"Clean" and "simple" gallery designs

[furrygirl]

I don't do much gallery submission (about 35 in 3 years), so here's a TGP newbie question. I see a lot of experienced folk say that they like "clean" and "simple" gallery designs, but what would you say *that* looks like, exactly? I personally loathe overpowering graphics and flash and animated things, so I keep my sites lo-fi.

Here's the most recent gallery page I made, and I use the same general template for all my galleries (changing colors + header/footer font): http://www.furrygirl.com/tgp/tgp-29/a.html

Would people consider it *too* clean and simple?

[bunky2u]

I think it looks good. Good text, you might want to make it a bit more eye catching... maybe toss it in between a row of pics. The green suits the area where these pics were taken, but if you need to come up with a different color scheme, here is a nice website that will help you on your way. http://wellstyled.com/tools/colorscheme2/index-en.html

Hope it brings lots of sales!

bunky

[Mr. Blue]

I've built around 1800 galleries in the last year. I've been all over the place from newb start, to high end graphic galleries, and after a year I think I'm finally discovering my "style" and what works for me. So my comments are purely based on my own experience, the niches I work, etc.

Your gallery is clean and I don't think it's too "clean" but I think the layout needs help. If I were to take the elements you presented in that gallery, here's the things I would change:

• I would make the thumbnails bigger - I like big thumbnails...I never use under a 160px size thumb...I'll sometimes use even bigger thumbs
• The full sized pics I would make a shade bigger 650 ot 700px on the long side
• I like the top banner...I'd keep that
• The block of text and the top sales link is something I wouldn't do. Also the top sales link is very innocuous and would be overlooked. I'll come back to this point.
• Solid block of pictures, no. Personally experience, a solid block of pictures just doesn't work as well as when I have sales text mixed throughout.
• If I were doing the layout I would have that banner, then a row of pics, a smaller paragraph with a noticable sales link, something that would catch the attention...then a second row, then the sales text that you have, "I love to get naked..." thats good and another sales link...then finally another row and the final graphic is also fine.

By no means am I a gallery building expert, but each month I convert better, and it comes through a lot of trial and error. There's certain layouts that get more clicks, get more sales, etc. Also, sometimes, you build a gallery you hate, spend the least time on, and it gets the most sales...UGH. A lot of people put down TGP traffic, but if you stick with it long enough and you adapt...you'll soon find that you can convert at a very good rate.

[Toby]

I agree with Mr. Blue's points, and I'll add a couple of more of my own. The gallery should flowwwwww, to borrow one of MrMaryLou's lessons from On The Bench. I try to make the text as well as the pics progress down the page in a logical order from one section to the next. The text is fairly easy, just spread out your current block into sections between groups of pics, ending each with a bit of linked selling text.

Your photos don't seem to have any logical order to them, no discernable start or finish. I'd select a series of shots from the set that seem the "tell a little story" as the surfer proceeds down the page. Ending with the most provocative at the bottom.

[natron]

Originally Posted by bunky2u

I think it looks good. Good text, you might want to make it a bit more eye catching... maybe toss it in between a row of pics. The green suits the area where these pics were taken, but if you need to come up with a different color scheme, here is a nice website that will help you on your way. http://wellstyled.com/tools/colorscheme2/index-en.html

Hope it brings lots of sales!

bunky

That site will come in handy
thanks

[RawAlex]

I would add this: Just like in politics, negative campaigning isn't usually very effective. Don't waste valuable sales space putting other people down or burtsting the bubble about what other (more corporate) amateurs may do. I know you want to look good and be number 1, but it is more productive to climb a mountain than it is to try to dig a hole for everyone else.

I personally found that the images were quite small, and often the subject (you) is a very small part of the image. None of these pictures felt very intimate or warm, just more like snapshots of a vacation where the location was way more important than the person. You are selling "furry" so you might want to make sure that people can see the furry and not just the trees.

It is a decent enough start that I am sure you will get listed in many places, but sharpening the focus and the message will get you the most sales.

Alex

[Mattinblack]

Lol at Alex.... cant see the fur for the trees good one. The thing the gallery most resembled for me was scenes from the Blair Witch Project! Just required a bit more mist and odder camera angles....

Seriously its good just a bit .... well off. Difficult to explain. Try surfing some galleries that made it on the Hun for a half hour then look at yours... you will probably get the same feeling. Whats in the thumbs and their size is very important and many people dont pay enough attention to them. If you have a restricted range of content you use then rather than reduce the whole image to a thumb crop it to the interesting/graphically/sexually exciting part first then reduce it. For example take the fourth picture from the left on the top row, I would crop it so that it only contained her face, breasts and hairy armpit before thumbnailing. The limb shots I would group at the end. Faces are good in thumbnails!

