Review: Sophia @ Designing Amateur

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Site Name: Designing Amateur
Owner: Sophia
Reviewed by: Georgina
Reviewed on: 2nd July 2009

Previous reviews:

Designing Amateur

Smooches-x

Site Name

It’s still fairly long; I have to resort to my browser to remember most of it.

Coding and Validation

Your coding is valid.

Your CSS is valid.

I’m very pleased to see you’ve gone through and validated your coding. Even having a look at your coding you’ve cleaned it up and made it very neat and organised. Many of your other pages are valid too which is very impressive.

Browser Compatibility & Usability

Looking at your site at Browsershots.org, your layout is looking consistent in most browsers.

You’re sticking with a good small sized layout; no problems would be encountered viewing your website in smaller resolutions. I like that you have stuck to the compact layouts much like the one you had when I reviewed you before.

I’m really liking the snazzy navigation. It’s quite a unique style and adds a touch of interest to this layout. The font size is legible.

The header image is quite large in height; it really should be cut down.

Layout

The header image is what I first notice. It’s rather large and takes up most of my screen. I can understand why you would want to make it large to capture the design, but it should be cut down a bit.

The colours are very nice but they’re very pale and bright and hard to see. The background of the image is nice and subtle but you need to make your website name stand out more. The pink should be darker and less bright.

The black background isn’t really fitting with the layout. A grey shade, or a medium shade of pink, will stand out less and bit better with the layout. The black is very dark and too bold for the image.

My suggestions for the layout are just to create a smaller header, less pale and less bright, and utilise a background image or fitting background colour rather than black.

Content

Owner

Just a few errors on this page:
in October should be on October
1993 that should be 1993; that
choice, it should be choice; it
now a days should be nowadays
but at least should be but I can at least
loosing a tooth should be losing a tooth
used to write should be used to writing
trying not too should be trying not to
what’s the reason should be what the reason is.

Articles

“Not site related” would be better expressed as “Non-site related”.

On the top rules in web designing:
effects used should be effects you use
Make sure to use should be Be sure to use
propose should be purpose
How ever should be However
result, it’s should be result; it’s.

On the Adobe PhotoShop article:
adobe should be Adobe
many of us has should be many of us have
do that action should be take that action
cracked version should be cracked version.
for it’s product should be for its product.

On the Swim Chick fever article:
Swim Chick should be Swimchick
swim chick’s should be Swimchick’s
a live should be alive.
I believe you make a good point in this article to be original, simply by using a popular website as an example. It’s true that there are many popular websites out there but none are idolised as much as Swimchick.

On the Piczo article:
Weather should be Whether.

You could add more hosting websites to your hosting article. There are many out there such as RigRag.com and ParadeHosting.com.
desk space should be disk space.

In the first paragraph of your article on cheating:

Cheating has occurred in many venues such as; Cheating in sports, personal relationships or in the academic venue, in this article I’m going to talk about cheating in the Academic venue.

Could be expressed better as:

Cheating has occurred in many venues such as: sports, personal relationships or in the academic venue, which is what I will be discussing in this article.

There are few more errors on this page:
collages should be colleges.
This is a great unique article. I haven’t seen any articles written on this topic. It’s very impressive and you wrote this very well.

On the article about gossiping:
it’s should be It’s
became a habit should be has become a habit.

On the article about friends:
i should be I
real a friend now a days should be a real friend nowadays
some what should be somewhat
now a days days should be nowadays.

Resources

The brushes are very nice and the stamp ones are very unique. The flower ones look a bit pixelated but I’m sure with a change in size they will look better.

Colour schemes – pretty standard and simple; good to see some bright colours. There’s not much one can say about colour schemes.

The bulk of the wallpapers are nice; the butterflies and the simple ballerina ones are good. The others look quite fuzzy and strange like an optical illusion. I don’t know if this was intended but it doesn’t look very attractive.

The icons are quite nice and simple. I like how they have intricate detail in the background. They are well made.

Your nephew is very cute – love the photography. More would be excellent. I quite like the previews as well.

The blue textures are quite fuzzy and an eyesore like a few of the wallpapers. The others have a softer or at least smoother look, and look a lot nicer. It’s not just the colours but the fuzziness of edges and the “rougher” look.

Contests

An introduction into how this competition works would be better. I am unfamiliar with what criteria you are basing this on. Explaining what a reviewer is would be nice; I don’t even know what sort of reviewer you are after.

Writings

Coming soon. What a shame.

Tutorials

On the Swahili tutorials, use the brackets nicely without spaces between. For example, (text).

Website

On the affiliate page, weather should be whether. You also have Allie’s website typed incorrectly.

On the website history page:
not going too should be not going to.

Originality & Creativity

You’ve got a lot of original and creative graphics. You don’t have a large amount but what you have is fairly good.

You have made a great improvement since your very first review in which your website was quite generic and had a lot of unoriginal graphics.

Organisation & Errors

Well organised. The only errors I spotted were the grammatical and spelling errors.

Overall Comment

You’ve done a much better job and I’m pleased to see that you fixed up your coding and worked on your layout as well.

Your articles were very unique and covered interesting topics. Essentially this review was just to correct your mistakes. Your textures are impressive and your graphics are very good; some just need to be fixed a bit to be made more appealing.

I’d love to see more added to the website and different styles of textures and wallpapers. You have an individualistic style but you need to keep adding more and more. Also work on the writings section. There’s quite a bit to work on but you’ve made a great improvement.

Rating

(out of 5)