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Best Website Designs of 2010

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Re: Best Website Designs of 2010

#31

Post by krosaen »

dpcan wrote: post #3

What I wouldn't give to watch YouTube videos of some of these designers putting these sites together. Everything from how they get the background textures, to adding gradients, shadows, altering colors, everything. It would be amazing. I'd probably pay to watch a 10 part series from an accomplished designer who goes start to finish designing some of these nice sites.

That would be cool. Perhaps even more interesting to me would be the thought process behind each decision, font choices, font sizes, spacing, layout etc. If you watch enough videos on lynda.com you can get pretty good at production of design, but design itself is much harder in my experience.

Re: Best Website Designs of 2010

#32

Post by johndar »

Except maybe for "ben the bodyguard", these websites are pretty much all "design" and no "web". In fact, most of these look like they were made straight out of Illustrator (a couple of those websites are actually huge images stitched together with no text!).

Re: Best Website Designs of 2010

#33

Post by rapind »

redthrowaway wrote: post #22
jamesteow wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm just taking this list as what it is: A list of very well crafted websites that hopefully inspire others for their own work. And really, what's wrong with style over substance? It's not like a firm needs to have a Reddit/Gmail style of a design. I, like you, use Facebook, Gmail, and Reddit quite a bit. However, I don't consider their design to be as outstanding as their functionality (which I know we'll disagree w…

If you look at design as being purely aesthetic, then I agree with you. If, however, you approach design as does an architect, that is, to facilitate human interaction with a necessary medium, then these sites suck. They are a chair that looks really great from a distance, but that you can't sit in. It's pretty and pointless.

I disagree. You're generalizing and not looking at the business purpose of the sites.

If the purpose of your site is to impress potential clients then there's absolutely nothing wrong with: http://www.dawghousedesignstudio.com/

If the purpose of your site is world domination of classified ads then there's absolutely nothing wrong with: http://toronto.en.craigslist.ca/

Re: Best Website Designs of 2010

#34

Post by dawgr »

thingie wrote: post #10
iamjustlooking wrote: post #2

Have there been any good looking regular websites released this year? A lot of best of lists tend to just be a list of portfolio and design studio websites.

I really liked this one, for example. http://www.cmap.illinois.gov/

It looks good but there are some bad choices in my opinion, like having transparent menu backgrounds. It decreases readability, for example on the menu "GO TO 2040", "Regional Mobility" merges with the background and it becomes hard to read.

Re: Best Website Designs of 2010

#38

Post by redstripe »

iamjustlooking wrote: post #2

Have there been any good looking regular websites released this year? A lot of best of lists tend to just be a list of portfolio and design studio websites.

Only app I spotted on that list was http://www.coolendar.com/ Seems to be hosted on google app engine. Nice example of simple design that does one thing very nicely.

The rest looked like brochures. Not nearly as impressive as a functional app with a good UI.

Re: Best Website Designs of 2010

#39

Post by dawgr »

rossriley wrote: post #27
dawgr wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read somewhere recently that most sites are using central layout now as opposed to fixed or liquid. I was looking for tutorials but I didn't find any, how would I go about making a central layout?

you just need a container, make the width of it about 980px and set the margin like so: #page_container {margin:0px auto;}

Alright thank you. Just one last question, within that 980px space, would the design be liquid or fixed? Maybe it sounds stupid but I'm kind of new to CSS.

Re: Best Website Designs of 2010

#40

Post by redthrowaway »

rapind wrote: post #33
redthrowaway wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you look at design as being purely aesthetic, then I agree with you. If, however, you approach design as does an architect, that is, to facilitate human interaction with a necessary medium, then these sites suck. They are a chair that looks really great from a distance, but that you can't sit in. It's pretty and pointless.

I disagree. You're generalizing and not looking at the business purpose of the sites. If the purpose of your site is to impress potential clients then there's absolutely nothing wrong with: http://www.dawghousedesignstudio.com/ If the purpose of your site is world domination of classified ads then there's absolutely nothing wrong with: http://toronto.en.craigslist.ca/

Dawghouse is an exception. I actually quite like that one. However, I don't like it because it's "pretty", I like it because it follows good design fundamentals and includes nice little touches - like js button highlighting on mouseover. It looks well-put together. I'd hire them.
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