Don’t let people tell you your ideas won’t work.
- Dennis Crowley
Who doesn’t like a good movie? Virtually every movie made has a film website these days, ranging from little more than an online place to park a trailer to a fully-immersive experience. And with the varied content, themes, and visual style of movies out there, it’s no wonder that film websites are just as varied.
Below are more than forty excellent examples of film websites, broken down by style, content, and features. We’ve also included some dos and don’ts for this type of site. If you have other favorite film websites, please share them in the comments below!
Sites Not Using Flash
At the moment, virtually all movie and film websites are using at least some Flash — either for video content or their entire UI. The lone exception we found is below. Of course, expect to see more non-Flash movie websites as HTML5 becomes more widely adopted, especially considering the lack of Flash support on iOS.
Red Hill
The Red Hill site uses no animation on the homepage, and the trailer page uses QuickTime rather than Flash:
Trailer-Only Sites
This is a particularly popular site style for upcoming films that don’t have much content yet. It’s not often seen on film sites once the film has been released.
True Grit
The True Grit website at first resembles a vintage, old-west poster. Click anywhere on the page, though, and a video window showing the two trailers pops up. It’s simple, but effective:
Rango
The Rango site is simple, with an animated background and what looks like a rustic, home-made movie screen, with the trailer video playing on top of it. It’s simple, but gives a good sense of the feel of the movie. If you close out of the trailer, there is some other interactive content, but it currently doesn’t do anything other than some animations and sound effects:
Gnomeo & Juliet
The Gnomeo & Juliet site starts with a brief Flash intro, and then the focus is squarely on the trailer. The only other content on the page is an option to share or like the page on Facebook:
Super 8
Leave it to J.J. Abrams to create a site that has minimal content (just a trailer and some sharing options) and yet can generate such interest for an upcoming film. It’s proof that film websites don’t need to be complicated to be effective:
Immersive Sites
Complete immersion in the world of the film is the ultimate goal of most of these sites. Some include interactive content taken right from the film itself, while others go so far as to link to sites that appear to belong to companies featured in the film itself.
Devil
The website for M.Night Shyamalan’s Devil is captivating. It puts you into the action of the movie in a way that’s engrossing and encourages you to spend more time on the site:
Skyline
The website for Skyline is visually beautiful and includes an interactive feature that lets visitors upload an image of themselves to see what they’d look like under alien control:
Accidents Happen
Having scenes from the film play in the background on the Accidents Happen site is something that isn’t often seen and really makes the site stand out:
Gamer
The Gamer website evokes the feel of the movie perfectly, and offers visitors the chance to control a slayer. The navigation takes a bit of getting used to, since the screen moves around dependent on your mouse movements:
Coraline
The Coraline site is wonderfully dark and has a great 3D effect. The look and feel of the site really evoke the movie:
Surrogates
Websites that really evoke the themes or elements of a film are way more engaging than their counterparts that only offer a trailer and some stills. The Surrogates website includes a link to Virtual Self Industries, giving the story a touch of added realism:
Iron Man 2
The Iron Man 2 website immerses visitors in the world of the film via graphics and interactivity that are reminiscent of elements within the movie:
Star Trek
The Star Trek site uses a 3D walk-through of the ship for navigation, with fantastic transparent elements and a style that’s reminiscent of the computer consoles in the film:
Daybreakers
The Daybreakers website plays clips from the movie in the background, immersing visitors in the look and feel of the film:
The Spiderwick Chronicles
Offering content straight out of the movie is a fantastic way to engage visitors, especially young ones. The Spiderwick Chronicles site lets visitors look at the Field Guide featured in the movie, which is a great way to draw users in, as is the “Create Your Own Field Guide” feature:
District 9
The District 9 website plays on the themes of the movie by looking like a map of the city, with the restricted area highlighted:
Sites With Extra Content
Extra content, like games, downloads, or music, are a great way to keep visitors coming back to your site. These sites all include bonus content, from interactive desktop downloads to interactive games.
Legend of the Guardians
The Legend of the Guardians website is perfectly suited to the target audience. The inclusion of an interactive game on the site increases the likelihood that visitors will spend more time on the site, and that they’ll come back in the future:
Alice in Wonderland
The website for Tim Burton’s version of Alice in Wonderland has a fantastic visual style that fits perfectly with the look of the movie. Plenty of extra features, including a gallery, downloads and music are all included:
Avatar
Avatar’s website is almost as spectacular, visually, as the film itself was. There’s tons of extra content here, including and Pandora Desktop app, immersive video, an app to turn yourself into an Avatar, and more. The layout of the site is simple, with a scrolling horizontal nav bar along the bottom and a slideshow of images from the movie in the background:
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
The website for Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs is fun and cheerful, just like the movie. It’s clearly aimed at kids, and includes games, downloads, music, and more:
Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events
The Lemony Snicket site has fantastic, fully-animated navigation. Bonus content, including games and downloads, is also offered:
Leap Year
The Leap Year website offers interactive content (a quiz), which is not often seen in this genre of film. The design of the site is simple, with emphasis on the film’s stars:
Sweeney Todd
The Sweeney Todd official site has a fantastic black and red color scheme and gritty look that evokes the feel of the film. The “Cut Your Own Trailer” feature is a great way to get fans involved:
Celebrity-Focused
If your film has big-name stars, it only makes sense to feature them prominently on your film’s website. That’s just the strategy these designers have taken.
Public Enemies
Putting your big-name stars front-and-center is a great way for a movie website to generate more interest, as the Public Enemies site does with Johnny Depp:
Inglourious Basterds
Inglourious Basterds is another site that puts their biggest star front-and-center, this time Brad Pitt. The subtle animations on the site are also a great touch:
Tropic Thunder
The Tropic Thunder site uses the characters as part of the navigation, and uses interactive content (like the Weapons Check game) to engage visitors with the site:
Prominent Award Placement
Winning or being nominated for a big award lends credibility to your film, so it makes sense to feature that information prominently on the film’s website. This is seen most often with Oscar winners and nominees.
Pan’s Labyrinth
Showcasing awards and distinctions prominently on the homepage is an excellent strategy for an independent movie site:
The Hurt Locker
The Hurt Locker is another site where awards are given prominence on the homepage. This is especially popular on sites that have won major awards, such as the Academy Award for Best Picture:
Mongol
The Mongol site is another that showcases award nominations on the homepage, alongside positive reviews. The rest of the site is very simple, with downloads, video content, and e-cards:
Other Film Sites
Some sites take a different approach entirely. Maybe they go a bit more minimalist, or fit more into what most would consider a “traditional” film website. But they all do an excellent job of representing the films they promote.
Four Lions
The Four Lions site is simple, with a crow animation and links to watch the trailers, find out more about the film (including where to watch it and reviews) and options to share it on Facebook or sign up for updates. Everything is displayed on the homepage, with sliders to show new content:
Sanctum
