Journal Journal: Redesign V: Redesign Forever 14
lets get it started!
Wes Hunt's design is a
mixed bag. I think his slashboxes are a bit weak- that carved out/sunken in
effect can be used really effectively, but his doesn't work because it's on all
4 directions. I think his header is to dark to work with the body. I think
the layout of the articles is quite solid. I don't care for the color choices or
the
Peter Lada's design continues to be one of my favorites. I think his article header needs some work yet, that faded yellow just doesn't work for me either, but his efficient header now more strongly echos Slashdot of today. I think ultimately by changing the colors of the article headers to be white on green instead of grey on green, and perhaps avoid that lighter green and use grey instead and the color scheme works. He has some expanding/contracting mojo in the menu that goes a good distance towards saving space over there. Me like.
Matt Walker's design is a mixed bag. I think the gradiants o nthe articles doesn't really look that right, and that his article headers are a bit uninteresting. But I think his menu choices are excellent. I think a few menus could be collapsed dynamically. I think his header could be tightened up a bit- it's roomy, but the focus of Slashdot is the articles, so the faster we get there, the better. The boxes on the left and right are the same design for the most part. That might work for this design. It might work against. But since this is a static image and not a complete implementation, it's hard to predict.
I linked one of Jason's designs, but I figured I'd show you a few more of his entries. His first entry and second entry try a few different variations. The latter mor strongly echos Slashdot and I think works quite well. The 2 column menu thing is nifty. The gradiants on the articles adn comments look pretty nice.
Jens Wilk's design needs a lot of work to seriously consider, but I think his article layout is interesting, and his highly compact header is worth considering. The B&W icons up top don't really work for me. As I've said before, that space is dead in the current design... no real reason to keep it. his design includes tags, but they aren't very well integrated into the article layouts either.
Dave Snyder's Design's design is a mixed one too. The header looks choppyy- the logo sticks up on the left and the menu on the right with a whole in the middle. Just doesn't flow right to me. I don't care for the '/.' iconography there either. I feel that
John Reilly's Design continues to refine an entry that works pretty well. He fixed the problem with the ad up top so it will fit. His slashboxes look nice. His articles are almost totally unchanged from today- I think he could possibly work to improve that. I think the squares on the menu on the left are visually a bit heavy, His positioning of the quote won't work on any page with comments, although it looks nice here. The footer menu is wrapped into 2 rows for no good reason. I think his design is one of the better ones in the 'Stay very close to Current Slashdot' class of entries.
Johnathan Hok's Design is still just a PNG. I think his left hand menu is a bit busy, but the rest of the design works quite well. I wonder if it might be to white as it stands. Withought a strong secondary color it just feels soft to me. He chooses to keep the top icons as-is for better or worse. But I think overall this is an elegent design. It will be funy to see it become more than a mockup.
Ben Heise's Design's design is just like a slightly tackier version of Slashdot today. But his article layout is really good. I don't think the search box makes sense in that space, but everything else in there works really well. Outside that tho, the stipled lines, the constant use of '/.' in menu headers, the loss of the coliseo font... that stuff just won't work for me.
Khoi Le's Design is just another mockup so it's hard to comment on fully, but there are some cool ideas. I think his slashbox column could look really cool with that curve in the header. His articles are simple and very nice. The topic icon issue i've covered many times is unaddressed here, and I'm concerned that the green menu on the left might weigh down the page a bit, but I think it could all work depending on how he chooses to handle the slashboxes. Another great start that I'd love to see thought through more as it becomes CSS.
Ben Kittrell's design deserves mention for simply presenting the most action hero of any design so far submitted.
So that's it for now. I'm caught up now. Depending on how many more entries I get in the next 24 hours or so, I may do another batch of entries on saturday or so, but I'm in california for a few days after that so I doubt I'll be able to post more before next friday... and at that point I'm hoping to post something to the Slashdot mainpage. As always, feel free to update any designs you have entered, or submit fresh ideas.
At this point there are perhaps a half dozen entries that I think could win with very little additional work, but I still think the contest is wide open. It's been really fun going through everyone's entries. Keep it up.