Template Swith Implications

The template of your blog is one of many key ingredients to making it successful and viewable. As I posted in my "Top Five Blog Tips," having a template that compliments your subject and creating a synergy between the two is key. For my Science Fiction Review blog, I wanted something that complimented the usually dark and spacey feel sci-fi films. Here is the current template:

As I stated above, I wanted something that would compliment the feel of many of the science fiction films I will and have been reviewing. Most of them are either time travel, space epics, dis-utopias, or future wars, so the dark background with a white text seemed to be fitting. I wanted viewers to feel comfortable with the subject matter, which you can do with your template, to make them feel welcome. It is a template overall that I have enjoyed and thought worked for the blog over the semester. But what happens if you switch it up and try something new?

Alternate Template #1: Watermark


This is a template that just doesn't work with what I am writing about. It is light, colorful, and has dandelions......just doesn't work. This is the exact opposite feeling that compliments science fiction films. Now if I was writing about nature, kittens, or balloons for numerous blog posts, then yes this template would work. But for dark science fiction films, it just doesn't work. It doesn't create the type of synergy I am looking for. It's not as if I am writing about death, gore, and the morbid, but I am writing about films that take you to other worlds, meet alien beings, and have time traveling robots, and dandelions just don't fit into that equation. This is an example of a template not complimenting the blog, which I think off puts readers and confuses them overall, I know I would be confused by this.

Alternative Template #2: Awesome, Inc.


Now this design takes what I had before and makes it only better. It is dark (black, grey's, and white), which is the tone of my blog, but also contemporary. It isn't just blocks of posts, pictures, etc, it seems to separate everything nicely. I also enjoy the borders it puts around each image, which sets them apart even more so then the 1st template. Another separation it sets forth is between the post and the background. The background has a simple diagonal line design, while the posts have a dark grey design, which is a subtle way to differentiate the posts. Overall I think it is a stronger template since it seems to be even more appropriate for what I am posting about, which in the end all that matters is that it compliments your writing and is almost unnoticeable to your readers.