The site for Sanctum is fairly minimal, with a Flash interface and three pages: “Story”, “Video”, and “Gallery”. The UI is slick and works seamlessly, offering a great user experience. The only thing out of place here is the social media links in the upper left, which don’t really fit in with the aesthetics of the rest of the site:
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
A movie website should always evoke the feel of the movie itself, and the site for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory does just that, with a whimsical design and color scheme:
Paper Man
The Paper Man website is very simple, with a comic-book look that fits with the feel and theme of the movie. They put the trailer link and reviews prominently on the home page:
My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend
Here’s a simple site that includes all the relevant information a film site needs. There’s a section for where the film is playing, you can watch the trailer, follow the stars on Twitter, and view information about the film on IMDB:
Beowulf
The Beowulf site is a bit different in that it uses horizontal scrolling rather than new pages or vertical scrolling:
The X-Files: I Want to Believe
The X-Files: I Want to Believe website is simpler than many film sites, with an animated background and links to the trailer and videos, downloads, and synopsis, and other content. Visually, it’s a very minimalist site, with clean typography and navigation:
Inkheart
The Inkheart website includes information about the movie, video content, a still gallery, downloads and more, all in a visual style that evokes the style of the film:
Robin Hood
The Robin Hood website is another that uses horizontal scrolling, with images from the movie serving as the background for different sections of the site:
Lord of the Rings
Sites for movie trilogies or series pose additional design problems, as it’s important not to give away plot points from the later movies in the imagery, while still representing all the films in the series. The Lord of the Rings site does this beautifully. They also include extras like an interactive desktop download and information about related video games:
Astro Boy
The Astro Boy website starts out with an animated intro and short trailer before the rest of the site’s content loads. There’s plenty of content, though, including downloads, photos and links to merchandise:
Cloverfield
The Cloverfield website puts the focus primarily on the trailer, though they do offer a widget you can put on your own site and links to purchase the DVD. The visual style meshes perfectly with the film:
Film Website Best Practices
Here are some guidelines to keep in mind when developing your own film websites. Feel free to offer more in the comments!
- Do evoke the style and feel of the film being marketed.
- Don’t forget to give visitors the option to turn the sound off on your site. Film sites are one of the few places you can get away with autoplaying sound, but it’s still important to give users control.
- Don’t resize browser windows or automatically go into full-screen mode when visitors land on your site. Remember, your site might not be their primary focus at that time, and if you force it on them, they might just walk away.
- Do provide extra content from the film to engage visitors. This is especially important for children’s films.
- Do feature any big-name stars prominently on the site.
- Don’t be afraid to try new or experimental UI ideas if they work well for the film. But make sure they’re relevant to the film and will add to the user experience.
Aviary Screen Capture lets you take a screen shot of any web page. Use the Aviary.com applications after you’ve gotten your screen shot to edit that shot from within your browser. The basic image editor lets you mark up (by drawing arrows and rectangles), edit (crop, rotate and resize) and get the exact pixel colors of the image. Features include: Chrome SEO provides easy access to search engine optimization tools. These tools help you with daily SEO tasks like competitive analysis, keyword research, backlink checks, page rank checks. Chrome Sniffer allows web developers to inspect web framework / CMS and JavaScript library running on a website. The extension displays an icon indicating the detected frameworks. Currently, this extension detects up to 70 popular CMS and JavaScript libraries. Eye Dropper allows you to pick color from any web page or from an advanced color picker. Firebug Lite for Google Chrome is not a substitute for Firebug (unfortunately), or for Chrome Developer Tools. Instead, you should use this tool with these other tools. Firebug Lite provides the rich visual representation similar to that of Firebug with HTML elements, DOM elements, and Box Model shading. Firebug Lite also provides some cool features such as inspecting HTML elements with your mouse, and live editing CSS properties. The IE Tab is available through Internet Explorer and lets you display web pages in a Chrome tab. This extension is great for web developers who want to cross browser test with the IE rendering engine. (This is a Windows only extension.) Instant Image Editor lets you right-click any image or element on a web page with a background image while holding down the alt key (ctrl key on Linux). You can edit the image instantly in a new tab using Pixlr, which is a fast, easy-to-use app that runs in the browser. When right-clicking an element that is not an image, Instant Image Editor will also try to determine whether the element has a background image that is editable. The Lorem Ipsum Generator generates random “Lorem Ipsum” text using a minimalist and attractive design. MeasureIt! lets you use a ruler to get the pixel width and height of any elements on a web page. Pendule provides extended web developer tools for Chrome. Use this extension with the built-in developer tools, which include view, reload and disable CSS, view JavaScript, forms editing, view, hide and get information about images, color picker, ruler, topographic view, markup validators and more! PHP Console is an extension for Lagger (lightweight and flexible open-source PHP library for errors/exceptions/debugs handling in PHP) that displays PHP errors/debug messages in Google Chrome console and in notification popups. Speed Tracer helps you to find and fix performance problems in your web applications. This extension visualizes metrics taken from low-level instrumentation points inside of the browser and analyzes them while your application runs. This application helps you understand where time is being spent in your application. This includes problems caused by: Web Developer adds a toolbar button to the browser with various web developer tools. This is the official port of the popular Web Developer extension for Firefox. Webpage Screenshot is a fast and simple extension to capture the whole web page. Even long pages are saved in one image file. This extension lets you save PNG/JPG image of any web page with just one click. Features include: Window Resizer resizes the browser’s window to emulate various resolutions. This extension is particularly useful for web designers and developers by helping them test their layouts on different browser resolutions. The resolutions list is completely customizable (add /delete/re-order). There are three screen types available:
1. Aviary Screen Capture
2. Chrome SEO
3. Chrome Sniffer
4. Eye Dropper
5. Firebug Lite for Google Chrome
6. IE Tab
7. Instant Image Editor
8. Lorem Ipsum Generator
9. MeasureIt!
10. Pendule
11. PHP Console
12. Speed Tracer
13. Web Developer
14. Webpage Screenshot
15. Window Resizer
Lately, we’ve been pondering some of the better web designs that have popped up over the past year.
When we say “web design,” we’re looking beyond the pretty face of a well-laid-out page, beyond color and typography, beyond trends. What we’re after is a truly elegant and functional design, and those things are just the icing on the cake. We specifically looked for sites that stretch the boundaries of our technologies’ capabilities in interesting, useful and beautiful ways.
As greater bandwidth, new file formats and new markup specs make it easier, cheaper and faster to deliver high-quality digital images, sound and video, groundbreaking web designers are making visually and aurally intensive sites that change our point-and-click expectations of what the web should look like.
Here are a few of the websites we think showcased excellent design work this year, both in terms of form and function. They range from video and music showcases, to media troves, to high-volume social media apps, but they all have one thing in common: a (in some cases, renewed) focus on digital multimedia content.
1. Best Social Media App Design: The New Twitter
2. Best Media Website Design: Vogue.com

