Pioneer Graphics

I think this is incredible. Your work keeps getting better! Its really insparational(sp?). If you have time could you give us a run down on how you design such a work of art? Do you start out on photoshop? Whats your process etc. That would be great!
Later Slayer!.

-Michael

thats amazing work you guys have there...

really nice details an effects... i dont really have much to say, since i cant really find anything i dont like..

Yeah, your site looks great. I'm just soo sick of Flash these dayz...dunno why. I guess I just dont' like waiting with all the fancy effects and what not.

It's weird how that works...I used to love them...now I just wanna check out your portfolio...and if feels like it takes too long to get there.

well im going out on a limb here.........i dont really like it. (ducks as a giant angry mob chases him).

The biggest problem is space isnt used properly. Im on 1024/768 using opera with no status bar/windowbar/mainbar. Currently on my screen is the title bar for opera....main menu and my taskbar. Thats a hell of a lot of space and i still have to scroll to see the entire interface at once. Now i would understand if your interface was packed with elements...and it needed to be this large (which would still be a problem) but its not. Take the space between your navigation and audio control panel. Thats like 40px of empty graphics. Its a waste of space and it doesnt add to your "look". Take the palette headlines for 1 more example (featured site...latest news)....thats another 40-50 pixels wasted for text thats only like 14pt. Just with those 2 examples....u could save ~100 pixels. That means smaller interface, less k/s to download etc.

Now sounds.....damn. Sound is your choice..i dont have a problem with that....but you have 3 different rollover sounds. Not only is it annoying....but its confusing. You want to let the user know they are over a button with a sound....but if u keep changing that sound......it defeats the purpose of sound in the first place. Also this is 3 sounds.....ontop of the bg music. I mean 1 more sound and your about to rape my ears. (not meant to be mean......but its true) Also...if u used that same sound thats less K/s to download (which is still important even if it is for broadband)

The grunge. I think grunge on the outside of the iface would be good or even on the section headers.... but all over the interface itself? Your interface is busy enough (small elements,glowing text...shadows/highlights....variations of the color blue etc) that all the grunge is too much.

Now...the other stuff thats bothering me....the 45degree angles...that shape of the site itself.....its bothering me cause its played. There is nothing orig. or really even overly pleasent. Thats not to say its a bad website.

I'll give ya respect though.......cause technically/graphically its good (def. complicated) work.

Pretty good site, I have to admire your skills, but I would avoid having your pages assemble dynamically. If I just waited thirty seconds to see your site, I dont want to have to wait more so I can see all the options.

/me tries not to belive that it's someone from teamps who made this.

...Even tho I'm not really fond of flash site coz of the scrolling usually sucks and loading...loading.....loading...well it gets on your nervs at some point.
And what you finally come to is usually for me a Alt + F4 move.

But I didn't do it now...
coz I really like it.

In my opinion...
Flash can be devided in to two different categories:
Eyecandy: That's all flash is...
you wait a long time but then you see the nice intro movies.

...and second...
very anoying...
To be able to get that little info you want to know from the site takes you forever to get.

But Slayerment, DON'T get me wrong...I highly admire your skills.
You really are a pro at it!

What it all comes down to is what the customer wants and that you get your money :D

Ok, I've been told that flash is just illustrator, on a time line. How true is this?

Right now, I'm taking a homotacular graphic design course at skool (Stupid freshmen prerequisites. 3d in the fall, though!) but, um...what do you need to know for flash? I don't think I want to do an entire flash site, (though I'd like to be able to) I mainly want to give my page a few embellishments here and there.

You clearly know what you're doing, so I guess you're as good a person as any to ask, assuming you've used Illustrator.

I still don't have everything down, but I am, shall we say, 'capable' with paths in PS, so Illustrator's no great leap for me. I just have to get the whole timeline principle down.

So...

Yeah.

Thanks for all this great feedback guys .

Michaelp:

This site was designed in photoshop. I then exported the whole thing from photoshop to flash. If i needed alpha layers for objects I exported them as a 24-bit PNG. As you can imagine, this took a while and was very hectic w/ this site. Once I had the main interface in Flash, I animated the startup sequence and the main gui components. I then made a separate swf for each section that was loaded in. Thats the basics of it.

Rodder454:

Great feedback . I agree with the space thing for the home and services sections. I was originally going to try to fill it up as much as possible like on the contact section - I feel that page uses space very well. But anyway, like 1/2 way through the main design I realized I didn't have enough content for the home section and maybe a few other. I liked the interface so much, though, that I decided to go on with it and see what I could think up the next day. As far as the interface goes, I always had my intentions on a 1024 layout, so I could see that causing some problems. I think I might add a Fullscreen button on the splash, so you can go there w/o any scrollbars or header stuff. Would that help at all?

I thought the rollovers worked well... I tried to make each sound go w/ the type of animtion on the rollover. The rollovers that quickly flash have a quicker rollover sound than the ones that fade brighter slower. You still have a great point though. Ill have to see what others think.

I think the grunge on the interface is cool...My whole intention was to create a super busy site that was still fairly easy to use. I thought the grunge added to the already graphically intense site.

Thanks for the critique, as always this kind of feedback will help on future projects . Cheers!

Censured:

Yea I agree, I'm hoping my site leans more towared the 'cool' type where people go there to experience it while still getting some content at the same time.

Pganguly:

I guess its kind of like illustrator on a timeline, but it still has its own qualities like Actionscript to totally stand its own ground as 'Flash'.

I think a mix of design, animation, and programming concepts are important to know for Flash. And the best way to actually know how it works is to get in there and experiment and do projects. I would advise just messing around w/ it and seeing what you can come up with.

Later guys.

I really enjoy the layout and I think grunge looks good on it. Also the color combination makes me all warm inside...
I have to agree with some of the things rodder said. I think 800 width is still the standard. Although my own site is 1024 I never did it for a customer...also a smaller interface yould help with loading times... Regarding the eyecandy factor - yeah - you got it!...It looks good enough to kiss. Regarding getting to the content....well - you do have to wait a while for it even on cable... Maybe you could do an html option for the whole site. That way you can have both sides happy If the client will pay for it...
Great work anyway.

Actually I have an old hybrid layout:

http://www.pioneergraphics.com/index2

Should I give an option for that on the splash or something?