new website http://www.simonsaysscuba.com

Hi Everyone,

I've recently launched a dive photo website: http://www.simonsaysscuba.com, which I am still beta testing.

it's just a personal photo blog, but always interested in feedback on the work, or if you experience any issues with the website itself. (Tested with IE6 and above, Firefox, Safari and Chrome). Let me know if it works on your system or better of course, if it doesn't. I really appreciate the feedback, especially the bugs.

Thanks,

Simon

Hello Simon, great web-site! You use a lot of reference links on your pages, that is great for background information but these pages open in the same browser screen as were I came from, result is that you lost your visitor, all the sudden I was searching for books at Amazon instead of coming back were I left your site. Just open all external pages in a new browser screen of show them with frames in your web-site so you stay in control.

Regards

Rob

Hi there Simon. I do like your web site - one minor thing I noticed is that you have 8 pictures in your gallery but when you view them zoomed in it says 9, and indeed shows the black and white cuttlefish one both as number 1 and number 8 (don't blame you, its a really nice picture ). I think that the zoomed in images were slightly too large - great for viewers with large monitors and hi resolution, not so good for others - the old problem of how to cater for everyone ! On your last page the picture of the Yellow Taill Scad is missing. I found the pages slightly cumbersome - for instance if all you wanted to do was read about the Yellow Tail Scad you have no choice but to step through every page before it to finally get to the one you want. Well done though, you are up and running !

Hello Simon, great web-site! You use a lot of reference links on your pages, that is great for background information but these pages open in the same browser screen as were I came from, result is that you lost your visitor, all the sudden I was searching for books at Amazon instead of coming back were I left your site. Just open all external pages in a new browser screen of show them with frames in your web-site so you stay in control.

 

Regards

Rob

Rob, good point and thanks for letting me know. I'll fix that asap and point it to a different frame.

Hi there Simon. I do like your web site - one minor thing I noticed is that you have 8 pictures in your gallery but when you view them zoomed in it says 9, and indeed shows the black and white cuttlefish one both as number 1 and number 8 (don't blame you, its a really nice picture ). I think that the zoomed in images were slightly too large - great for viewers with large monitors and hi resolution, not so good for others - the old problem of how to cater for everyone ! On your last page the picture of the Yellow Taill Scad is missing. I found the pages slightly cumbersome - for instance if all you wanted to do was read about the Yellow Tail Scad you have no choice but to step through every page before it to finally get to the one you want. Well done though, you are up and running !

Mate,

thanks for the heads up with the gallery 8/9 mismatch, it's indeed counting both the image on the left and the whole gallery from the javascript library I used, I will fix that as it is confusing.

The zoom shots are 1024*1024 max, they should fit the screen on that resolution. I was thinking of making them slightly smaller initially but ended up with this width which matches the screen design. Not sure what to do here yet. Out of curiousity, what reso. are you running?

I fixed the yellowtail scad, well spotted!

If you wanna see them, just hit search, you can go there directly, or use the archives link on the right hand side.

Much appreciated,

Cheers,

Simon

Mate,

 

thanks for the heads up with the gallery 8/9 mismatch, it's indeed counting both the image on the left and the whole gallery from the javascript library I used, I will fix that as it is confusing.

 

The zoom shots are 1024*1024 max, they should fit the screen on that resolution. I was thinking of making them slightly smaller initially but ended up with this width which matches the screen design. Not sure what to do here yet. Out of curiousity, what reso. are you running?

 

I fixed the yellowtail scad, well spotted!

 

If you wanna see them, just hit search, you can go there directly, or use the archives link on the right hand side.

 

Much appreciated,

 

Cheers,

 

Simon

Simon,

I was viewing on my laptop running 1280 x 800 using Internet Explorer 7. I guess most laptops will not accommodate 1024 x 1024 without the need for scrolling. I find if you need to scroll the impact of the image is lost as you can not see the whole image at once. I do not think there is a need to display them quite so big, and indeed most photographic websites choose smaller (which may also be for image theft reasons....).

René.

Simon,

 

I was viewing on my laptop running 1280 x 800 using Internet Explorer 7. I guess most laptops will not accommodate 1024 x 1024 without the need for scrolling. I find if you need to scroll the impact of the image is lost as you can not see the whole image at once. I do not think there is a need to display them quite so big, and indeed most photographic websites choose smaller (which may also be for image theft reasons....).