Through the help of social media and good site architecture, small business owners have come a long way in creating sites that not only rank, but also engage users. However, it’s no secret that one area where SMB owners still struggle is in the world of paid ads.
Last year we quoted a study that found that more than half of SMB owners quit paid advertising within six months of starting. Google is obviously looking to change that in the best way Google knows how – by creating valuable resources for SMB owners to learn from.
Last week Google announced the launch of the AdWords Small Business Center. The Small Business Center is designed to be a knowledge hub that SMB owners can use to learn AdWords best practices and get key information about everything they need to know to run a successful AdWords account. The information provided will be broken down into beginner, intermediate or advanced, so that small business owners can benefit regardless of where they are in their learning and grow into the information.
Here’s a look at some of the early topics covered:
- Write great ads
- Choose the best keywords
- Adjust bids and budgets
- Improve your website
- Track your results
Going through the information already on the site, I was pretty impressed with the depth. For example, just checking through the Adjust Bids and Budgets section, I was surprised by the breadth of knowledge offered and how well broken down it was. It allows small business owners to really go at their own pace and pick up additional information as they’re ready for it. I’d imagine that even experienced AdWords users could get some additional tips by checking out this resource. It’s nice to see Google really digging in and not just tossing out a few high-level tidbits.
Also part of the Adwords Small Business Center is a Discussion Forum where small business owners can meet others new to the AdWords process and share information and tips. However, there was no sign that Google representatives would be also be participating in the forum, which was a little disappointing. It looks to be strictly for small business owners to talk and share with each other.
The Center also provides links to the AdWords Help Center, the AdWords blog and other resources so that small business owners can easily access them. There’s even a link to find an AdWords-certified professional if you want to hire someone to help you with your campaign.
While it would be nice to see Google designate some personnel to monitor this center and take part in the Discussion Group, this is still a great resource for small business to sink their teeth into. It organizes trusted information on a tricky topic into one place so that business owners don’t have to hunt all over the Web to find it. It’s just another example of Google doing what Google does best – providing hubs of free information that business owners can use to grow their businesses. The AdWords Small Business Center is one resource I definitely recommend SMB owners check out.
For more information contact eWave Designs - infor@ewavedeigns.com

