Dhuaine

This is a truly stunning work of art. From the first glance at the thumbnail, you know that it's going to be real pretty when you click on it to see details. What is admirable is that this image 'works' in all dimensions - thumb, small and full view. The imperfections - all very tiny and not annoying - are visible only after analysing the big version.

On the technical side, the first bad thing I noticed is the sky. Stock photo(s) used for it were rather grainy and it shows. It causes a dissonance with very good quality of the bottom half of the image. The only other thing (which I noticed only after reading the comments) is the little statue at the top of the building. Its color is a bit different than the palette of surrounding rocks and it seems to be blueish in comparison. Once you know it's there, you keep noticing it all the time.

The image has a couple of quirks that give this image unrealistic, fantasy feel. First, it's lighting. It's obviously sunset, but the foreground is very light, as if glowing on its own volition or being lighted from the front. The tree, the dips of terrain, the rock formation - they all cast very little shadow. The colors are very vibrant, especially the weird orange grass in the foreground. Pink hues of the sky form a halo of sorts around the building - subtle thing, but very meaningful.
The second issue is the unnatural sharpness. The viewer can see every detail, regardless of the distance. You can see even separate strands of grass and cracks in the rocks!
It all induces an unsettling feeling; at first glance, the landscape is very realistic, but then you start to notice all these weird things and begin to wonder. This image plays tricks with the viewer; it's hard to look at it for longer time and not start to get a sinking feeling that something is wrong with it. I personally think that this unnatural aspect of this landscape is brilliant (benefit of the doubt), but it can be counted as a flaw/error on artist's part.

In my opinion, this image is rather original when it comes to photomanipulation category. It's rare to see a building so immersed into elements of nature in a photomanip. I am left to wonder why it was built in such a location - lonely slab of rock in the middle of nowhere, where was the entrance (in the deep shadows lurking in the crevices?), why the tree next to it died while the one in the distance is still full of life. The crows (are they crows?) add to the unsettling atmosphere of this place.

All this, paired with very rich color palette, create a very good, seamless photomanip that's hard to forget. I wish there were more such images in photomanipulation category.

Glad to be of some help!
Good luck with this layout I hope you don't get overworked or too stressed...

Converting to images is the best idea IMO It's not like you need to worry about search engines when all they say is "links", "contact", etc. xD
IE6 doesn't like floats. I honestly have no idea how they work. The easiest course of action is to snatch working code from somewhere... 'cause developing one's own is often a matter of trial and error. >.>

This is a beautiful design <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/s/s…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Smile)" />

1. I don't like the horizontal line cutting through the header. At first, I thought it was frame border showing on beta version. The idea of such a line is definitely nice, it separates the header and supports the hint of modern feel introduced by the footer, but maybe you could change its looks?

2. When I first saw the search field, I thought it was an error. It should be on the top, I agree, but it shouldn't stick out of the sidebar. Something in the graphics could suggest that the right edge of the sidebar is not solid and stuff can poke through there.

3. I'm sorry, but I had to lower the mark for technique mainly due to the font. Kunstler Script is definitely not OS-friendly font. There are actually only 8-10 fonts that can be found on all systems, though one could argue that Linux users won't view your site because they can't run Photoshop. Anyway, I don't have Kunstler Script on my new XP laptop and I remember I installed it manually on my old desktop.
Moreover, the font is very ornate and hard to read. It's not bad as menu (which can be done as static images) but it puzzled me for a split second as sidebar headers. Employing cufon etc to handle it would be like killing a fly with a cannon, so maybe you could change the font to something OS-friendly with oblique style? Or, if you have predefined sidebar headers, just use the images too.

4. The subheaders in the sidebar (those which go to the right) disturb the flow of the text. I think they would look better centered or slightly shifted from center to the right, but not aligned fully to the right like in current version.

5. The sidebar itself looks pretty, but after some consideration I decided it's a little too dark. It goes well with overall design, but when viewing only portion of the website (like on my laptop; I have 1280x1024 monitor for my desktop and it's okay there) it tends to dominate the screen and drive my attention from the content.

