Two years ago today I published the first post on this blog, a short discussion on making a good first impression (Something I’d obviously been thinking a fair bit about for starting my first blog!)
Now 2 years, 7000 subscribers, 188 posts, and 5 and a half thousand comments later, here we are. This is design number 3, and I’d love to hear what you think!
I owe a big thank you to everyone who has left a comment here, emailed me, subscribed or interacted with the site in anyway. It’s been a great 2 years, and I’m looking forward to many more!
We have a competition sponsored by Bizcard at the end of the post where we’re giving away 2500 business cards.
The New Design
I’d love to hear what you think, so open up the site if you’re in an RSS reader and let us know how it’s looking.
I had a few main goals with this redesign:
- Brighter, bolder design – I loved the old design, but the colors were a little muted and I was getting a little bored with it. It was time for a change, to a much more exciting look.
- Easier to scan posts – I’ve always used bold in my posts to help make them easy to scan over, but the subheadings on the old design did not stand out as much as they could have. The new design should solve that problem nicely.
- Social media links – With the Facebook page we set up a few weeks ago and the growing Twitter profile, I want to find as many of you on other networks as possible.
- Social bookmarking options as well – There are now icons at the end of the posts to make sharing our posts easier (And a big thanks to Function for the awesome icons!)
Some Fun Sides to the Design
There were a lot of fun touches added to the design that weren’t essential, but I definitely hope have helped a lot.
- Text replacement in headers allows me to use a different font to normal there. I’ll write up a post on this soon!
- CSS 3 has been used in different places to improve the look for those on modern browsers without the need for loading extra images or JavaScript, e.g. Compare the post headings on IE v.s. Firefox’s drop shadows and rounded edges.
- The popular posts list in the sidebar is dimmed out by default. But when you mouse over it, it becomes brighter and easier to read. It’s a simple effect with CSS, but helps to cut down on the amount of clutter on the screen when you aren’t looking at those links (Original idea came from an older version of PlainBeta)
- CSS rollover effects. I’ve used quite a lot of rollover effects on the design. My favorite has to be on the logo link though.
- Animations in Safari. I can’t show this in a screenshot, but if you’re using Safari 4 then there are some nice animations on CSS effects. I like the “Services, Subscribe, Twitter etc.” link in the sidebar in particular!
The New Blogroll – The Sites I Read!
We also have a blogroll in the sidebar now, filled with my favorite design sites. They’re all well worth checking out!
- Arbenting – Angie Bowen recently become an author here as well, but her own blog is full of great articles on all sorts of design and creativity.
- CSS Globe – Aside from having one of the nicest clean designs around, CSS Globe writes great articles on a lot more than just CSS. They also wrote the great JQuery plugin we’re using for the tooltips.
- David Airey – David Airey’s blog is a great site for general design and blogging advice. Also well worth joining is his other site, Logo Design Love, which has a wealth of info for logo designers (His case studies are great!).
- Fudge Graphics – Great Photoshop tutorials and freebies.
- Fuel Your Creativity – Part of the Fuel network, FYC is a great place for articles on all forms of design.
- iDesign Studios – Selanie has some top tips for productivity and working as a freelancer, but also writes on blogging and design of course.
- Inspired Mag – Catalin writes on a wide variety of topics, including our old favorite; WordPress.
- Just Creative Design – Jacob Cass’ blog is a great site for graphic designers (Like David, his case studies of his work are some of my favorite posts)
- Milo – Milo is a great WordPress coder who has shared a lot of codes with us here at Pro Blog Design. She also has one of the more unique web design styles!
- Naldz Graphics – Naldz Graphics have some fantastic Photoshop tutorials that are well worth working through!
- Noupe – Noura’s site features some of the biggest and best resource lists on the web, as well as writing its own top articles on WordPress and design.
- Pelfusion – Awesome posts on every aspect of running and promoting a website.
- Smashing Magazine – You’re probably already aware of Smashing, but just in case; this massive site is one of the best sources of design tutorials and inspiration on the web.
- Spoon Graphics – Top design Chris Spooner blogs here with some awesome tutorials and showcases of his work.
- Styletime – Written by social media guru Roger Byrne, Styletime is his outlet for design tips and tricks.
- Vandelay Design – Steven Snell’s site covers a lot of the same topics as this one, but the real shining star of Vandelay Design is the awesome design inspiration posts.
- Web Designer Depot – In less than a year, Web Designer Depot has taken the web design niche by storm. Check out the articles and you’ll soon see why.