Choices are great on a menu, but too many choices on your website or landing page or even within your products can cause indecision. Too many choices can lead to confusion, and when you’re in the business of trying to make a sale, confusion is the enemy. What’s the opposite of confusion? The answer is easy. The best way to make things easy? Keep them simple.
Often we’re too focused on giving our customers too much. When you go to the barber, he doesn’t give you a menu of haircuts. You sit down, tell him simply what you’d like done, he pulls out his tools and cuts your hair. All very quickly and without fuss, which is the reason most men still prefer to go to a barber rather than a “salon”: It’s simple.
Now, if you were to sit in that same barber’s chair and he gave you a 20-question survey about what type of hairstyle you prefer before he started cutting, you’d not only be annoyed, but most likely never go to him again.
Let’s look at an online example to further prove the point. Imagine you’re visiting the e-commerce store of your favorite pet supply retailer. You need a new collar for your Labrador, Bella. Upon arriving at the site’s dog collar section, you find 20 different types and brands of collars. There are fancy collars, cheap collars, chain collars, collars for small and big dogs, collars with diamond studs on them, fashionable collars, and many more. Whew… you’re faced with lots of choices.
“Great,” you say. “I love it that this store has so many choices, I came to the right place.”
But perhaps it’s not so great. Having too many choices might be a problem. You just wanted to get a collar. You were ready to buy one. But now, well, you’ve found out that there a lot of decisions you need to make before you buy one. You think to yourself, “I had no idea there were so many collars. I like so many of them, I don’t know what to choose.”
So you didn’t buy. You were ready to, but you didn’t. Chances are this has happened to you at some point in your buying life, and chances are what happened was that you were ready to decide, but the explosion of choices either confused you, or made you realize that you weren’t ready to decide. Effective sales and marketing is all about helping the customer make a decision, and simplicity is necessary to make that happen.
Here are some ways your site might be confusing customers:
- Poor navigation so your customer has to figure where to go
- A poor unique value proposition (UVP)
- Too many choices of products and services without a clear indication of which one is the right choice for the customer
- Tons of drawn-out copy that nobody wants to read
- Requiring a customer to register before they can buy from you
Are you guilty of overcomplicating customers’ choices on your website? Think about ways you can make it simple–and you’ll find that making the sale gets much easier.
For more information contact eWave Designs info@ewavedesignms.com
Magento is by far one of the coolest, fully-featured, robust, free shopping cart utilities on the planet. With it’s easy to install and rich front-end and back-end features, Magento beats the living hell out of the current, run of the mill shopping cart solutions. Some of these inferior shopping carts I’m referring to include, but are not limited to cre-loaded (impressive home page, but trust me, their home page was created by a professional, their software does not echo the professionalism they front.), Zen Cart (bad templates, bad functionality), and plain old oscommerce.
Don’t get me wrong, the above solutions were excellent choices for the last generation of web entrepreneurs. And lets face it, Magento probably would not exist had it not been for the above solution providers setting the standard. In short, that standard has been blown out of the water and Magento has raised the bar significantly. Those solutions had their spot in the limelight, they also had ample time to improve their code and offer better options to their customers, but they failed to improve and innovate. Now it’s Magento’s turn to take center stage. Time for the other providers to see Magento’s bet, or jump off the nearest cliff.
To find out more how Magento can benefit your online business contact us at eWave for free complementary advise. www.ewavedesigns.com
Mobile commerce has been growing quickly, and there is significant demand for merchants who want to mobilize their business. And although Magento has provided mobile web optimized themes (WAPs) since 2008, a majority of retailers want engage their customers with the rich & personal features that only mobile apps provide. However, the cost and time to build, integrate, deploy and manage these native apps for various popular devices is significant, and therein lies the basis for our product. Magento Mobile will enable our over 70,000 merchants to easily create branded, native storefront applications that are deeply integrated with Magento’s market-leading eCommerce platform. The product includes a new administrative manager (available for free on Magento Connect), a native iPhone app that is fully customizable (colors, images, buttons, etc), and a service where Magento manages the submission and maintenance process for the iTunes App Store. Magento Mobile is compatible with previous versions of Magento, including Community Edition 1.3+, Enterprise Edition 1.6+, and Professional Edition 1.8.

