Here is a second theme that I am progressing work on. ... Basketball! It only makes since since I have baseball and almost football. Please take a look and let me know what you think. Thanks....

http://michealportell.smugmug.com/gallery/920854

Here is a quick summary of the changes I have done
1. Basketball Jersey logo
2. Basketball "stars"
3. Wood floor background
4. White boxes with orange backgrounds (kinda simulate the free throw lane)
5. Backboard and net "shopping cart"
6. Floating boxes (shadows in Firefox)

Micheal

I'll give it a really good working thru tomw. One thing that struck me is that it's missing, IMO, a larger, b-ball - maybe in one of the corners at the bottom. Love the baskets, for cart - and the balls for stars!

Good idea. I couldn't do that before, but with my new knowledge of using the extra divs, I could do that and keep my tiled background. Thanks for the comments. That basketball hoop shopping cart was a pain. I must have redrew that 20 times to finally get it to where I liked it.

Micheal

I took your basketball idea Andy and built upon it. I modified a basketball player going for a dunk to be a shadow, with the basketball you mentioned (in color). It looks cool (well I think) I works in Firefox (it disappears behing the thumbnails but in front of the orange box).

Explorer however is not cooperating though (as usual) and goes over the thumbnails. Anyone know how to teach Explorer how to read the Z-indexes? Thanks...

Micheal

It seems I did something stupid. I usually fine tune the theme in Firefox and replace the the theme by pasting over the previous one. Well, I seemed to paste the theme with the other one, duplicating alot of stuff when I added the guy dunking. I did find that it is the problem of the dunk guy going over the thumbs in explorer. But I will fix that problem tomorrow.

Like the idea with the player shadow, but as you already noticed in IE and especially in smugmug style it sits over the thumbs.
Also the background of the photobox is way off in traditional and all thumbs.
Again, I would like to see some captions, especially how this works without a background color in journal.

Sebastian

Nope - I don't like the shadowed bball player, I do not.

I'm thinking REAL Bbal - down in the corner.

The shadow player now behaves the way I want it to. Andy, I will do another with just a basketball on the bottom left. I believe that some people will like the shadow player and some won't. I believe my step son has a couple of basketballs in the basement for photos. THanks for the feedback.

Micheal

Originally Posted by portellimagery The shadow player now behaves the way I want it to. Andy, I will do another with just a basketball on the bottom left. I believe that some people will like the shadow player and some won't. I believe my step son has a couple of basketballs in the basement for photos. THanks for the feedback. Micheal

Great. I think the shadowplayer as it is right now, is too jaggy. Not appealing to me.

I hope you know I'm just calling it like I see it! I think the other elements are great and you're on to something here...

I know you are calling it as you seeing it :) The shadow guy was a "quick" thing. He does need some work to fine tune him. He is a concept. Thanks :)

Micheal

Okay I made some more changes. Per Andy request, I now have a theme with a basketball.... THe basketball "floats" when the page is resized behind the thubnails but in front of the orange box

http://michealportell.smugmug.com/gallery/966301

I have also tweaked my shadow dunker. I blurred him several times so he is more shadowy. It is here in the same place....

http://michealportell.smugmug.com/gallery/920854

Thnaks.

Micheal

I gotta say, neither one is doing much for me.

i like the concept of the hardwood for the background, but my first impression is that it's pink.

Originally Posted by portellimagery Okay I made some more changes. Per Andy request, I now have a theme with a basketball.... THe basketball "floats" when the page is resized behind the thubnails but in front of the orange box http://michealportell.smugmug.com/gallery/966301 I have also tweaked my shadow dunker. I blurred him several times so he is more shadowy. It is here in the same place.... http://michealportell.smugmug.com/gallery/920854 Thnaks. Micheal

Originally Posted by bigwebguy I gotta say, neither one is doing much for me. i like the concept of the hardwood for the background, but my first impression is that it's pink.

I'm thinking for a background like that there's no need to make it less opaque.

I will mock up a less opaque background. I made it less pronounced since I had more pronounced backgrounds on the baseball and football themes and both times I was requested to lighten them. I will modify one of the two test themes I have. Thanks.

Micheal

Okay,
I now have a darker background background on the theme with the basketball. I left the lighter background with the shadow basketball player. I need to do some work with the darker background (the black text is now hard to read on the darker background) . Let me know what you think so far. Thanks.

Micheal

The floor in the BG does not look like a gym floor to me. Gym floors are always yellow, like the floor in your shots.

I prefer the silhouette to the bball, but mostly because the bball is misplaced there, I think. It's orange on orange.

Originally Posted by DavidTO The floor in the BG does not look like a gym floor to me. Gym floors are always yellow, like the floor in your shots.

right on. think pine not oak.

the basketball theme at 1024x768...

Ok, after fixing the dark wood text, I now have light wood. Pine. Game on.


Micheal

Actually Mike, I initally intended to have it disappear behind the orange box. But I kinda liked the fact that it would still be visible behind the thumbnails. The shadow dunker looks kinda cool to me that way. Of course it is is too distracting it will probably have to disppear behind. (I just have to fine tune the Z-indexes to do that)

Micheal