Thanks!
I’m basically following the mockup from @mariuszdaniel here at the moment. I may add some padding there later on those sides, but they were intended to go to the viewport edge by design.
That first image is actually a carousel of screenshots and is slightly larger to display prominence, but this is in flux currently as well so is certainly subject to tweaking. 
Not sure which “logos” you might be referring to?
Thanks for catching the footer! I’ve adjusted them to behave correctly.
It is fine when the view is wide. When it isn’t, it is uncanny. I prefer them to be aligned.
I mean the rings.
1 Original v new: I like the former. The text is nicer between the r and a too. Glad the blur is going away.
2 Narrow v wide: I like the former.
Ah, I had originally aligned the logo the the text vertically, but the former version didn’t actually have it aligned that way (the descender on the “p” was pushing the logo down on vertical alignment). I’ve gone ahead and revised the logo to better match the old one. Thanks for catching that and good eye!
I was already discussing earlier about making the image carousel centered on the page instead of right aligned. I’ll work on that tomorrow (gutters will work out once I do). It was kind of driving my OCD a little nuts that it wasn’t centered, but I was trying to implement the design we were working from (time to start deviating a bit as needed, I think).
@patdavid On the downloads it would be good to have:
About this build.txt info behind a button/tiny hyperlink
Access to legacy builds
I think it looks great!
A RawTherapee blog newbie here (lurking for awhile but using RawTherapee since 5.0), and my programming skills predate most of your birth dates so I can’t help there. I have done a tiny bit of layout and font selection in my life and have one suggestion so far on any otherwise very promising redesign. I agree with Hiram’s and the other suggestions above but find some of the current main headings to be rather overwhelming in font size+weight. What I’m seeing on my PC screen I believe is Segoe bold but at that size I think the semibold weight would be better. Alternatively, a small drop in font size could also make the page less “shouting”. I look forward to seeing how this evolves!
I see those big images like headings to the explanations of each section (high quality, …), and they are nice. But maybe if they are a bit more interactive, the visitor will be more interested and more willing to test RT.
I’m talking about using something like a TwentyTwenty plugin, where you can easily see the before and after of a processing, but with one image just above the other and a curtain you can play with.
Examples of good use for this: denoising, sharpening, b&w processing, vibrance, soft light, haze removal … All of them really eye catching if shown with the proper image.
Nice page.
The only thing is, I found the coloured gradients below the images distracting. At first Ithought it was an error…
I’m trying to avoid having to bring in so much jquery just for a comparison slider. I have some lightweight options I’ll look into for those places. I feel like comparisons like this might be better placed on a Features page - those section placeholders will probably end up being showcase images from users (possibly? Not 100% sure just yet, maybe a combination of showcase + comparisons).
Hey
Beautiful work!
I like the two large logo symbols in the background of the screenshot at the top, they add nice color to the page.
I’ll go through the user feedback (What are your favorite things about RawTherapee?) and return a few points.
As a user I get quite fed up with shitty program descriptions on F-Droid, Play Store and on software websites, descriptions more akin to someone trying to up-sell their shitty program for $$$ instead of being the honest and insightful info I’d expect from an open-source project which has nothing to gain from marketing and lies. As such, we should also mention the target audience in this prominent section, so that it’s clear what RawTherapee does not do and who it’s not for, so that people looking for a program don’t waste their and our time by installing software that lacks features essential to them, and filing issues for features which won’t get implemented. Our README.md already covers this, though it does not need to be copied verbatim.
Agreed, and only the release note-type posts.
We’ll only be publishing news, mostly release announcements (consisting of release notes + screenshots + perhaps demo video). There will be no blogging.
I would like the new website to keep things simple and avoid sub-pages unless necessary.
The way it is now, with the short “About” section at the top, is good. If we want to mention the history of the project, then there could be a “History” section at the bottom, or a sub-page, containing a summary of this and this (but with places of residence stripped, and with other info stripped and summarized as necessary).
It’s hosted on a Hungarian server paid for by Gabor. There have been numerous issues with the server in the past, so it might be a good idea to switch. I am contacting Gabor about this now.