 

René.

again, excellent point on the widescreen notebooks. I use 1650*1080 on a MacBook Pro but even here the portrait images don't fit. I'll look into rescaling them, I was going to replace the jpgs with pngs for image quality reasons anyway, might just combine the two. I agree on the theft and the resolution, then again it doesn't bother me much i am only an amateur. Someone would try to steal from me i'd probably be flattered instead of upset

Cheers,

Simon

I use Linux and the website looks fine. One minor point is that in the Gear section underneath the Setup narrative, you show an asterisk and say (not used under water yet). I didn't see the asterisk next to any of the lenses. Later on, when I looked at the rest of your website, I could see that the Tokina 11-16 is the one you haven't used underwater yet, but you might want to place an asterisk next to the lens in the Lenses section so we could see which lens it is that you haven't used underwater. I suspect, though, that you'll soon use the lens underwwater and the asterisk will not be needed at all!

Nice job overall!

Ellen

I use Linux and the website looks fine. One minor point is that in the Gear section underneath the Setup narrative, you show an asterisk and say (not used under water yet). I didn't see the asterisk next to any of the lenses. Later on, when I looked at the rest of your website, I could see that the Tokina 11-16 is the one you haven't used underwater yet, but you might want to place an asterisk next to the lens in the Lenses section so we could see which lens it is that you haven't used underwater. I suspect, though, that you'll soon use the lens underwwater and the asterisk will not be needed at all!

 

Nice job overall!

 

Ellen

Hi Ellen,

thanks for the good feedback, I'm glad everything works on Linux/Firefox(?). Also well spotted on the 60mm lens. I literally went diving with that thing yesterday and took that * off the gear page! (but forgot to update the rest) - it's all in the detail.

Fixed now,

Cheers,

Simon

Simon,

 

I was viewing on my laptop running 1280 x 800 using Internet Explorer 7. I guess most laptops will not accommodate 1024 x 1024 without the need for scrolling. I find if you need to scroll the impact of the image is lost as you can not see the whole image at once. I do not think there is a need to display them quite so big, and indeed most photographic websites choose smaller (which may also be for image theft reasons....).

 

René.

I have now rescaled all pop ups to 800*600, should fit everyone. They are also PNG format, the jpgs do show compression artefacts.

Keep it coming!

and new shot online, I"m posting the links instead of images: http://www.simonsaysscuba.com/?p=400

Looks good Simon! Well set out, well written, and I didn't come across and problems.

I might've missed it, but I would've liked to have seen something about where you dive regularly (can see from your profile here it's Sydney, but didn't see that on the site).

Ryan.

Guys,

out of curiousity: does anyone here still use Internet Explorer 6? Browser stats for this are still around 20% (8 years after it was released), I sometimes find that hard to believe. Are there one in five amongst you who use this?

Cheers,

Simon

Hi,

I have done some work on the site to generally improve it - used Google page speed and followed most of the recommendations in there to make things faster, such as using GZIP filter, minify Javascript, cache expiry for images. For all webmasters among you, this is definitely worth a look.

If there are any eager beta testers in here please let me know

1) search results for posts now have thumbnail images, so do tag search results.

2) Crunched everything to 300k for the main page, should make this a LOT faster. Converted all png images to small jpgs.

3) Started a photo tips section with articles.

4) Added post tagging and a tag cloud.

5) Added timeline of recently updated pages, so you can see what's new.

6) improved search engine in the backend, now finds alot more posts.

Feedback is most welcome,

Cheers,

Simon

Hi,

 

I have done some work on the site to generally improve it - used Google page speed and followed most of the recommendations in there to make things faster, such as using GZIP filter, minify Javascript, cache expiry for images. For all webmasters among you, this is definitely worth a look.

 

If there are any eager beta testers in here please let me know

 

1) search results for posts now have thumbnail images, so do tag search results.

2) Crunched everything to 300k for the main page, should make this a LOT faster. Converted all png images to small jpgs.

3) Started a photo tips section with articles.

4) Added post tagging and a tag cloud.

5) Added timeline of recently updated pages, so you can see what's new.

6) improved search engine in the backend, now finds alot more posts.

 

Feedback is most welcome,

 

Cheers,

 

Simon

thanks, useful information.

I'm trying no enter but no way. Is the webpage down?

This topic is from 2009.

This topic is from 2009.

Ups, sorry.