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New Blog Design
Filed under: Design, Meta | November 13th, 2006
It is now official get out of your RSS reader day. Take a few minutes to check out the new photomatt.net and browse around a bit. This is, I believe, the fifth major iteration of the design here but it’s the first one since 2003. When I last freshened the paint around here it got a link from Zeldman saying “lucky in redesign” and I figured I would never be able to top that, so I left the design the same for years. The only major change was the introduction of Asides in 2004.
Well I couldn’t top the last design, but Nicolò Volpato had no trouble creating something beautiful I started coding up earlier this weekend. Nicolò is still working on mocking up a few of the pages, and in the meantime I’ve been working on a little additional functionality around the site, particularly with photos.
Here are a few things you might notice so far: related posts on entry pages, recent entries shown in the sidebar on entries older than 2 weeks, when a blog is from the same day as a photo album random photos from that day are shown at the bottom, and likewise a photo will show when there’s a post that day.
The main goals of the photo integration were to enable a little more serendipity. There are a lot of other little Easter eggs, but those will remain an exercise for the reader.
seriocomic | November 13th, 2006 @ 3:53 am | Reply
Congrats! It’s been a long time coming, but appears to be worth it. The name of the header image (giant-header.jpg) is fitting
Glenda | November 13th, 2006 @ 3:56 am | Reply
Someone has to be on a plane tomorrow. Don’t you have to go to sleep?
And yes, I love this redesign, though I’ve said so many times already. I think the integration of all of these photos into the design is going to keep you on your toes to take more photos… a very good thing, of course. =D
Bryan Veloso | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:00 am | Reply
I can actually say that I saw this design before it was coded, over some of Mr. Boren’s luscious steak. This is a great leap forward from your last design, and it really keeps your personality around for the trip.
You’re giving this de-uglifier a run for his money. Nicolo has a lot to be proud of.
lucacicca | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:00 am | Reply
Mmhh… 149 KB for the header image are a lot, but the blog is beautiful.
Abhijit Nadgouda | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:04 am | Reply
A good redesign Matt. The colors are great and the photos integration is subtle. The only thing that I did not like so much was the big header. Though it looks classy, it consumes more than half the screen. Otherwise it is very vibrant, will pull me more often out of feedreaders
Amit | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:07 am | Reply
this design looks way too better than the old one!! while the old one was neat, this one is pretty!!
good job on the facelift Matt!!
Elea | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:12 am | Reply
I noticed the redesign earlier today and for a minute, thought I stumbled onto the wrong site until I realized that hey, it says “Photo Matt”, has the same tagline, and your face is on the layout. Very nice change, although I keep forgetting about the “Home” tab and thinking that clicking on the site name will bring me back to the homepage…
Konstantinos | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:13 am | Reply
Nicely done, Matt.
TDH | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:13 am | Reply
It’s really nice Matt, a great improvement!
Derek Punsalan | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:23 am | Reply
Great new look. Definitely more vibrant and alive than the previous design. I’m still looking through some of the different pages. So far so good. Can’t wait to see what other pages are being mocked-up. The masthead collage is great, I need to get me one of those WordPress stickers to plaster on to something in real life.
pinguin | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:36 am | Reply
very nice.
xinfo | November 13th, 2006 @ 4:52 am | Reply
above back ground color look like kinda wall paper late 80’s style
Nina | November 13th, 2006 @ 5:40 am | Reply
Wow, this is really pretty. Congrats!
Rob Hyndman | November 13th, 2006 @ 5:53 am | Reply
Sweet. Really sweet.
Alistair | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:07 am | Reply
What a great surprise to get this today Matt, fantastic redesign. Congratulations to Nicolò Volpato for putting it together for you.
Al.
Petit | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:16 am | Reply
Absolutely beautiful design.
Navigation is pure logic - breezy!
One small problem seems to be that the really wonderful header takes its time to load. For a ( short ) while the upper part of the page is empty ( apart from the background ). It also means, we’ll have to wait for the navigational system.
Congratulations and do keep this beauty, at least for a while
Chris G. | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:25 am | Reply
Stellar redesign!
David Babylon | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:28 am | Reply
Well done. I love it.
Andy | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:33 am | Reply
Major improvement. The header graphic is great. Wakes up the reader but doesn’t induce a headache - which red can do if it isn’t used as subtly as here! Much better than the old look.
indi | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:36 am | Reply
header is cool, but it doesn’t load at all on my crappy Sri Lankan connection. Reloaded and it did, but guess it works for proper broadband. Best wishes
dandyna | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:37 am | Reply
oooOOOO!!! amazing!
Titanas | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:47 am | Reply
Nice one! I like the fade out effect on the background and the huge header with red all over.
Thomas Silkjær | November 13th, 2006 @ 7:03 am | Reply
On time
- And nice to see a great 1 column design.
