I spent a good bit of time today looking at some website design examples. You can look all over the web and see examples of what corporations are doing in web design. You can use your social networking sites, and see some of the newer ideas, but neither of these two brings you some of the more cutting-edge ideas from the art world or from students.

What I went looking for were some simple ideas to help prompt the color and layout choices for a few upcoming micro-sites. For the uninitiated, a micro site is something of a web brochure. It lets a clients promote a specific event, or opportunity. It gives the client a little more leeway when choosing the design because it does not have to math 100% with their corporate identity. Typically, these micro sites don't last more than a year, nor do they have more than a handful of pages.

Some of the considerations that you must make when planning a full site, don't apply here. Things like adding new content on a regular basis, making it easy to update, community features, don't play into the decisions you make when designing the site. Instead, what you want to do is make the information easy to access. Engaging to look at, and since the goal of the site is not the be the primary source of promotion, but merely a supplement to traditional marketing methods, SEO optimization, while always a concern, is not a top priority.

What you are left with is a site that can be fun, informative, and a little bit of a creative outlet. These sites serve well to launch a new product, or establish a new way to communicate information.  So, in my wanderings, looking for inspiration. I noticed a few things. As always, there are some truly talented people out there. I am, as I have always been, in awe of people with the true artistic talent to create something from nothing. Finally, some people know how to use color to set mood and tone, and others use it to clutter the screen.

Ideas that struck me

This page found here, grabbed my attention as a great way to create a front page for a micro-site. Its engaging, sets a mood, and invites the visitor to click on in. I would not want to have my main site by this dynamic, as I don't think it serves well for long-term viewing and interaction, but what a way to make a splash for an event site. Rich texture, deep colors, and a cohesive theme all pull this off.

While the previous one set a retro feel, this example went for a modern and clean feel. What I took from this particular example is to simplify the color pallet. Keep the main page clean, structured and easy to identify what the most important elements are. For a site that is only going to have a few key pages, this was a great inspiration, even if the idea is used quite often.

Finally, the last take away I found, was this simple illustration base page. There is nothing getting in the way of the illustration, and nothing interfering with the navigation into the contents of the site. The great idea from this was I found a way to promote the product or the event, while keeping the front engaging and easy. With little content on the front, you are almost guaranteeing that visitors go in at least one level.