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radiodelicate
New Member
Sweden
53 Posts |
 Posted - 13 July 2008 : 07:29:19
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The Ark is one of Sweden's most famous rock bands at the moment, and I've had the fortune to work at their forum.
When I took over, the forum was suffering terribly from spam, and it was still stuck at a 3.3.03
No MODs or customizations had been done what so ever.
basically, it looked like this
What I wanted to do was not only to bring it up to date, but also to make it feel like it was truly a part of the rest of their website.
I was rather experienced with HTML and CSS, but had never ever touched anything that had anything to do with databases before, so it was a true challenge. It was all trial and error, and these forums have been a great help!
this is what it looks like today
http://thearkworld.com/forum/default.asp
user/password is demo/demo is you wanna have a look.
For comparison, this is what the main site looks like
http://thearkworld.com/main.asp< |
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ruirib
Snitz Forums Admin
Portugal
26364 Posts |
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radiodelicate
New Member
Sweden
53 Posts |
Posted - 13 July 2008 : 10:13:36
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thanks!  < |
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JJenson
Advanced Member
USA
2121 Posts |
Posted - 13 July 2008 : 12:38:45
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It looks very very nice.
Great job on the look and feel.< |
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radiodelicate
New Member
Sweden
53 Posts |
Posted - 14 July 2008 : 03:30:09
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quote:
Originally posted by JJenson
It looks very very nice.
Great job on the look and feel.
thank you :)
I think I did pretty well considering I've never done anything like it before.< |
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Grandmaster
Starting Member
Brazil
46 Posts |
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leatherlips
Senior Member
USA
1838 Posts |
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Will-Scotland
Starting Member
United Kingdom
1 Posts |
Posted - 21 July 2008 : 15:48:08
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| That looks amazing - really good job you've done.< |
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leatherlips
Senior Member
USA
1838 Posts |
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radiodelicate
New Member
Sweden
53 Posts |
Posted - 22 July 2008 : 05:23:32
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quote:
Originally posted by leatherlips
One suggestion I would have it for you to decrease the file size of the header image. It is 364kb. That's pretty big for a header graphic in my opinion. If you saved it as a gif you could get it down to about 80kb or so and it would like exactly the same.
thanks for the input!
I really didn't like the way how the colours in the feathers compressed in gif though, but what you said made me realize there might be other ways of decreasing the file size. I chopped the image into two pieces. The top with the text and the beige bars are now a png with a size of 5kb, and the actual image is a 133kb jpg.< |
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AnonJr
Moderator
United States
5768 Posts |
Posted - 22 July 2008 : 06:23:46
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| You could also use a PNG and shrink down the size with PNGOUT/PNGGauntlet or OptiPNG. You'd have all your colors, and it would probably be smaller. I'd make the PNG from your original though. (assuming that you have an original Photoshop file, or something)< |
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radiodelicate
New Member
Sweden
53 Posts |
Posted - 22 July 2008 : 07:07:25
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| I gave PNGGauntlet a try, but the output still was about 345kb, so it seems like slicing the image still is the better option.< |
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AnonJr
Moderator
United States
5768 Posts |
Posted - 22 July 2008 : 13:48:27
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| When you ran it through PNGGauntlet, did you start with a PNG as outputted by your graphics program or did you convert the existing image? I ask only because it does make a difference.< |
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phy1729
Average Member
USA
589 Posts |
Posted - 22 July 2008 : 14:13:37
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| I ran the original PNG through PNGcrush and it did not make a significant difference.< |
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AnonJr
Moderator
United States
5768 Posts |
Posted - 22 July 2008 : 14:30:46
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I'd try with PNGOUT (PNGGauntlet is simply a .NET GUI for PNGOUT) as some have gotten better results with PNGOUT than with the other options. I've got a few other articles from different people that essentially echo the results that Jeff Atwood had gotten.
Either way, even a small reduction is significant - especially when you get that bandwidth bill.  < |
Edited by - AnonJr on 22 July 2008 14:31:36 |
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radiodelicate
New Member
Sweden
53 Posts |
Posted - 23 July 2008 : 05:43:12
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hehe yeah that's true. Well I'm quite content with the solution I have right now, I think 138kb in total is pretty alright for a header :)
If anyone wanna have a look again, I've changed the folder icons into peacock feathers instead, to make it fit the theme even more.
New posts
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First I tried to find a good stock graphic of a peacock feather, but then realized it would probably be better if I just made it myself in order to get exactly what I wanted.< |
Edited by - radiodelicate on 23 July 2008 05:47:16 |
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The Ark official forum
