Inspired by Shunya, I took the bold step to change the look of Accidental Blogger to a custom design after using one of Typepad’s pre-set templates for nearly a year and a half (to which I had become quite sentimentally attached, I must confess). The main motivation was to increase the font size for easier reading. The new look is quite Spartan but provides a better focus on the posts. Everything else remains the same as before. Please let me know how you like the new uncluttered theme. So far, only my husband has weighed in. He likes it.
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Accidental Blogger 
17 responses to “A New Design”
Well, I like it too! ;-) Definitely more readable. For an image+text based page banner, you’ll need a software program such as Adobe Photoshop Elements (or similar) to create one you like and define that image file as the banner. I’m sure you’ll be tinkering with the design for a while. I did. ;-)
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I like the uncluttered appearance, but find the contrasts a little stark, but that’s just me ;) MS Paint might work just as well if you have an image file that you want to place text on, or one of the ubiquitous photo editing software programs, if you don’t have Adobe Photoshop.
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Sujatha, how do you like the contrast now? It is either this or the black I had on first. I will play around between the two and see which one is easier on the eye.
Shunya, I have Adobe Phtoshop (Elements and more) but as usual, I don’t know how to use it. Must spend some time to learn. What I would like to do is stretch one of my paintings into a banner format if possible and write the text over it. Don’t know how hard that will be. May be resort once again to the co-operation of my dear husband.
It is funny how running the intellectual portion of the blog is a snap for me but anything to do with the technical side of it is a grueling struggle between “woman” and “machine.”
The comments window now is so much easier to write in than the previous narrower one. I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before. After all, A.B. has been on Typepad’s “Pro” mode ever since guest authors were added more than a year ago. Well, now is as good a time as any.
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This looks fine to me now. I’ve sent you a more detailed email on how to get a barebones banner using Paint.
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Congrats on breaking away from the pre-set template. I like the new design. As an added bonus, from a disability perspective, the new format and font are definitely more accessible for folks with visual impairments (given the hours I spend staring at a computer two feet from my face, this will no doubt include me, someday far too soon).
Have to admit, though, that your announcement of a new design had me expecting a more radical change. If you do decide to undertake more changes, my vote is for some added color. While the prose on the site adds “color,” of course, the grey tile seems out of character, aesthetically, with the the beautiful artwork you’ve posted on occasion.
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Very nice. I am eager to see how images (e.g., of your paintings) appear, yet I am also a fan of the “grey,” “Spartan” approach to the background. Good work.
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Great! Everyone seems to like it, more or less. Thanks for the feedback.
I will be playing around with the design a bit in the next few days, I am sure. But like Dean, the blue/grey combo was the most pleasing to my own eyes after trying several others. If I can add a little “color and texture” to the banner (Sujatha might help), that is all we might need for a slightly more punchy look.
As for how paintings will look on the new page, I will post a couple in the middle of next week. Also, you can check out the art category or Richa Arora’s latest exhibits at the bottom of the current page.
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Look what we have now !!!
Sujatha took the sky from one my paintings (The Beach Umbrellas) which matches the color scheme and created a truly “customized” banner. Hooray!
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I think it’s easier to read, which is good, and I like the banner/painting at the top.
The color scheme on the left is more… grey… than what I probably would have chosen. But to each his or her own, right?
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I kind of like the severe grey myself, especially now that the banner is more lively and not a flat blue. Also, for some reason I cannot change the grey. The sidebar seems to have been set in this color. The best I could do is frame the banner and the sidebar items in some red.
But hey, the real color will come from what we “write” in the posts. I am feeling energized with this new fluid format.
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nice. looks good on my screen, especially when i shrink the font in firefox. might want to play with fonts though to make it look more unique (i assume this is arial or georgia?).
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I like the color now, and like even better that it’s from one of your own paintings. The floating clouds also work, conceptually, with the name “Accidental Blogger,” in a free association kind of way. A trifecta of improvements.
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I think this design has a very soothing and cool effect. The colours are in harmony and do not tell upon the “matter”. But one point, I think the banner on top perhaps needs to be spread across till the end leaving a small border rather than a large blue chunk.
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Ruchira,
The changes don’t seem to show up when I looked at the blog, or am I not seeing something.
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To “manoj,” for whom the changes don’t appear: I have noticed that some blogs and other web sites fail to refresh if my local machine has a recent cached version. To correct this, try the Ctrl+Shift+R keys, a “hard refresh,” which forces your browser to return to the site–AB, in this case–and download a new instance.
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We’ve got it now. More reader friendly and I suspect packs more material in the given space.
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Sleek…Don’t you think the border on the left too should go, specially if there’s none on the right. I definitely like the idea of no side borders for freer flow of imagination.
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