Mar 09
Day 2 – Design Per Day
Design number two is out 5 minutes before the deadline. Much more detail in this design than the last with probably two hours spent more than the last time. I am happier with this design than the last, but there is still lots of improvement to be made. Inspiration came from the Imprezz theme found at Smashing Magazine.
Overall
I tried involving some contrasting colors. I am having difficulty finding good places for those colors. I am going to concentrate on this a lot more in future designs. Perhaps starting with a different color scheme will make it easier to apply the contrasting colors.
I am not typically a fan of three-column layouts, especially for a forum application, but I went with one anyway. I like it, but I had a hard time filling all the columns, and if I did not fill them as much as I did, the page would look rather empty.
Header
Very simple this time. I managed to reduce the number of links in the header compared to the original design by adding a search box to the red sidebar. I have also considered adding a chat area to the bottom of the home page that would get users using it more, and remove one more link from the header. Probably would not happen, but it is a remote possibility.
Main Content Area
Filling the content area was the most challenging part of this design. I normally design the look of each individual thread to be long and narrow, and with this design, I was forced to shorten them up. This allowed me to add some extra information that is not normally seen with the threads. Seeing a count for the number of unread posts can give a user a rough idea of how much time he will spend reading all his or her unread posts.
By placing a mini calendar in the sidebar, I can add a plain list of events to the main content area. I normally would not do this, but as long as a user can have a glimpse of the upcoming events, I am willing to take a chance.
Sidebar
Quite a bit more detail in the overall sidebar this round. The Awards and Links sections are both rather bland once again; I am struggling to make them different. The search box in the sidebar was placed there so users are more aware of its existence and to remove a link from the header. The mini calendar is growing on me. Getting the color right on it is extremely difficult. I tried several different schemes and finally settled on this. I unfortunately could not determine a satisfactory way of displaying the number of events on each day. If this were implemented, I would plan to use a large balloon tooltip on each day that would contain the title and a short description of each event for that day. I moved the “Who’s Online” section into the sidebar because there is plenty of room for it. Without it, the red sidebar looked empty and like it was missing something.
Footer
Can you even call it a footer?
March 12th, 2009 at 12:04 am
My personal favorite is the alumni “reltations” :) Seriously though it looks pretty good. The column layout is really cool with the title colors. What’s with the calendar? Can I click it? Without that help text, I would assume the search was for the calendar. Sweet and JIT.
March 12th, 2009 at 1:32 am
The calendar style is sick. Would one (or both) of the secondary columns be collapsible?
March 12th, 2009 at 10:22 am
@Nate: If you have an idea how to show that a day in the calendar has events, I would love to hear it. I struggled for a long time and eventually stopped trying. After I published, I started thinking a thick inner border might be useful to indicate a day with events, but I never got around to trying it out.
@Nick: The columns would not be collapsible, but they would not appear on every page. When viewing a thread, I like having most if not all of the width of the page for listing posts. I find it much easier to read than posts that are only half the width of the page.