Web Design
Since mid-November I'm now a professional web designer for Hammer Design based in Hathersage in the Peak District. If you're in need of bespoke web or print design services, we're the company for you.
Websites
Prior to working for Hammer Design, I designed and implemented the following websites of which I'm particularly proud. All my websites are written by hand; I'm a firm believer in writing webpages in a text editor rather than a GUI client as you get full control over the appearance that way and code that's elegant on the inside is much easier to make elegant on the outside.
I mused before about the HTML and CSS standards being only relatively recently being used to full effect. This statement glosses over an incredible amount of work done to give web designers like myself the tools to create great looking sites. The CSS Zen Garden is a superb site to get some inspiration and see what can be done, although the long list of things to consider on the Position Is Everything site provides the entrance to a very dark tunnel of trying to get fantastic quality, good looking sites that work on every computer out there. One day I may get the time to produce my own Zen page; I'll keep you posted.
My own website: http://www.bencarpenter.co.uk- This website uses a fixed-width design and tries to maximise the graphical potential of basic CSS commands to keep the pages quick to load. The pick of the features here has to be the pure CSS drop-down navigation menu at the top, so it works even with all active content / javascript disabled.
Based on:
icons by Paul Davey aka Mattahan. All rights reserved; and 
icons by FAMFAMFAM. 
My research group: http://ldsd.group.shef.ac.uk- Collectively my most advanced website to date. A semi-flexible width design based in part on the Jello Mold method of page design by Mike Purvis. Every group member has their own page which they can modify using custom forms and they can add publications to the custom database engine, written such that a given page looks up its relevant publications rather than displaying the whole list or having multiple copies of each on different pages.
EU Semiconductor Research: http://ldsd.group.shef.ac.uk/poise- The Physics Department at the University of Sheffield coordinates an international European Union research training network studying emission from semiconductor devices. This is a simple and completely fluid design using a modified version of my original tabs template.
Team Alpha: subsite- This collection of 9 physicists from Leicester University, codenamed Team Alpha, have taken on the UK Three Peaks Challenge which they completed in 23 hrs, 24 mins and 57 secs! This site had to include some pink, but a completely pink page would be too garish so this blend of pink and grey seems to work well.
Consultancy
I've also taken more of a consultancy role in the development of the following sites:
Safe Sunbathing Information: http://www.safesunbather.com- Safesunbather.com is an emerging business based on the beaches in southern Spain encouraging everyone to take more care of their skin whilst on holiday. The site is designed with a bright and fun appeal based on the look of a beach, whilst providing a source of clear and concise scientific reasoning for keeping protected from the sun without sacrificing holiday enjoyment.
The coolest crab in Gran Canaria: http://poguin.com- A fixed width design, making use of variable transparency PNG images for overlays over a gradient background. Now IE7 has been released, this transparency support is becoming much more widespread so subtle drop-shadow effects to enhance a design are much easier to implement. Of course, this is tweaked to work in earlier versions of IE, but every other browser gets the unadulterated W3C strict standard content
The Pulham Orchestra: http://www.pvo.org.uk- Time for a well known local Norfolk orchestra to have a web presence; I was asked to provide technical support as needed, but my commitments in my research forced me to stay out of the design and graphics work.
A final note...
This site is hosted on a server from 1&1. I happen to think they're a good host, so if you're in need of some webspace then by clicking my affiliate link below, we both benefit. I don't have to put this link here, its not a condition of the contract and I hope you've enjoyed browsing my ad-free site.
1&1 Hosting and Domains; 99.9% Uptime Guarantee; 15000 MBit Connectivity & 24/7 Support!
http://www.1and1.co.uk
