Forums Archive -> VectorStar News

New web look... 2001-12-03 10:52:31
by lmbedore
If you have any comments on the new look for vectorstar.net, please comment here. I'd like to see what people think of the navigation box in the top-right corner in particular.



Re: New web look... 2001-12-03 16:54:51
by geek
Great, i love the new look
Re: New web look... 2001-12-03 18:24:35
by stale
Seems a little redundant to me there haus.
Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 02:35:11
by jonsnews
A fine fine touch up on a allready excellant and simplistic design.. Bravo..
Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 12:37:55
by josh
being a web developer (tootin my own horn there, and no comments there Frank!)...anyway, I like the new design Laird, it's pretty badass, and since I did teach you your HTML skills (hehe), I'm way proud, no doubt dawg. But... your VectorStar networks logo looks like crap yo! I can see rough edges and junk... weakness all over that! Want me to Photoshop you a new one? other then that... why don't we add some cloud imagery on the site? you know... like copy/cut/paste some Windows95 backgrounds? Just give that a thought!
Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 17:11:17
by lmbedore
That logo was the work of about 6 hours worth of Photoshop compromises... Here are the factors that go into the logo and why it's a bit rough:
  • Must be a transparent-mask image (gif or png)
  • since PNG transparency doesn't work right in IE (any version) or netscape 4.x, gif is used
  • gif format only allows up to 256 colors. it has very limited transparency mask support.
  • It's very, very easy to tweak a transparent-mask image to look right on black OR white (exclusively), but not both.
  • as a compromise, I used a 50% grey dither on the edges in order to create an edge that looked as good as possible on both black AND white backgrounds.
  • I also want to maintain color-depth compatibility with 256-color clients. The VAST majority of VectorStar's site is designed for 256-colors.
proper image design is a real nightmare. Sure, I could table-to-all-hell the top frame up there, doing static, non-transparent image blocks that are forced to a zero-border HTML and table, but that's a browser-compatibility nightmare.

implementing the white bar across the top must be done with a uniform tag methodology. For example, I have implemented it as a table background image. Browsers that don't support table backgrounds won't lose much, though the two static links in the top-right might not be readable for them. Had I implemented the horizontal white fade-bar as a table BG, and then made a static image with the slanted white fade-bar and the logo superimposed on top of that, it would be done with an IMG tag. Then, if a browser didn't support table background images, they'd have this gawd-awful looking white corner with no matching bar going across the rest of the screen. It'd look like crap. Add to that the other problems (the logo+angled fadebar image would be substantially wider - about 80 pixels wider) and it really would make that implmentation idea suck.

Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 18:28:38
by lmbedore
Oh yeah, frank.. it is a bit redundant. The problem was that the pulldown-menu and go button looked way too cool to omit from the design, and without them there, the design wastes too much space. I was trying to use it as a quick-reference to some of our most-desired but heavily-buried docs. Another possibility is that it will eventually replace the left menu entirely.
Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 18:35:42
by stale
Yeah, I agree. The button is absolutely necessary to make the stuff at the top look cool. I think the absolute black fading to absolute white is a little hard on the eyes though. I know I'm being my usual critical self, but you think about trying it with less drastic colors?
Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 18:36:14
by stale
Oh, and Josh... you know I love yah baby.
Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 18:58:53
by Josh
Frank, watch this, I'm gonna agree with you! The white to black fade going down is super drastic, I couldn't agree more. It also kinda messes with the mostly black color scheme I worshipped so much. How about using that darker purple color to fade to black, ... a sweet gradient would look nice!
Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 20:09:28
by lmbedore
That white bar might be dimmed to another shade of gray at some point, who knows... but you'll see *why* that bar is white in a month or so. oooooooooh yeah!
Re: New web look... 2001-12-04 23:05:09
by forge
and here i thought you were just racist ;)~
Re: New web look... 2001-12-05 05:50:38
by caridwen
i have this sudden urge to call all of you, excluding forge of course, "Boothster".
that is all.
Re: New web look... 2002-01-03 16:45:46
by superfly
If you want any help with the graphics i'll be happy to give you a hand. like the logo for instance.. Anyway have a good one