Again thanks to my wire framing my news page was really easy to design and build, I integrated a few unplanned text sliders because I liked the idea that various segments of news could be used to grab peoples attention. Personally I have found when reading event site news that smaller headings have been used in this way - (Glastonbury employs a similar tactic although these separate headings of news link to other site pages with this info on)- because I didn't want to have too many pages I have opted instead to put some important news on the page and then link some external news stories to images at the bottom.
I opened with an embedded video because it helped to catch the eye and also meant that I had something to break up and separate the subsequent text placed beneath it. I have placed a newer music video by one of my featured artists in this space although I guess if my event were real I could replace this with something related more to the actual festival.
Small columns of news broken up my another slider- this one features album covers as well - I figure that I should really promote my musicians and it gives those that have just stumbled upon my festival an idea of what music is going to be featured. From a design perspective it also works visually because it introduces a more dynamic element to the page.
The bottom section of the news page is by far one of my favourite layouts- it was actually inspired by one of the layouts that came with my theme - but I had to recreate it to include more of my own elements. The nick cave image is actually part of another slider- again various news items taken from my artists pages- with links to those pages when the image is clicked on. I know that using lots of links helps to create better SEO, but also from a practical perspective it allows me to include lots of snippets that may interest my target audience. I don't think anyone really reads much text which is why I have kept the news page as image/video based as I can in order to ensure overall interest.
I have rounded my news page off with a simple gallery - it is a slider but it will only move on the mobile platform (when its reduced to mobile size the images shrink appropriately and it becomes a three column circle gallery the slider allows the fourth one to remain in the same row without compromising the overall layout) this only works well because the captions are very small and the images very clear otherwise I wouldn't have bothered. Again the smaller images link to their respective external news pages (again this helps the SEO and may help to generate some more traffic because of it).
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