site design opinions wanted

i've been tinkering alot with the site design whenever things are slow enough to play with code for a few minutes

plus our sites built on a framework from a much larger network and there are tens of thousands of site creators on another site and i often offer help and design tips there wich inspires me to work more on here anyway out of the 10s of thousands they had picked like 6 or 8 of the most helpful ..and yesterday they added me to that pretty list so because of that honor i wanted to post a few more advanced tips as a thanks (and an opportunity to learn and try some new things)

in the past month or 2 you probly noticed alot more transformations when you hover your mouse over somnething which is a simple transition from state to state thats sorta like animation, well the next step was actual css animation

the dreadlockshampoo ad as an example looks the same today as it did on day 1 (except now fades between frames) but originaly it was a flash animation at nearly 400k i changed it to animated gif but was still 100k with css anination its now actualy 1 jpg stacked ontop of another and they rotate through a transparent state so only 1 is visible at any time

then i added the zooom in on the dreads natural dreads 12 sec after page load it ..ziooms in from the right as the text tilts to add to the speed effect

then added the pic of the week "fall off animation which has it tilt and dangle from a corner then fall off 3 times

anyways i've done so much tweaking of the site im nearly constantly working on it when things are slow so i have a few questions i want to ask

1. have i done too much? has it "muddied up" the design?
2. is there any 1 thing you like most?
3. is there any 1 thing that annoys you?
4. is there any part of the site you think could use some more tweaking to make it more interesting or cool?
5. i know the sites a tad slow, mostly due to javascripts most of wich are essential to the features of the site, removing all the added styling ive done would only reduce the load of the page by 32k ( the site header image is 1/2 that size alone, and isnt as high quality as id like cause i reduced that alot) anyways theres a question in that haha would a simpler less dynamic site be preferable if it was only a fraction of a second faster and hardly noticable?
6. months ago i ran out of room in the sites built in css editor (which you all have access to in your profile page design studio) so i had to switch to an external file, because of this alot of the code i add for the site effects personal pages as well (most of which can be overriden by you if you know a lil css ) how much does this bother you? would it help if we had a group for tips and tricks to make those things as cool as you want?
7. everything ive done on the site and more (almost) can be done on your personal pages as well how interested would you be in learning a lil and making your pages super cool
8. and finaly youve all made it plenty clear how much you love the site as a community, but what are your thoughts on just the sites design..??
9. ah ok 1 more question..who wants to tie me up or keep me distracted so i stop tinkering withit (unless u think i should keep on with the never ending improving)

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1
updated by @soaring-eagle: 01/13/15 09:27:56PM

1. With what you have said you have been doing I don't think so. It hasn't affected my speed or ability to use the site but I don't know how many people here are still on slower connections.
2. Are you asking specifically about the tweaks you've made? In that case I think that the fade effect on the advertisement is a good idea because it makes it much easier to look at.
3. Same question as number 2, only in regards to what you have changed? I can't say that any of the changes has annoyed me at all.
4. As far as tweaking goes, What I would suggest is not so much a "cool" or dynamic tweak but I feel that the site text interspersed with the advertisements should be separated out. For instance, I have 2 Xfinity ads above and below the sidebar links that almost makes them visually non-existant. Then there is the mobile phone info below the 2nd Xfinity ad which for the first month my eyes skimmed over as part of the advertising. If these things that were site specific were pulled out from between the ads I think it will be easier for people to notice them, read them, and use them.
5. Hardly noticeable on my end.
6. A group sounds like a good idea! If no one ever joins then you can always kill it, right? So skin off your back. I'm not sure how many people here are webdesign literate but it would be great to share the little tips and tricks within the code. I personally would love to overhaul my page but I am too busy most times to dig through the source code to find the stuff I am looking for to do it. :P
7. Same as number 6, I believe. Ooh, maybe there is a way to make and submit templates for other users to be able to use?
8. To be perfectly honest, I would enjoy a more streamline design opposed to a more dynamic. One of the things that I keep seeing with new users is that they comment on having trouble finding stuff or taking a long time to figure out the site and how it works. Maybe this is due to the design. Just curious, are you doing this yourself or working from a template or do you have people helping you with the site design? I remember the contest for new design and saw some people posted... what happened to that?
9. Haha, bondage, eh? :P Who'd have thought. Anyhoo, I'm sure you will be plenty busy with reading this long reply for a while

Are you talking about when you mouseover the current topics and they balloon out?

bobbi blaine said:

i have one request... can you stop the rollover pop up effect on the forum page? : )

Am I not seeing it? I wish I could alter the back ground of my group screens like I can on my personal page.

1. nope

2. I like the "mouseover balloon effect thingy"

3. didn't care for the feature photo fall animation

4. agree with rebecca, while the grey is nice & neutral it is a bit bland looking, i'm not really sure what would be better tho...?

5. seems fast enough to me

6. doesnt' bother me. & a group for the tips & tricks sounds good

7. interested but i don't like messing with what i don't know hah

8. agree with valerie about new ppl coming in, maybe you need something noticeable right away with the dreaducation so that everyone will read that first?

9. you can help me with my blog soon, other than that what's a good distraction for you?

k thnx everyone rebeca simple solution get firefox internet explorer sux!

groups can be styled but its more of a hack what id have to do is make a stle sheet as a file, attach that to anything like a group post or whatever then insert a <link type=text/css> in the html linking to the style sheet

by doing this you can style every group diferently

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1

oh and val i didnt respond to your quesytions the design contest nobody really submitted anything so i redesigned it myself th sites actualy about as esy to use as i can make it i streamlined and simplifiesd alort of the navigation ass an example but with over a million pages its still not going to be a site where yiu just click a next button to go through the site and some ppl dont see whats right in front of them so cant figure oit out its not a design issue (example how do i add a photo to this discussion when the add photo button is right there in front of them)

i do the designing mysyself it is template based like your profiles you can change themes and customize the themes in the design studio then add css code to really modify it exactly the way you want it

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1

1. The changes have all been pretty subtle except for the homepage, so I don't think you've gone too far. I don't think even very big changes would go too far, since over time, certain things can be improved. If you think there are improvement to be made, I'd support that
2. I love the layout of the homepage, it's a lot less cramped and confusing as it used to be, when I first joined. And the animation/picture thing there too is cool.
3. None of the changes annoy me.
4. Can't really answer that, I don't know what possible changes you can make since I know nothing about all that stuff.
5. Not at all. I wouldn't want you to take anything away from the site (unless it was something hardly at all noticeable of course) just to make it a tiny bit faster. To be honest, it doesn't even bother me anymore, I'm on a poetry site that's slow too, so I'm used to it.
6. A group for tips and everything is a really great idea I like that.
7. I haven't done anything to my page at all yet, regarding design, mostly out of laziness, but it'd be great to give people the option to make their page look how they want.
8. I like the design. I think when some people first join they find the navigation confusing because there's so much content, but it's just a case of exploring and getting used to it. This is like my virtual home, so the design itself has become a part of it in my opinion.
9. As long as you want to make improvements, I think it's a good thing.

thnx tara and yea i really simplified the navigation awhile back when i redid the menu and added the 2 drop down menus

there has been a group since the new design studio was released and was added to personal pages its called page pimpers but hasnt been used alot but if anyones interrested i can write up plenty of tutorials in there

--
My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1