Things to Look For in Site Search Data:
1. Regularly check the top search terms on your site.
They can be good indicators of new items your clients are looking for, or product lines that are performing well. For example, SLI customer Jelly Belly used to offer only a 10-pound bulk case of its Champagne Bubbles jelly beans. Using information gleaned from site search, the company discovered that Champagne Bubbles candy was the third most-requested search. They decided to offer a one-pound container, and it’s now one of the company’s biggest sellers with wedding planners.
2. Review site search terms for SEO and PPC campaigns.
This is a great source for keyword research because it shows the language your visitors are using.
3. Review the searches with poor or no results.
A poor result is one that has a low clickthrough rate. These terms either relate to content that people are searching for that you don’t have or, more often, are examples of your visitors using different language to describe your content than you do. Both of these pieces of information are extremely valuable. If visitors are searching for content that you don’t offer, then you know that there is demand for that content and may indicate products that you should be stocking on your ecommerce site. If visitors are searching for products that you are not able to or don’t intend to carry, then you can address this by showing keyword-specific banners suggesting similar products.
If your visitors are using a different language to describe your content or products, you can either start using this language on your site (which will help with your search engine optimization as well), or you can add synonyms to your search so your visitors will find the items they’re looking for.
4. Review your site search quality metrics to ensure your site search relevancy is improving over time.
A good site search solution “learns” by tracking visitors’ aggregate search queries and click-throughs to deliver results based on criteria such as popularity. This means that, over time, searchers on your site are presented with the most relevant search results and can find what they’re looking for more quickly and easily. Improved searches result in more satisfied customers and greater sales.
5. Integrate your analytics package with your site search.
It shouldn’t require too much effort to make sure your analytics software is tracking search activity on your site. Your site search provider might be able to help you with this. Being able to measure site search results – like any other marketing activity – demonstrates the value and ROI benefit you’re getting. For example, you can track the conversion rate for site search results pages as compared with other pages on your site, as well as the percentage of revenue generated by site search results pages. You can also determine the average order size for site search users as compared to those who don’t search; if your site search solution is performing well, those numbers should be higher.
6. Watch the keywords that are quickly gaining popularity so you’re able to continually meet increasing product demand.
Again, it’s important to understand the language of your customers – and like any trend, nothing lasts forever, including the search terms used most frequently on your site. Trends around popular terms may shift with the seasons, or with popular songs and movies, or with the latest look sported by the Jonas Brothers. The point is, as terms gain popularity, they signal to you that the products that go along with those terms will likely also gain popularity, so be prepared.
Today we will show you some nice examples of purple websites! Purple is for sure a very vibrant and strong color that used in the correct amount can give a nice touch to your website. You can either have some purple elements or a whole purple background, it all depends on your creativity. Check out these examples and reload your ideas about the color purple.
GoodBytes

