Help on designs

[Brandon W]

Well honestly, I have never been a designer. I used to be able to make really good signatures for forums, but I lost that skill a long time ago. Developing is my new thang

But now, I have to design and develop a site for my brother and I. But, like I said, I have never been good for designs. I will show you my really bad skills;

Design #1;


This was my original design, I did all the HTML and CSS for this and then I decided. Nah, it doesn't suit the BMX theme. So I went on and created layout 2, which I seemed to have lost

Design #3;


Also, that is my brother on the bike in that photo. The purple bike frame near the top is his, and BMX Bandits is not actually on the bike.

I quite liked this one, till I go to the part with the older news. The older news and the latest news just didn't work well, so I started again. This is my fourth design. This one is my favourite, hardly completed though;

Design #4;


Please I would like some tips on what I could do with design #4, and how I could fix design #3 to look good. I really need to change the Latest News and Older News bars, so they are the main ideas.

[Jordan]

Where is design #2? I like #3. I'm not sure what else you could improve, the design is a bit limited with expanding but I am not very good at design anyway.

[WingedPanther]

I like #3.

[Xav]

Design #3 is OK, but the text contrast needs to be much clearer, and a new logo wouldn't go amiss either.

[Brandon W]

Yer, I can't seem to find where to put a logo yet for #3. It's always text that is hard.

@Jordan
I lost #2. I can't seem to find it.

[Xav]

Perhaps you could modify design #3 so that there is another object at the top above the notepad thingy, maybe a pencil case or something, which could then house a nice, chunky logo.

The answer to bad text contrast is simple - put the text on a solid background. Perhaps an 80% transparent background under the text would like nice.

[Brandon W]

There is no room for a pencil case? Also it's BMX?

[Xav]

I am fully aware that it is BMX. If you have a notepad then you jolly well need a pencil case to go with it, otherwise it is useless in its function.

If there is no room, then make room! Move the other elements down by a few hundred pixels and there, you have room.

[Brandon W]

True, maybe I will Then have the pictures on the journal to look like they are sketched with a pencil. I don't know, I will need to play around with it when I get home.

[Xav]

Best of luck with your designs.

Just make you sure you follow web standards as well!