At one time or another, every one of us has been a critic. Someone who can give a well-informed stand on something, whether for or against, is a critic. He does not only take a stand, but understands the salient details for which he could say something more than just ?I'm in favor of it? or ?I hate that thing!?. He may not be exactly good at doing it, but that's beside the point.

Web Template

It could be said perhaps that most web design softwares carry with them instructions on how to set them up or some ?ready-made? pages that would act as guides. You can just supply the needed information in the blanks of fields and you will see the result. In the internet, there are more or less 13 to 16 million ?web template? sites which either come for free or for a fee. Visiting this enormous number of sites at a rate of 1 site/day would take you about 44,000 years.

However, you can narrow down your search by typing in the right search keywords for the sites that are relevant to you. For example, the general search keywords ?html templates? could be narrowed down by adding a specific word such as ?flexible?, ?elastic?, or ?liquid? (don't use quotes of course).

For those who have become familiar with the web, you must have observed that some sites have common elements. This could be attributed to the fact that sites having similar line of purpose will practically have the same form. It could also mean that from among the many web templates that are available, these sites have used exactly the same template. It is for you to decide whether or not to build your site with another look alike. Or better still; build your own web template from scratch after going over the many sites and noting down what you really want for your own.

Graphics Tricks and Tweaks

Some web designers in the guise of building a ?nice looking? web design template would use graphics effects. This he can do on pictures or header-text with drop shadows, sections that have color gradients across them, boxes and buttons with rounded corners, and others which usually entail extra effort compared with the usual tiled background images. Some designers can do these well with small background image sections and repetition to save bandwidth.

However, the problem about too much of this stuff is taking its toll on the eyes. Too much of these graphic effects can cause eye strain especially on the defective eyes of the viewer. The graphic effects ?steal? the clarity of texts which again some designers fail to consider that some fonts are easier to read that others.

It has also been observed that different sites use different initial text sizes. With the correct keystrokes you can change the size of the font. This will reveal which sites have used fixed dimensions for text, boxes, lines and placements. Some designers forget this one important aspect of their work so some sites would change text sizes so that sections run into each other. If not, the problem goes with boxes and lines that block the text sections. As a whole, the efforts in creating those ?beautiful? graphics just did not serve any good purpose.

Good web design can be observed in those sites which have well established reputation. Google News for example would not be easily affected by changing font sizes or dragging the edges of the browser view port. It would be observed that it has few rounded corners or buttons but none on tables or headers or menus, and a few small icons.

Too much graphics on a page would cause it to decrease loading speed. It could be said that not all certified web designers who are good at graphics could create a good web template just because of it.

Usability

For anyone who would like to design a web template, his experience would still be the best teacher. For this, he should realize that visitors need information more than those graphics. In the end, these annoying graphics would just drive away visitors from the site, taking no interest on who built the ?nice? but irrelevant site.