Website Critique and Quicktime Help Needed

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PTNL

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Part 1 ...

Here goes with another website critique request. If possible, please check out the following site in IE and other browsers as well:

http://www.switzerfilm.com

This is a videography company website that is to provide information about services, give sample videos/pictures, and also hooks into a pre-existing shopping cart to allow customers to build their own wedding videography packages. Suggestions and positive criticism is appreciated.


Part 2 ...

On the above-listed site, goto the "Samples" link, and click any of the sample video links. The goal is to have a new window appear that will display the Quicktime video (and also provide a link to download the clip or close the window).

This concept works fine in IE, but the video does not play in Firefox. This really has me stumped, and a week's worth of random Google-ing for advice and implementing suggestions has still not solved this problem. I can paste code if needed.


Thanks in advance to everyone that can help me with this!
 
From Quicktime.com's site, you should use this as an example to embed Quicktime movies:

Code: 
 <OBJECT CLASSID="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" WIDTH="480" HEIGHT="276" CODEBASE="http://www.apple.com/qtactivex/qtplugin.cab">
    <PARAM NAME="src" VALUE="http://movies.apple.com/movies/qt_posters/qtstart5a_480x228.mov">
   <PARAM NAME="controller" VALUE="false">
   <PARAM NAME="target" VALUE="myself">
   <PARAM NAME="href" VALUE="http://movies.apple.com/movies/focus_features/mysummeroflove/mysummeroflove-ref.mov">
   <PARAM NAME="pluginspage" VALUE="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/">
 <EMBED WIDTH="480" HEIGHT="276" CONTROLLER="false" TARGET="myself" HREF="http://movies.apple.com/movies/focus_features/mysummeroflove/mysummeroflove-ref.mov" SRC="http://movies.apple.com/movies/qt_posters/qtstart5a_480x228.mov" BGCOLOR="FFFFFF" BORDER="0" PLUGINSPAGE="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/indext.html"></EMBED>		
 </OBJECT>

If you're not linking to another movie (using a poster-movie), you can ditch the href parts.
 
thanks for the comments/help so far, keep it coming!
 
It seems too mid 90's internet. I'd say bring the graphic down behind the menu and add some color. :)
 
^

I agree. I would say you need more color. As far as the blurred image in the corner, I would color that bar it is in with some faded shade of whatever, and subtely put things that have to do with the site blurred into the bar (ex. videocamera, happy couple, etc). I've done a lot of Photoshop work for clients, if you want any work done for free (to an extent) or samples, just PM me and I'd be happy to give advice or do some small projects for you.
 
yeah, the site does look rather plain/empty and i'm not 100% sure what would help make it more impressive. i'm primarily the coder behind the functionality of the site (aspx, database, and shopping cart communication), and there is another person that has been handling the graphics, sample video clips, and the shockwave splash screen.

i really do appreciate the suggestions given so far, so please be as specific as possible. for me, i feel that there is only so much i can think of, and it helps tremendously to bring in other thoughts and ideas. if there is any changes to the site, i will certainly post a comment in this thread to get feedback on any change to the site's look.
 
my first thought is the front page looks plain... as it's a commercial site it the front page needs to draw users in more. i would bang some nice pics of sexy brides in there right away :)
 
distortedmind said:
i would bang some nice pics of sexy brides in there right away :)
Click to expand...
hehe, i like that idea. god knows that there's plenty of pictures and footage of beautiful brides and bridesmaids available :)
 
When links are hovered, dont make the text increase in size. It seems to break your layout.
 
inotocracy said:
When links are hovered, dont make the text increase in size. It seems to break your layout.
Click to expand...
Seems an intermittend problem, using IE they sometimes increase in size and sometimes they do not.

The site seemed slow to me, the links do not load pages that contain a whole lot of data, there should be instant response.

I would say lose the flash intro, especially since it doesn't actually show anything but the logo. If you look around, not many professional web sites feature a flash intro anymore, mainly because users do not want to wait or have to click "skip".

Be consistent, either have all the link content centered, or don't.
A w3schools stat shows that for the recent months 800x600 web browsers still account for 25% of the internet users. I would suggest to make sure your site does not scroll horizontally in 800x600, especially since you are a business. Private sites may get away with scrolling.

Unless cnn.com changes to something wider than 600, I'd stick to sites that work for 800x600 just as well.

It seems as if you would allow just anyone to order copies of past events, I would strongly suggest to reconsider this. IMHO the only person who should be able to order copies is the party who paid for the service in the first place, and they should be able to specify a different shipping address than their billing address so they can drop ship it to friends and family.

2-6 weeks delievery time for archived films? You still using VHS? Can you be competive if you have that long of a delivery time for archived movies? Same goes with initial delivery time, if you can stay in business delivering a final product 2-6 months after it was made, then more power to you.

Videos wouldn't load for me, or I got tried of wating after nothing happened some 15 seconds after I clicked, I do have broadband.

You talk about courteous staff and professional experience, yet none are listed. Have some pictures of your staff online, no one wants to see some hideous dudes taking videos at their wedding (not saying you are one, just saying people are more likely to trust you if they see your picture first). No professional experience listed. If you don't have any, you shouldn't write that you do, you could use something like "we provide a new and fresh look" or some other BS. If you do have experience, you should definitely list it, along with references.

You should provide a contact form to arrainge a consultation. No one is going to add $2k worth of services to your shopping cart and check out without to first talk to you about what they want and what you can do for them.

etc etc, I kinda am getting tired of writing, plus it's not my business to run, thus I really should limit myself to web design critique.
 
Lots of good comments so far, all of the specific details are extremely helpful.

To give a little background, the site itself was functionally complete, but the UI and much of the content is still being worked on. Personally, I wanted to get as much feedback as possible, and thought this board would provide an ample number of visitors using a wide array of platforms, browsers, opinions, etc. The company is grateful for everyone that's taken time from their day to provide their impressions and suggestions on the site.

The responsiveness is something that I have recently noticed as being an issue. When the original post of this thread was made, the site was very quick-acting. After looking again today, I'm seeing some lack of responsiveness on the site. I will be looking into this among some of the other functionality concerns. The content aspect of the site has primarily been handled by another person, and he is at work on that aspect.

When there is an update to the site, I will post to get some continued feedback.
 
Thanks to everyone that participated in this thread!

I will be taking many of the suggestions listed, and working on updating the site sometime in the near future. When I get a new version of the site completed, I will post a new thread asking for comments and feedback.
 
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