Neil Rain Persad - Real Estate Website

my first reaction was...

AAAAAAHHHH WHY CAN'T I TURN OFF THE MUSIC! few things annoy me as much as sites with built-in music, especially if i can't turn it off. it makes the site work unfriendly, at a minimum.

then i realized that the play/ff/rw/pause was for music, not for the animation. is there a reason there's more of a "jukebox" of sound? and you need to put the sound controls (at least on/off) while the site is loading. you can't turn off the sound until the site loads because the controls are in what's loading. or don't play music while it's loading.

and if i pause the music, that still doesn't help with the sound effects on the navigation. maybe it's just me being anal, i'd just prefer a general "mute" button for the site.

also, it drives me crazy that on the site i can't use ctrl-tab to switch between firefox tabs. your flash site has taken over my keyboard and ctrl-tab cycles through your navigation. that's one thing that could make me navigate away unless i *really* want to be there.

it would be nice if there was a way to scroll through the properties even faster on the main page. if you want to go back to something that already passed by, it takes a while to get there. i know you can do it once you're inside an individual property, but you can't seem to do it from the main page.

the text on the marketing page has a scroll bar, but there isn't any additional text to scroll to.

i like the gallery pages, they're well put together and easy to navigate.

overall, i think it's interesting and unique. there are just a few things that bother me, and many of them are "hot button" things for me (sound, in particular).

Agree about the sound issue mentioned by gwells. For such an innovative site as this, why not add an illustration of a funky radio and then any visitor to the site can have the option of turning on the music...

I like the gallery style presentation of the homes for sale (holy cow), and the ceiling lights illuminating the navigational tabs.

Well done.
3dog

"Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible."
— Frank Zappa

THAT IS ONE SEXY SITE!!!!!

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UPDATED PORTFOLIO
www.jhousedesign.com
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I hope you're getting paid well, you do a fantastic job. Every element ties in so well for a complete user experience. I personally do not work in web so I may not have the most constructive critique, but this site is pure eye candy for the casual joe, like me.

That said, I agree about the scrolling thing. I was also just at a website that KILLED my eyes with the sideways, uncontrolable scrolling, so I'm extra sensitive to it right now.
I did a house search and clicked on an image. A separate box came up, but the image wasn't there—it just said "close," so that's something to fix, but maybe you're just not at that point yet.
LOVE the colors and images.

Message to Gwells:
I guess there are not too many people who are annoyed by music. It is a great idea that the user can mute the music when the site starts to load. As far as the ctl+tab button it works for me and everyone that has seen the site. The main (HOME) page gives you the ability to go through all the properties from the properties tab.

Message to Alissa:
I can't really do much more about the scrolling...my client loves it. As far as the SEARCH page that is really part of the MLS system. Too bad I can't modify that...:(

Thank you all for your comments and suggestions. Any other comments or suggestions are welcome.

I usually can't stand music built into a website (it conflicts with whatever I have on iTunes) but this one really works well! I instantly wanted a latte and to talk to someone about my new ultra stylish properties :)

Nice work.

Kris

My tastes run simple. I'll settle for 8581 Hollywood Blvd. But I ask you, does this price include a pool/bunion massager boy? And could I hope that his name is....Sven?

"Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible."
— Frank Zappa

Good to see the current real estate market hasn't affected Neil ;)

Apart from the auto-playing music, I like the site. It's flashy without going overboard.

In terms of the music I'd choose a softer track, but that's just me. It does get your attention and it *does* stand out, so I guess it's not all bad.

Sweet site though. Definitely reflects the success Mr. Persad has achived, based on the houses he's selling!

Leaky Penny
www.leakypenny.com

“If you do what you love to do, then you won’t do it in an average way.”
~ Angela Bassett

I agree pretty much with the others. It's very impressive work and I think you've done a great job with the design here.

It lags a bit every now and then, even on my perfectly modern iMac. Maybe this has to do with the fact that Flash doesn't perform too well on Mac, maybe it will be fixed when I upgrade to Flash 10.

And also I'm going to put myself in the camp with the others, ideally the music should be muted to start out. At the very least, the mute button needs to be big and obvious. I don't care if you think it makes the site look worse (which I disagree with, it looks fine and it's a necessary element), usability should ALWAYS trump eye candy. Saying you don't want to change the size of the mute button because it doesn't look good is akin to saying you don't want to put a copyright on your page because it looks bad. It's a VITAL ELEMENT.

You do have going for you though, that it's not too loud. If something is loud I immediately hit the hotkey to close the window never to return. Even if it's not, I'm likely to do that. I just don't like it when something makes noise without my explicit permission, and I know I'm not alone on this.

Again, love the visual design of the site (apart from the occasional lag). I think the sound clip you used is great and compliments the site perfectly. Just think it needs to start when I tell it to, not when the page loads.

Good work.