Its possible to get galleries using the same content accepted 2-3 times in a year just with differently cropped and edited thumbs and a different 'feel' to the pages if you are short of content you can use, but fresh content is king!

[pvtspanky]

I agree with the advice in this thread. I would make the thumbs larger. Zoom in on "the focus" of the pic... I use 120x160...

I like to match the color/design of my gallery to the colors/design used on the tour so the surfer doesn't feel like they are "going some where else", not sure if that makes sense.

The "click here" link could be bigger I think.

I try to use something animated when I can.

Other than that, I would consider it "clean" but not too simple

[furrygirl]

Thanks for the replies, especially the long one from Mr.Blue!

I'm taking about half the galleries I've made in the past to use as FHGs for affiliates, and I wanted to see if there were some relatively minor fixes I could make. (Apart from the useful ideas of making photos and thumbnails bigger, which have been noted for new stuff.)

So, here's the new version of the same gallery: http://www.furrygirl.com/fhg/hibernation.html The text is spaced out between the photos and I made the text link to my site bigger.

bunky2u: That's an nice little design tool! I like to use colors that fit whatever photos I'm using, though.

Toby: I hear what you're saying about the photos not seeming orderly, but that particular set is me, naked, walking through a forest in the spring time. Some of the sets I shoot for my sites don't follow standard softcore pattern of clothed -> top off -> pants off -> bra off -> panties off -> cooter shots -> masturbation. I like that. Many of my sets are more "typical", but I don't feel the need to standardize the hell out of what I'm doing in each set. Here's another gallery that's has better "flow", and ends with the question of "what will I do with my toys?" (since I give away less "good stuff" than most sites): http://www.furrygirl.com/tgp/tgp-27/a.html

Alex: I'm happy with my sales text, my question was about design. I do find the fact that *I* actually run my site to be very worth selling, and I have no issue with doing it at the expense of "exposing" corporate single girl site pratices, like other people answering models' fan mail. Maybe you think that makes me a traitor or something, but it's in response to the thousands of asshats who build galleries with random content written in the first-person perspective of the girl talking about how she's so eager to get them off "inside". With all the blatant lies and misleading text used to make quick sales in the industry, I stand by my text.

Matt: I've seen tons of other TGP galleries before, and I actually don't get the same feeling as you do comparing mine to the bulk of what else is listed out there. (BTW, the Hun has listed the majority of galleries I've submitted.) I actually find most TGP galleries and free sites to be an assualt on the senses with too much crap all over the place to overhwhelm people, but that's my own personal sense of style and design. But, cropping thumbs a bit to focus on the subject of the photo (me) is a good idea.

pvtspanky: It's a good point about keeping surfers on the same design, I should try some galleries with the blue hues of my tour. Although, with the other suggestion, I'd rather have a surfer fixated on a photo of my hairy pussy than an obnoxious flashing GIF that says "hairy pussy!", since I try to let the content itself be the focus of the page, not loud superfluous graphics.

[Mr. Blue]

Originally Posted by furrygirl

So, here's the new version of the same gallery: http://www.furrygirl.com/fhg/hibernation.html The text is spaced out between the photos and I made the text link to my site bigger.

That's much much better furrygirl! Only small suggestions, that first sales link "Click Here to visit Furrygirl.com" still seems a little too muted for me. Perhaps its the earth tone coloring of the text that kind of makes it too relaxed of a sales link.

I like the text, I think it would work better on a freesite...it's a little wordy and tgp surfers have the attention span of a gnat in heat. I'm personally wordy as well, so take that suggestion with a grain of salt because I seldom follow that rule myself, lol.

Definitely a nice improvement though and with the larger thumbs in future galleries it'll be clean, simple, and effective.

[selena]

~chimes in to agree with Mr. Blue~

Bigger thumbs on the second gallery, and it would be right there.

[RawAlex]

Furrygirl, once again you take helpful suggest as an attack on your person. It isn't. I read the sales text the first time and it struck me as negative not positive. We sell happiness and joy, not put downs and "neener-neener". People don't want to know or don't want to be reminded that some parts of this industry are run in a manner similar to McDonalds or Dunkin Donuts. Reminding them of that isn't helping your sales pitch.

In the end, I think it is a great selling point, and would be a great selling point if you put it in positive spin about yourself rather than creating it out of negative spin on others. Everything about your sales pitch (unless you are selling BDSM or similar) should be happiness and light... negative campaign ads don't do it.

