Fantasy Writer's Site

[legacyblade]

Hello everyone. My website, spencerconrad.com, is finally finished. On it, I have a blog, free short stories, and a free ongoing fantasy serial called called Myriad Souls. Myriad Souls is an ongoing serial, taking place in a world darker than what you're used to in fantasy. We follow the story of Aveyar: a man condemned to the edge of society because his race is believed to be the spawn of demons. This is a tale of an angel, reborn in the body of a demon.

Please don't judge my writing skills based on this post. A post in a forum is different than a story, so I don't put effort into making it sound good. My stories are up for free not because I cannot publish them, but because I want to provide a good read for everyone. I'd also like to increase my reader base, since I love when people read my work. If you guys are interested in my fantasy writing site, you can follow this link.

http://spencerconrad.com/

[Vell]

glad I could be an inspiration to you.

[Calintz]

Very intriguing ... I may have to take a gander see into your site .

[fugibo]

My thoughts (constructive for the most part)
1) Look into Human Interface Guidelines (find some from anywhere, as long as its not some crap-design group like MS or GNOME), and take a look at some of the stuff they emphasize. Design is about a LOT more than being creative -- a properly designed app or website is inherently faster and easier, and therefore better.
2) ACK! MYRIAD IMAGES! Please use CSS more and raster graphics less -- much, much, much faster at low connection speeds. Also, to prepare for the Resolution-Independent future, you might consider SVGs (Scalable Vector Graphics).

BTW, while developing a site, it's best to use Chrome/Safari in conjunction with Fx to get the best results -- Fx because it's spot-on accurate every time, no matter what browser the page was designed for, and Chrome/Safari because they have the best HTML5/CSS3 support of any browser (WebKit FTW!)

[legacyblade]

@UltaFlame, yup. That episode also got me an A in creative writing, XD I am very thankful.

@Calintz, awesome. I see that you joined. Glad you checked it out.

@WcW, I actually just used a wordpress template. I don't really understand CSS or raster graphics. Could I persuade you into helping me with this? Thanks for the CC, btw, I love getting criticism.

[fugibo]

@UltaFlame, yup. That episode also got me an A in creative writing, XD I am very thankful.

@Calintz, awesome. I see that you joined. Glad you checked it out.

@WcW, I actually just used a wordpress template. I don't really understand CSS or raster graphics. Could I persuade you into helping me with this? Thanks for the CC, btw, I love getting criticism.

That's what I thought you might be. Raster is the name for pre-rendered graphics like PNG and JPG; basic HTML and all CSS are rather easy, I recommend you check out the W3C's website at http://w3schools.com/

[legacyblade]

I understand the very VERY basics from using that site, but I'm not sure how I would do this in CSS.

[fugibo]

I understand the very VERY basics from using that site, but I'm not sure how I would do this in CSS.

Just look at some of the tutorials on the CSS section. The best way to practice this sort of ting is create a simple index.html on your harddrive and open it in your browser to test it.

[legacyblade]

Alright, thanks for the advice.

[Tazero]

I checked it out, I meant to post earlier (v-.-)>
But didn't I like the site though, i like the parchment.

[legacyblade]

@WcW, I found a new theme, and edited it a bit to fit my needs. Is it a better one? I'm pretty sure it relies more on CSS than raster images, since it loads a lot faster.

@MetaKnight, don't like the site, eh? The theme, or the content? I changed the theme, similar feel, but more professional looking. You should check it out.

[fugibo]

No, that one is still reeeeaaaaaally heavy on images. It looks good, but a site can still look good with only 5-6 images on the page >_<

The current state of web design is crap. (not insulting you, just making a general statement about how bad the standard is)

[Diokatsu]

No, that one is still reeeeaaaaaally heavy on images. It looks good, but a sight

site*

[legacyblade]

Is it better than the last one though? The images are all a lot smaller, and it reuses the same images a lot on the page. It loads quickly even on my poor inet connection up here.

-edit,

btw, there is another story up. It's better than Myriad Souls episode one, I think. It's called Divine Intervention, you should check it out

http://spencerconrad.com/?p=112

[fugibo]

I like the design better, but as my idiot ISP has yet to realize that we are _not_ signed up for 250kbps, I can't really tell if it's much faster. Feels like it, though.

[legacyblade]

It's a lot faster. It uses much smaller images, and reuses the same ones. The scroll lagged for me, but I thought it was just wordpress or something. and that sucks about your inet.

[fugibo]

It's a lot faster. It uses much smaller images, and reuses the same ones. The scroll lagged for me, but I thought it was just wordpress or something. and that sucks about your inet.

No, 250kbps is five times faster than what we're paying for. When I said that, I meant that it's too fast for me to tell (Safari 4 + 3G (250kbps) level speeds = 1-2 seconds for a page to load)

[Blizzard]

You have a 400KBits connection? o_o; That's a very unusual number for speed.

[fugibo]

Meh, it's closer to 512. Don't take rounded math numbers seriously.

[Blizzard]

Lol, ok. It would be 4 times then. xD