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Thread: Site for first major client!

  1. #1
    Mark Bowen
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    Site for first major client!

    Hi there,

    Please could everyone take a look at this site :

    http://www.something2ad.com/heliair/

    The site will eventually have a splash page with all the pre-requisite flash plug-in blurb and be on their own server but at the moment everything else is fully operational.
    You will need the latest Flash plug-in to view it but I'm pretty sure everyone in here should have that!

    Please be gentle with me. This is my first real site for a client and I want it to be good so any pointers and tips would be greatly appreciated, especially the audio loader if that is slow on some computers then tips in that are would be appreciated.

    Again, please be kind!

    P.S. A couple of small things aren't operational yet. Namely the contact form as I don't have any of the email addresses yet so it is just there as filler but ready to work!

    Thanks for checking it out if you do and

    Regards,

    Mark Bowen
    Last edited by Mark Bowen; 09-22-2004 at 06:35 AM.

  2. #2
    www.designerunderground.co.uk
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    Very nice. A few comments...
    > I think your intro is too slow
    > Like the top banner - it adds a nice feel to the site
    > sales page maybe needs another image
    > because the logo at the bottom is a button, it looks like it should activate something
    > not sure the clock adds anything to the site - it makes the nav look untidy - besides try and find a browser/OS that doesn't already have a clock...
    +
    You are not your job. You are not how much money you have in the bank. You are not the car you drive. You are not the contents of your wallet. You're not your ****ing khakis.

  3. #3
    Mark Bowen
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    Hi ojc1,

    Thankyou for the comments!

    When you say the intro is too slow do you mean the texts fading in? If so I would like to change that and put more into it but to tell the truth I was up last night doing the intro at the small hours and couldn't really think of anything else to do as my brain was getting fried!! :-)
    Thankyou for your comments about the top banner. I got the idea from looking at http://www.afterlifeseasons.com

    As to the 'Sales' section image I whole heartedly agree with you on that one and will be changing it as soon as possible. Thanks for that!

    As to the logo being a button,

    1 Thanks for noticing that. I didn't know if anyone would or not which I suppose brings me to
    2 Do you have any ideas as to how I would best implement showing this?

    The clock wasn't quite finished as I was going to make it clickable and then show different time zones and UTC times etc as it is a aviation site and lots of people work in UTC.

    I am actually a Pilot myself and trained at Heli Air (Wellesbourne Mountford).


    Thank you once again for your exceptionally kind words and thanks for all the tips.

    Regards,

    Mark

  4. #4
    Junior Member
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    A nice clean feel to the site, especailly the nav bar. I'm watching the splash page at work with no sound (i'm not sure whether there is any) but it is very slow and you don't know whether it has stopped or is still running at some points. I don't actually think that it is 100% necessary either. Some of the transitions are a bit jerky at the ends which may be because of the frame rate. The logo / button at the bottom needs to have the 'hit' area altered as at present it is using just the text and circle area (if you get my meaning).

  5. #5
    Mark Bowen
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    Hi rg_22uk,

    Thanks for the nice comments.
    There is audio on the main entry yes but it is really the first time I have ever used an audio intro and wasn't really very sure as to how to do it. What I did was streamed in the mp3 file so when it started playing then so does the animation. I suppose that that is probably the completely wrong way about it now that I look at it as if the mp3 never loads or takes an age then that would stop the animation happening!! Silly me!! I will learn from these experiences.... I hope!!! :-)

    I have changed the hit area now so it encompasses the whole logo. Someone else mentioned that but I was so tired when they told me that I didn't understand what they meant. Must get more sleep!

    Anyway thanks for the comments. They help a lot!

    Regards,

    Mark

  6. #6
    japanese nayades's Avatar
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    having problems with firefox. i just cant see a top stripe with the menu. the rest appears grey.

  7. #7
    Mark Bowen
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    Hi nayades,

    What exactly is Firefox. Is it a browser?

    Regards,

    Mark Bowen

  8. #8
    Mark Bowen
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    Hi there,

    Just found Firefox the browser. Downloaded it and I have the same problem too :-(

    It must be something in the HTML code as when I open up the .swf file directly in Firefox it is fine.

    Could you let me know if opening the .swf file is okay on your version?

    http://www.something2ad.com/heliair/HeliAir.swf

    And if anyone could take a look at the HTML code and let me know if there is something wrong somewhere then I would be exceptionally greatful.

