For our research the inevitable idea is to look at lots of examples of website. We were told while doing this to ask three fundamental questions for each website.
What is the Purpose?
Who is the target audience?
What are the audience needs?
We were also told to look at webpages with an open mind and write down the first words that came to mind without thinking as with so many webpages a person decides whether they will stay and browse in the first 5 seconds.
A couple of examples used in class were:
Leeds College of Art
Initial Words: abstract, grid, shapes, busy
What is it's purpose? To entice potential creative students to enrol at Leeds College of Art
Who is the target audience? Creative students, school/college leavers, parents (?)
What are the audience needs? To be excited about LCA, want to enrol here as a college or university student, to want to be on one of LCA's courses.
Evangel Cathedral
Initial Words: American, overdramatic, cringe worthy, over compensation
Purpose? To convince people to attend their church and prayer meetings over other. To seek them for spiritual (Christian) all American guidance
Target Audience? Christians, potentially trying to reach a younger audience- it won't work but I think they're trying to reach teenagers... especially with the electric guitar
Audience Needs? To want to attend their church and be keen and excited about going to the Evangel Cathedral. To believe their cathedral is the most exciting and the best.
From these examples, as well as others we then went on to find our own and continue with the initial words exercised as well as ask the three fundamental questions of web design.
I began by looking at a miss mash of general websites.
Caliser
Initial Words: Busy, simple, organised, absorbent
Purpose? To entertain/inform about celebrity gossip and shocking stories- lighter gossiper version of the news
Target Audience? Young people, gossip lovers, procrastinators and social networkers, people who are bored
Audience Needs? To be entertained and the kill time, to be engaged in 'interesting' and 'shocking' stories.
For Dummies
Initial Words: Busy, dull, text heavy, clean
Purpose? To teach people the basics on nay different topics, in a simple easily understood way
Target Audience? All ages, beginners (on any subject), people wishing to learn new skills/refresh forgotten skills
Audience Needs? To learn how to do something in an easy, simple to understand way.
The Escapist
Initial Words: Bright, futuristic, grids, full
Purpose? To entertain/inform users on all topics geek and subculture, including science and tech, table top, games etc
Target Audience? Fans of any of the subjects (table toppers, cosplayers, gamers etc), geeks and nerds, mostly male
Audience Needs? To be informed and entertained on all geek related topics, to keep up to date with news and informations from geeky niche markets.
IFLScience
Initial Words: Bright, clean, vectorised, simple, cold
Purpose? The inform people about current events, new discoveries and news updates in science in an easy to digest format
Target Audience? People interested in any scientific subject, people who wish to learn, time killers and procrastinators
Audience Needs? To be entertained/informed, given a brief summary, kept up to date and educated in scientific topics.
After browsing and analysing a variety of webpages I decided to look into webpages that focus around the area that my website would be based on: Charity and animal charity webpages.
NSPCC
Initial Words: Bright, clean, green, simple, children
Purpose? To encourage people to donate to the NSPCC, to inform people about the NSPCC's work
Target Audience? People wishing to donate to a charity, parents, families (I'd list the people that need the NSPCC like abused children or concerned adults however just because the charity supports them doesn't mean it's website is aimed at them)
Audience Needs? To understand the work done by the NSPCC, to be convinced to donate regularly
Blue Cross
Initial Words: Blue, simple, puppies, calm, cool
Purpose? To encourage donations and/or sponsorship or animal adoption, to inform viewers of the Blue Crosses work and offer advice to pet owners
Target Audience? Animal lovers, charitable people, pet owners, families
Audience Needs? To be persuaded to donate, sponsor or adopt an animal, to be given information on pet ownership, to understand the work of Blue Cross
Bumble Bee Conservation Trust
Initial Words: Vector, white space, grids, floral, nature
Purpose? To inform and provide information about bumble bees and bumble bee conservation, to encourage donations for the charity, to educate people about bees and conservation work
Target Audience? Animal and nature lovers, charitable people, gardeners, families
Audience Needs? To understand about bees and bee conservation, be informed on charities work, be confined to donate money
Give Bees a Chance
Initial Words: Green, garish, clip art, clashy
Purpose? To persuade people to donate and to inform people about bees and charity work
Target Audience? Nature and animal lovers, families, charitable people, gardeners
Audience Needs? To be convinced to donate money, to understand about bees and their importance, to learn about bees and charities' work
After looking into and analysing webpages I decided to look into 5 different, recent web site design trends.
Skeumorphism
Skeumorphism is a form of design that tries to make something within a digital format resemble something from a real world format. With this example here we can see that although this is a website, Team Fannypack have designed their website to look like a physical newspaper.
Flat Design
Flat design is very opposite to skeumorphic design, it is purely for a digital world and every looks, as the name would suggest, very flat- a bit like a vectorised image.
Single Page Websites
Responsive Design
Responsive design is a form of digital/web design that works on multiple platforms. The pages are designed to work, and still look good on many different screen sizes from a large mac down to a phone.
Type Based Websites
Single page websites have all their content on one page that you continuously scroll down making one, long page. They can have issues when it comes to being found on a search engine.
Responsive Design
Responsive design is a form of digital/web design that works on multiple platforms. The pages are designed to work, and still look good on many different screen sizes from a large mac down to a phone.
Type Based Websites
Type based websites do what they say on the tin, they are websites that rely heavily on their typography to drive the look and design of the pages.
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