Design
This site was originally sketched out using the gimp and the imagery used on the site was extracted from that work. Branch Immersion generally have a very organic feel to their music and so I have tried to recreate that in the design.
Valid
I like to make XHTML valid webpages. I know many professional designers are indifferent to that sort of thing, but I find it a pleasing challenge. Unfortunately not all pages on this site, in the gigs page case it is due to cross-browser compatabilty, which must always win out. In the case of the media page it is embedding flash objects, something that one must deal with when producing a media site. These are bitter pills to swallow bu one must accept them.
Cross Browser
I have tried to keep the design consistent across browsers but there are some places where one must accept a little degredation. If you are viewing the site in a modern browser (Firefox, IE7+, Opera, Chrome, Safari 4 etc) then you should be seeing it in all its glory, including full png transparency on the rounded corner content boxes. In the IE6 version you are reduced to gifs. Similarily, if you have Javascript disabled then you don't get rounded corners, but you do get styled boxes. finally without CSS enabled you see the site in pure unstyled XHTML. Perfect.
Of course, this isn't a perfect design (I wish I'd thought ahead a little about the edge of the main content), but it is a good exercise in cleanly structured degradable design. Please feel free to view the source and read the extensive notes found within. You are welcome to use as you please.
This webdesign only:
Branch Website by Kevin Carmody is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.
Based on a work at wwwusers.brookes.ac.uk.
