our first flash site... please critique

[B&B dsgn]

Hello Everyone!

We are new to the forum- when I saw we I mean my girlfriend and I. We are both seniors studying GD at the Fashion Institute of Technology in NYC and have joined skills to do some freelance work.

This is our first flash site. The client was a friend of ours who owns a movie-themed sneaker boutique. Due to bad planning on behalf of him and his partner, we were asked to halt a current project and produce, WITHIN A WEEK, a flash site as a front page to lead into their existing online store and blog.

Please keep in mind that not only was the deadline a week to complete this landing page (design, typesetting, coding, etc), we also had to manage our academic schedule as full-time students.

We'd love to hear any and all feedback. Thanks!

http://extrabutterny.com/landing_page/butter_landing_page.html

[B&B dsgn]

P.S. just wondering how much this work deserved... i'd like to reference for future jobs. thanks

[MikeHun]

For a flash site I consider it static and quite underutilized the exact opposite of what can be achieved with flash. As for conveying the information, your website, well it's bad... I would consider HTML/CSS, the coding looks like a blog template. 100 dollars, maybe. Only my honest opinion.

[tZ]

I'd have to agree. Flash for flash sake. If your going to use flash then use flash. Otherwise you might as well have created it the correct way…

[Prosco]

I liked the design but... this design don't make me think of a shoe store.
So this design is a bit misleading.
I would also choose a bigger font size for the content and for menu buttons as well

[steve2112]

tz is right. is you are making a flash site i want to see flash stuff. i could code all that quicker in HTML then making it in flash and actionscripting. It looks like elements are floating all over the place with no flow. i would think about hierarchy a bit more and how the eye is flowing around the page. I would also either make some interesting flash stuff happen or redo it in HTML with some flash movies in it. I think it would load better and quicker too as html than flash.

steve

[Totem-Media]

...This is our first flash site. The client was a friend of ours who owns a movie-themed sneaker boutique. Due to bad planning on behalf of him and his partner, we were asked to halt a current project and produce, WITHIN A WEEK, a flash site as a front page to lead into their existing online store and blog.

They sell shoes or does "sneaker" have a new definition now?

I see what you were trying to achieve and completely understand the deadline you had. Like others said, it isn't very flashy or Flashy ;) and doesn't tell me anything about the store. If I came across this on the Net, I wouldn't have a clue what it was about and wouldn't click on any links.

[bismal]

I dont like flash because of this (and because of the new mobile internet-anywhere culture that is going to take over)

It's a perfect example of using flash when html, css and jquery would be cleaner, easier on the browser and like TZ said, more 'correct'

[steve2112]

exactly,
If things are done in flash then it should be because it simply isn't possible to do it in html or you are designing for something specific like dvd menus or in-game menu. In this case HTML would be a better alternative in many ways easier to update especially with CSS, it would be searchable and since they are selling show you would want them to get hit by search engines and if this is too demonstrate skill then people who might hire you might also know the downsides to flash and you ould have to justify having a shopping site not accessible by search engines.

steve

[bandwagon]

the main photo is poor, and doesn't convey what I think you need/want.

If you're going to use flash, make it more interesting with some slow-moving photgraphy or more interactive rollovers/buttons.

its ok for a quick time-scale, but its not finished.

the picture of the seats looks a bit bland. An actual photo would work much better, with less red. A darker image with just touches of light reflecting off the tops would look cool. With more light in the centre of the page obviously.

Hope this helps...