6. I like the fonts and colors used to format the content. It looks very elegant while still retaining the modern look. The only thing I would suggest is to give it more breathing space. The date is very close to the header... though admittedly I wouldn't distance them, just make the date color brighter so that it doesn't pop out that much.
Also, there could be more space between the entries.

7. I like the white border around the content box. It's very modest and nearly unnoticeable but it does good job in making the content stand out from the background.

8. I have an impression that the top part of the layout is heavier than the rest. It might be the menu and the search bar being in one line and thus taking all free space there. Also, sidebar and content are visually close to each other, which should be solved if you decide to shift sidebar subheaders to the left. If it doesn't work, the left padding of the content can be made wider (it looks narrower than the right padding at the moment, so no harm would be done, I think).

9. RSS feed is OK where it is. I checked how firefox and ie handle rss and there's usually separate button offered by browser interface so that the user doesn't need to search for feed on the site. Opera has such button in address bar and I have to say I've never even tried to add a feed in other way.
The rss icon is very blue right now... users expect it to be orange. Maybe you could change the color so that it hints that it was orange in its previous life?
Subscription placement is ok - just where I would be looking for it if I wanted to subscribe.

10. I absolutely love the reflection effect under the sidebar and content boxes. ^^ The tag cloud looks very stylish and neat. It's quite a rare place for tag cloud, but it looks like it belongs there. Aesthetically, the cloud's perfect. In practical sense though it would be uncomfortable to use since you have to scroll all the way down to reach it. Nevertheless, there's no place for it on the rest of the page, so it can stay there. It looks pretty enough to have an excuse <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/w/w…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Wink)" />

11. The footer rocks. It's very dark, which makes it appear as if it was separate from the rest of the page, but the coffee links it with the layout theme. Very nice effect, I applaud you for it <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/s/s…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Smile)" />
The bold font stands out compared to the delicate cloud above, but it doesn't disturb anything.

12. The layout is very, very beautiful. <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/s/s…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Smile)" /> It's smooth and clean, but it doesn't feel "cold". There's a lot of warmth and coziness there. It suits the style of your art perfectly. The color palette is very original, the header is original too... Graphically, it's an amazing layout.
(I just realized that it's indeed pinkish on my laptop display. It's more like violet/beige on my desktop and I think I like that color more. Oh well. It's still beautiful.)

13. The site's killed on IE6. There's a thin white line severing sidebar under search field. Content div is shifted to the left. Sidebar div is floating under content and it's shifted to the right. One can still read stuff, but IE6 kind of defeated the purpose of having practical menu in the sidebar. <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/f/f…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Sad)" />

14. Regarding the title... It's commong practice to include site title, but I don't think you have space for that. It should be somewhere on the top and the header's heavy enough in the current version. Anything more and it would be overloaded.
In my opinion, you can skip the title. It's not like it's your company's site and you have to beat the identity into everyone's brains. <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/s/s…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Smile)" /> Not to sound harsh, but your title is rather long and doesn't provide much info about the kind of stuff that is listed under it. ^^'


Summing up, I'm amazed how well you managed to combine the delicate, elegant and ornate look with modern-style layout. Great job! <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/b/b…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Big Grin)" /> There are some issues to be fixed but they are cosmetic differences and it wouldn't matter much if you just decided to keep the current version <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/s/s…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Smile)" /> The biggest problem is the custom font as it completely ruins the layout on some computers. Other than that, the design is really fresh and a nice eye-candy to watch <img src="e.deviantart.com/emoticons/s/s…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Smile)" />

I'm still looking for a group that doesn't allow DmC fanart. I don't want it in my inbox. It's Devil May Cry only in the name, it doesn't belong there.

Anti-DmC attack the game, pro-DmC attack the anti-DmC. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if some of them were paid trolls.

I rarely visit CU and almost never other forums. Though I lol hard when I see the empty desert that are Devil May Cry forums now that they got rid of all "hardcore" DMC fans. Before DMC4, boards were buzzing loud and full of people.