To be blunt, I’d grown tired of the previous look. I liked the simplicity, but I thought it was a little hard to read and I wanted to brighten it up a bit. The previous look was the Arclite Theme by Digitalnature that I had tweaked a little to customize the look a bit. Nothing too fancy. Since I generally liked that theme, I figured I’d start my search for a new look with that theme’s designer.
I was immediately drawn to the Mystique theme (there’s a link to load a blog with the out-of-the-box look), but had some quibbles with the stock look thinking it a bit too fancy, so I went elsewhere. After test driving a bunch of other themes on my backup blog here at home, I finally came back to Mystique and started tweaking the CSS sheet. Little things like colors and font sizes. I don’t know if my changes might have mucked up other stuff, so if you pick up on anything glaring, let me know.
Other modifications: I’ve eliminated the header bar and replaced it with the Site Nav menu over yonder on the sidebar. The Site Search has also been moved from the header area to the sidebar.
Lastly, I’ve added a couple of WordPress Widgets to the sidebar- the Calendar and the Tabbed Menu. The Calendar is pretty self-explanatory, but the Tabbed Menu I thought was a slick little way to conserve sidebar area and still provide a bunch of nice features.
The tabs each provide a different means for checking out the blog. The first tab is a Categories tab, followed by Tags, Archives, Popular Posts and Recent Comments. The Tags tab allows you to bring up posts based on tags I’ve assigned to the various posts. The larger the font size over there, the more posts corresponding to that tag. Popular Posts is based on a simple metric of number of comments to a post. The other tabs are self-explanatory.
Another subtle, but nice, feature is noticeable when viewing a single post. In the upper left-hand and right-hand corners of the post, above its title, are links to the previous post and next post, respectively. These links are not visible on the main page since it’s a running list of the past 20 or so posts.
Lastly, I’ve added a favicon which is just a smaller version of the background picture. You might see it pop-up in the address bar, or possibly on the tab in your browser. That picture is from Michael Yon and he’s given permission to use the picture (not just me- anyone who wishes to. See the link.). I thought it only right to give credit where it’s due.
The main goal was to make the site brighter and easier on the eyes; ultimately, making it more readable. I think that’s been accomplished (It’s already been given the Wife’s Official Seal of Approval.) Suggestions for further tweaks are welcome.
And now- back to regularly scheduled blogging…
UPDATE 3/28:
I’ve additionally modified the extend entry “MORE” link for long posts.
UPDATE 3/30:
Prodded by a suggestion in the comments, I’ve changed the “Site Nav” by creating buttons. Before, those links were created using a WordPress widget. I’ve removed the widget and hardcoded the links as the buttons there now. It looks a little more like the old nav bar that was in the header, but the position is now relegated to the sidebar. Also, I’ve subtely modified the site’s favicon.
3 replies on “A New Look”
Neat !!!
I like it, a little refresh is always nice and your homage to your high school colors may be subliminal or intentional, it is hard to tell, but either way they have always looked nice together.
Does the site have RSS Feed capability for the main blog posts and not just the responses? I saw the little logo on the sidebar when you rollover it that I thought was RSS, but ended up being XML text, not sure the point of that feature. Also, I think the sidebar is a little oversize, you could maybe narrow it down a bit. Although, when you tab over to the “recent posts” it is convenient to have a little more real estate so the word wrap does not look like a barber pole a mile long. Maybe switching the font size on that tab would help solve both issues, or maybe even the font size of the whole sidebar would allow you to shrink it a bit.
The other thing that catches me is the style of the Site Nav section. I don’t think it clearly conveys the importance of that aspect of the site, as it is basically the Master navigation point of the entire site. It is essentially your iPod Home Button, but it looks more like a simple link list that shows up at the bottom of the most webpages. Maybe by bulking up the links under the Site Nav bar, or making them more bulky or prominent, it would help to distinguish this part of the site as a more central feature. I understand you are trying to link the styling that exists all the way down the bar, but I just think that aesthetically it should have a little more “heft” to it. That was what was nice about the old bar across the top, but I do like the switch, it cleans up the site and makes it flow nicer with everything off to the right…just my personal take, one heck of an overhaul though, it definitely is a very professional set of changes and I like them quite a bit.
The RSS Feed under Site Nav is a main feed for the site- while if you select the Categories tab you can select an RSS feed for different categories. By clicking on them, you get the URL for the feed and should be able to copy that into an RSS client, or your browser may give you the option to subscribe to the feed.
I eliminated the Site Nav bar on the top with this theme because I didn’t like it’s location. I thought it took up too much or the header area up top. I’ll look at trying to come up with a better solution- perhaps something along the lines of your suggestions.
The ratio of the main page to the sidebar is 2 to 1, which seemed like a good proportion. I can skinny it up a bit and see how it looks. If I do that, I may increase the font size to make the site a little more iPod/ smartphone friendly.
Part of the issue here is I’m looking at it on a normal screen, as opposed to a wide screen. I think that makes a difference when judging the overall look.
Thanks for the suggestions, I’ll see what I can do.