Interactive Design / Exercise 1 - Web Analysis

Omar bin Shafik / 0371439
Interactive Design / Bachelor of Design (Honours) in Creative Media
Exercise - Web Analysis

Exercise 1 - Web Analysis

We are tasked to do an analysis of two out of the three websites that were given to us, covering the purpose of the website and the strengths and weaknesses of the website and how they can impact the user experience. I will be talking about these mainly from a desktop point of view and mention a few things about how the website looks on mobile near the end of the analysis.

1. Web Analysis 1 - panelki
Website link: panelki

Intro
Panelki is a website that tells the viewer several aspects of residential units called panel houses in Germany, their history, culture and what is currently happening to them. The header manages to convey this pretty well. 

Website Navigation
There are buttons scattered across the main page that lighten and dim in a sort of rhythm with words on the left side of the page that tell you the what the contents of the page the buttons lead to are. There is also a hamburger menu in the top right for navigation through the website. It can be used as an alternative to the buttons on the main page. There are also back buttons on the sub-pages that take the viewer back to the main page. Almost every button on the website changes colour when hovered on by the mouse cursor as a form of visual feedback telling the viewer it can be clicked. The information provided in the website is concise, being able to convey what is needed very quickly, with there even being a quick summary close to the bottom of the main page if the viewer didn't view the other pages. The footer on the main page is just a button leading to the website that they used to create the panelki website. 

Website Experience
The website itself looks very nice with a colour palette that is easy on eyes and doesn't use too many colours. It is very simplistic but it is enough to convey what they want to. It is also able to maintain the viewer's attention with several animated elements on the page, some moving freely and some moving as you scroll down the page.

Text
The font used is also quite effective in my opinion as it is a very simple sans serif font that is easy to read which is able to convey information faster and easier. The text layout is also well done as it flows very well with important information being emboldened making it easier to take in the important bits. The loading times were pretty consistent, not taking more than 3 seconds to load each page on good internet. 

Mobile
The website layout on mobile is quite similar as well with the buttons being bigger to compensate for the fact that viewers usually use their fingers on mobile. 

Conclusion
All in all, panelki is a website that is able to convey what it wants to in a very quick, easy and interactive way that works well on both desktop and mobile platforms.

2. Web Analysis 2 - tomoyaokada - portfolio v5
Website link: tomoyaokada

Intro
This is a website made by Tomoya Okada, a Japanese front-end engineer, as a portfolio showcasing his works and what he is able to do through various tech demos and Blender. 

Website Navigation
The website open up on a black screen with a tilted rectangle in the centre. The word "Enter" near the bottom of the screen can be clicked to go further in to the site. There is also an option to turn sound on or off in this page. Clicking on "Enter" will take you to the main page. If you had the option for sound turned on, audio reminiscent of waves in the ocean will start playing. There is a button in the top right indicated by a line in a circle that you can click on to turn the audio on or off if you didn't do so on the intro page. To the left of the audio button, there are the "Archive" and "About" buttons. The archive contains links to more websites made by Tomoya Okada as personal projects. The about page contains information about Tomoya Okada, his achievements, and a link to his email. Going back to the main page, to the right of the audio button, there is a slider you can click on to switch between light and dark mode. For the main page itself, it contains all the works and techniques that the creator would like to show off. The works are shown off in panels that can be clicked on that take the viewer to individual pages for each work. Each page showcasing the creator's works and techniques contains a short description of what he did with several panels containing images showing off his workflow. At the bottom of the pages, there are buttons that can take you to the next or previous works as well. Every page also has the letters "TMY." in the top left which, on every other page leads back to the main page, while on the main page, leads back to the intro page. The website itself features a lot of animated features with the panels warping while scrolling through the main page and panels zooming in  when going through the other pages as well. The main page is also a seamless loop that the viewer can scroll through as long as they want. 

Website Experience
The website can be a little confusing to navigate through at first, but it is very easy to discover what everything does in the website. The colour palette used is very simple, being only a light grey and black. This, paired with the audio used makes for a calm experience. The website does what it is intended to do very well, which is being able to show off what Tomoya Okada is able to do. The website itself could also be considered part of his portfolio considering the amount of special effects and techniques he used in it. 

Text
The font used is very simple, being a sans serif styled font which is easy to read thus being able to convey information faster and easier. Since the website was made by someone from Japan, it also includes Japanese translations for Japanese viewers. The text layout is done well. It gives information about the work and is set before the images showing the work. 

Loading
The website loads quite seamlessly, with the graphics on screen fading in and fading out as it loads a new page. 

Mobile 
The mobile website is also very smooth with the only exception being the intro page loading into the main page. The animation used there gets quite choppy. Another downside on the mobile website is that the warping effects on the display panels aren't there. This might be because of limitations on mobile, but I can't say for sure. Another issue that I might just be nitpicking on is that, on the main page, it often scrolls past the point where I stop my finger when sliding it across the screen. This doesn't happen on the other pages and kind of bothers me as an inconsistency. 

Conclusion
Other than the mobile website, the desktop website does it's job very well, showing off Tomoya Okada's skill set with the website itself also being able to be part of the portfolio if he wants it to be.

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