http://www.perrygarvin.com/blog/2008/11/17/hammer-museum-website-redesign/ Links, artwork, and editorial by Perry Garvin Thu, 19 Jan 2012 22:34:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 http://www.perrygarvin.com/blog/2008/11/17/hammer-museum-website-redesign/comment-page-1/#comment-44594 Whitney Website Redesign | Plog Thu, 12 Nov 2009 17:59:51 +0000 http://www.perrygarvin.net/blog/?p=455#comment-44594 [...] saw many museums of the Whitney’s caliber relaunch their websites including the Hammer Museum, Guggenheim, MoMA, SFMOMA, and Museum of Art and Design.  These organizations produced polished, [...] [...] saw many museums of the Whitney’s caliber relaunch their websites including the Hammer Museum, Guggenheim, MoMA, SFMOMA, and Museum of Art and Design.  These organizations produced polished, [...]

]]> http://www.perrygarvin.com/blog/2008/11/17/hammer-museum-website-redesign/comment-page-1/#comment-2644 david evans Tue, 18 Nov 2008 16:09:10 +0000 http://www.perrygarvin.net/blog/?p=455#comment-2644 Perry: I get the drift of your comments on both the SFMOMA and Hammer websites. I'm sure you will understand that I agree with most, if not all of your observations and conclusions. Among the most important disagreements I have with the artsy side of museum and gallery website design (other than my utter and conventional aversion to 99% of the Flash typically used on most artsy sites) is the slavish use of black backgrounds and white type (or, occasionally worse, colored type)... what we used to call "reverse type"... on entry pages. Don't the artists who design these things get any training on usability and readability?? In the advertising business we have almost a century of research and experience that says reverse type drops readership by stunning amounts. In terms of eye camera research spanning almost 50 years (...yes... 50 years... I got my first experience with eye camera readership in 1960) we know that reverse type in any form or any point size makes readership plummet. In this regard, the very first pages on the Hammer site that have any hope of intellectual connection with the visitor are two pages deep or three pages deep within the site... at least one page beyond which the typical visitor will bounce out due to lack of clear direction and communication. And, in fact, the "Exhibition Info" pages are excellent examples of what the entry page should be: easy to read, conventional in layout, black (flexible) type against a white bg, etc. These exemplars demonstrate, too compellingly, how chopped up/unreadable/confusing/defeating the home/entry page of the Hammer site really is. Just a thought. Best: David Evans Perry: I get the drift of your comments on both the SFMOMA and Hammer websites. I’m sure you will understand that I agree with most, if not all of your observations and conclusions. Among the most important disagreements I have with the artsy side of museum and gallery website design (other than my utter and conventional aversion to 99% of the Flash typically used on most artsy sites) is the slavish use of black backgrounds and white type (or, occasionally worse, colored type)… what we used to call “reverse type”… on entry pages. Don’t the artists who design these things get any training on usability and readability?? In the advertising business we have almost a century of research and experience that says reverse type drops readership by stunning amounts. In terms of eye camera research spanning almost 50 years (…yes… 50 years… I got my first experience with eye camera readership in 1960) we know that reverse type in any form or any point size makes readership plummet. In this regard, the very first pages on the Hammer site that have any hope of intellectual connection with the visitor are two pages deep or three pages deep within the site… at least one page beyond which the typical visitor will bounce out due to lack of clear direction and communication. And, in fact, the “Exhibition Info” pages are excellent examples of what the entry page should be: easy to read, conventional in layout, black (flexible) type against a white bg, etc. These exemplars demonstrate, too compellingly, how chopped up/unreadable/confusing/defeating the home/entry page of the Hammer site really is.
Just a thought.
Best: David Evans

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