Website Critique

AJ Young · May 12, 2020

Just finished updating my website! What do you think? Anything I can do to make it better?

http://www.ajyoungdp.com/

Daniel D. Teoli Jr. · May 12, 2020

Opening photos don't work well for me. Maybe it is my slow rustbelt internet. I keep scrolling and they just blank out as I scroll down. If I wait a long time they load but they still blank out as I scroll. I much prefer little window views you can see all at once and click on a photo to enlarge. But that is just me.

Your reel worked fine and is impressive. Some nice lighting and photography! Only thing I didn't like was the lady with burnt out face near 1.11, but not a big deal. Maybe it goes with the storyline. But she is pretty burnt out.

Also good you can download your reel. Makes it easy for potential clients. That is what I did to study your reel some more. The internet take a while to load video. I prefer to watch downloaded video for instant access.

PDF of resume loaded fast, compact and to the point. Maybe make contact info a little cleaner design at top, maybe in bold. Also try some color. Make the titles of films in red to stand out. But really, it is good as is even if you don't change a thing. Just trying to throw out some options to look at and possibly try.

Good luck!

AJ Young · May 12, 2020

Thank you for looking at it!

Did any of the opening photos eventually start to play? They're place holder thumbnails until the video fully loads which then plays the shot as a loop (essentially a GIF, but it's an .mp4 to save on download time)

EDIT: I think I may have fixed it. If you're willing, could you try it again?

Edited May 12, 2020 by AJ Young
Fixed code issue on website

Daniel D. Teoli Jr. · May 13, 2020

Yes, it is better.

I like the blinking eye guy! He is an attention getter, like the opening one buried in the dirt!

AJ Young · May 13, 2020

Thank you! The blinking eye movie was a fun one to shoot.

Vital Butinar · May 13, 2020

Hi AJ!

I took a look at your website and I actually love the concept because it's simple and I like the cross hairs theme like looking trough the monitor.

You shot some pretty cool stuff! I like your reel.

Maybe the only thing I'd do is add some info about the projects but that's me

Anyway congratulations on updating your website I know how much work that is.

AJ Young · May 14, 2020

Thank you for your advice!

Miguel Angel · May 14, 2020

Good update of your website!

I prefer layouts where I can see every project at a glance and don't have to scroll down much but in this case I think that your website works well.

The thumbnails started to play eventually but maybe it would be better if they start to play when you place your mouse cursor over it?

Have a lovely day!

Vital Butinar · May 14, 2020

5 hours ago, AJ Young said:

Thank you for your advice!

You're welcome. I didn't help much.

I just redid our website but unfortunately there's not much difference on the outside because the changes I made were in the back and organized the site so that I can update it easily. It's a lot of work. If you have time go check it out, it should be in my description. But it's a completely different style.

AJ Young · May 14, 2020

3 hours ago, Miguel Angel said:

The thumbnails started to play eventually but maybe it would be better if they start to play when you place your mouse cursor over it?

I'll try to implement that! Thank you!

2 hours ago, Vital Butinar said:

I just redid our website but unfortunately there's not much difference on the outside because the changes I made were in the back and organized the site so that I can update it easily. It's a lot of work. If you have time go check it out, it should be in my description. But it's a completely different style.

I checked out your website! You've done a lot of projects. You're right, definitely a different style, but it works for you! ?

Backend development is a pain, so I totally understand. haha

Simon Wyss · May 14, 2020

What’s your name? Ayjay means nothing.

AJ Young · May 14, 2020

1 hour ago, Simon Wyss said:

What’s your name? Ayjay means nothing.

Oh! Is my name displaying as Ayjay? What browser are you using?

Vital Butinar · May 15, 2020

19 hours ago, AJ Young said:

Backend development is a pain, so I totally understand. haha

Oh yeah. But thankfully in my previous life I used to be an IT guy so it makes it a lot easier and I was never a programer so I still need a couple of days to get back to speed. But I guess being an IT person it makes it a lot easier understanding the film equipment and related technical stuff.

I'm gonna joke a little now. But sometimes I wish I wasn't such a technical person because now my girlfriend, who's also a great DP and editor doesn't need to know absolutely anything technical beyond using the equipment we shoot with and it makes for some really weird and funny arguments where people say "you guys are weird why do you arguing about codecs and ISOs". On the other hand a couple of days ago she was doing some storyboards for a feature that we're developing and kept nagging me to look at naked women showering (exact search criteria) online to find the one that I liked the most so the she could have something to base her drawing on. ?

What platform are you using for your site?

I don't know why but a long time ago I decided that wordpress was something that was simple enough for me to play around with so now I just keep using that.

AJ Young · May 15, 2020

Ha! The dynamic with you and your girlfriend sounds hilarious.

I coded the site from scratch. If you're curious, I left as much detailed notes as possible in the source code of the website. It's a little easter egg!

Vital Butinar · May 15, 2020

Yeah she's great and I love doing stuff with her. But yeah people always say that we're crazy. ?

Oh you coded the site yourself. That's cool! Did you just use PHP as a container for the html or is it generated?

I love the way you organized the code! I used to do that and one time I even created a small content management system that spat out and commented the html code so it was all organized. Admitted I went a little overboard but it was fun.

People always make fun of my organizational systems when we shoot stuff and even my girlfriend(her desktop is a mess) did when I organized her sculptures into a organized folder structure. I'm pretty strict about this filing system and only have a couple of unessential folder for a mess on our storage system and even that gets deleted on a random schedule by an automated script. But then when someone needs to find something they always come running "Oh where is the...". So very cool commenting!

I keep wondering what what will come in the commented section under the hidden divs for future use.

AJ Young · May 15, 2020

Thank you!

I chose PHP because I wanted to have one file for header/site menu, one file for footer, and one file for the actual content. PHP then puts all three of those files into one and displays that. I found it easier to edit one header/site menu file and have that change applied across the website instantly rather than editing each individual .html file.

Here's what the PHP is doing:

<?php
   $path = $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'];
   $path .= "/header.php";
   require_once($path);
?>
<!--Begin Content Section-->
HTML HTML HTML HTML
<!--End Content Section-->

<?php
   $path = $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'];
   $path .= "/footer.php";
   require_once($path);
?>