Concept Development, Element Suggestions

[Chrystyan]

I'm working on a design for a donations simple website. It allows my visitors to come and donate, read a bit about the cause, things like that. I value simplicity, and think that clean-cut center designs are nice, but there are a few things that I believe would add to appeal of the page however and would like a few suggestions on things to change or ideas on concepts I'd like to develop with the design.

Additionally, for any thing you suggest would you please include either a tutorial of how to do it, or explain it in detail. I can figure some things out but I'm not completely experienced.


The ideas I have for adding are white glossy buttons for the donate/share area, and so far that's about it. I have no logo ideas, or color ideas. I did white background for ease of reading and the font color is obviously better than black... Any suggestions would be nice to improve this design please .

 

[ibclare]

At this point, you don't have a design. I know you want simplicity, but this needs some structure. Will you have more than one page? Will there be contact information that you provide a link for? What kind of charity is this?

Even simplicity can have some design to it. Do you have ideas of a style, such as formal, laid back, a soft feel . . . ? A little more information on what you would like would help us give you advice.

And actually, I think the font is too light and should be black, for simplicity and clarity.

 

[Chrystyan]

This is severely in the early stages of development. For structure and things like that, I have most of it written down just not put into an art concept. I design in Photoshop and splice images out of layers.

To elaborate on the design concept, essentially I'm running a college funding site where my friends and family can contribute to my college experience. The two images currently there are Donate and Share. Upon clicking either, you receive a jQuery popup with details of what is available to you in an overlaid Zurb Reveal Modal Plugin. The main page's content never changes, and you never leave the main page. There will be a bit of an about outline, but nothing too extensive on the main page so font is a minimal issue.

My two main problems that I'm having with the concept are designing the Share/Donate buttons and the logo. My website is CreativeChrys, and I have a logo I made a while back for a darker background (attached)... but I hate it since I'm a male and it suggests elsewise. Also it's a little plain.

To go with a style theme, I'd say I like to stick with laid back. One of my favorite website designs is what(dot)cd, and in everything I do I maintain that single page layouts with good interactivity can retain focus better than multiple pages. Building SEO on it will come later if I decide to add a blog, but I'll be facing redesign by that point. I will play around with the font color a bit after it's on the web, and while in design just to see what looks good.

Thanks for the reply .

 

[ibclare]

Interesting home page, what.cd. I take it you don't want to be quite that minimalist. IMO, you need to design the logo before you can create a concept for the buttons. You would want them to be in the same style to some degree. So, logo first.

I agree you need a logo redesign. I wouldn't even call that a logo as much as decorated text. So, some questions to consider are (and realize, as you work on a logo, it will evolve and maybe change entirely):

Do you want an image? If so, what is descriptive of you?
Do you want to use text only? Contained in a geometric shape? Do you want to design the text for the initials CC?
Or do you want to use both image and text?

Starting points for working on a logo.

So, last question, are you asking for a few design ideas to stimulate your creativity? Some of us might be able to do a couple designs, though since you work in PS, we are encouraging you to do it and we can give direction, have you take off from what we propose.