- Webmaster Source – Matt Harzewski writes on just about every topics a webmaster would need to know. In particular, he always has a great commentary on current events and hot topics in the web industry.
- WP Recipes – Jean-Baptiste Jung publishes short WordPress codes here for doing just about anything. No fluff, just straight to the point!
Competition – Win 2500 Business Cards
Bizcard are giving away 2500 business cards to 3 winners on this site (1000 each to the first 2 winners, 500 to the 3rd).
To enter, all you have to do is leave a comment here telling us what you think of the new design!
I’ll select the winners this day next week. Can’t wait to hear everyone’s thoughts!
And if there is any part of this redesign that you’d like to hear more about or an article explaining how to do the same with your site, just let me know.
Update: The winners have been chosen; Timo Zimmerman, Carla Rose, and David Millar. Congrats!
Custom Search
Emre (1 comments)5 August 09
Very nice design. But I didn’t like menu hover explanations.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for the reply. I don’t think you’re alone in disliking those hovers! Going to go through everyone’s comments properly now, but I think I’ll be deleting those hovers at the very least!
Mark McWilliams (1 comments)5 August 09
I LOVE this design over your older one, it’s much more refreshing, and still easy on the eyes! The colours go well together, and the layout is straight forward!
Are you planning on releasing the older theme as a freebie, or are you still thinking about it? While I prefer this design, the other was still unique in it’s own right!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Really glad you like it Mark! The colors were the main thing for me, I just wanted a livelier look
I think I will release the old theme for free, yep! I said the same thing about my first theme though and still haven’t managed that. They both need a bit of work in the coding first just to tidy them up a little for public use (They make sense to me, but I think they’d just give anyone else a headache at times! xD )
But yep, no point letting them go to waste I guess
David Airey (55 comments)5 August 09
Hey Michael,
Very well pieced together, with touches I couldn’t achieve on my own, but I’m gonna be the bad guy who says I liked your previous design more. I feel the older design looked a touch more professional.
But hey, you’re the one who’s looking at the design day-in, day-out, so it’s much more important that you’re happier than me. And we’re creatures of comfort, so maybe it’s just the change in general that prompted my comment.
Feel free to remove me from your blogroll now.
(Thanks, by the way!)
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
No problem David! Thanks for the comment, I do want honest replies
I think you’re right to be honest. If the 2 were sitting next to each other, I’d say that the older one felt more professional as well.
The overall aim of the site is finding new clients for the business, so I guess the real test is to wait and see if the less professional look affects that. If so, then I’ll be knocking on your door looking for tips to make this look more professional again! xD
Sumesh (39 comments)5 August 09
Good redesign, Michael. I liked a lot of the new elements – the tooltips, the logo, sidebar links (contact/tweet etc.), comment form, comment listing (especially the stacking of comment author div over gravatar), h3/h4 styling in post, social media links in header, the box after the post etc.
Now, to open a can of worms (let me state, I use Firefox on Mac OS X, although I don’t think it causes any of these):
I think the use of text-shadow etc. is bad – it looks poor on Firefox.
The normal state on Blog and Design services link in header looks good, but the hover state looks like a throwback to the pre-2005 era of cheap looking plasticky gradient.
Sidebar post list looks too muted and tucked under, I wonder how many actually notice it.
Blogroll dropdown lacks vertical padding on non-hover state.
Google branding under the search box looks bad – perhaps a better quality image (or better yet, remove it completely?)
Green background+black text color on post headings on home looks poor.
Hope you’ll take this as friendly, constructive criticism. Like I said, I liked a lot of the elements (many of them were new ones to me), just that a few others reduce the joy.
Sumesh (39 comments)5 August 09
I hate to be the spelling/grammar nazi, but anything to make PBD’s theme perfect
a typo in the comment field, it should be *Your reply will be* after clicking on a ‘Reply’ link.
Sumesh (39 comments)5 August 09
And I just noticed that you’re using sprites, that’s awesome, Michael! I sometimes wonder why so few smaller sites use sprites.
PS: And where’s the ‘edit comment’ plugin+link? I could have avoided asking requesting you to merge these three comments, oh well.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for the detailed reply Sumesh, really appreciate it!
Text shadows – I’m going to look into this. A few other people have mentioned it further down. I like personally because the subheadings feel a little fragile on their own. But maybe that just means I need to find another solution
Blog and Design Rollovers – You could well be right about this (And there’s a little bug in the bottom right corner of the Design one when you rollover that is there because I want to save loading as few images as possible). Any ideas on an effect you think would be better?
