Design Exploration

For this exploration I found two designs that I found compelling.  I have had a fascination with animation for as long as I can remember, and am really excited that I am learning what I have always found amazing.  The most intriguing websites to me are the ones that have bold colors, a solid theme, and great visuals. 

This website is a great example of this.

http://www.aparte-graphique.com


The main subject of this portfolio is a beautiful landscape illustration.  That alone kept me interested in exploring this website more.  I then began clicking around to explore my options.  I noticed the little helper in the bottom right corner, to help you understand what you are about to click on.  The website is in French, but the navigation is put together so well, I understand where I am going.  The navigation is also something that really caught my attention.  There are bars for 3d, 2d, and different website designs.  There is a little display box that animates to the center of the screen to display these.  I enjoy the color palette, the blacks, greys and shades of blues go together very well.  It has a sort of a movie reel feel to it, and I also very much enjoyed that.  The design principles say you should make your navigation easy, and like I said, this website is in French and I know exactly what's going on. The consistency of the website is very on point, but also shows differences so you understand you are changing your location.  This is a website that I find very inspirational as a designer.

http://www.michaelkelleyphotos.com


I have always found a fascination with photography websites.  There are a billion photographers in the world, with a billion different websites. This is a very clean, and well put together portfolio of photographs.  The navigation bar for the photographs is what I found most interesting about this website.  The bright white background, with the beautiful blue transparency over each photo on the navigation bar really catches your eye.  Each picture is transparent until you roll over it, and it becomes very bold.  The photos are very bright, and really stand out against the white background.  There is a great consistency, and repetitiveness with this portfolio.  It is very simple and easy to navigate for anyone to use.  I am interested in copying a lot of this designers techniques for a website of my own.