Topic: BobaFett.com Evolution Discussion

Hi everyone, :D

I am currently discussing with Aaron concerning the possible evolution of BFFC as a website. I already sent him my ideas in emails, but I thought it would be useful to post it here as well so YOU the members, can bring your comments and suggestions. Many heads are better than one.

*Aaron, I hope you don't mind me pasting this here, I thought it could be useful if we got everyone's participation. They have an importance with this site too.

Ok, now I'd like to have everyone's comments and suggestions about what was said here. If you agree, or disagree, if you have suggestions regarding any point, please say it. Aaron is the one who'll take any final decisions, but I'm sure he'll take your comments in consideration.

Hoping to hear from everyone! :D

.

Honestly I like the layout of the boards.  I think a background graphic would make it a bit too busy.  But I agree wholeheartedly with the mainpage.  It seems very cluttered.

well, everything Sev said fits my boat.

Like on " BFFC Colours "

I'd like it if they were a bit more colourful. Black, red and grey are a bit dull looking, but that's just my opinion.

Also, more Games or polls in the news and games bit.

Sorry, if it seems impossible... :P

Green. :)

I like the boards the way they are. I like the site the way it is too, the background colors are nice. They're easy on the eyes. If it were red on black, for example, no one could see it, especially those with HD. If there were a background image it would make loading time much longer, and it would be distracting. I hate sites with background images (or a lot of images, like an imagemap linkbar thingie) because they're impossible to navigate. I don't go to sw.com anymore because of their big, bright, tons of images, and fancy stuff. Simple is better. If the site were to change it's background to something hard to see I wouldn't come here anymore.

i had a chance to read over ur letter terra and i know that ur getting into the web design scene.
so i thought u r comments were astute and i agree w/ them. if it is possible it seems too much info is accessible on several pages.
chatroom since u brought it up has recycling news info, last posts (which i like.) but this is also on the first page.
to find out who might be in the chatroom u have to go to the boards page...which is odd.
i like the boards by the way they r clean and a few boards that i belong to- r busy and people have huge graphical
annoyances in their quotes. so i like this.
point being it is busy but i do like the fact that there is little to no flash animation to bog down loading etc.
another observation is that the main page has imbedded videos in a few places on it. IMHO not really needed. i do think the revolving title banners r nice, news is in a good place. i think the image gallery could be reworked but all this takes time and i know how little we all have.
drop down menus r great. sites r always evolving- if u see a site u like the layout of make a mental note and link it. as always i am on stand by for any graphical help i can assist w/
and i have a few banners that r in mothballs right now, hopfully to be reveled soon :)

I agree with a lot about with what you mention about the mutliple fonts, and the main page. The boards are what I use the most, and they seem clear enough.  Perhaps a simplification of the main page would draw more fans in.
Honestly, I happen to like the simple grey, black and red color scheme. They are some of my favorite colors. I've seen sits with simply too much backround textures and images, and I have found some to be too distracting and bothersome to my eyes to read somethings on the pages. They made it hard for me to want to go back again to tthe site.

I'm unsure about the problem with the log out button. I've used it at my old job on a daily basis and didn't have a problem. Although I will mention that was a few weeks ago. Things could have changed since then.

People are starting to add their comments! That's great!
:D

Thanks Sev Fett and Fett_II for your comments. Feel free to leave more if you have ideas coming.

Hello Green, here we are discussing the layout of the page, its look and organization. I don't know about adding new content, but thanks for your suggestions.

Here is what I meant by background texture:

http://www.geocities.com/magincia_games/Gifts/bgTextures.htm

Never meant anything big or super flashy. A background texture is a filler, it's not there to get attention, so it might be similar to the exemples I am providing or even more subtle. It's a very small file (1k) which is repeated so it doesn't affect loading time. And if the layout is going to change, the color scheme already in use will be respected, it's a bit what makes the personality of the site. So no worries for seizures! There won't be odd colors. We'll keep it in the subtle tones that work here.

Thanks a lot Cujo, your comments are very relevant and I agree with them as well. I am taking note of them. The Boards seem indeed very well the way they are and the plans are to keep them as close to what they are as possible. No huge graphical annoyances in perspective, and I don't think Aaron plans on adding any Flash animations. A lot of sections need reorganizing and some cleaning.

I plan indeed on making a research of several websites and retain those of which the style of layout is compatible with BFFC and good looking. The plan is to stay close to what BFFC is, but improve the layout a little.

It's very cool of you to offer your help, I know your talent as illustrator I suggest you email Aaron directly with your suggestions, banners or others. Or you can paste them here and he'll eventually take a look. I told him about this thread.

Yeah if there's any background texture added it will be very subtle, not agressing for the eyes and not making the site too dense. We might try some and see how it looks, if it really doesn't work we'll get back to the plain grey.

For the log out command, it's a problem I get when I use it from the boards. I never come here through the main page as user.

Thanks a lot everyone for your comments. Please add more if needed. My next step will be to browse websites and see what could be adapted to the site's style and color schemes and eventually come up with mock-ups for Aaron.

Hoping to hear from all if you come up with ideas, comments, suggestions or questions. Everything that is said here is taken in consideration.
:)

Hey thanks for even asking us! You know I'm always here for honest opinions. :D

Thanks a lot Si. I appreciate very much. You're sweet. :D

If anyone has anything to say, please do. This thread is there for that reason.

I have to be honest terra, I hope you dont use the texture that you had in the picture in one of your posts there. The one with white dots on black. It almost made me sick, i couldnt stare at it for long, lol. In terms of colors I think its fine here. Graphically I like everything because it is simple and not an eyesore. But yes, the home page is cluttered so that could be reworked. And I really want the chatroom cleaned up. The feature that shows who is in the chatroom was good, if it would automatically update without having to refresh the page that would be perfect. I would also like some new features for it. Just to spruce it up a little. But anyways ...good ideas terra.