Just an opinion, you can take it or leave it. I didn't post it as an attack on you or your person, but just making point that I got taught almost 10 years ago getting into this business: Sell the positive, sell the sex, sell the happy... stay on message and don't let the negative anythings get in there.

Alex

[GonZo]

Originally Posted by RawAlex

Furrygirl, once again you take helpful suggest as an attack on your person. It isn't. I read the sales text the first time and it struck me as negative not positive. We sell happiness and joy, not put downs and "neener-neener". People don't want to know or don't want to be reminded that some parts of this industry are run in a manner similar to McDonalds or Dunkin Donuts. Reminding them of that isn't helping your sales pitch.

In the end, I think it is a great selling point, and would be a great selling point if you put it in positive spin about yourself rather than creating it out of negative spin on others. Everything about your sales pitch (unless you are selling BDSM or similar) should be happiness and light... negative campaign ads don't do it.

Just an opinion, you can take it or leave it. I didn't post it as an attack on you or your person, but just making point that I got taught almost 10 years ago getting into this business: Sell the positive, sell the sex, sell the happy... stay on message and don't let the negative anythings get in there.

Alex

Dunkin Donuts suck.

Alex Ill see if I can get a topless pic for you while Im out there tomorrow. If I cant you will have to settle for one of me.

[docholly]

Originally Posted by GonZo

Dunkin Donuts suck.

Alex Ill see if I can get a topless pic for you while Im out there tomorrow. If I cant you will have to settle for one of me.

The Coffee is THE best.. the donuts sux. the "time to make the donuts" guy died.

[RawAlex]

Gonzo, I would appreciate it. This is the first year since, well, I started that I am not going to the January show, so all pics (even topless Gonzo) are appreciated in their own way.

Enjoy.

I want one of the new T-shirts, BTW. I missed the collectors edition ones from Miami!

Alex

[GonZo]

Originally Posted by RawAlex

Gonzo, I would appreciate it. This is the first year since, well, I started that I am not going to the January show, so all pics (even topless Gonzo) are appreciated in their own way.

Enjoy.

I want one of the new T-shirts, BTW. I missed the collectors edition ones from Miami!

Alex

I have one here for you Alex. Shall I give her a kiss for you too?

"Guess Whos Back in Circulation?"

[RawAlex]

Gotta love it

Alex

[Halfdeck]

The pics don't work for me because they lack context (i.e. it just looks to me like photos of a naked girl in the woods).

I remember listening to a photographer (a guy who takes landscape photos from choppers) talk about how lack of captions underneath his photos shortened the time people spent looking at each of his photos.

In other words, I prefer reading about where you were, what were you doing there, who you went there with, and what you were thinking / feeling at the time.

This isn't to say I dislike your sales text. But if you have a killer tour, then I'd trust the tour with the sales pitches and make sure the photos and text in the gallery is going to leave a guy with a throbbing dick and maaaybe a pounding heart... That personal touch is what separates impersonal content-oriented sites like Videosz from FurryGirl which I assume has alot more to offer than pics and vids.

Also, if you got rid of photos in the gallery where you make eye contact with the camera, the gallery will not only rake in surfers turned on by public-nudity porn but also those who get off on voyeur porn.

[furrygirl]

Originally Posted by Halfdeck

The pics don't work for me because they lack context (i.e. it just looks to me like photos of a naked girl in the woods).

...

In other words, I prefer reading about where you were, what were you doing there, who you went there with, and what you were thinking / feeling at the time.

Thanks for your feedback!

That particular set is, actually, a naked girl walking in the woods. It does not follow a pattern of undressing and whatnot that most of my sets do. I suppose it's not the best example gallery, but I like doing sets that aren't formulaic sometimes.

I try to include a couple of lines about the set and then tell people if they like, say, outdoor nudity, I have about __ hundred more photos of me naked outdoors (or in water, or with pantyhose, or wet & messy, etc). (I see my greatest weakness with my sites as a lack of good erotic writing, which I've never been able to do nicely. Some people are fabulous sexy text authors, but I find that when I try and do something sensual and honest from my own perspective, it ends up either very dry or high camp.) Anyhow, more personal text about the *exact* situation/location/set is a good idea, thanks!

[droopy420]

I think the gallery's very visually pleasing. I have to admit I clicked thru to your site and not many galleries get me to do that... The only suggestion I have is to move the click here to visit link up a little further so it's on the first half of the page and you don't have to scroll down to see it.