NEWISM

Corporate Image

bjango.

tapmates

Full Fat Studios

one mighty roar

Kaleidoscope App

Small and medium sized enterprises often focus too much of their attention on the technical details of setting up and running their businesses, particularly in the online retail sector. As a result, attention to customer experience often suffers.
The role of a good web design company is to step in and bridge that gap. Good designers put themselves in a customers’ shoes and work to optimise the total experience of engaging with a product.
There are numerous opportunities to impress — or disappoint — a customer. They start when a customer hears about your product and these opportunities continue when the customer visit your online store, sees the product for the first time, purchases it, opens the package, sets it up, uses it, maintains it, upgrades it and replaces it.
Web design firms define your product’s visual appeal, presentation and position against your competitors. At eWave, we focus on a product by using this mantra: “Consider, Create, Build, Deliver.”
- Consider the product’s users, environment and relative market position across a range of factors. Customer demand, as well as additional and export market opportunities, are taken into account at this stage.
- Create innovative ideas for designing the online store re-aligning it with current demand and future trends.
- Build and narrow down the best technology for the online eCommerce store.
- Test and Deliver, testing is one of the most important steps that will allow us to go over every part of the project, fixing bugs and making sure all design and development requirements are met before delivering the final product.
Good design aligns your product with customer needs, desires and expectations. It also is measured by product sales and growth.
Are You Making Money With Your Internet Business? http://bit.ly/aYBxBa ewave ecommerce webdesign










































