Design Refresh
If you’re reading this from a feed reader, then hop on over to DustinDiaz.com and check out the latest design iteration of ./with Imagination. The first thing you might notice… it’s white!. Yes. Finally. A website you can read. However I still believe I’ve maintained the brand despite such a contrast switch. Nevertheless, for those that still enjoy the light-on-dark, I whipped up a simple contrast switcher located at the top right hand corner of each webpage. Go ahead, click it; your preference will be saved. Also if you’re so inclined, take the tour as well. You wouldn’t want to miss that.
Page/Font Scaler
One of the coolest things that I enjoyed with the new design is the page’s ability to scale with the font. Feel free to use either your own browser shortcuts (”control” - “+” or “-”) or the font-scaling links located in the header near the top right located as “A, A+, A++.” Take special note that the size of the webpage will scale along side any changes in font-size.
A Design for You
In the end, the inspiration for the redesign was you, the reader. Taking what I learned from Google, and applying it to my brand, I think I have achieved something special despite the minimalist look. It is indeed, very utilitarian, but with hopes that it will be easier to use and give you a better user experience. Cheers!
November 27th, 2007 at 2:01 am
I found it better now, good job pal!
November 27th, 2007 at 2:14 am
“it’s white”, looks grey to me. In a good way
November 27th, 2007 at 2:23 am
Looks great! Even though white on dark can look good, this design is a great improvement. Makes reading a lot easier as well.
November 27th, 2007 at 2:27 am
I found the black design better…
BTW, you forgot to set the font color to black, if you’re like me and you have a dark visual style with light gray texts, your site’s text appears gray on gray :)
November 27th, 2007 at 2:39 am
Very nice,finally an example of an elastic layout that makes sense. I always struggled to use elastic layout as I tried to contain them within the viewing area. But once you see the joy of increasing type size up to huge, you see what the advantage is, if I had poor vision this would be great. Thanks.
November 27th, 2007 at 2:49 am
First off: great site. But! In Firefox 2.0.0.9 on XP the kerning in the main text isn’t looking so good. In IE7 it looks how I guess it’s supposed to…
November 27th, 2007 at 4:12 am
Nice design - but the name is still not decided? Its been ‘./ with imagination’ for months.
November 27th, 2007 at 4:29 am
It was good.
Now it’s good too.
Maybe the current look seems more “serious” (maybe).
I don’t know but i’s someway better. :)
November 27th, 2007 at 4:30 am
It was good.
Now it’s good too.
Maybe the current look seems more “serious” (maybe).
I don’t know but it’s someway better. :)
November 27th, 2007 at 4:50 am
This is way better than white on black, good job!
November 27th, 2007 at 4:52 am
Dustin, the new look is nice. Definitely simple and easy on the eyes. And it loads much faster too!
Jim
November 27th, 2007 at 5:00 am
This color scheme is so much easier on the eyes Dustin. Good stuff.
November 27th, 2007 at 5:52 am
Dustin,
While I enjoyed your dark theme, I find your new one soo much easier on the eye. I don’t know if you’ve also changed the font size, however everything seems that much more readable now - it’s one of the key things that will draw me back to a site, great content and easy to navigate/read.
Really good job I think,
Al.
November 27th, 2007 at 7:01 am
Much easier to read and I think it does still carry over the “Dustin Diaz Brand” from the old design. Great work.
November 27th, 2007 at 8:04 am
I like the utilitarian design that you’ve implemented, Dustin. I’m not able to check it on a Mac, but in Firefox/Win the letter-spacing on #main p has resulted in some pretty uneven kerning that impacts readability for me. Letter-spacing still appears to be poorly supported by browsers. I’ve got a screenshot, in case you’re interested in what it looks like:
./ With Imagination srceenshot
I found that I was able to increase readability (for me) and preserve the open feel by using default letter spacing and increasing the line height a little.
