IO'S GUIDE TO LORE SITES
BASIC INFORMATION
For an OC website, you're going to want at the very least the $9 USD a year premium just for the unlimited elements. You can get by doing a free carrd - but it'll have to be pretty simple.
I recommend checking out some carrd tutorials on youtube - though they're typically designed for personal pages, they give a lot of good ideas/tips for how to create certain aesthetics/use certain elements.
Also this tutorial assumes you know the basics about carrd (the different elements, saving etc.) so uh. Look up a basic tutorial if you're not sure.
Note : every #Control acts as the start of a new page, and won't be visible unless directly navigated to eg. https://loresite.carrd.co/#controlname
Whereas headers/footers will always be visible (unless you toggle it off per control)
ANYWAY. Let's get into it.
SET UP
If you do this before you start properly, it'll make your life easier :
Work out the color scheme you want (have a notepad open with hexcodes)
#8B2112 / #DB1B19 / #030303 / #2E2E2E / #EAE7E1
- Prepare any images you might want to use (backgrounds, character art etc.)
- Have your lore/character information written down somewhere*
-*can just use filler text too, no big deal
Once you've got that done, it's time to work out what exactly you want. I recommend at least THREE ( 3 ) kinds of page :
- Home Page - Faction/Lore Page - Character Page
HEADER + HOMEPAGE
You don't need to have a header. It can just be a super easy way to help people navigate your site (also looks neat). My headers usually have page back/forward buttons + a link to the home page.
This is what it looks like stripped down to basics :
The rest is just messing around with colors, images and font.
IMO on your homepage you should have links to the rest of the main pages (Factions, World Information, Character List etc.) But don't overload it with information. Use visuals to keep it simple.
USE STYLES
Styles will save your sanity when your carrd becomes multiple pages, especially if you decide later on you want to change the aesthetic. Have a text style for your main text font/size/color, another for titles, etc. It'll help keep things consistent too.
FACTION/INFO PAGE
Stripped down:
You can also be use this type of page for Locations, Lore Information, anything tbh. Big focus on text, with images to break it up and/or link to other pages.
I really prefer using images as links rather than buttons -- just makes it easier to know at a glance what the page is going to be about.
CHARACTER PAGE
Stripped down:
Create a basic layout that you can use for each character. Ideally an image, a basic fact sheet + bio/background information. Now this is important : If possible, make sure every element is in ONE/TWO CONTAINERS!!!
Why? Because you can't drag/copy whole pages in carrd, which means you have to duplicate then drag every element one by one unless it's in a container, then you can drag the whole container with the elements inside. Trust me...when you have 10+ characters, it becomes a huge pain.
NOTES
Honestly that's really all there is to my lore sites - I just experiment with containers, images, buttons etc. But making basic layouts - Home Page, Info Page, Character Page - should be enough to start with.
My page layout with Controls basically looks like:
#HEADER END #home #factionpage #character1 #character2 #factionpage2 #character3 #character4 #FOOTER START
so that way when it's navigated with the left/right buttons, it should make sense to the reader!