Layout
about the current version
The second version of the network features scans of... a guy from the manga Forest of Gray City by Uhm Jung-Hyun. As you can probably tell from my not-so-subtle slip-up there, I've never read the series before. BUT THE AWESOME LETHE GIFTED ME WITH THESE GORGEOUS HIGH QUALITY SCANS ONE DAY, OKAY (LIKE WHO DOES THAT??? COOL PEOPLE, THAT'S WHO), AND I SAID I WOULD MAKE SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL OUT OF IT so here is my... attempt. /SOBS (Also, if you want to know more about the series from a far better and more qualified person WHO ACTUALLY READ THE THING, please refer to Lethe's blurb about it!)
This layout has gone through at least four different versions (multiplied by three means at least twelve different layouts!) because I'm awful at making things out of manga scans.
The first finalized version (you can see it here!) was originally just one gigantic page that utilized Fancybox pop-ups for the different sections and pages. Although it was probably more cohesive and demonstrated the sequence of the manga panels better, I thought it was a bit too impractical. And while I really liked the last layout of the domain, I realized later that it probably wasn't very user-friendly; this was something I wanted to fix when redesigning the domain.
The second finalized version used a lot of responsive elements so that it would fit all sorts of different screen sizes. Similar to the first version, it was all coded and ready to be released. But one day I looked at my test pages again and fell out of love with the arrangement and overall look of the design. Even though I ended up scrapping it, I did learn a lot while coding the different elements, so I consider it a win for me personally, heh. Unfortunately, I'm a dumbass and didn't save screenshots of it. But like the first version, I still do have the images and CSS to reference in the future!
The final version that you see before you now definitely came at a whim. I was creating a new layout for my online TCG trading post using my standard style when I fell in love with it, haha. I decided to revisit the old images and .psd files of my previous failures layouts and the result was this! Many of the elements I used in the previous layouts were recycled and implemented here which I think is pretty cool. This includes the brushes in the footer, the main navigation, the footer navigation, and the different colors in the CSS!
If anything, I learned that while I will forever be in awe of other people's talents in responsive web design and designing huge, gorgeous layouts, it really isn't my forte. What's my forte? Slapping together all the different paper and wooden textures in the universe, clearly, haha.
Also, the progression of an actual sunrise is probably not depicted here very well, so, uh. Ignore that and just bask in the pastels I guess?
Although I was kind of sad to bid farewell to the domain's very first layout (the nostalgia!), it will forever live on in the domain's layout archive!
Credits
The layout images were gifted to me by the wonderful, fantastic Lethe which were grabbed from Blast Manga.The photographs used in the layout are by Roberto Trombetta, Yong Sok Yun, and Alistair Nicol. The photograph used in the fireflies fanlisting image is by Mr.k_Taiwan. They were used under the Creative Commons license that allows for alterations and changes. The textures used come from actofmadness, anne-pearl, chambertin, Ex-posed, Lost and Taken, lovelamp, masterjinn, mirand-ah, sweettasteofbitter, troughtpsds, and wubulge. Other resources include lionaTudor, Swimchick, and Vecteezy. The pixel is from Cherish. The navigation and custom scrollbar scripts were taken from Dynamic Drive while the tooltip script is by Alessio Atzeni. The various text in the headers are, of course, taken from J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan.
Fonts used, some via Google Fonts, include Bell MT, Courier New, Droid Serif, Georgia, Imprima, Karla, Lora, Playfair Display, and Verdana. Others are Coalhand Luke and Pea Gretchie.
