Show HN: I saw this cool navigation reveal, so I made a simple HTML+CSS version
134 points by momciloo 2 days ago | 35 comments
Two clip-paths, over the navigation:

- The first clip-path is a circle (top-left corner) - The second clip-path is a polygon, that acts like a ray (hardcoded, can be improved)

The original work by Iventions Events https://iventions.com/ uses JavaScript, but I found CSS-only approach more fun

Here's a demo and the codebase: https://github.com/Momciloo/fun-with-clip-path


tgv 15 hours ago
Wrt to the remarks about this being bad design: not everything is meant for (immediate) usability. Sometimes, a web page functions or doubles as marketing material.

And there's more than "minimal number of interactions" functionality. People generally like good looking stuff. While it may be superfluous, it may feel more pleasing than yet another dark gray text on a light grey square. It may even help remembering navigation, since it's easier to remember deviating design.

reply
flaburgan 2 days ago
It looks cool, but to have to navigate from one side of the screen to the opposite one is quite suboptimal
reply
mym1990 20 hours ago
You don't have to optimize the fun out of every single thing in life.
reply
self_awareness 12 hours ago
The problem is when the engineer's fun starts being user's daily life. Then it's not fun anymore.
reply
jotaen 11 hours ago
This is the portfolio website of an event agency, not the Gmail website.
reply
self_awareness 10 hours ago
Fortunately.
reply
savolai 17 hours ago
On mobile, (my) thumbs are already at the locations where iventions places the toggle and the menu.
reply
AlexAplin 21 hours ago
I'm pretty forgiving about accessibility (I'm able to say this at all because I don't have to rely rigidly on accessibility tools) but nav menus feel like a baseline we shouldn't muck with. Tabbing doesn't seem to respond very well in the live example, and at least in the limited demo you can't expand the listing without using a mouse (I thought it would respond to a space with the :checked pseudo, but seems not).
reply
swyx 2 days ago
one thing i dislike about "good design" in general is that it usually takes away from information density and practical convenience in order to achieve "good design". this feels like a bad tradeoff. i wish that designers cared about making things more accessible and delightful rather than impressing fellow designers.
reply
falloutx 24 hours ago
Its not about information but about directing the user in this case. Not everything has to be information dense or even convenient. Sometimes you want users to scroll or make them click step buttons. (checkout is sometimes made to have more steps to give users time to adjust to pain of paying)
reply
division_by_0 2 days ago
Agree. Info-dense designs are also more difficult to implement and many designers lack experience in this area. E.g., creating a coherent design system that uses borders instead of excessive padding to separate elements is much more difficult than it may seem.
reply
orphea 2 days ago
Agree. I opened this iventions website, hated every second being there, closed it.
reply
vrighter 12 hours ago
which in itself makes it a bad design in the first place. Because first and foremost it has to be functional.
reply
xtiansimon 9 hours ago
I like the demo. It's bold, creative, and dynamic. Will there be more explorations? Maybe a writeup on the design to code process?
reply
MagicMoonlight 11 hours ago
That looks really cool. No idea what to use it in, but it’s great.
reply
todotask2 20 hours ago
You made me recalled we made something similar with growing circular on mobile menu the last decade. It was cool for our marketing event website.
reply
bmacho 16 hours ago
Is there a demo? The link points to a github repo, and github pages is not active
reply
momciloo 16 hours ago
good point. added the demo link
reply
xtiansimon 9 hours ago
The _inspiration_ site loaded slowly on my Dino laptop, but the _demo_ was super fast. Good job.
reply
djfobbz 9 hours ago
This is not mobile friendly. Was that intentional?
reply
thekevan 2 days ago
I saw this on Twitter about an hour ago and was going build one as well. Nice work!
reply
rhplus 24 hours ago
Flashback to the days of Macromedia Flash.
reply
ddtaylor 16 hours ago
Site is death hugged? Anyone have a working link?
reply
felineflock 22 hours ago
Good job! Looks amazing! It is a great way to call attention to content.
reply
pmkary 16 hours ago
This is just awesome!
reply
self_awareness 12 hours ago
As expected, this doesn't work with non-standard browser window sizes and is butchered on mobile in horizontal mode.

But since the original implementation is also broken, I guess that's OK?

We really have a low bar for quality these days. I hope this won't be used anywhere that's relevant.

reply
jackomelon 21 hours ago
Very neat.
reply
elian55 23 hours ago
Hola
reply
Gabrys1 18 hours ago
calc(1.42 * 100vmax)

is the same as

142vmax

Just saying :-)

reply
uxcolumbo 24 hours ago
Neat experiment, but this is not good design.

Design is about solving problems.

A menu is suppose to help you to quickly find and get to a specific section of your site.

Why do I have to click on a thing to reveal the menu even though on my laptop there is enough space to show it all? And then I have to move my mouse all to the other side of the screen?

Who is this for?

Nothing wrong with experimenting with CSS, but avoid ‘dribbblizing’ your designs if you intend to ship it to users who use your site for information or to get a job done.

Edit: commenting more on the iventions.com website where this effect is in use.

reply
hippo22 24 hours ago
“I have a cool idea in my head that I’d like to show other people” is a problem that some people need to solve.
reply
mym1990 20 hours ago
Iventions site is clearly a showcase and uses maximalism, which is most definitely a design philosophy. Design may about solving problems, but the fact that you feel entitled to think that you know the problem that Iventions is trying to solve, and also that they are doing it wrong is very presumptuous.
reply
uxcolumbo 12 hours ago
Not presumptuous. All based on doing enough usability testing to understand that time and time again people get confused if you try to reinvent the wheel or trying to be fancy when it comes to navigating around your site. Stick to best practices.

That's all.

reply
peckemys 16 hours ago
> Who is this for ?

This effect imitates a spotlight, which is cited on the page and quite relevant for a company in the arts domain

reply
uxcolumbo 12 hours ago
I tried to use it yesterday on my iPad. Some kind of element was blocking the menu.

Tried it today on my PC (big screen) - the intro animation is slow - 6-10 FPS and clicking on the menu item to reveal the items is slow as well. I could hear my fan spinning up.

Not everyone uses the latest greatest Mx chipset.

This tells me they haven't done any testing. Basically 'this looks cool' and 'works on my machine'.

reply