The sidebar popular posts section is muted on purpose though. And I would remove the Google image if I could, but I think it’s part of their TOS (Guess I’ll go and read that to make sure, I was just assuming it was!)
Thanks for spotting that typo though, fixing that now!
And I removed the Edit Comments plugin because it adds a few extra files to be downloaded, and is used surprisingly infrequently. I can’t remember offhand but it had either been used 120 times or 160 times over the life of this blog, and a lot of those times were me using it for mod changes.
I think that with threaded comments, it becomes a little irrelevant because when someone needs to make a change, they’ll just do what you’ve done and add another comment.
I think I’ll write up a post with more on my logic there later, but it was purposefully done and I want to see how it goes
kevin (19 comments)5 August 09
pretty cool, like the blue, altough it’s definitely not my fav colour. The tooltips are cool but way too much used! i think it should be much smaller or just used when really needed. Looks like you just found a new toy and used it everywhere.
Also why there is twice the huge twitter/rss icons on each page ? Really that important ?
Hope am not too hard, but as a webdesign i’d prefer objectives comments rather than “hooo it’s beautifuuuull…..”.
No worries, still like the content
kevin (19 comments)5 August 09
Ho yeah and texts shadows, really not fan, gets the fonts a bit dirty.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for the reply Kevin!
The Twitter and RSS icons are definitely big, but I’ve kept them quite far apart and they are the main things that I want a reader to do if they like the content.
The one in the header is quite out of the way, and the sidebar one shouldn’t be too attention grabbing so I hope neither of them takes away from the post.
I think you have a point about the tooltips and text shadows though. Definitely going to have to rethink them!
JD Hartley (5 comments)5 August 09
Michael,
The site looks absolutely amazing. The rounded corners look great and add the diversity between the squareness of a browser to the the site.
The hover-color change in the sidebar best-of widget is sweet as well–it totally keeps from distracting people with slight ADD problems (is that a squirrel?!) and keeps the articles (which are always great) flowing in the way they were intending too.
Another huge plus is the ease of navigation. The tag navbar looks slick, the social media bar at the top is super convenient and the buttons in the sidebar are fun to mouse over (ADD? haha).
Oh, and I love your drop down blog roll.
Congratulations on the two years–hope you extend it out even farther.
-JD
JD Hartley (5 comments)5 August 09
A few more things it seems I missed:
The link to the comment ID is broken (the link on the date after the name) it is just “#” instead of like “#comment-1231″ or something. The link to the comments section at the top of the page also should just be “#comments” instead of the enter permalink.
I would move the tooltips under the mouse–it isn’t working too well on the right side on my netbook.
Congratulations again,
-JD
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for the in-depth comment there JD!
Really glad you like the new look (I love the sidebar thing as well, definitely a post on that coming soon
)
lmao – Sorry the buttons wrecked the ADD benefits though!
Thanks for spotting the comment link error though and the #comments link improvement. Made both the changes now, thanks!
Richard Pham (1 comments)5 August 09
First off, congratulations for the 2nd year anniversary of the site.
I really like the new design over the previous one. The colours are much brighter and refreshing. The navigation bar is clearer and stands out more. All the subtle details make it more enjoyable.
Congrats!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for that Richard. Great to hear that you like it. I’m hoping the new nav bar will make getting around the site a lot easier as well
Ben (18 comments)5 August 09
Hey Michael – I don’t like the massive tooltips, they cover up the text I am trying to read, but everything else looks really nice – great job!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for dropping in Ben! I agree on those tool tips. They were a last minute thing and evidently just a bad mistake
Dmitry Chebakov (2 comments)5 August 09
Oh, gratz with re-design! I loved previous version, need more time to get used to the new one..
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Hey Dmitry – Yep, it can take a while to get used to a change. You’ll have to come back after that while though and let me know if it was worth getting used to!
Timo Zimmermann (8 comments)5 August 09
The new design looks great.
There are only some small things I don’t like. The text fields for name, mail, url and message should have a border or contrast should be higher. On my notebook display I don’t see a big difference between the fields and the background.
The animations on the sidebar are really cool. But why did you use the animation? I see no point. If you would have added some additional informations it would make sense but in the current state it is just “playing with new css3 stuff”.
Also if I hover a element I don’t see what I hovered since the title is a bit too big for my taste.
Ignoring those two points the new design rocks.
Just a little question: do you care about IE compatibility or just go with “screw those old and broken browsers”
Is CSS3 ready to be used in production with every possible feature or should a designer still play year 2000 when most designers just didn’t use every available feature because they cared about IE users?
