2013 OPEN HOUSE: Suggestions for Next Time?

[cutiebunny]

Yays! Just finished! Please let me know if you did not receive any write up from me. The galleries I reviewed first (the ones on the bottom of the list) I sent feedback through the RS galleries, but the rest I sent through the feedback link.

It's been interesting and I've been enjoying the comments, both positive and negative, from the feedback I've received. Thanks to everyone who has sent me their comments.

[Rekka Alexiel]

yay! I believe I'm finished, too. If any hasn't received a message from me, just let me know.

I've also been busy working away on my gallery from the info everyone gave me, especially one little trick from sensei!! You've made a long-standing irritant go away with a simple space! Thank you so much!

So, I've spiffied up the main page and also finished the first entrance page (Opening cels) page for B't X thus far, adding in all sorts of info, opinions, and coding. 'tis fun!

Anyway, thanks again, everyone, for your comments! It's been a lot of fun!!

[sensei]

Just one more to go (that's you, ginga123!). I'll get yours done tomorrow, and then I'll be done. I have eight sets of feedback so far, all interesting and with some useful ideas (and I'm picking up more from visiting galleries with my own problems in mind...)

[ginga123]

hahaha, sensei! maybe i should change my homepage look back to classic mauve first before you click on it.... hehehe

[sensei]

Too late. I'm already made my judgments and just need to get some more clever phrases from H. L. Mencken's Evil Treasury of Invective.

Actually, I'm OK with most color schemes except some I ran across (blood red on black, charcoal gray on black, navy blue on gunmetal ). Black on white is always cool.

[Yupa]

I just finished too. I received feedback from ten participants. It seems ReiTheJelly isn't around at the moment as she hasn't read my feedback from a few days ago either.

I very much enjoyed revisiting the participating galleries and this time I checked the sections of unknown shows I normally would've skipped. I've seen some great artwork there and it convinced me I have many more shows to watch.

I learnt many things from the feedback you gave me and I'll make a list of things I will change in my gallery. Once the Open House is over I'll post some results of my questions here.

[sensei]

I just finished too. I received feedback from ten participants. It seems ReiTheJelly isn't around at the moment as she hasn't read my feedback from a few days ago either.

Rei let me know that she is in the middle of moving house and will handle the feedback to other galleries as soon as she gets settled. May be a few days to a week after the so-called "formal close" of the Open House, though.

[ginga123]

i'm finished. wow, i caught a glimpse of classic RS through the rating system today (for those who asked that we cast a vote.) nnnoooo sensei! lmao (j/k)

[sensei]

DONE!

Thanks to all the participants for inviting me in. I hope my muddy footprints and noseprints up against the glass of the exhibits aren't too difficult to clean up. I really enjoyed the experience and am glad that others seem to have had a good time as well.

[Rekka Alexiel]

Yay!! Thanks much everyone for your awesome comments!! I'm sorry some of you may have received only a handful of comments toward the beginning. I must confess I didn't quite know exactly how in depth and detailed our comments should be, so the first couple galleries I visited may have received less feedback. Sorry about that!! But please, feel free to respond to any or all of my comments, and we can continue the discussion further.

[animeobsessed]

I'm finished. Had a delay on the last one, but I completed it this morning. Thanks to everyone for all the comments. I have some work to do on added more narrative, but not sure if I will work on it before or after updating more sketches.

[toonybabe]

I have two more to do this afternoon! This has been a really fun experience!!

[sensei]

OK, time to get those last feedbacks done (Rei, I know you have special circumstances) and start thinking about how this could work better next time. I personally felt that it went smoothly and am satisfied with the suggestions I've gotten (I'll work them into a reaction as I have a chance). Still, I'm sure that it could be tweaked to improve the experience.

And next time I'd like to get wider involvement. Any reactions, from either participants or non-combatants, about how we could enlarge the number of participating galleries?

[Yupa]

Maybe next time you could send an automatic invitation to all A-B members, if this is possible? Or attract more attention by making a new forum section just like with the cel and sketch awards?

Here are the results from the feedback I received. Thank you to everyone who visited my gallery and sent me feedback.
My first question was about showing full cuts vs. showing the best sketches in the set. Only two visitors were against showing full cuts, the rest was in favor of it, like to see everything except partials or had no problem with the current setup. A few even like to see the partials, because they are very uncommon in galleries. It was remarkable that some people suggested me to make animated gifs, without noticing I already have many of those in my gallery. I thought that they were easy enough to find as I put links to them in every section header...

My second question was about the best section in my gallery. Spice and Wolf got the most votes (4) which was no surprise, but the new Rocket Girls section was an unexpected second (2 votes).

Some people commented on the letter index I use. Some like the division into different sorts of artwork, some don't. I don't think I will change this.

There were also mixed reactions about the settei copies in my gallery. Some like them because not many people upload those, some don't because they are only copies or they dislike settei art. Although I'm not actively collecting them anymore I will definitely keep them up, as they are the most popular items in my gallery looking at visitor numbers.

I received many useful suggestions on improving my gallery. These included changing the link and background colors into something more distinctive and more colorful, not too much text in section headers and a larger font size. I won't change the latter, because I don't think there is a way to change the font size for the whole gallery. However, every visitor can easily change the size by using CTRL = and CTRL -.
Most visitors suggested me to improve my descriptions, especially the gallery headers. I should also add more personal comments on why I like the sketches. I will eventually work my way through the gallery, but that will take some time as I have to re-watch some shows.

[Gabe]

Maybe next time you could send an automatic invitation to all A-B members, if this is possible? Or attract more attention by making a new forum section just like with the cel and sketch awards?

I was one of those that saw the postings about the event.
But had no time because of some "RL" events.
My gallery is probably not ready for it so i had gotten anyway only bad critics. ^^