Phu | November 13th, 2006 @ 7:09 am | Reply
Lovely stuff. Nicolo’s worked wonders:)
Kristin | November 13th, 2006 @ 7:10 am | Reply
I really like your redesign, except that the header is way too big, it loads rather slow; which again might cause that people turn images of to view your site, but then they sit without any navigation.
Have you considered doing a image map instead of using the header image as a css background property?
rzepak | November 13th, 2006 @ 7:20 am | Reply
very nice indeed!
Kitta | November 13th, 2006 @ 7:23 am | Reply
A few people have said they dislike the header, that it’s too big, but I think it makes the design. The colour scheme is vibrant and the header is perfectly disheveled.
Wonderful re-design Matt.
Charleen | November 13th, 2006 @ 7:50 am | Reply
Wow!! The new design is fantastic!! I love the “then” and “now” pictures - a nice blend of where you’ve been, and what’s coming!
Miss you and hugs, C.
…I have to give you my first thought, though, on seeing the new header for the first time: “Well, that’s definately not his writing!”
Mike Purvis | November 13th, 2006 @ 7:55 am | Reply
This is really gorgeous; wish I had those Photoshop skills.
Aargh | November 13th, 2006 @ 8:28 am | Reply
Love the new design. It jumps off the page at me!
Jos | November 13th, 2006 @ 8:40 am | Reply
Nice design!!
On my own website I’m trying to integrate my photo album (Gallery2) with my WP site, but it looks awful - what plugin did you use?
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Ethan Neuenswander | November 13th, 2006 @ 8:49 am | Reply
Looks Nice, The Wordpress sticker is also nice.
Ted | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:09 am | Reply
Very nice… I like the header design most =)
elsakawai | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:15 am | Reply
I wish i am so smart like u!! lovely site
Joerg Petermann | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:22 am | Reply
Great look, new, fresh, better than the older one.
Colors of your life with nice photo integration. Good!
Mike Steinbaugh | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:36 am | Reply
It looks great Matt! Good job.
Malte | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:38 am | Reply
Very nice rework!
But consider saving the haeder-image with Photoshop’s save for web feature, it saves a lot of kb.
I did an its more comfortable for my (not so much readers), because some of them and me too are not using broadband internet.
Jonathan Rascher | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:45 am | Reply
Umm, very nice. I *love* the header design. It is a little bit “giant” for my tastes, but it looks really good.
ludwik | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:50 am | Reply
very sexy!
becca | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:57 am | Reply
nice! now you’re finally in with the times!
engtech | November 13th, 2006 @ 10:06 am | Reply
that… that… that’s just crazy talk!
Michael K. Pate | November 13th, 2006 @ 10:12 am | Reply
Jealous of Alex, huh?
Matt | November 13th, 2006 @ 10:33 am | Reply
No plugin for Gallery, just an old version hacked to bits.
Eliot Landrum | November 13th, 2006 @ 10:37 am | Reply
As a fellow big-header guy, I say ignore the nay-sayers and enjoy. It’s your blog and it does look fantastic! I love the fading pattern background. That’s a really nice touch. Great job!
Mike D. | November 13th, 2006 @ 10:40 am | Reply
Looks grrrrrrrrrreat. I love it. One suggestion with the header would be to leave it that big on your entrance page but shrink it down to maybe 1/3rd that height on all interior pages. I don’t even so much have a problem with how it loads, but rather that on a non maximized 1024×768 screen, when you click a navigation button it doesn’t look like you’ve gone to a new page because all of the content is below the fold.
Great work though… it’s v. nice.
claude | November 13th, 2006 @ 10:45 am | Reply
very nice
“très beau” in french
seanrox | November 13th, 2006 @ 11:11 am | Reply
Wow Matt! This is one awesome design. Very classy and functional at the same time. It even has a bit of geek feel to it as well. Again, great job.
Eston | November 13th, 2006 @ 11:18 am | Reply
Matt, this looks a lot better than the old layout- that’s for sure.
luke dorny | November 13th, 2006 @ 11:47 am | Reply
Wow! Super slick. love the physicalness of it.
Very impressive.
I rather like the pattern more than anything, but the simple stain through the nav gives it a bit of used and abused which is also visually appealling.
jess | November 13th, 2006 @ 12:11 pm | Reply
Damnnnnnnnnn. So hot! Good job, darlin’.
photojunkie | November 13th, 2006 @ 12:12 pm | Reply
Drool!!!!
Awesome.