    Regards,

    Mark

    Code:
    <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
    <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en">
    <head>
    <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" />
    <meta http-equiv="Pragma" content="no-cache">
    <meta http-equiv="Cache-Control" content="no-cache">
    <meta http-equiv="Expires" content="0">
    <META HTTP-EQUIV="Cache-Control" CONTENT="Public">
    <meta http-equiv="Cache-Control" content="no-store">
    <meta http-equiv="Cache-Control" content="must-revalidate">
    <title>HeliAir</title>
    </head>
    <body bgcolor="#cccccc" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" topmargin="0">
    <!--url's used in the movie-->
    <!--text used in the movie-->
    <object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=7,0,0,0" width="100%" height="100%" id="HeliAir" align="top">
    <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain" />
    <param name="movie" value="HeliAir.swf" />
    <param name="menu" value="false" />
    <param name="quality" value="best" />
    <param name="salign" value="t" />
    <param name="bgcolor" value="#cccccc" />
    <embed src="HeliAir.swf" menu="false" quality="best" salign="t" bgcolor="#cccccc" width="100%" height="100%" name="HeliAir" align="top" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" />
    </object>
    </body>
    </html>

  9. #9
    japanese nayades's Avatar
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    mark, lol. its not the first time it happens to me. i'm discussing it in the lounge;

    http://www.flashkit.com/board/showth...hreadid=584632

    i know the way of solving it:
    just delete the doctype line on the top and you'll have it.

    however, that will leave you with a non html 4.01 transitional page... which is quite important. just check the link and read yourself.

  10. #10
    Always learning
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    love the site! especially like how the footer moves up and down when you resize the screen.

    was that intenional because of the subject matter (helicopters) ? If so, very nice!

    My only concern, I am a believer that not all sites should be done entirely in Flash, It is my OPINION that only entertainment and product sites should be done in Flash, while corporate and professional services would be more appropriate in HTML with Flash enhancements. Then again, that is just my opinion.

    I am sure many more big clients will follow.

  11. #11
    flash surfer
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    great

    great site. i agree with the comments about the slow intro, it seems to create too much anticipation for speed to come.. I have never been one for elaborate intros though...also maybe add some preloaders in the gallery section, the high quality pictures are long loaders and i wanted some load info.....
    great work though, i hope i can craete some good content like it someday..
    thx
    f-
    http://www.freak.freightgraff.com/ciscov2
    don't eat the yellow snow. lets stop this beatin' around the bush.(beat the bush)

  12. #12
    Mark Bowen
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    RE : Comments....

    Hi Inasite & hc4tu,

    Thanks for the comments on the site. I really didn't know what to expect when I put this up for everyone to look at but the response so far has been great so thankyou all very much for your time.

    Inasite. To tell the truth I hadn't even thought about the footer moving up and down as per a helicopter (me being a PPL(h) aswell!!! :-) )
    I put it in their as I had seen it done somewhere and as the rest of the site was going to be fairly static (even though that is if you don't resize the page) I put it in their to hopefully add some flair, but very nice idea, thanks!
    [I won't use it as my own idea though as it wasn't and I am not that kind of person, just to let you know]

    Actually the client has already seen the site and absolutely loved it!! I think it was the womans voice on the intro. I work (at the moment) for a Commercial Production company where we make radio adverts for all the stations in the UK and also some abroad aswell. If anyone wants to check out my work then they can go to http://www.soundlogic.co.uk and if you go to the flash version and after the intro you should hear a load of my ads playing in the background.

    As to the site being completely in Flash (this is just me) but I see it that as Flash can do everything that HTML can do (and a whole lot more) I don't like to see Flash elements included in a HTML site as I know a lot of them don't put in any checking scripts or warnings in case people don't have the Flash plug-in so it just doesn't work then. Having said that I haven't put a splash page in yet for the site so that people know to download Flash but I will do. The space that the site is hosted on is actually just for testing at the moment, we are awaiting permission to change over the hosting of their current site.... wait.... wait.... wait....!!!!

    The intro is something that I am very worried about and again if anyone has any pointers or ideas as to what I could do instead then I would be exceptionally greatful. This is the first time I have done an intro (this was the clients request so it needs to stay in there) and I wasn't really too sure as to how to do it best! All I did was said - stream in the MP3 and when it is ready to play then play the animation and on a fast connection it even syncs up fairly well! Again if anyone has any ideas then I would be extremely greatful. As I said the client loves the music that I composed and especially the womans voice :-) so they need to stay.

