Please let me know what you think

[bornondating911]

I have been working on this site for about a year now. This was the first site I ever did. I have learned as I went. It doesnt have a lot of fancy stuff. So just let me know what you think.
www.beachcityvfd.com

[buntine]

You need a straight-forward paragraph explaining exactly what the site is for on your homepage without making the user scroll. It should be just under the menu.

The scrolling marquee is really annoying and will only work in some browsers. I also recommend you leave the menu intact for each page, otherwise you have to navigate back to the homepage before you can go to a different section.

The Web Site itself gets the message across and is somewhat pleasant. But you really need to understand accessability and its importance.

Regards.

[qzn]

There are some salmon colored lines showing up in firefox - they are between the "station81" and "members" links. It makes me wonder if it is spaces in the code between the <a href></a> since the next pages have the same salmon colored links
Frontpage, so no chance im going anywhere near staring at all that junk in the code.
The logo on top is nicely blended to the background mostly.
Can't say the "new" graphics are very well for this background since they are showing the white outline, plus only one would be necessary really since it is moving

[dera]

get a layout... http://wdhaven.com/layoutwell/fauxframe3.html that looks suitable for your site, then choose the colours - your colours are not appealing.

your content is weak aswell, you have links saying you need me? what do u need me for? why should i click there

get rid of the scrollers, why would i wait to see my content.

[HostBreak]

Well ladies and gentlemen guess what its not working at my end no text appearing and no link working

[Mausau2000]

lessen on the eye candy
Show users a perpose to the site without scrolling

[KDLA]

Hmmm -
It could stand some major tweaking.

- decrease the size of the banner - it's way too big
- put the navigation on the left, so the content can come up "above the fold," i.e., not making the user scroll to find it.
- substitute campy images for textual content - lack of true content lessens the impact and legitimacy of a website
- put the text on a white background, instead of black - white text on a dark background is hard on the eyes.
- as previously stated, get rid of the scrolling text, and in addition, get rid of the twirling buttons. These don't contribute to your design, instead they detract from it.
- try to keep your text as plain text, not in images - this will help keep your file size down
- "Help Us Help You" is a little tight on the button. You might rephrase this so more space is around the text.

Good Luck!
KDLA

[bornondating911]

I appreciate the feedback. I was curious as to opinions of getting a message across the general public viewer. It is a small poorly funded fire department that is in need of members and money, Without the scrolling bar.....is there a more appropriate means to get this message across early? Thank You

[LJK]

Hi -
I hate to say it, but you're just going to have to learn about (x)html and css coding. [I'd recommend "HTML and CSS for the www: 5th edition" by L. Castro, as you'll be able to use it as a reference, anytime.] Not for the scrolling banner fix, but just so you can have more control over your website and make things much easier for all of the users who visit it. It only really costs time and practice!

We can't talk about nav bars, accessibility, divs, external css styles, browser bugs, and what type of layout would be more effective until you are comfortable with those things, yourself! Meantime, look at websites - esp. ones by good designers [or big business] and get the gist of how "fast, easy-on-the-eyes and info. easy to find" websites look. Then View Source and check that puppy out! ;-)

First tip: leave the black if you must for the body, but learn to add a container div that holds all of the page's content/elements/tags and give it a white or pale colored background - then get the text and links uniform, [esp. with colors...] and easy to read.

For your important news - a paragraph with a different background, larger header, an outline, or even just 'padding' would do to set it apart.

Good luck & have fun,
El

[the tree]

I appreciate the feedback. I was curious as to opinions of getting a message across the general public viewer. It is a small poorly funded fire department that is in need of members and money, Without the scrolling bar.....is there a more appropriate means to get this message across early? Thank YouYou already have some worth content, the problem is that it's not the first thing your visitor sees. Try to drop the eye candy, especially the wordart. Everything your audience needs to see from your home page can easily be fitted on the screen without scrolling.
Although what LJK said about learning your code does hold merit, you really don't need to become an expert.