I apologize if this is unwanted feedback. I really do like the overall look of the site. Nice work. :)
November 27th, 2007 at 8:48 am
Dustin: It’s looking nice. I especially like Buzzy the tour-guide.
November 27th, 2007 at 9:45 am
Good one. I find this colour scheme much more readable than white on black.
November 27th, 2007 at 9:46 am
Looks way better, although looking at a few of the archives it looks like code snippets don’t stand out that well. That’s my only complaint, but in the end it’s the content that counts, and that’s never been a problem.
November 27th, 2007 at 10:34 am
Nice work - Very happy that you left the option for me, the user, to decide which contrast to use!
I have read several articles where people criticize the use of dark backgrounds with light text, which is just plain ridiculous! Being in front of a computer for at least 8 hours per day, I cannot stand staring at overpowering bright backgrounds all day.
This is an excellent example of empowering the user and not making blanket assumptions based on personal experience.
Great work, as always!
November 27th, 2007 at 10:38 am
Love the minimalism — the previous design had some nice widgets, but this one is much more pleasant to read.
I’m no expert typographer, but might I suggest bumping up the line-height, perhaps from 1.3 to 1.5 or so? Georgia is a pretty font, but sometimes it needs a little space.
November 27th, 2007 at 10:52 am
Wow, this has singly been one of the most welcoming and delightful set of comments I’ve received for a redesign. Thanks very much to everyone so far.
@Scott Nelle: Thanks for grabbing that screenshot, I’ll have a muck around on Window Firefox and poke around with what I can do.
And everyone else, thanks for the suggestions. Your feedback is excellent.
November 27th, 2007 at 12:38 pm
Thank you for making it easier on the eyes. As for the new design, looks good, could look better with finer adjustments in the area of spacing, color, and typography.
November 27th, 2007 at 2:26 pm
Dustin, the truth is .. that now I can lurk at your blog
without fear at my workplace , because it seems more professional >D
(…Honestly I don’t know who estabilished that lighter layout is more professional…)
November 27th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
um, its just the default wordpress install template I see. I assume maybe you are working on your site or something?
November 27th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
@kenrick: Indeed it was. I completely nuked the blog after the upgrade! All is well now. You seem to be the only commenter who noticed it during that brief 30 minutes. I had to quickly run home and reupload the new theme etc. And to think it was my smoothest redesign ever :\
November 27th, 2007 at 3:58 pm
This is so much easier on my eyes. I love the layout changes too. Great job, Dustin.
November 27th, 2007 at 4:38 pm
Nice redesign, but on a personal note, it’s immeasurably sad to hear real people talk about their “brand”.
November 27th, 2007 at 5:13 pm
You should make your tour guide move onto the next point when you click the text box.
November 27th, 2007 at 11:00 pm
@Wells: Brand is influenced by “look and feel.” Look and feel is determined by interaction, layout and aesthetics. With this latest redesign, I felt that my “brand” was maintained.
November 27th, 2007 at 11:30 pm
I like the previous black theme better, even the green links too (got a very console feel).
The grey background’s fine but blue links doesn’t sit well with it no matter what the UX ppl say.
Good job on the theme switcher, At least readers like me have a choice. :-)
November 29th, 2007 at 12:29 pm
Boring compared to the old one. I liked the green and orange. BTW, just so you don’t think Florent is the only one, I also have my browser text set to gray, so I see gray on gray text here, which I doubt is what you intended.
I like the contrast switcher, but I’d kill the text size widgets.
November 30th, 2007 at 6:27 pm
Dustin,you are not a web designer. I liked the one with the butterflies the best, this is too sterile.
December 1st, 2007 at 2:41 pm
It looks a lot more professional, but it would be nice if the code snippets stood out a little more. The about page needs an update, too.
December 13th, 2007 at 1:44 pm
Excellent!
On the black one, if i read here for a long time then went to a light site it really done my head in so good job.
There’s a horizontal scroller on Firefox but meh it’s a small trade off for a readable website.
I love the Googleish plain, light and simple approach to design.