I am trying a new html editor and it apparently sucks or I suck at using it. It’s called SeaMonkey and while its pretty easy to use it also messed around with the key frames of the page I was working on. And it turned my tables into thick ugly things where I prefer them to be completely invisible.
Could someone (anyone) please take a crack at improving the layout of the following page:
http://www.thundercatslair.org/merchandise/statues/lion-o1.html
Thanks,
Mark
Chris here…
Holy hell, that’s made a mess of that page! I’m no expert, but I reckon it might be the HTML editor you’re using clashing with the main template that this site is built around - the original “skeleton” of this site was put together with Dreamweaver, and whilst Dreamweaver is definitely the best in terms of the coding it spits out, I still reckon another HTML editor might clash with some of that coding - did you edit the page via a visual interface or by inputting the code directly, Mark? 
Another problem that the page has is that some of the graphics used are too wide for the “white space” area of the site’s template - i.e., all the content we add goes into the white area of each page, and if an image that we add is too wide for that, it stretches the white space area with it, messing up the overall appearance of the site… 
So, the first thing that needs to happen is that the images need resizing so that they fit the width of that table (the white space area) - which is a bit tricky to judge from looking at the source code because the table width looks to be set to “100%” rather than a specified number of pixels. But, I’m sure if you left it with me for a while I could come up with an educated guess! 
If you wanted to be able to display all of those images at that size, what might be best would be to use some sort of javascript like lightbox2 (which to my embarrassment is the only one I’ve ever used!) so that clicking on the image makes them display larger - you used to use something similar in your Animation Art section, and in fact all the lightbox2 code is still there, but the javascript file has disappeared! 
There is some amazing content you’ve got there, Mark! :eek: I’d like to suggest that at least some of those images be watermarked, as I reckon they could become “hot” images on sites catering for action figures and related collectibles. What do you think?
Hope some of that is of help, my friend, and LMK if you’d like/need me to do anything else.
Take care…
Heya Chris,
If you have the time mate, do you think you could do this page the way you think it needs to be done? I have no attachment to the layout or format but you could use the text that’s there and I’d like to keep the images in the same sequence. I’m happy for them to be resized or to be used in a thumbnail / lightbox format, whatever you think looks best.
I’ve also asked Hard Hero for some descriptions of the images and what each piece means, or some of the backstory. I want to add a short caption to most / all of the images.
Great idea to do watermarks, can someone help with that also?
Thanks,
Mark
Chris here…
Hey Mark, absolutely no problem - it would be my pleasure to take care of the HTML for that page! I’ve got a fair bit on my plate during this week, but might be able to do a bit of work towards it over the weekend if that would be of any good to you?
The actual HTML for the page should be relatively straightforward, the trickiest bit is resizing the images so they fit, without an obvious clue as to how wide they should be - but I reckon I can figure it out!
Re: the watermarking, I’ve recently started experimenting with Adobe Photoshop and reckon I might be able to do this now using the awesome watermark that Kyle recently created…will let you guys know if I encounter any problems!
To all of the team - please feel free to hit me with any HTML jobs you guys feel need doing - whilst my spare time can be slightly limited, one of my goals for 2010 is to bring my HTML / XHTML / CSS skills up to near W3C standard, which means I need lots of material to practice on, and be motivated to work on! 
Take care…
I’m hoping to have this ready for the 6th when the statues hit stores in North America. Chris, any chance of you being able to clean up this html by then? No worries if not, I can put up this temporary page as is, and have you clean it up later.
Cheers,
Mark
Chris here…
OK, here with what I hope is the completed page - I was able to make the images large enough that working on a thumbnails, “click here for larger image” was unnecessary.
A couple of points:
I’ve saved and preserved your original page, Mark, until I was sure that you were happy with this new version. I’ve saved the original here: http://www.thundercatslair.org/merchandise/statues/lion-o1-orig/lion-o1.html .
The new version can be found here: http://www.thundercatslair.org/merchandise/statues/lion-o1.html . This is the exact same URL of the page you originally created.
As a side note - although I’m pretty pleased with the way this page has come out, trying to make it work I realise how outdated a lot of the coding of ThunderCats Lair is now - bear in mind it was 2006 when we launched this updated version of the site (and 2005 when we launched the original site) and so web browsers have changed a lot. There’s a lot of coding in our site that’s designed to effectively “trick” web browsers into displaying our content the way we want - I employed a few of those tricks in this page! (And 99.9% of the coding I’ve done for the site in the past has been full of those tricks.)
So, this is why I’m now completely behind MannyF’s idea to redesign the site using WordPress - he was far more far-seeing than me when he originally proposed it.
In fact, I would say that updating the site is becoming increasingly vital to the site’s future on the Internet, because I suspect we’re only a few browser upgrades away from looking like a really messy, badly-displaying site, as browsers get stricter and stricter about how they’ll display old HTML coding. So, hopefully it won’t be long before we’re able to take concrete steps towards overhauling the site ready for the future of the Internet! 
Take care…
Chris, thanks this is terrific, you’ve become a master of the web! After all that rushing it looks like the release will be delayed until around the 14th. Unfortunately the statues haven’t arrived, or aren’t ready to be shipped from Hard Hero’s offices yet.
Chris here…
LOL, I don’t know about that, but I did spend much of 2009 honing my HTML skills, and would like to expand on this as I’m really getting to enjoy it. A lot of the credit has to go to Kyle, who taught me a hell of a lot of excellent things last year, including the principle and basics of CSS!
If you, Mark, or indeed any of the rest of the team want anything put into HTML for this site, please don’t hesitate to ask me - if I’m too busy I’ll say so, but as I say, I’m very, very eager to expand upon my HTML / XHTML / CSS skill this year, and so am eager for “real” pages to be testing myself on!
LOL! Well, that’s fair enough - do you want me to adjust the header of your article to show the new date, or leave it as is for the time being?
And, would you like me to delete the old version of your article from where I archived it (see the link above)? No worries either way, just LMK!
Take care…
Thanks Chris, yeah please delete the old version. Let’s leave the date as is for now in case there is another delay.
Cheers,
Mark
Chris here…
Hey Mark, no worries - have deleted the old version as requested. LMK as and when if you want me to make any alterations to the new version of the page.
Take care…