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for the reply Timo. I’ll definitely look into those input fields more, I don’t want to be doing anything that will harm usability.
The animations were just for fun to be honest. There really wasn’t much to them other than the fact I think they look kind of cool (That’s why I haven’t bothered using JQuery or anything like that to try and replicate the effect in other browsers).
I think I’ll look at them again in a week or two when the novelty is gone. If they’re looking a little pointless then, then I’ll just remove them.
As for your question – I think it’s a mixture of both. The way I work is to build the very best site that you can in the most modern browser. Then as you step back into older browsers, it doesn’t matter if they don’t have all of the nicest effects. Just disable the ones that don’t work for them and make sure they’re left with a site that still works
That’s what I’ve done here. This site works fine in IE6, it’s just not as nice as it is in Firefox 3.5.
webbografico (1 comments)5 August 09
Very nice and clear design. I love the CSS3 transparent implementation and the animations (for onlysafarydriven websurfers)
great job!!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for the comment, glad to hear you like them too
Geek in Heels (1 comments)5 August 09
I like the new color scheme and the utilization of CSS3 to make the site look more modern (damn IE!). The new design is also a bit more user-friendly and easier to navigate. However, I have to say that I think the old design looked a bit more professional. But if you’re happy with it and you keep rolling out great posts, I have no problem whatsoever!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for your reply!
I think you could well be right about the old site looking more professional. The question I’m stuck with now is “Would the site be better off looking more professional?”
I think the only way I can answer that is to just wait and see how it affects my design services and user participation
Chad Mueller (1 comments)5 August 09
The site looks really good.. my only complaint is the font you chose for the post titles.. I think it doesn’t fit well with the new site at all, as well as I don’t like the font at all… it looks very unprofessional.
Other then that.. I love the sidebar.. looks great.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
I’m not so mad on it either Chad. In Photoshop, I was using the same font I have used in the logo and sidebar sections, but when it came to implementing it, the script didn’t support CSS word-spacing and that font *really* needs word spacing.
I think I’ll have to try another way of implementing the custom fonts, or find another font
Jeremy (6 comments)5 August 09
Fantastic job on the new design. I usually read through my RSS reader, but I might have to start visiting the site more often now. I love all of the mouseover effects.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks Jeremy, that’s great to hear!
Keith W. (1 comments)5 August 09
Great looking site! I love the mouse overs on the links at the top of the page. Too often pages have links and it’s easy to assume where they will lead you but to get a quick summary makes it even easier to know what you’re clicking.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks Keith! I agree – it only takes a minute to add in those descriptions and they can be really helpful
Niche Store Journey (3 comments)5 August 09
Hey there Michael! Great work on the redesign. Blue is my favorite color, so I really enjoy the color scheme. I think that lots of the added plugins and widgets you’ve put in really make a positive impact as well.
You’ve had a crazy successful 2 years! Remember when we both started out with 0 posts and connected with each other? Well you have surprised the heck out of me since then. I hope that with 2 more years I can replicate even half of your success!
All the best my friend,
Tyler
The Niche Store Journey
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Hey Tyler! How are you doing?
Thanks for the comment, that was great to read! I’ll never forget those days. It’s a lot of hard work, but it all pays off in the end!
Samantha Armacost (2 comments)5 August 09
I am quite keen on the new bold look. It gives a much more inviting vibe. However, the mouse overs on the social elements are giving me horizontal-scroll-bar-itus.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks Samantha, I’m glad you like the bolder look too! I hadn’t realized the mouseovers where doing that though, thanks for pointing it out! Definitely going to have to do something about them
adis (9 comments)5 August 09
I think it’s cool theme. Except i don’t like blogroll with dropdown style.
adis (9 comments)5 August 09
And do you say this blog do follow? I read the source code and there is rel=’external nofollow’
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks Adis! Sorry about that, in setting up the new design I forgot to add the new plugin! It’s on now! Need to have made 2 comments to get it removed though, not sure if that will work on old comments
Joffrey (1 comments)5 August 09
Great redesign, very clean!
Congrats.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks Joffrey!
Joseph (1 comments)5 August 09
The 125 x 125 ads aren’t clickable in Firefox –
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for letting me know about that Joseph, that was the very first thing I fixed this morning! Advertisers definitely would NOT have been happy! xD
John (Human3rror) (9 comments)5 August 09
brilliant.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Hahaha, nice and to the point! Definitely made me smile!