    Hi hc4tu as to the gallery this is part my mistake as the images actually load a lot quicker than it appears as once they are loaded there is a kind of timer on them before they show and then they fade in and out so that is probably why they take so long. I must remember to fix that so thanks for pushing me in the right direction to remember! I will be placing a text that comes up when loading a new image that says loading with a loading animation for slower connections though.

    Once again thanks for all the nice comments and the kind suggestions.
    I would not have been able to create this site if it hadn't been for all the really nice help that people have given me on these forums over the years so a big thankyou goes out to all those people aswell.

    Regards,

    Mark Bowen

  13. #13
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    speed up

    very nice site but speed up your frame rate is a bit slow and slow equials borring if you speed it up it will be perfect people often get annoyed when they have to wait

  14. #14
    the thud of the body rabbitkiller's Avatar
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    Everything is pretty much said...
    I'l just add that it's pretty darn good for a first site. I remember my first pieceACrap I made for money
    world[i] = new world();

  15. #15
    Mark Bowen
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    Hi wvd426 and rabbitkiller,

    Thanks for your comments. I will definitely be looking into the frame rate issue and changing the introduction to a much better one!!!

    Thanks again for all the help everyone and if anyone else has any thoughts or suggestions please do keep on hurling them this way.


    Regards,

    Mark

  16. #16
    Senior Member
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    nice site

    real nice and calm site ..well done ... one question where did you get the sound fx from?

    need some desperatly..
    thanks

  17. #17
    Mark Bowen
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    RE : Sound Effects....

    Hi shrav,

    Thanks for the nice comment!!

    The sound effects were all put together by myself. My current day job is as the Senior Producer at http://www.soundlogic.co.uk If you go to the site and wait for it load then you will here the kinds of adverts I make everyday!

    As to the sound effects I have a massive library which I own and am able to use for jobs such as this.

    Just to let everyone know about the audio on the site, I mean the intro audio. All the music was composed and created by myself and the voice is a very good FVO from http://www.a1vox.com

    If you need some SFX just let me know what you need and I will see what I can do.

    Regards,

    Mark

  18. #18
    Senior Member
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    hello mark

    thanks for replying ... checked out the site .. love the sound fx... great mexican voice...lol

    yeah i really need some help getting some sound fx... my sound library is very thin and dont know how or where to get any ...?
    i would really appreciate any help or even if you could send any sound fx...?

    really need the kind of sound fx that most websites have ... buttons...swishes... clicks blips.. beeps...etc....?

    the kind they have at www.plotdev.com..

    just put our site live let us know what you think

    www.hotmonkeydesign.com

    shrav

  19. #19
    Mark Bowen
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    Hi shrav,

    Thanks for the comments on the Sound Logic site. My favourite advert is the one for the 'Adult Shop'. I was given a script that looked like it would just about fill out at 8 seconds and it was for a 30 second ad!! I had no idea what I was going to do with it so I just added a load of SFX and some music and it came out the way it did. I'm really proud of that one!
    We had to show the script to the RACC first to ensure it was legal to go to air which as a script there was absolutely nothing wrong with it so they passed it straight away but I bet if they had heard it after then they may have thought differently!!!! :-)

    As to your site I don't think that you need any sound effects do you?
    I think it works really well the way it is now, or did you just mean for in the future?

    The only one thing I would say about the site is that (not sure if it checked whether I had Flash first or not) but it went into the screen saying that I would need Flash if I hadn't got it but this screen was in Flash so a bit confusing. Maybe a splash page beforehand telling people they will need the plug-in designed in HTML then let them go in.
    Also (I don't care one bit about this but I know a lot of people are bothered by it) maybe on the splash page let people decide whether they want the window to fill out or not. Some people get put off by it. I don't know why though.

    Speak to you soon and keep up the great work.

    By the way if I did misunderstand you on the SFX then just let me know and I will see what I can dig out. I pretty much create all my SFX from scratch when I need them for buttons and the like by using Reason refills etc...



    P.S. Just wondering where did you get the animation of the birds from. Would it be possible to get a copy of them in exchange for some SFX??


    Mark
    Last edited by Mark Bowen; 09-23-2004 at 12:02 PM.

  20. #20
    Just a Member
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    Nice Look,

    but I think yoru intro is weak,

    how about using your great sounds and having a helicopter fade in with overlays which go to alpha and give the effect and illusion of movement and have it fade in before the company name....

    then the company name comes in, and the lines and the lovely woman's voice...presto done!

    smooth, more action, and more appealing....

    T.

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