What are you eating? Why are you crying?

Not exactly sure why, but... I laughed, I cried, I wanted more.

elsterama site still getting recognition

Reviewed by: Lindsay Winkler, Jenna Zydron, Mike Antonicelli on 5/16/05 Mark Elster www.elsterama.com The site is for Mark Elster and designed by Mark Elster. The site includes a portfolio, personal profile, his music, photography and contact info. He is the creative director and founder of Eye580, an interactive agency creating and developing engaging websites, rich media advertising and branding programs. The site was found May 12, 2005. His site has been recognized and been awarded, mostly in 2003, by many organizations for being a good site. We don't know how long the site has been up but it has been up for at least 2 years. It is a good website because it is still very successful even 2 years later. This site is distinctive because it is successful in its concept and overall personal aesthetic through its design and ease of navigation. It is professional but playful and creative at the same time. Alignment, repetition, proximity and contrast are all working to his advantage. His calm color palette lets his own designs and photography really pop out. His background is a grey that contrasts with his vibrant images. He really reinforces his identity and brings contrast to the page by using his name is large letters on the top of the page. Overall it has a very clean and clutter free design that is easy to navigate. He set up his navigation in a creative way but has another option to reinforce the navigation in case there is any confusion. He has reinforced where you are at in the web page by integrating the button icons in other parts of the page so you know where you are at. There is no scrolling and everything opening in the same spot, which makes it easy to navigate at 1024 by 768 resolution. Some of the navigation is linear and some is non-linear. The linear navigation has a story telling aesthetic which is part of his personal aesthetic. The information on the site is well organized. Everything is explained and their is little confusion as to what is going on. Another interesting thing about the site is that every time you visit the site or go back to the home page there is a different image. This mixes it up and gives the user more to look at so its not the same every time. Some flaws are that in the portfolio for the web sites he doesn't have links to the actual site. Some people could consider linear navigation a flaw. For example in his portfolio he could have added thumbnails or a list of clients to pick from instead of having to go through his whole portfolio. Depending on what your internet connection is some of the pages load slowly. Another flaw is that on the music section if you click to get his music it sends you to another site and you have to try to find his music, which was confusing. He should have sample music on his site. The link on the profile page to Eye580 opens in the same window so you can't navigate back to his site. Some of the photos in the photo section could be more related to his work since this is a portfolio site not a family site. He also did not use the same grey color on all the backgrounds which shows slightly. Reviewed by: Lindsay Winkler, Jenna Zydron, Mike Antonicelli on 5/16/05