Yes, the lack of gap makes me uneasy.
On my calibrated + profiled screen it looks nice but I agree a little too contrasty from the actual text. Maybe change #1a88ff to something around #4ea3ff.
Interesting, could you link to them?
No! No more external bundling of AboutThisBuild.txt. Is it scary nonsense to users and a source of many headaches to me, as (unknown to probably anyone on the dev team) there were frequent issues with these files which required re-writing the info manually. It’s a relic from the past when there were long gaps between releases and I would upload various dev builds from various people. That won’t be happening anymore - now we have frequent releases, and builds are mostly generated automatically. To be clear, the builds themselves (EXE or MSI, AppImage, DMG, etc.) can still include AboutThisBuild.txt internally, but we should no longer ship this file outside of the builds themselves as we do now.
Let’s just have a simple download section as it is on the new site now, and in a “Download Older Versions” section the downloads should be grouped by version (not the way it is on our current downloads page), so e.g. a “5.5” section would have a button for Windows, macOS and Linux.
The download buttons for the latest release should be prominent. Two small hyperlinks in a less-prominent place (under the latest release) should link to automated dev builds, and to a page with older versions. Windows and AppImage automated dev builds: https://github.com/Beep6581/RawTherapee/releases/tag/nightly We will need to work something out with @HIRAM who makes macOS builds manually.
Not sure a dedicated Features page will pay off in the long term. The sections with large images on the main page are the most prominent features. Dedicated “features” pages quickly become outdated. There is one place which lists all features, in detail, and should be always up to date, and that is RawPedia. A Features page should not list things like noise removal, color toning or sharpening because these are all tools (I just updated and greatly simplified the Features page), and all tools are clearly visible on the RawPedia main page. Better to spend time polishing RawPedia than duplicate the effort on the website.
Cutting out About and Features pages. Will do! (I may still advocate for an About page later to give some further info about the project in general, as I think it humanizes things to see that there are real people behind such a great project - but that can be pushed for later and is not a showstopper).
Here’s the contrast checker for Web Accessibility Guidelines with the current colors (I’ve updated them since the initial comment to meet AA guidelines):
https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/?fcolor=1a88ff&bcolor=222222
I’ll summarize your responses on the issue tracker on GitLab and we’ll get these sorted out.
@patdavid (ping @Morgan_Hardwood) Just read the whole thread and had a look at the website. Nice work, even though I agreed on everything that has been said. I’d use thinner normal font (e.g. Segoe UI Light in the body section) and make some elements with evolving size when scrolling down (i.e. having a large header which become thinner when scrolling down), but that’s nitpicking.
Again, nice work.
I agree with Hombre about the text. It’s very subjective so I imagine you’ll get different opinions, but I find the text too heavy and it makes it hard to read. So a lighter font for the body text and a much lighter font for the sub-heads which look old-fashioned to me.
Looks better now. With a few more touches and we are there. Can’t wait for the release.
Looks great, @patdavid…much more current in appearance than the old site, and looks good on phones as well.
I think it’s always important to have a clear idea what purpose(s) a web site is intended to serve. In this case, it is serving as an online brochure and a set of links to other resources (downloads, doc, forum, etc.). If that’s the intent, it’s pretty much right on the money.
As a brochure, it needs to convey clearly and concisely what the package does and highlight what makes it good at what it does. The text so far is a good start. I think “before and after” image pairs are a good way to demonstrate RT’s capabilities. In addition, a video of an editing session that shows someone making major improvements on a photo in a short time would be a big plus.
As a means to reach other assets:
The copy does need some loving, and you’re right about the forum/doc/code links. I’ve been meaning to put them under the first “About” section near the top of the page, but apparently forgot. (I did just add an issue to remind me, though).
Dear website people, I believe this logo used at the beginning of README.md in the repo has been misplaced. https://www.rawtherapee.com/images/logos/rawtherapee_logo_discuss.png
README.md right at the top.
According to google I think that’s the only place it is being used.
Thanks, fixed.