I suppose that would be ok, but I still wouldn't like it as much.

Thanks a lot for your views.

Yes, the texture shown is still a bit too noisy. It was shown as an example, nothing's definitive at this step. As I said earlier, we might try options and if it doesn't work we'll leave it as it is. For new features and content it's really up to Aaron. I agree with you though, the chat needs a bit more flexibility. I am not even sure where I'm supposed to go to see who's there.

Sorry, Cujo.... but what are mothballs?

I know about them and hear about them, but I never actually knew what they where.... :| :)

( sounding like a noob )

Mothballs are like cotton balls, and you put them in places outside like the shed, or in the crawl space under the house, or around the garage. What they do is keep snakes out. I think they have smells in them that snakes don't like which makes sure they don't come near a place you just put them in. And you normally put them in places you don't go around often, which is why saying something has mothballs in it means you don't often touch or go near it. Because mothballs also smell bad to humans, I hate the smell. And apparently it's dangerous for children to be around them much, because whenever my mom put them out she made us kids stay far away.

Thanks Miba for your clear explanation. *Back to topic*

Updates to the home page and the header navigation. Let me know if anyone's seeing something act up on your browser; I haven't tested it on all of the major platforms.

http://bobafett.com/

Thanks!

AH I see. I'm not sure about the BFFC bit with the backwards "F". The Skull is great through.

Main page looks much better I think; less cluttered, more organized, and I like how Community is a bit more highlighted with both a direct link and updates on the recent posts/ threads. 

Not sure what I think of the skull, but I really like the backward F, almost reminds me of the Mythosaur skull; and the look at the top of the pages with the new banner is pretty sharp.  Good work   ;)

THe Myhosaur skulls at the top looks a little too cartoonish for me, but everything else is great!

Thanks for the feedback! Keep it comin'. :)

I like the mythosaur skull on the front page! The side angle is great. I'm guessing one of BFFC's AMMs drew it right?

Also, bring back the sarlacc pit picture from the old boards. (I wasn't a member, I just saw the page) I thought it was cool.

First, before anyone asks, I am not behind any of the recent changes that you've seen.

Aaron,
I am still working on what you've asked from me. A logo, a header design and a layout for each of the pages. I've seen what has been done here and on the front page, and I think a lot of it looks better, but I still wish to show you what I'd come up with for those. I'll try to come up soon with the mock ups you wanted, but there's a lot of pages, and conception takes some time. Sorry if I appear as a bit slow. I'll send you my work as soon as it looks "done" enough for a first check-up. Talk to you soon.

I like the search at the top. ...that's new right? I haven't just been not seeing it?

At first I agreed with Si that the backwards F was bad. Backwards letters are usually for kiddy sites. But then after a moment or two of staring at it I figured it out. The two Fs make a T visor symbol! That's actually kinda cool.

I think its great. the backwards 'F' is pretty cool and I've always wanted to have it that way on the shirts. Good to see someone else had the idea too.

Yeah, I'm with you there, Val. The backwards "F" actually looks really good, in my opinion. I'm liking the changes, so far.

Nice idea. I hadn't noticed that. Thanks Miba.

ok...how long has the backwards "F" thing been up....cause i just noticed this second after reading Miba's post...it looks cool...just how long has it been like that lol

I think very recently. But I can't be sure.

okay good...i was starting to think i was becoming brain dead or something

Less than 24 hours.

Hey everyone, hi again Aaron,

I came up with an idea for the logo, starting from the recent change that got done, and using Miba's suggestion (thanks again there, for your inspiration!). I am posting the rough draft for the moment. Please don't judge the quality as it is not a final yet, I still need to work on the edges, add details and effects. And please don't judge the big red square as background, it's really the logo that matters, the background might be much smaller, of a different shape, different color, etc. But the idea is there.

I like it! I think its better then the one we have currently.

i like it a lot!

Thanks a lot MandoGirl!

I worked on it a bit further, and came up with 18 different models for Aaron. Here's 2 of them, as examples. I'm waiting for Aaron's decision before going any further but I wanted to post some of them here so you have an idea of what's coming.

Don't worry, the little outline will NOT appear on the real thing.

Holy moly!  That's absolutely amazing!  I love that!

Wow! They look amazing! I like the circle background on the first one better then the rectangle.

How did you make them?

Great work Darlin'!  If Aaron uses one of them, can't wait to see it up.  :)

I like them! They look really great.

That is amazing and I am extremely jealous that i can't do anything like that

Wow Terra, thats a great logo. The whole Boba's helmet thing is very cool.

Wow Terra :D they are really funky , I really like those :D Well done :D

Those are grea. I hope Aaron uses one of them.

Thanks a lot, everyone. :)
I just got Aaron's reply, and the logo as it is won't work. I'll try bringing the changes that will make it closer to what he needs, and eventually post the new versions if it's ok with him.

WHAT???!!!???  WHY NOT???  It's PERFECT!!!  Hell, that's the catchiest thing I've seen for a site in a LONG time.  That's the sort of thing that would give the site a real individual personality; something to stand out from the crowd, with a very profesional look. 

This is like Nike throwing away the check mark logo.....

lol, well maybe the size or something won't work. With a few adjustments, hopefully Aaron will be able to use Terra's awesome logos ;)

I agree, terra's logo is pure genius.

Thanks for your feedback.

Sorry if I worded that a bit strongly, I'm sure you have your reasons.  I just REALLY love that logo and feel that it should be explored if at all possible