all i can say that your beggining is better then above. go back to it and dont use scan lines anymore.
Dont give up i think for the second one u just tryed to make it stand out to much and u over filled it. The banner im not a big fan off. This layout looks like something you could get away with text as the header/banner. If your going to use scanlines dont leave them that high lower the ocpacity of it down to below 15%. Also the banner text im not a big fan off dont really seem to go all to well with the overall feel of the layout.
Whats with all the people using glows at the moment, it does't look good. We'll ig you use it properly i guess it does but on that banner there is far too much of it. I don't really like the way the banner looks like it's "floating" Keep at it though.
I think you should go back to the 1st design you posted. That was a good start. Then attach a banner at the top - same width as the page and just attach it like a normal banner. Read some tutorials on how to do good effects (i need to read some as well) and then just mess arround until you come up with a good looking banner. Try www.pixel2life.com