Andrea_R (20 comments)5 August 09
I like it, it’s much brighter. Also not a fan of the tooltips. Otherwise, good job.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks Andrea! I’m definitely going to get rid of those by the looks of it, too many people disliking them! (They really do get in the way of the content
)
kevin (19 comments)5 August 09
yeah same as joseph, ads dont click with firefox (3.5.2).
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for letting me know about that Kevin. That was a pretty urgent fix, can’t believe I missed it!
steindani (1 comments)5 August 09
I like the new, clear design, but I hate these explanations. And the shadow of the headers are annoying.
You use rounded corners everywhere, but the comment boxes. I don’t really like rounded corners, they don’t look good.
The gradient of the background makes the text more readable, but it makes it “boring” too. And where are the strips? They look good in the header. Repeat them below too (only a bit faded)!
Perhaps the header is too big, half of my screen is filled.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for the reply Steindani!
I wanted a mix of rounded and straight, instead of all one or the other. The one place that I think I might need to get rid of the rounded edges is on the subheadings. Not sure about those
Thanks for your comments on the background. I’ll have a look into it, but the issue then becomes the page load time with the larger images
gNcWebmaster (1 comments)5 August 09
nice design but i don’t like this menu style… hover…
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Going to get rid of those I think, too many people disliking them!
TeMc (2 comments)5 August 09
I really like the website overall.
Using CSS3 and Safari 4 animations is a nice reward for those who choose to use a better browser (where Firefox or Safari).
Also the comment section and the post headings and footers (Font replacement post title, comment author as label a bit over the avatar, about the author-section etc.)
A few points though I didn’t like:
* The tooltips come directly where the mouse is to the middle right of that. It would be a lot better of the tooptip would not appear to the middle right but the bottom right, and also a little margin or distance would improve.
* The tooltips cover the button/title ! It’s very annoying when hovering the top menu that the tooltips are covering the rest of the navigation. So not only horizontal but also vertical distance would help
* There’s no point three, I just love this new design, really !
–
My 2c,
TeMc
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for your comment, that was really nice to read
I think you’re completely right about those tooltips. I might try and salvage them with a much less obtrusive design, but otherwise, I’ll just remove that script altogether.
Michael SteelWolf (4 comments)5 August 09
Overall I think it’s excellent, but I really can’t stand the hovers. I feel like that’s very five years ago and gets in the way, especially since they’re used in contexts that are, in my opinion, already obvious. “Click to read more” doesn’t need any further explanation!
Michael SteelWolf (4 comments)5 August 09
To add to that, I’m very impressed with the rollover effects and the way you’ve made exploring the site both practical and interactive. There are certainly some techniques you’ve used in this design that have inspired me to explore further in my own stuff. The logo rollover is definitely my favorite.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks Michael! I’m glad to hear you like the rollovers. I think I just went over the top with those tool tips. They were a last minute change and clearly not a well thought out decision
You definitely have a point about those “Click To Read More” links. When the tooltip is small, I think its harmless. But with these big ones, its just unnecessary.
Jay S. Fleischman (1 comments)5 August 09
Excellent new design; I really like the smooth lines and modern look. That having been said, I subscribe via RSS and seldom have a reason to visit the site directly because I’m hooked on the content. Keep on keepin’ on!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for dropping in to check it out today at least Jay! So long as you keep enjoying the content, there’ll be plenty more of it coming
Si (1 comments)5 August 09
I really like the new design. Well laid out and easy to read. The strong colour scheme also works well and feels cohesive. There are a couple of things though.
The first is the search box, which seems like it’s been a bit of an afterthought, and is hidden away down the side bar. A lot of users tend to head straight for it, and it’s a bit difficult to find at the moment.
The other thing, and I’m afraid this is major, is the tool tips. I really can’t stand them. On my relatively small screen, the ones on the sidebar cause the horizontal scroll bar to appear, pushing everything around the screen, and just in general, they feel a bit gimmicky and unprofessional. And in some cases, they actually hinder my ability to read the links, as they cover the text of the link while simultaneously pushing the tooltip off the side of the screen, making it unreadable.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for your reply Si. I agree completely on those tooltips now. A lot of people have mentioned them and you’re all right about them. They’re definitely going to go.
About the search box – I think I’m a little against blog search boxes because I know the built-in WordPress search is awful. I suppose with a Google search though, it’s more worthwhile. Might have to highlight it a little better
Brandon Cox (3 comments)5 August 09
Whoa! Nice! Problem is, I just went through all the work of posting a screenshot of your previous awesome design two days ago – now I’ve got to redo it. But it’s worth it. Nice job, love your blog!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
lol – Sorry about that Brandon! Glad to hear you like the new look though, your own sites look awesome
Hussain M Elius (3 comments)6 August 09
I like it. It’s clean. But the explanations are pretty unnecessary and a bit annoying, imho.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Sorry about them Hussain, definitely going to take them off. A lot of people have mentioned them being poor!