Venu | November 13th, 2006 @ 12:12 pm | Reply
Coool ! I guess many have already mentioned it, the header is tooo big, on my widescreen, initially i saw only a blank page and after some time the header loaded up
Epat | November 13th, 2006 @ 1:04 pm | Reply
finally,
nice design
Hiten Shah | November 13th, 2006 @ 1:47 pm | Reply
About time…looks really good
AsceticMonk | November 13th, 2006 @ 1:48 pm | Reply
Personally, I like this new design much better than the previous one. However, I have to admit that I am sucker for one-column blog templates. I especially like the header image, it hints to us what kinda person you are.
Harry | November 13th, 2006 @ 2:09 pm | Reply
A very fresh and good looking Design!
Nice color balance.
Johan Van Mol | November 13th, 2006 @ 2:10 pm | Reply
Great redesign!
Huge improvement over the last design.
I can imagine the header being too large when you’re using a low resolution, but on my 1680*1050, he’s superb.
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Nate K | November 13th, 2006 @ 2:25 pm | Reply
The new design looks great! It has a great feel and flow throughout the entire site. The header gives it great personality.
Awesome job.
doug | November 13th, 2006 @ 3:01 pm | Reply
Great design!
Mike | November 13th, 2006 @ 3:10 pm | Reply
Really nice job, it does a good job of illustrating who this Matt guy is. Google and I agree: you’re the #1 Matt around.
Daniel | November 13th, 2006 @ 3:14 pm | Reply
like the header and the red/brown background. navigation is also very usable…
ade | November 13th, 2006 @ 3:41 pm | Reply
This is absolutely awesome.
Andre | November 13th, 2006 @ 3:46 pm | Reply
Looking great. The new design was definatly needed.
Jonathan Dingman | November 13th, 2006 @ 6:07 pm | Reply
Wow Matt! Awesome job with the redesign. I really like it a lot. Fresh, clean, and awesome! Good job.
siUUL | November 13th, 2006 @ 7:35 pm | Reply
wew.. good looking ya!
dawn | November 13th, 2006 @ 8:11 pm | Reply
I think this is the best one I’ve seen yet. The colors are nice and the navigation is clean. Well done!
Raj | November 13th, 2006 @ 9:41 pm | Reply
very nicely done. the photo integration in your header is really cool. Should have been a little smaller in size though.
filosofo | November 13th, 2006 @ 10:07 pm | Reply
For a second I thought I saw my reflection in the coffee.
DannyB | November 13th, 2006 @ 10:34 pm | Reply
AWESOME !!
Very nice … very hard to see things that stand out …
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Shriram | November 13th, 2006 @ 11:41 pm | Reply
The new design looks awesome Matt !
Lori | November 13th, 2006 @ 11:55 pm | Reply
Beautiful design. I love the header
stchatterbox | November 14th, 2006 @ 12:21 am | Reply
Very attractive design. I love the header image.
Priscilla | November 14th, 2006 @ 12:35 am | Reply
Nice, love the header!
vanchisel | November 14th, 2006 @ 1:17 am | Reply
matt, you’re an inspiration. i’ve never spent this much time on, reading or going through a blog before. ths design is well-thought out, serene and inviting. i used to be a programmer many years ago. how long ago? can you say ‘assembly language’? yep! that long. google it.
so, now, i’m gonna get my feet wet, again, and start designing some wp themes.
look out world, here comes, vanchisel.
Kishore Balakrishnan | November 14th, 2006 @ 1:35 am | Reply
Looks very nice. But the akismet “blue button” looks odd !
milo | November 14th, 2006 @ 2:13 am | Reply
Congrats to you and Nicolò for the tremendous work: fresh out of the box.
Adel | November 14th, 2006 @ 3:01 am | Reply
Lovely! A good change from the earlier one.
Miriam | November 14th, 2006 @ 3:09 am | Reply
What a gorgeous design! I love the details, like the background and the coffee stains, and how the submit button even has a faint pattern on it. Nicolo did a fabulous job.
Mark Jaquith | November 14th, 2006 @ 4:13 am | Reply
I found a Moses reference.
Really interesting is how the header background doesn’t match up with the site background, but the pattern is such that it isn’t really noticeable except while you’re resizing.
Lisa | November 14th, 2006 @ 4:30 am | Reply
Good. I was getting tired of that yellow background.
Jem | November 14th, 2006 @ 7:46 am | Reply
Very swish.
Ryan | November 14th, 2006 @ 8:13 am | Reply
Excellent work by all involved.
leo | November 14th, 2006 @ 8:45 am | Reply
awesome, looks good
engtech | November 14th, 2006 @ 9:20 am | Reply
I’m really digging the way pingbacks don’t disrupt the conversation.
Blaze | November 14th, 2006 @ 9:50 am | Reply
Very nice work matt! Congrats.
Baysharam | November 14th, 2006 @ 10:31 am | Reply
Grooovy man
William H. Harle Jr. | November 14th, 2006 @ 10:45 am | Reply
Very nice, but I highly recommend using overflow:hidden on the links in your main navigation. It will take those long outline boxes when someone clicks on a nav item and make the interactivity a lot prettier. Sorry, that’s a huge personal peeve of mine.
