For this week’s blog post, I didn’t have to look very hard outside my own immediate circle of websites, and it’s a large part of why I’m taking this course.
The first website that I will critique is the website for the community of Little Pine First Nation.
I took a screenshot of the homepage for LPFN, and it is an upgrade of the old website. With that being said, there are a few things that I would fix, especially after learning about graphic design concepts.
When the site first loads, the slider photos enlarge slowly to fill the space. There are no signs of similarity in this homepage other than the drop-down headings being the same size and font. There is some continuity again with the headings being a uniform shape and size.
As far as closure goes, the image that I have screenshotted is one of the branded trucks from the First Nation. The waves actually move in this photo, and the photos themselves expand to eventually fill the screen, so although parts of the truck are always hidden by the waves, we know its a truck with tires sitting on the ground. Proximity-wise, we also allude to the buttons being close enough together that the user can identify that they are all working buttons that lead to other pages, with the exception of the services button being a drop-down.
As far as Figure/Ground goes, the call to action button of “Contact Us” is highlighted, as is the Homepage button. For Symmetry and Order, I’d have to once again refer to the Heading buttons located in a pattern at the top of the homepage. There is no example of common fate unless you count the rolling waves that appear to be a design choice—there are no sliders or anything in motion on the page.
As far as how I feel about the design, I feel that there is a lot that could be improved on the site. The spacing of the logo is off and actually touches the slider, and it serves no function if clicked upon. The logo itself is extremely busy, and it appears to be an artistic interpretation of the medicine wheel and utilizes a lot of colors.
The fonts are all mashed together with no uniformity, and the font sizes are scattered—the actual name of our First Nation is a skinny little font and almost appears to be an afterthought. Color choices all appear to be picked out of the logo and clash together. The white space stretches on under the slider, and then another huge Little Pine logo sits underneath alongside the Chiefs name and phone number. Continuing on there is also a pinkish photo with a rubber duck on it with a bright blue “Learn More” button with details for the LPFN daycare.
In my opinion, the website is a mess. It looks like a basic squarespace “Drag and Drop” type of website, with mismatching photos, a random color scheme, and some links don’t function. The postsecondary application also leads to an outdated word document that hasn’t changed in 20+ years. One of the first things I will do when I graduate this program will be texting my Chief and offering to redo the site for free – I don’t charge my community for anything since it’s one of the ways that I can give back from over here in California.
The second website that I am selecting is not even the website that I had in mind when I was searching for it, but it popped up, and I decided to go with it instead since I had a reaction to it.
The website is called “Shop Native Online”; here is the screenshot.
Alright, so… similarity wise, the Headings at the top of the page match in terms of fonts, size, etc. The photos do not match whatsoever in size or even in uniformity of the button placements. Continuity-wise, the only thing that shows that items are meant to be grouped together is the awkward rectangular buttons placed over them.
Closure wise, some of the photos disappear, leading the user to believe there is additional content to be seen; indeed, the next two sections on the site are eight large photos of bracelets, then a full-screen grid of recent Instagram posts, which then disppears into four featured products, then a random Journal with two large photographs and blocks of text.
Proximity-wise objects are slapped on the site with no thought to design elements. Each clickable item technically functions, at least the ones I clicked on, but its quite messy. For the Figure/Ground element, the buttons are placed in the forefront of the screen and draw the viewers attention with a call to action.
The only thing symmetrical about the site is the headings, the entire thing looks thrown together. It does not look orderly at all. There are also no moving parts to this site to show Common Fate.
If I were to elevate the design of the website, I’d start with the logo itself. It’s quite garish and does not encapsulate Native designs; it looks like it was created as a tribute to cave paintings or primitive drawings, which does not age well as we enter a technological era.
The photos themselves appear to be of good quality, and I would position them in a more aesthetic manner, in small squares, spaced neatly throughout the shopping sections. I would make better use of white space in between the photos and work with clear headings throughout the entire site. I’d also organize the headings better and make clear sections in the website.
In summary, I do believe that both websites get the general message across of who they are and what they’re doing.
I also understand that Little Pine First Nation may not be moving forward with clear ideas of who they are in terms of branding, and thats probably not where their focus lies. They probably assigned one of the university interns the job of creating a drag-and-drop website, and it worked, so whatever, which is why I want to help them by creating a well-thought-out site that’s easy to navigate for members to use. I can also think of a few other things that could be added to the calendar that I could help out with as well: a calendar of events, a staff page in addition to the Chief and Council page, and more. I believe a few minor changes could make a difference for the better and could probably create up-to-date sites for other reserves as well.
Heather.
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