Deantastic (1 comments)6 August 09
I love the new design. The colors are much better, IMO. I also like how you’ve switched to sans serif on your header image. Not a big fan of the tooltips on the menu bar though.
Of course the best part of this blog is always the content. Keep it up, Michael. Congratulations on Pro Blog Design’s second birthday!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for that Dean! lol – Glad to hear the content is up to par with the design too
Those tooltips will definitely be gettng removed now!
pablopabla (50 comments)6 August 09
Hi Michael!
Happy to see another milestone on this blog!
From a non-techie guy, this is what I have to say:-
What I like
- The logo and its rollover effect.
- Social bookmarking options at end of post (nice icons, by the way)
- Easy to read
- Cool blue background which blends well with the green lines
- Bold and daring design (which fits your niche)
What I don’t like
- Too much rollover effects. I don’t think there’s a need to explain every link
- After the bold looking logo, the navigation bar is a let down as it is too simplistic.
Overall, I am still partial to Design 2 of your blog. It may not look as loud or fun-looking but it has a certain aura of authority to it. But I guess it has to do with my personal preference for neat and traditional looking sites.
Anyway, glad to see your site’s growth, mate!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for that comment Pablopabla! You’ve known this blog right from the start so your opinion means a lot!
You’re completely right about the tooltips. I hadn’t really considered that about the navigation bar though. I’ll try to come up with something that would make it look better, but without adding much clutter.
You could also well be right about the 2nd design. A few other people mentioned that it looked more professional. I might end up reworking this theme a good bit to try and make it look more professional and authoritative as you said as well.
pablopabla (50 comments)11 August 09
One thing is shouldn’t change is this brilliant looking (design, colour and function-wise) comment section. I love it!
redwall_hp (139 comments)6 August 09
First of all, great design. I still prefer the other one overall, but this one has some nice touches.
1. I like the header, and the large social media icons within. The background and new logo look good too.
2. The hover tooltips are a neat idea. They’re a little buggy at some screen resolutions though. If I point to one near the edge, like the Twitter link in the header, part of the bubble appears off the edge of the viewport, and a horizontal scrollbar appears. (The same goes for the one on your text “[Advertise]” link, and the social links in the sidebar.)
3. I like the section at the end of the posts with the bio and social media sharing links. It’s well-styled.
4. Comment styles are excellent, and certainly unique.
Oh, and thanks for the blogroll link and mini-review here.
I need to get around to adding a blogroll, but I haven’t worked out a good clutter-free way to do so. I like the dropdown idea. (I remember seeing a tutorial on something similar recently, but I can’t remember where.)
redwall_hp (139 comments)6 August 09
*Facepalm* I found the dropdown tutorial link… It was on Pro Blog Design!
http://www.problogdesign.com/w.....avascript/
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Haha Matt – Glad you found the link!
Thanks for the detailed reply. I’m really glad you like the look overall. Was there anything in particular that you preferred about the old design? (A few people have said it felt more “professional”, which I think I’ll have to work on. The home page might have something to do with that)
redwall_hp (139 comments)7 August 09
I don’t know. I just liked the overall “feel” of the design. It’s hard to pin down exactly what it is.
Brian Purkiss (24 comments)6 August 09
Wow!
Nice redesign!
Not gonna lie, in a way I will miss the old design.
But the new one is great. Very slick, smooth, professional, and has some very nice details in the design.
You’ve come a long way from when I started following you.
Makes me wonder where I’d be if I wrote regularly. lol.
In all seriousness, again, nice fresh design and great change.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
lol Brian – You’ve known this site for about as long as I have I think!
I really liked the old design as well and I think I’m going to have to work on this one some more to bring it up to the level of the old one, but a fresh change is what I needed so hopefully it will work out in the end
saud (1 comments)6 August 09
Nice and a refreshing new clean design! Love the colors too.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks, glad to hear you like it!
Carla (9 comments)6 August 09
I love your new design. The colors are great and I love the layout and how easy it is to scan and search for posts. Way to go!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks Carla! Really nice to see you’ve noticed it being a lot easier to scan over, that was one of the things I wanted most
Sat Chen (1 comments)6 August 09
Really love the new design. The layout is good and its easy to look for posts but the one thing I really hate is the Tooltip. Sorry, to say but its been far over used. That’s the only flaw I found. Otherwise, great design. Forgot to say, Harry Birthday on 2nd year.
