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Ask HN: Please rate my sites

12 pointsPendulumMoves17 comments

Am a burnt out teacher relaunching with thoughts of becoming a website designer. I used twitter bootstrap and wordpress themes in the end. I used Brackets on Debian. http://hungarianinterpreter.london http://youaretheone.london I thought of using ghost but it wasn't suitable for quick learning? Is my use of images and ideas ok? Any ideas?

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Few points of feedback on the interpreter site. Bear in mind I am not the target audience but I am a designer, and this site is unfinished.

* The image for Éva looks like something they'd take at border control for a refugee. Not a fitting profile image for a professional interpreter in the slightest. Also it's placement on the homepage hero image is bizarre. Her face is...reassuring though. Reminds me of a kind aunt. Probably a good vibe for your audience. Take a better photo that isn't a passport scan.

* The navigation font size is quiet small and does not have enough contrast to stand out against the background image. Most of the important text is small actually.

* The background image is actually quite nice I think – from what I can make out it isn't Hungarian though – very well might be wrong. I do think it's Roman mosaic feel lends credibility to her practise though.

* "...with a subversive sense of humour" — not sure this is applicable

* "...drug importation, human trafficking, rape and murder." — Human rights issues might be more suited here. Rape and Murder pull you out of focusing on her expertise.

Thats all for now. Good start. Keep working.

Thanks for your comments. I had to use what the client gives me. So the text and images I can not change. It's what my client wants. However, I can work with font size and make it more reader friendly.

No problem. If you are serious about going down the road of a designer, you will have to get comfortable with telling clients what I told you above and moving them away from subpar ideas. Most of the time, when things are pointed out in the right way – they will most likely agree with you. Because half the time it's common sense. Good luck with all dear friend :)

You should remove that JavaScript that is overwriting the scrolling behaviour of my browser. I almost feel bad for how many times I have to point this out but it's really annoying to a lot of people.

Someone less lazy than me should put something like this in a chrome extension.

    getEventListeners(window).mousewheel[0].remove()

As junto noted, you are using a pre-built theme. In light of that, what is the reason for your post? You would like to know if people like the theme that someone else built, and you used?

Is this the 'Rival' Wrapbootstrap theme you've used?

https://wrapbootstrap.com/theme/rival-responsive-multipurpos...

I like the use of the video in the header. Font size is a bit on the small size though.

Yes it is Rival theme in both cases. I'm not a from scratch webdesigner so using a these off the shelf themes has gotten me started. I shall try to enlarge the font size though. Thanks junto

Good start! I would say the most prominent issue is readability and contrast. Simple things like a little bigger fonts and making sure that light text is not on light background (e.g. use some semi transparent dark rectangular overlay behind to make white text contrast over light backgrounds)

Other than that, good job!

I'm failing to understand how this is on the hn top page.

Clickable http://hungarianinterpreter.london http://youaretheone.london

Well I'm not a designer but I know what I like and don't like, if that makes any sense.

I think the Hungarian Interpreter one is great, but I agree with eranation that you have some font issues to work out to increase readability.

On You Are The One, there's a section in the middle of the page where a grid of pictures is left-aligned, and it doesn't look good.

You might want to add a plugin to do asset minification for you on WordPress. Even though the sites were fast, you're loading in too many CSS/JS files individually. On a 3G network, this is a very noticeable delay.

Much appreciated A.Ninja

Super small font is a bad design fad that needs to go away. I should not have to increase the page zoom to greater than 100% to be able to read the text. Granted, I don't have the best eyes in the world, but I've had a recent eye exam and don't require glasses. Make the font bigger for the paragraph text.

There are some scrolling and spacing issues on mobile (iOS) for the first one.

Also, clickable links:

http://hungarianinterpreter.london

http://youaretheone.london

first thing i see is a spinner for about 5-10s, most users will just hit the back button and leave your site

On that point, both sites require javascript in order to see anything.

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