I've changed the look of my site to hopefully not put casual browsers off too much for being too 'dark'. Sadly, I need to attract the general public to this site because there are more people out there who will enjoy my stuff than those who are a little weird (like us).

What do you think?

http://www.matazone.co.uk

You might have to refresh the page to see it.

I like it. You haven't changed that much but it's given the page a fresh new look, whilst not being totally different. And it is a bit less 'dark'.

The background was the most fun bit: I selected the whole thing and inverted the colours then doodled a little bit on it. You could fairly accurately say that it's completely the opposite from what it was before!

im not totaly convinced... but hey.

Im liking the logo, but the background is kinda making me sad... but change is good... so well done

I still see the old background...

nevermind, it was loading from the cache. The blobs on the background aren't very visible, It might be better if they were more prominent, it'd look less...white.

It seems a bit too white for me too.. I think I prefer the blue background.

I really like the logo though.

Ooh, that's nice, and the background is cute. Well done.

It's amazing what you can make with some old photos, trick cards from crackers, and the ripped up back of your cheque book.

I've added occasional aged-wood textures to the background and put the link fonts in bold to make them easier to read. Hopefully that will help reduce the feeling of whiteness. It probably only seems so bright in comparison to the layouts that have gone before it. I'm sure you'll get used to it!

I'll be a tad nostalgic for the old black look, but I love the textures and pictures of the new background. It's far less dark and more friendly, but still related to the old background. Good work!

Thanks. I'm going to be very interested to see if I get an increase in hits because of it.

Didn't someone figure out that people prefer to read light text on a dark background as opposed to the other way around?

I was seeing the old background without noticing, but i forced it to totally refresh and yeah, it looks good.



Yeah, that is the only problem, I now have to highlight all the text to get it light on dark but hey, what can you do?

Weirdly, I've been having exactly the opposite problem lately. I've been finding light on dark tiring on the eyes to read.

I freely admit that I've made this change for the simple reason that light colours make my site look more approachable to a wider range of visitors. I really am sorry if this makes things harder to read... Would some sort of dark background behind the central box help?

EDIT: Oh, and to my knowledge, recent studies have shown that different people respond to different colour combinations of reading. There might have been a general preference result that I didn't see, but it changes between people. Personally I find it easiest to read black text on a light blue background, which is the way that I've set up Windows now, but I think that's just me.

Don't feel you need to change it on my account, I don't really visit the main page very much. I go straight to the forums or your blog, and if I want to see the animations I can go to them easily enough. It's fine.

i don't like it and i want it back, also in other news, i have become a very demanding person in the last 5 minuites.

can't there be a choice on the colour?


edit: i like it now, it took some getting used to.

Please ease up on the smilies, especially when they all contradict each other. Your points will be clearer without huge clumps of twitching little faces.

I like it I suppose. I love the doodles in the background. It certainly is creative, though. *thumbs up*

Cheers Blakrose, nice to see you finally made it onto my forums!

People might be interested to know that in the last few days I've been getting around two thousand hits more per day than I was a week ago. I'm guessing that this means that more people are staying on the site for longer. Hurrah! It worked!

I was having the same problem as CheeseMoose, I was seeing the old background. Well! I see the new one now and its.... well I like it, but its different and thats weird. I miss your old old old layout! That was the coolest. And it explained how the animations was The Otherside too. Now its only a legend =(

I like it. It was a bit of a shock at first (AGH! Too bright!) but it looks good. I like the background doodles, hehe.

In time all things shall pass, including my site layouts.

Inspired me to doodle all over one of my AP Euro tests! *cough*

And you still didn't pass? Astonishing!

Hehe. I got 26 right out of 90 or something like that.... Ouch.

But there were cute little kitties! How can someone resist bumping my grade when there's little KITTIES?!

It's got to be better then my last test, I doodled a thatched-roofed cottage being burned by a dragon (in considerable detail), and the examiner knocked marks off for spelling. In a physics test. And they weren't even spelt wrong, he just couldn't read my handwriting.

Your examiner is plain evil

I'm just dumb x.x; I cant remember anything in history. It sucks.

By the way, thatched roof cottages being burned by a dragon? A bit of a Trogdor flashback?

Very possibly. I think he didn't like me though because of the other thing that I drew on it. I'd recently been reading the S*P archive and drew this:

They didn't send you to a psychologist?

Suprisingly no, I suspect that the examiner is a secret fan of S*P

Would this be odd because he's a teacher or because he doesnt look like he'd watch S*P?

Suprising because he's not the sort of person who I would expect to like Something*Postitive, but hey, everyone should like it.

The new layout is cool, but the text on the Images page is a little hard to read.

Otherwise, it makes me giggle.

Thanks, that page is using an old structure so isn't using the standard CSS that controls most of my site so it wasn't update to the new colour scheme. I've changed the text colour now.

I liked it better when the background was blackish. I understand that you need to attract the general public, but those of us that arn't "normal" need a place to get away from the "normal" people,and for a while now, I've been using matazone as that place. Eh, it's just an opinion.

-Izzy

*gigglesnort*
Did the black background match your soul better?

"No, that's okay, I like it down here. It's dark. Dark like my soul. I've written a poem about it. Would you like to hear it? Skippy? Skip?"
I am a hopelessly dorky fangirl.

The black background was initially to define the difference between The Other Side and the webart site, which was primarily quite light. Given that the webart section is hardly ever visited these days, it seems a little silly to continue with something that puts off many visitors.

I do agree that the dark background creates a better viewing space for the animations, but it was putting people off from exploring the site. Ho hum.

Yes, actually it did!