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Site Name: Paradise Cloud
Owner: Alex
Reviewed by: Georgina
Reviewed on: 7th August 2008
Site Name
Paradise Cloud – I like it. It’s easy to remember, something definitely original. I don’t like the ring of it though, how you put those two words together. My previous site name was ‘Beyond Paradise’ but I wasn’t too fond of the ‘paradise’ after a while.
Layout
Your header image is very pretty. I love the flow of the text and the musical notes. I couldn’t really see the dandelion head though, only its stalk. Perhaps you could’ve tried to lighten it. The green stands out a little too much.
The brushes you used are great. Though I think the scribble-type one over the dandelion is a little too harsh. It stands out quite a fair bit and makes the image look a little messy.
Your headers on your sidebar are alright, but again the green stands out too much, and I cannot see the dandelion. Your CSS is relatively good, but I think you should change the pink italics to match the layout.
I see you also have an image at the bottom of your layout. It’s a nice touch, but isn’t necessary. In fact I didn’t really notice it until I scrolled around! I’d been to your site previously when you first had this layout and I didn’t notice it. I think you should make this a little smaller, or even just put the copyright as text. You have already mentioned that you got the image from Getty on your sidebar, I don’t see a need to repeat that.
As for your background, it works well, but it’s a little too solid for the layout. The colour is fine but I thin you could have used a slightly rough textured background that looked like parchment, or something similar.
As a little note, I like the idea of the ‘back to top’ link. Maybe you could put a ‘back’ link too?
Content
VISITOR:
You appear to have a lot in this section. The one I like the most would probably be your Gibberish page. I didn’t know that that’s how you speak it! Heh heh.
Your graphics to begin with. You don’t have many blogs, and I think that people don’t use these anymore so maybe you could remove them or offer them as layout images. Your adoptables are all good. They aren’t excellent, but I can see that you’ve improved and have obviously worked hard on them. Your scribbles are okay, I think you could have outlined some of them more with the pencil tool because they look a little rough, for example the rainbow.
The rest of your graphics are okay, I don’t really like your CGs. The ballerina one looks good, but the rest are a little too basic and not as good quality. You also need more layout images. Perhaps you could put them into the scribbles page and CG page as there are only two, and mention that visitors can use them on layouts.
I think your avatars are pretty good. However your scribbling style can improve (I know, I am pretty crap at it myself, and pixelling I’m horrid at). Since you offer a fair lot of these on your site you really could improve them. Your layout is lovely, and I’ve seen a few of your previous ones. I’m sure you worked hard on them (your current one took 7 hours, you say!) so perhaps make something similar for your visitor content, or spend a little more time on them.
AHAHAAA I love your ice creamie maker. The graphic style for this (I’m not too sure, would it just be a CG..?) is good. I don’t see many makers for anything around nowadays. (Except dolls but I’m not fond of those.)
Your fun/reads are good, again mentioning the gibberish one, and ‘things girls don’t realise’. I like how you’ve added recommended reading. Your tutorials in addition are wonderful, they’re simply laid out, if not to mention colourful, and they’re easy to understand.
OWNER:
Not much here but that’s okay. You probably don’t need a main link under navigation as it’s just one page, and you’ve got your little info on the sidebar.
WEBSITE:
Haha, as we all do, start on Neopets. Same here! It’s interesting that you had the name for a while and still liked it. It took me a year or two to get settled on mine =P.
All the stuff here is good. Your past layouts are all wonderful and I love seeing how they vary and how you try different styles.
Originality
You’ve got great stuff here. I couldn’t complain. Your graphics are clearly yours. Your adoptables too (I’m sick of seeing characters from Sanrio and whatnot). You’ve got a lot of original content too.
Errors
No errors, really! As a note you could use icons to indicate new and updated pages, but of course it’s probably easier to use a text symbol =)
