would look better if it occupied the whole footer, so it's display is similar to the header. Right now it makes me feel like tilting my head to the right because it's so heavy there.

    Content
    ====================
    I'll only point out things that appeal to me, or have issues with.. so bear with me (:

    Home: The pagination links at the bottom a bit annoying

    Next page &raquo; &laquo; Previous page

    They're too close to each other and pointing to each other. Maybe move swap places and align one to the left, one to the right? Or even swap places, separate them with a character, and align center?

    Portfolio: You shouldn't ask visitors to drag the images. Implement a hyperlink, or better yet, use LightBox, a javascript plugin.

    Your thumbnails are also a bit off since they're not in aspect ratio. Maybe a cropped version would be nicer? So perhaps a thumbnail version which is linked to the actual image would suffice.

    About: Ooh a Phantom of the Opera fan! Nice! I'm a fan too, and I hope to see the real play soon! Anyways, it would be nice to have proper links for your contact information. I'm the lazy type who doesn't like to drag / copy and paste to get somewhere :)

    Conclusion
    ====================
    A lot of room for improvement, but a nice start (: Good luck!

    Using Firefox on Windows | Report This?

    kinza's Response:

    Hi Chien!
    Thanks for the advice. I'll have to find the code for LightBox again if I can ever make myself look for it.
    Thanks for the help on the body/head/html tags. I've never understood where to place those, and you've been a big help with that ^^;

    Thanks for the review!

Write Your Own Review

Leave your feedback for Era below, and remember - the longer your review, the more points you receive. Don't forget to look at things like style/design, content, coding and originality as they will all help to improve the quality of your review.

You have to be logged in to write a review.