This lovely banner (ahem) was made on webestools.com.  The animation I chose is in the glitter category.  I was amazed at how many variations of glitter there are and how different they look.  I love this effect!

I have used similar sites in the past to make web pages but they weren't as user friendly as they are nowadays. This experience made it easier for me to navigate and understand, somewhat, how to make use of the tools on the sites I chose.
My first attempt was on webs.com. It was a little challenging at first, but after a little trial and error, I was able to come up with a simple page. Along the bottom of the main "builder" page are all the widgets for the basic page build. Click and drag the feature of your choice up to where you want it and follow the easy instructions.

This site was very easy to use and delivers as promised. You can easily make a free website with no ads and they will host if for free. There are some premium options that are unavailable unless you purchase them. The free options are pretty decent if you just want to keep it simple.

I discovered that I could not upload a video to the site without purchasing premium services, but was allowed to link to video content externally. I uploaded my video to YouTube, made it private, then placed a link on the page to it.

My second attempt was on yola.com. It was equally as simple as webs.com. I had a lot of issues with uploading photos on this site. I have 4G wireless which is usually pretty decent, but whenever I would start uploading photos, it became slow and cumbersome. I spent a lot of time waiting for things to load. Sometimes they just wouldn't, so I would close my browser, wait for a few minutes, and start again. I was able to save changes in between browser closings/re-openings so at least I didn't have to start completely over every time. This happened to me on this site for 3 days in a row, so I know it's not my connection. I was, however, able to imbed my video. This is the only site of the three that would allow it without paying for premium services.

I was also disappointed with not being able to change the color of the turquoise banner on the top of the page. That color just does not fit with the rest of the page. Overall, I am pleased with the finished page even though it took so long to put together.
My third attempt was at zoho.com. This site was also easy to use. The banner at the top was a disappointment because the only element that could be put there was a photo. I wanted my title there. So.....I took a snapshot of the page, used paint to crop the center of the banner image, then used ArcSoft to insert my text and saved it as a .jpg image. I then uploaded this image to the banner to get the effect I wanted. It was a little extra work, but I think it came out very well.

The tools are all at the top of the page and self explanatory. I was disappointed at having to upload only one image at a time. I used several, so it was very time consuming. Once they were uploaded though, it was quick and easy to put captions on them and place them on the page. Again, there was no way to imbed my video without paying for the premium service, so I posted a link.

Of all three sites, I think yola.com was the easiest to use and has the most appeal for newbie website designers. I have a few ideas I may put to use here after this class is completed. I really enjoyed this project.
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