New Website

[Juggalicious]

Hi Everyone,

We are in the process of re-doing our website and wanted to know what everyone thought. What should be changed? What shouldn't be? Likes, Dislikes? -

Just remember it's a work in progress so it's not perfect.

http://www.projectdynamite.com/

[Isabella]

Like the overall look - neat pic. Clean design that reflects the attitude and tone of your show.

Humility? It feels like you're trying to be ironic about humility but it also makes professionalism seem ironic.

Why have the news on the front page and who you are and what you do later? Your experience may be different, we find it's clients at the webpage, fans on the Myspace.

Pic thumbnails really small, and it would be nice if one loaded right off the bat instead of an empty space.

Like the blue and yellow suits.

This website feels like it's slicker than the show I've seen (and I probably haven't seen your best show) - that's good, because you guys have probably gotten even better since then - and my honest opinion is that you guys are ready show-wise for nicer and slicker costumes and props. You've got fun material, solid tricks and a great site, and your actual show could visually reflect that more. I know that's not the question you asked, but because the site is so visually strong, some of the pictures of the act don't tie into that as well as they could.

[Dan Tastik]

I would rethink the show description.
It's a bit meaningless.
Visually, however it is pleasing.

[scot]

when someone posts a website they want everyone to say good things. I'll start with: "Beautiful website. Don't change a thing."

I'm going to spend 15 minutes on this and if you want the rest of my notes, you can find them strewn about in the other promo stuff threads.

News:
Okay, if you're not going to update the news very often, you might not want it on the front page. You have more news entries, but no one can tell. There are ways to fix that. The easiest is the one I would do. Make the first one shorter so that the second one gets cut off halfway through. The first one's boring anyway. The scroll buttons suck.

Color: use the same color in the body background as one of the colors in your header. use the dark blue from above instead of this bright blue that doesn't match

Headlines:
don't put the headlines at the bottom. headlines go at the head. So, the name of the page can be highlighted in the menu and you can leave out the headline, or you can put it in all that space between the menu and the body text. if you're going to have headlines they should match the colors and the style of the rest of your site.

Show description:
give me a reason to believe you and something to amaze me. and don't use the word high so much. Watch your capitals and more photo less random wordo.

I completely missed this quote the first two times I looked at it "Project Dynamite is a full blown circus." - The Boston Metro

the way the page is setup, I only expect the blue area to change, so I'm not looking around to resee the menu and everything.

Video looks okay. Would be nice to see a little more of what you do in order without cuts just to get an idea of the pacing of your actual show, but if this is getting you work, stick to it.

you don't know how long you'll have no other videos, so instead of having more content coming soon, have it say "Enjoy our promo video" Then, I'm not missing out on anything. And don't call it video library. No need.

one of you looks like Franklin Mint.

Use only photos in your album that will help you get work or achieve your goals.

I think putting auditions on your resume is the saddest thing I've ever seen. Your tour date page is cramped and pointlessly bad.

You're using flash all wrong. you might as well be using html.

why make your contact info hard to read?
left align all of it. put the college contact info in a box but still aligned with the other. put it all in an easier to read font. Make all the text selectable (so that people can cut and paste) and make the email address clickable.

Big head photos of you on every page

you don't have to have just one costume, but figure out a style of costume

the header should be clickable on every page and should return you to the home page

figure out what your logo is and stick to it.

no point in having white boxes behind half of the text in your menu

time's up.

love,
Scot

[Juggalicious]

Oooo I know it's not beautiful.... thats why we asked.

I think after what everyone has said we have decided to move the news page to a different page of the site and re-write.. the old and awful show description.

and now to scot's comments.. those scroll buttons do suck don't they.

colors: All the colors are off. thats why its a work in progress. A lot of the colors are still that way from the old design and will be getting changed once I can make my next round of revisions.

headlines:
dave was saying the headlines sucked the other day too - i thinik I might just get rid of them all together and have the button thats clicked stay blue.

show description:
awful place holder. quote above it - temporary.

Video Page:
We were toying with the idea of having other videos for a while but I think we are canning that on the video page and going to just put a nice big photo of the two of us there

I wish I knew who franklin mint was.

totally right about the photos page.


I don't think we have a resume on the site yet? Unless you count that it say's
"Check Out Past Clients"
but its good that you pointed that out because it's suppose to say:
"Check Out Past Gigs"

I know there are no fancy animations but I prefer it in flash so that I know every browser can view it properly and I don't have to do cross-browser compatibility checks for every internet browser ever.

totally right about making all text clickable. never even thought of that.

we here at project dynamite strongly believe in the poor practice of constant image rebranding.


white boxes- fixering it up right now


thank you everyone! will let you know when version 2 is ready for a bombardment of reviews.

[scot]

franklin mint : http://www.stuntsuperstar.com/

[Juggalicious]

New Cut of promo video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL1WDLVkddg

let us know what you think-


thanks-



alex

[Frisbee]

Cut the clip of you having a rope around the kids neck.
seeing that trick on there would make me not hire you!

Whether the trick is safe or not, it has the perception of putting a kid in danger and you even talk about it being his last show.

It may work in the show, but not on promo.

also do you have more footage from that stage show? seems like it is good and better than some of the other street footage.

-Greg

[Juggalicious]

that's all the good stage footage right there. kid thing is out - which is too bad - because it's my favorite part.

[Frisbee]

you can still do it for your show if you think it is so strong and funny...but for promo, it may prevent you from getting some jobs.

If you think it is an essential part of your show or reflects who you are or what your show is than by all means keep it in.

I have a joke in my show which gets a huge laugh and I use it where appropriate as it is a borderline joke, double entendre...I had it in my promo last year as it was a stage show, it looked good and it was a great response, then someone pointed out that it may hurt me getting some of the jobs that I am looking for.
The ones looking for a squeeky clean act, primarily a lot of the family fairs and festivals...first chance I got I took it out.

I do not know, nor will I probably ever know if it hurt me or prevented me from getting jobs, but why limit yourself and take that risk.

[Juggalicious]

o i agree. im positive we haven't gotten a gig or two because of that clip.

[Rachel Peters]

I made it about half way through. It felt really long to me. I might suggest cutting in half. 2-3 minutes.
I'd look again and try to figure out why it feels like much longer than 4 minutes, but I have to take off. Sorry I can't be more specific.

[Stephon]

Just some quick thoughts after watching it once:

-Take out anything that isn't in front of an audience. It makes it look like you don't have enough performance video and are using filler. (Which may be the case, but you don't want it to look that way)

-There are too many repetative segments--lots of standing on the chairs, lots of 3 club juggling. Cut out some of them; just use the most impressive and dynamic shots. That'll cut off a lot of time.

-Some segments could be tightened up. For example, on the animal trap part, all you really need is, "This is an animal trap. It closed with 150 lbs of force", and then you sticking your hand in the trap. And you might wanna sink up the trap closing with the peak of the part of the music where they're saying, "wooooo-OW". (on the "OW")

-You ask if they're ready for the grand finale, and the music builds the anticipation, but there isn't a clear "finale moment" at the end.

And the kid was talking too much--I say strangle him.