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Site Name: Urban Conspiracy
Owner: Nnie
Reviewed by: Georgina
Reviewed on: 17th March 2009
- Previous reviews:
- Brilliant Mistakes
Site Name
Hi Nnie! I reviewed your site before, but now I’m reviewing your domain. Congratulations on getting one – I love the name! Quite unique.
I’m actually quite excited to see what your site is like now.
Coding and Validation
Your coding is valid XHTML 1.0 Transitional. It’s great to see that from your previous review, you’ve managed to convert to XHTML! Well done!
Your CSS is valid.
An excellent job Nnie! Can’t wait to delve into your site!
Browser Compatibility & Usability
Looking in Browsershots.org, your layout looks the same in most browsers.
The layout’s centered; excellent. I like the navigation but I suggest making the font size as big as your main font.
I’d prefer if the main text was just a bit bigger – but I’m not too picky on that.
Layout
Wow, I really love the textured look of the header image! The choice of reds, yellows and oranges for the graphic are a great choice. I like the vector-style image of the girl that stands as the subject of the image.
The right side of the image fades out, but the bottom doesn’t. The bottom is simply cut off on a straight line. It would look nicer if it faded a bit.
While I like the right side of the image fading out, I don’t like the big white gap on the right. I think you could move the sidebar up to fill that gap. It’s rarely done (like on my current layout) and you can do that by cropping the image and making it as the top part of your content div.
Alternatively you can add a little bit more to the graphic on that side – just anything that removes that white gap.
I love the textured black background! It really brings out the bright colours. But – the white isn’t so great – it contrasts too much with the black. Having a very, very light tinge of orange as the content background would look great. The colour #FFF5F0 would make a really nice background for your text and content.
In fact, I’ve done an image mockup just for you to see and have a think about it.
Content
In your sidebar, you don’t need “was opened” – just “opened”.
Owner
The text on this page changes to a different font style. I don’t know if it’s intended but it doesn’t look as good as the font on your blog.
Last time I didn’t pay huge attention to your grammar mistakes because I felt as if I would be offending you as English isn’t your mother tongue. However you will be reviewed by others and I thought it best to correct your mistakes so you understand, and it should help you in improving your English. I helped a friend of mine in this way.
riot should be can create a riot
How comes should be How can
make-ups should be make-up
like to should be like
musics should be music
playing internet should be and playing on the internet
it could spend should be it could take
along the movie should be during the movie
I disposed to “against the stream” should be I dislike “mainstream”
altitude should be heights (it’s more sensical)
have never studied should be never study
homeworks are pain in ass should be homework are a pain in the ass
The text you’ve written for the image links are a little confusing. Just having ‘photo 1′ and ‘photo 2′ would be easier to understand.
Visitor
I’m not sure if these resources are the same as from your old site, but I shall look through them again.
I love the brushes. I really like how you’ve included instructions on how to install them. These brushes are of good quality, and very unique.
I’d prefer if the icon textures were all shown rather than being in a zip file. Nevertheless, they are great.
The light stocks are excellent – high quality and very good. I am really enjoying looking through your resources; I might use some!
I absolutely love the scans and stocks! Did you make the first set yourself? I recognise the Indonesian! The sky stocks – I think I recognise from your old site. They are small but are good. In future you should make bigger ones which are easier to work with.
The last three scratch textures are broken images – not found on Photobucket.
The first desktop wallpaper of 800×600 pixels is a dead Photobucket image. You’ve put the link with an extra quote.
The second wallpaper is simple. I like the first one better, but both are of good quality and it’s great you offer them in different sizes.
Tutorials
I notice you’ve changed the navigation here from that drop-down menu type to something much simpler. This is better – stick with this!
I love how you have previews for the tutorials. If I don’t comment about a tutorial, it means it is fine.
The image for the glowing lines tutorial is too big! It is bigger than your content div. It has your old site URL on it so I think while resizing, you could also update the URL.
I love the colour bars tutorial! It makes everything seem so simple, and it’s a unique idea – the first time I’ve seen something like this.
However the title on this page says “glowing lines” instead.
The grunge layout tutorial is titled “gray texture” – that needs to be fixed. The image at the top of the page is also not the same as the end result.
At the top of this page you say to click the number of the step for a screenshot, but that doesn’t happen here.
On your rollover tutorial:
your image should be the image
rastersize should be rasterize
automatically loaded should be automatically load
with clicking should be by clicking
It was smart to link the step number to the screenshot, but I personally prefer to see it all. It’s okay though.
On your color texture tutorial:
color black should be color to black
similar like should be similar to.
On your gray texture tutorial, half of your steps are underlined, possibly because you forgot to end an HTML tag.
On your grunge texture tutorial, you’ve forgotten to space out some of your steps.
Your industrial brush tutorial is rather simple. Again, the title reads ‘gray texture’. I don’t really like this tutorial. The result is rather ordinary.
Your entire steps 7 and 8 are links because you probably forgot to end a tag.
in new document should be in a new document.
On your bubble text tutorial, you’ve written ‘Click Click here’. There’s no need for the repetition.
On all your tutorials, I make this should be I made this.
Also, This tutorial is translatable into should be This tutorial works in.
Site
Wow, you have such a short history!
in a long should be on a long
got hosted should be became hosted
a how should be and how
would search should be should search
buy me domain should be buy me a domain.
The link to your credits page is in the sidebar, but you should also put a link on the site page too. When you credit DeviantArt, try and credit the actual user at DeviantArt.
Possibly link to your affiliates page too.
I won’t review your network sites as they are separate, but portofolio should actually be spelt portfolio.
Originality & Creativity
Everything is so original and creative. I love the graphics you make and the tutorials really support that.
A creative layout; creative graphics – I have no complaints here.
Organisation & Errors
Everything was very well organised. The only errors I spotted were a few broken images and grammatical errors. I hope that by correcting your mistakes, I have helped you better your English a little bit. =)
Overall Comment
Well Nnie, I really enjoyed reviewing your site. I love your work – your graphics are just of excellent quality and really inspire me. You have an individual style which I really like.
You have excellent tutorials on concepts that are quite unique. I would really suggest adding more graphics-related tutorials. I’d love to see how you make all your wonderful graphics.
There weren’t many errors apart from the ones I pointed out. Don’t forget that the homepage (your blog) has a different font to your other pages – try to make sure it is the same.
Do try and tone down the layout’s contrast a bit, by using the peachy colour I suggested. It looks so much better. I think your layouts will continue to improve and amaze. It is only a small suggestion, but have you considered creating layouts for visitors?
I don’t really have many suggestions. You’ve got a wonderful site that doesn’t need much improvement. 
