From my experience a website is never complete done and never will be. They need to evolve over time.... With that said this is a good start... Here are some of my opinions, please take them with a grain of salt ( I have been in business for little more then 5 years and still don't like my website: www.tayloredmemories.net www.tayloredmemories.com [newer site that is currently being coded])
Your first page image took a little long to load. Most people will get frustrated if they have to wait. Not the first impression that you want to give.
Second there is no information about you... people like to work with people, especially if there is some rapport... try to set up the rapport with a bio section.
Gallery... I think that there needs to be an index but not sure that landscapes need to be there since you specialize in portraiture....also, there is more white space than is needed between images.
Pricing... Start with most expensive items on top and then work down from there. The customer will see the larger price and then move to their comfort level/ budget. This will always be higher then starting with small prices and them stopping and not look beyond that level.
I hope that this info is useful. I know that when I did my first site that I would have like an honest opinion...
Robert
Thank you digimego for your comments. I see your point with the priceing structure. I am currently working on a bio for myself as well. your other comments are good also. When I look at my website it loads very quickly I am definatley interested to see what others have to say about that as well.
From a design standpoint....to be very honest it looks pretty bad. To me it looks obviously cobbled together by somebody trying to learn web design rather than designed and built by a professional. As the face of your business this may not be the best first impression!
Also would be smart to make sure the site fits on a 1024x768 screen without a very troublesome horizontal scroll being necessary.
Hi Brendan:
The site loads pretty slow for me as well. It looks okay - real "template'ish" like it was a canned premade site that you added your words to. The watermarks on the gallery thumbnails seem too large - i understand they're for your protection, but they are the only thing I can see when I look at your gallery pages.
Personally, I don't care for the color scheme, but that's just me. I also agree about the sizing. I have my laptop set for 1280x768 and it still won't quite fit.
I disagree that it necessarily looks bad, but then I feel that some sites are way overkill on all the latest whiz-bang graphics and flashy shiny things that only serve to distract. You need to keep in mind your audience, and most people like to see a good looking site, but in the end are more concerned with ease of navigation and finding what they want. Performance, not flash.
Having said that, however, I think you could spiff it up a bit and make it look a tad more sophisticated.
Please don't take offense to this...but the design itself looks on the retro side...like someone just started learning web design in the 90s on front page.It does take a while to load... your pictures are great though
