You’ve all heard me mention GoonBlog several times over the last three months. It’s actually been live for a few weeks now, and Chris and I have been hard at work in our rare spare time finding our voice and putting some content together while the graphic design takes place in the background. I have a lot of faith in this project for a variety of reasons, so I decided to pony up some duckets for a professional design.
We didn’t want to ‘roll it out’ until it was 100% done – but I’ve just gotten the first mockup back from the graphic designer and I want some feedback before I give him another round of changes to make. Click here to go to the designer’s site, and then select GoonBlog from the dropdown menu on the right.
I almost really like it. The gloves as a background image in each post, the Stanley Cups beside the titles, the center ice design at the top – but I’m not ‘wowed yet’ and I desperately want to be. The designer is obviously talented, and followed my exploratory round of suggestions to the letter, but it needs a ‘little something’. Here are a few of my ideas, and I look forward to hearing some of yours, dear reader.
– Cartoon players are duking it out rather than checking.
– Post cell is shaded with a light grey instead of surrounded by a thin border.
– Less real estate used at the top of the screen for the graphics.
– “GoonBlog” is more condensed and both words are on the same line. Saves space and will allow us to repurpose it as a logo.
– Yank the crossed hockey sticks.
Those are some of my first impressions. Detroit and I look forward to some of yours. We didn’t want to ‘drop the curtain’ before we officially ‘dropped the gloves’, but we have – so rip into it and slug us with some feedback. And be sure to have a look at the current version of the site so you can get the big picture/bored to frozen tears.
Hockey sucks you Hab.
That was very helpful. Thanks. Would you like it better if they all rode Ducatis instead of ice skates?
Where the hell is everyone today? A little help?
YO! I am with you Pye. I like it, but I don’t love it. It is a little too cartoony, and “fun”. Put some blood in there! Gets some tits, maybe a for sale sign in the background! I really like the Stanley Cups, but the cartoons need to be fighting like the organ in Strange Brew just went off. Monster, that was for you.
DP,
yep..way to cartoony and not nearly hardcore enough.
No goon site is complete without images of Jack(#17), Steve (#18) and Jeff(#18) that’s right The Hanson Brothers…
There has to be some images of a penalty box too, and of course “the foil”.
Let’s not forget about Clarence “Screaming Buffalo” Swamptown or Ogie Ogilthorpe either.
Personally, I don’t like the maroon font or the maroon mouseovers, it doesn’t go with the blue which is a great color. I don’t like the thin black line around each post and i think the gloves are just a bit too opaque and the crossed hockey sticks have to go.
I agree that it looks too cartoony. Very ‘Looney Tunes’. I half expected to see Daffy Duck and Porky Pig as I scrolled down. The center ice graphic should be at the center of the page and I don’t like the square boxes at all. I do like the Stanley Cup icons and I like the dudes fighting.
pye – don’t listen to these naysayers – it looks solid. stilts is right though – if the cartoon images were of the hanson brothers (puttin’ on the foil) you’d be in business.
and since there are few things i enjoy more than talking shit about hockey, i could be spending a lot of time over at goonblog…