JDH | November 14th, 2006 @ 10:53 am | Reply
Wow, that is a BIG CLUNKY header. More visible header per no content in my normally sized browser window. Ick. Do I come to photomatt to look at the header? no, the content. Yuck.
Aaron | November 14th, 2006 @ 11:00 am | Reply
Very cool, trendy stuff Matt. Its much more personal looking now. Bigger random photo would be cool. So your secret to success has been revealed: Ramen Noodles and Coffee.
Andy | November 14th, 2006 @ 11:01 am | Reply
This is a very nice design, both in terms the actual look and in the way the elements fit together. Bravo!
Robert Payne | November 14th, 2006 @ 12:51 pm | Reply
Very nice Matt! I’d say it is definitely eclectic in a weird sort of Tudor meets Victorian meets Americana sort of way. Considering your level of European travel lately, I’d say that has made an influence. BTW, I need stickers!
Empress | November 14th, 2006 @ 2:07 pm | Reply
Wow… love the new look
It sure makes me want to change things up on my site!
Lurve it!
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Yasnnic | November 14th, 2006 @ 2:14 pm | Reply
well done matt!
I love it.
typoman | November 14th, 2006 @ 4:50 pm | Reply
On my small notebook screen, the big banner takes all the place. Perhaps a bit too big. But although a real good site! Congratulations!
Birgit | November 14th, 2006 @ 5:18 pm | Reply
beautiful new design, congratulations!
rhythm collision | November 14th, 2006 @ 7:08 pm | Reply
It’s so really kool!
I like a header part.
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Kory Twaites | November 14th, 2006 @ 9:20 pm | Reply
Great layout. Nice and Clean, but gets the job done.
Matt | November 15th, 2006 @ 12:23 am | Reply
Actually it’s hot chocolate, not coffee.
Richard | November 15th, 2006 @ 12:46 am | Reply
Lots of nice touches, Matt: the coffee stain, the piece of tape, the copyright message (or did I just not notice that before?). Good to see a photo of you prominently on the site. Insert something insightful about being able to see what the writer of a weblog looks like here. But one thing I find hard to believe: do you really code PHP with pen and paper in your notebook?
Regardless, Matt, great design. Red is the new pink!
Indigo | November 15th, 2006 @ 5:41 am | Reply
Love big masthead images that are interesting. One small criticism, sadly the design gets a bit too plain as one scrolls further down the page.
Juha Liikala | November 15th, 2006 @ 5:49 am | Reply
Looks great! Did you design the wallpaper pattern yourself or did you found it somewhere in the web? I’ve been trying to search similar copyright free pattern myself - with poor luck
that girl again | November 15th, 2006 @ 9:40 am | Reply
I like it. It’s straight outta 2004 with the wallpaper background and serifs and grungy bits, but it’s all the better for that. Aside from the fact that nobody in their right mind would have implemented a 150kb header back then (it’s a bit doubtful now, but there’s no point trying to explain to Americans that not everyone in the world has TV-sized monitors and broadband. And I’m always prepared to allow people a bit more leeway on personal sites, where they’re entitled to pick and choose their audience.)
LobsterMan | November 15th, 2006 @ 10:50 am | Reply
Amazingly beautiful!!!
Paulo Raponi | November 15th, 2006 @ 11:10 am | Reply
beautiful
Aaron Brazell | November 15th, 2006 @ 11:16 am | Reply
Only one word comes to mind, Matt. Sexiness. Great design.
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Liza | November 15th, 2006 @ 7:00 pm | Reply
Your beautiful website loaded quickly out here in the woods of New hampshire, with a top dial up speed of 31.2 bps.
And that is always appreciated. 99 percent of the time I duck out of loading anything that appears stuck.
I just switched to Wordpress from whatever, and was looking for you to thank you for that ridiculous plug in that makes me smile when I see it. Hello Dolly.
You have great creativity in this world of code…
thanks
patrick | November 15th, 2006 @ 7:20 pm | Reply
Wah! this is beautiful design.
Brian | November 15th, 2006 @ 9:34 pm | Reply
Great looking site. Just found it, so I’ll trust the redesign is heads and tails above whatever was before. Great photos too - a true skill.
Cheers.
Damien | November 15th, 2006 @ 10:32 pm | Reply
Have to say I do like this theme very much…good work
Angee | November 16th, 2006 @ 2:16 am | Reply
I really enjoy seeing a new blog design that is well done and beautiful. Unfortunately I have poor theme-choosing skills and I sometimes become a little jealous.
I’m currently green and not happy with my current color scheme or list-style choice , I blame you!