Ever see something and say, “I wish I could do that”?

As an amateur web designer, I get that feeling all the time. Admittedly though, it’s never an envious desire; for the simple reason, I’ve been learning for less than a year, (a time restrained year at that). In fact, when I see something in web design which I can’t accomplish, I just get a desire to learn more.

When I first laid eyes upon the Premium News Theme, I must admit, I had a strong feeling, “I need to learn how to do that.”

You see, this theme is no ordinary theme; it’s far from it. It takes on a newspaper/magazine style layout, and seeks to turn the WordPress blogging software, into a CMS. But, considering there have been a few such designs lately, does young freelance web designer, Adii, have a right to title it as ‘Premium‘, or is he charging for something you could get elsewhere for free?

[Before you go any further, open up the Premium News Theme in another tab/window]

The Aesthetics

If you read my previous post, you’ll know that first impressions count. Now design is largely subjective, and being honest, Adii’s design style is often different than my own. He often swings towards high contrast, colour, and boldness, but it works.

Layout…

The main and secondary navigation, search bar, subscription options, content, and DOMtabs are all in the right place. Because this is a theme, and is targeted at a fairly general audience, everything should be in its proper place. What I mean is, things should be where people expect them to be, and for the most part, this is exactly what you find. There is no confusion.

The only area which may be in the wrong place, is the list of categories, but because the main categories should be in the secondary navigation bar, this shouldn’t pose any problem for visitors looking for content.

Colouring…

Because this is a theme, and not a fully fledged personal design, it uses a simple colour scheme. In fact, one thing a designer must bare in mind when designing a theme like this, is to have a colour scheme which just compliments the structure, and nothing too overbearing. Addi, in my opinion, has almost achieved that. He’s used black, white, and various shades of greys to help in organising the layout to the eye.

There are two things I’d change though:

1. I mentioned to Adii prior to its release, that I’d change the orange. When adding colour to theme which encourages post-purchase customisation, it’s always better to use reliable colours such as red and blue. Of course this is simple to change, but I think it would be attractive to a wider audience if he made all the default orange, red or blue.
2. The grey used in the secondary navigation menu isn’t pleasant, nor does it really suit. The background grey which drops down when there is a child to a category, is off putting. This would be much better if it was black or white.

Typography…

Never take your choice, and size of font lightly. Type, especially in this case, makes up the majority of what people are actually looking at, so it’s important that it’s right.

Again, the Premium News Theme looks fine in almost every area. Arial or Helvetica is used almost throughout, and almost gets away with it, except for the secondary navigation menu (again). At the size used, Arial has a habit of looking rather nasty when bold. It’s fine if it’s all uppercased, but as it stands, I think the best way to improve it would be to just change the weight to ‘normal’.

Like I said, it’s ok using Arial throughout like this, but it could probably be enhanced with a dash of Georgia here and there. Look at most major newspaper websites, like the NY Times and The Times (UK), and you’ll find them using Georgia in one way or another, usually for headlines.

The Options

Now this is where the Premium News Theme really sets itself apart. Adii has done a magnificent job in integrating a vast array of options in this theme. No joke! Almost every major feature you can see, is editable from an options menu under ‘Presentation’ in your WordPress Admin.

Want to easily change your advertisments? Don’t bother going into the sidebar.php, just edit the image location and the destination url in the options menu.
Don’t like the orange colour of the theme like me? There are seven variations of colour, all accessible at the click of a button.
Want to change the url to your feeds? No need to go into the header.php, just edit it in the options menu.
Want to change to a traditional blog layout? Change it in the options menu in seconds.
How do you remove the video panel from the homepage? Yip, you guessed it. Just tick a box in the options menu.

I’m sure you will agree, Adii has gone the second mile in seeking to make choices available, and giving those who are afraid to tamper with the theme files, the power to change many aspects of their theme.

Support

With all that’s possible with this theme, it’s important to provide people with all they need to know, in order to make this theme their own. Adii decided on a dedicated website for the theme, and there you will find almost everything you need to know.

Not only does he showcase what the theme is capable of, but he also has an excellent list of basic tutorials, to get theme users up and running:

• Editing the logo of your site
• Installing Premium News
• Adding images to your posts
• Writing a Featured Post
• Integrating Feedburner
• Setting up your Archives Page
• Activating your Video Player
• Adding YouTube videos to the homepage

Last Words

I shouldn’t have to emphasize it, but just in case you haven’t read this review properly, this theme is definitely something for Adii to be happy with. He has truly done a tremendous work in lifting the level of WordPress news themes, and making the CMS side of WordPress accessible to everyone.

Even the little negatives I’ve pointed out throughout this review, are easily changed, and they are nothing to cause anyone to avoid buying the theme altogether. In fact, it’s just provided a way for you to make your version of the theme completely different. If it was aesthetically perfect, then you would have nothing to change to distinguish your site from others

Of course, this theme comes at a price. And rightly so! Adii deserves every penny he gets for this work, and if you’re after a magazine/newspaper style theme, this is probably the one to go for. The functionality, possibilities, and future development for this theme is endless. Even in his stylesheet, Adii provides little details of what does what, and gives various warnings to theme editors, as to what they really ought not to touch (unless you’re prepared to make a lot of other changes).

I’m not going to give the pricing here. If you’re interested, head over and buy it now. If this is the kind of theme you need, it’s well worth the handful of dollars he asks for!

*This is not a paid review