I've invited some friends to check this page out, because it has a few design elements that I've been toying with for the final design of this site. So, if you wound up here for some other reason, well, move along. Nothing to see here. I haven't even tried to make this page look pretty.
Originally, I was going to try for an assortment of Art Nouveau elements, but I really couldn't work up enough skill to do anything that baroque. If you'd like to see an example of what I'd hoped to do, click here, and you'll see a draft of a introductory-screen logo for the site.
So, instead, I decided to go with my second-favorite style, Art Deco. Like Nouveau, it evokes a past that can never be recovered, but only rediscovered, and it's a nostalgia that might not get revived for a long time. (After all, they're reviving the 1970's and 1980's, and by the time they're sick of that dreck they'll be dredging the 1990's before we've even hit 2010.) And its simple, streamlined motifs are easy enough for a gimp like me to duplicate in Corel Draw.
I won't be working with Flash animations, and I'm keeping Java and ASP scripts to what I can make in Dreamweaver. The main reason for this is that I don't have the software to do Flash. But the other reason is that I like to archive stuff from the Web in Adobe Acrobat, and when large amounts of text are presented Flash, I can't do this. I'd like people to get some research use out of my articles, so I'll present them in good ol' HTML for the time being. (I am severely tempted to stream some 1920's ballroom music via Real Audio. Most likely, it'll be stuff by Jack Hylton, Paul Whiteman or Bix Biederbecke. Click on Hylton's name to hear an example.)
If you have a look at my Flashman Papers site,l you'll see how I've used three frames. The top frame simply holds the logo. The left side frame holds a list of categories. Clicking on these loads a new page into the main frame. Not a bad design, ergonomically speaking.
Plan 1 for my own site involves four frames. The upper left, the smallest (Frame 1), will hold a logo reading "Brian Siano." The upper right, which will run nearly the full width (Frame 2), will hold buttons directing users to five or six subsections devoted to my "Writings," my "Interests," my "Links," and whatever general categories I want.
The lower left frame (Frame 3) will hold lists of items under the Categories that are shown in Frame 2. For example, you'd click on "Writings," and Frame 3 would fill with a list of my articles. (Right now, I'm also having it load a new background image for each Category.) You'd click on one of these, and it would then be loaded into Frame 4, the largest frame of the site. For a graphic of this layout, with some rough images, click here.
You get the general idea. They'd match up seamlessly in the final page.) But these present some problems. That quarter-circle in the upper-left frame-- well, shouldn't the material in the left-side frame continue the design vertically? I tried it, but the result was a kind of purple border on two sides that looked kind of dull. I wanted to have use the vertical frame to show some classic Deco-verticality things, like the Chrysler building (see below). So maybe that quarter-circle logo ain't the best idea, but so far, it's the best I have.
Oh,
by the way, in the final version, the logo will light up when you pass your
pointer over it. I've finally figured out how to do a nice transparent glow
in Corel Draw 7, and the test illustrations here will demonstrate the general
"look."
Here's
where I'm starting to get punchy. I'd thought about doing something very simple
for that top frame-- just some nice Deco circles, just like the main logo--
but that neon-light effect really got to me. So, I thought about taking a photograph
of a nice Deco building, like the one at the right, and inserting neon signs
along its roof. (I'd have to render this into a night scene, however.)
The neat part about this idea was that the lower portion of the building could be rendered in nice pale colors, and used as a background for the documents that would appear in the frame below it-- thus, allowing a "match" with the image above, and giving the sense that one is scrolling down the length of the building.
I haven't quite followed this idea through just yet. Maybe I haven't found the right building to use-- the one at the right, while nice, ain't exactly right. Maybe the neon logo I was using-- Diner, the one in that purple circle above-- looked too 1940's, too film noir, for this style. Or maybe I'm afraid I won't be able to match a photograph with Corel Draw enhancements.
Here are some examples of the kind of images that would be the background of that side frame, the one listing the items that you'll be able to view. They're designed to fill a vertical space, about 150 picels wide.
The first image is just a repeating motif-- I copped the style from old 1930's movie title cards. The second is a photo of the Chrysler Building that I doctored a little. The original photo didn't show much below the green lights, so I digitally added a few stories to fill out the space. The third is an illustration by Hugh Ferriss, which I've tinted greenish-blue for some interest. The fourth is a paste-up of a tapestry design by John Held titled Rhapsody. It should be a tiling pattern, but it seems to tile in a skewed way, and the scan I have is skewed slightly as well.
I
came across this photo of something called Dreamland, and just to experiment
I tried to work up an electric-sign-like mock-up that was sort of like the signs
in the photo. I thought that if those smaller signs-- the ones reading "Cinema"
and "Ballroom" and the like--ran next to one another across the top
of the screen, I could maybe make a "Brian Siano" logo that would
run down the left side of the screen like the word "Dreamland" runs
down the right.
Just as a kind of a test, mainly to try to find a decent font, I came up with this test example. Now, if I can just match things like the reflections on the nearby walls, I might have something.
So... any opinions? Feedback?
Copyright 2000-6 Brian Siano
(unless otherwise noted)