P.S. Can you have your previous theme for download for free. Really liked it as well.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for your comment! The tool tips are definitely going to be removed. They seem to be disliked by just about everyone, which is a pretty bad sign!
And yep, I’ll definitely release the old theme for free. It might be a month or two before it’s ready though, I need to sit down and tidy the code a little
XIII (2 comments)6 August 09
Gorgeous and slick, I like the new design!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks XIII! Great to hear that it’s gone down well
Luis Lopez (10 comments)6 August 09
I love the redesign, even if I think i prefer the old design, it was on my opinion more professional, this one I found it a little flashy but is Ok, i like the mix betweent blue and green, and the sidebar looks really cool, personally I love the blogrrol.
Congratulations also for the 2nd year, keep working that way cause you are on a great way.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for the comments Luis. I think I’m going to try and make a few changes to get the site looking that little bit more professional again. Hopefully it will work!
Ben G (1 comments)6 August 09
Props on the new site design! Pretty slick! I subscribe to your blog, keep up the great work!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for that Ben! Glad to hear you’re enjoying the site
DoneZone (4 comments)6 August 09
Really inspiring to see the new site design. “Why inspiring?” you might ask.
Well, I’m presently in the process of developing a couple sites and seeing how much impact a site redesign can make inspires me to take the trouble of redesigning the look of the sites I’m working on, rather than merely adding a few more sections and options.
I find the new design so much easier to look at. It is way less cluttered, and the colours are gentle and comfortable, rather than harsh and jarring as I found the previous colour scheme. In a positive light, I guess you could say the previous design appeared bold and brashy. Which is all well and fine, but at times it felt a bit over the top.
I’m glad most of the advertising is gone. It was distracting, and over time, became boring.
The most amazing thing about the new design is how close it appears to just a plain old generic blog site, however (and this is its strength) although it has a familiarity to it, it manages somehow to also feel fresh and original. The familiarity of form, but with its unique individuality, makes it very appealing. Somehow you got it right with the spacing between panels and buttons, so that it feels expansive, yet very easy to observe.
The background, with its vertical lines, give the impression of a curtain at a theatre, and thus the main content is like the actors appearing on the stage. It just wouldn’t have had that sensibility to it if you’d simply gone with a solid darker background.
Simple presentation, yet highly effective as a visually pleasant site, and a easily readable one. Good job!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for your comment on the design, that was a pleasure to read. Really glad to hear that you like the site!
This redesign started off as just making adjustments to the old design, but the amount of work you have to do for that is so much anyway that it seemed worthwhile just starting all over from scratch. So keep it up on your sites, it’s well worth the effort in the end!
Caitlin (3 comments)6 August 09
Great new design!
I usually just read via RSS, but I wanted to take a peek and I’m glad I did. Very slick!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)6 August 09
Thanks for dropping by out of the reader Caitlin! I’m pleased to hear you like it
Gargron (4 comments)6 August 09
The menu hovers are okay (though the text itself a bit blurred if it’re not my eyes joking around), but the top tabs hovers are too… too light.
The text is easy to read, and the comments look nice, too. And in overall, as somebody once said on my design as well, the ‘layout is easy on the eyes’. That’s it. Good work (not sure if I am allowed to say that to a professional webdesigner though, lol)
Michael Martin (1319 comments)7 August 09
It’s not just your eyes Gargron, I think I need to redo that rollover effect. It’s definitely not the easiest to read
I’m glad the rest of the site is a lot easier on the eyes, as you said.
Andrey (1 comments)6 August 09
I like new design! Fresh and creative!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)7 August 09
Thanks Andrey – Great to hear that
All for Design (1 comments)6 August 09
Congratulations for your work man…
Even if I’m not kind of the colors, I must say that your design is very clean.
You must have spent lot of time to work on this redesign so congrats’ !
Thanks for sharing all these great articles with us
Kind regards
Michael Martin (1319 comments)7 August 09
Thanks for your comments AFD! I guess the colors are never going to appeal to everyone, but I’m glad they haven’t put you off the design too much. And thanks for the kind words, I’ll try!
Kyle Eslick (1 comments)7 August 09
*wipes drool off keyboard*
I LOVE the new design! Great job Michael!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)7 August 09
lmao – Thanks Kyle!
Does this mean I owe you a new keyboard though??
SJL Web Design (10 comments)7 August 09
Great job on the re-design Michael, I thought the old design looked more professional but this is much more fresh and brighter. I also like the use of CSS3!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)7 August 09
Thanks for your comment. I think you’re right about the other design looking more professional. Seems to be something that I need to work on with this one to bring it up to par
shaunjudy (4 comments)8 August 09
The site looks great! Wish you the best of luck and keep up the good work.
Thanks for all the ideas you provide.
Michael Martin (1319 comments)9 August 09
No problem Shaun, will keep writing for as long as yous find it useful
baloot (11 comments)8 August 09
where the heck is ur footer? i like this new blog design. but i like your footer style like design before this..
i mean footer with widget.. not footer with copyright text..
Michael Martin (1319 comments)9 August 09
I liked it too baloot, but I’ve taken it away for now. I moved half the content up into the sidebar, and just deleted the other half. With all the stuff in the sidebar now, there was no need for the expanded footer.
Might bring it back in future!
Alex Vorn (2 comments)8 August 09
Great redesign! did you made this theme?
Michael Martin (1319 comments)9 August 09
Yup! Glad you like it
Corey Freeman (11 comments)9 August 09
Awesome new design. You have a couple of alignment issues (using Firefox 3.5) in the comments section. The avatar and author data are overlapping one another. Other than that, I really love the new design.
It’s so much easier to navigate through categories! Happy birthday to ProBlogDesign and I wish you much success in the future!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)9 August 09
lol – The overlap was on purpose
But thanks, I’m glad you find the navigation a lot easier. I remember it was one of the things you mentioned when you video reviewed the old design, hopefully it’s much better now
EasyWPAdmin (2 comments)9 August 09
Easy to make your way around the site. I’m a big fan of dark colored designs too. This one is very cool!
Michael Martin (1319 comments)9 August 09
Thanks, that’s great to hear!
David Millar (3 comments)10 August 09
I love the new design. The only thing that bugs me is the text shadow on the subheadings feels out of place considering it’s the only text with a shadow, and the rest of the content part of the page feels flat, so it stands out too much.
Also, just wondering if you’re planning on using web fonts for your headers instead of the replacement technique you seem to be using now.
Fikri Rasyid (38 comments)10 August 09
Yaiks! Superb design! Somehow, i personally like the previous design. Much more elegant. This one is more cheerful, in my point of view. But i love the effects you used in this design
Maybe you should post about creative process of making this design from a scratch sketch into this appearance. It would be very interesting
Alastair Conditioning (6 comments)10 August 09
I really like the new design, however I’m not too sure on the text shadow on the headings as it seems to just make the text look a bit messy. Apart from that I think it looks a lot more bright and appealing.
Robin Reagler (1 comments)10 August 09
I love the blue!
Keith (3 comments)10 August 09
Very sexy, very fun. Even though the old theme was classy, this one shows the more modern and fun side of design
But I don’t think the text replacement in the titles is necessary. Arial looks fine.
Thanks,
Keith.
RobbyAnz (9 comments)12 August 09
Congratulations!
Cute and clear theme!
SuperMario290 (3 comments)15 August 09
I really like the new theme, but I am really more a fan of the last logo instead of this one.
Craig (4 comments)16 August 09
Love the new layout!
Any chance of a free release??
kiziel (1 comments)20 August 09
I think the new one proves your design skills, its more modern. I love features like : text-replacement, animations in safari and usage of css3. The only thing I’d change is font for post headers. Think of it, its not readable for me. Anyway good luck with future development
RogueDeals (1 comments)24 August 09
I just found this blog now and I have to say I’m very impressed. I really didn’t get to see your old theme, but this one is stellar. Very clean and bold and modern. Your posts are very in depth and have a lot of information, which I love. I’ll be sure to bookmark this and subscribe.
Definitely inspires me to keep forging ahead with my site.
Cheers,
Eric
FreelancerCrowd (3 comments)28 August 09
That’s a lot fresher
Keith Davis (60 comments)4 September 09
Great design and I agree with all the praise in the comments, but one tiny little thing bothers me.
When you hover over the various post titles, the bacground to the title turns green and you can click it. But you have to hover over the text, not the white space between the text. If you hover over the white space… no joy.
I appreciate you have used CSS3 etc, which may be the problem for me viewing with Internet Explorer 7. But if you can make it all clickable….
Ana Silva (1 comments)5 September 09
I really like the new design. Kinda miss the old one though.
I love your website and is one of the few ones I keep coming back to. I have learned a lot from here and taken a lot of good ideas with me too. I hope one day I can be as succesful as you.
I can’t remember if I subscribed already…I think I did…