What I do
I am a full-time web designer based in East London, working in Kent. I work for a company called Bell who have been around for over 15 years providing a number of communications-based services. One of these services is web design, for which I am part of the team. Our recent clients include Toni & Guy, Derby County FC and the Mall Group. At Bell my main role is front-end design working from design conception through to CSS/(X)HTML fruition!
When not at Bell, I also work freelance across a more broad range of projects, including work for print. I am always on the lookout for new freelance projects, so if you have a brief you would like me to look at just get in touch.
Outside of the workplace I take a keen interest in art and design, and am a keen music listener, player (guitars) and gig attender. Cars are my other great time-consumer. Sports I like but am not particularly good at are Football, Golf and Motorsport. I support Dagenham & Redbridge (my local team) and Newcastle United.
My Qualifications
I have 12 GCSE's and 4 A-Levels, and a Degree in Multimedia Technology and Design BSc studied from the University of Kent in Canterbury. I graduated in 2005 and have been working as a full-time designer since that summer.
My Skills
My general design strengths are a good eye for successful composition, and an understanding of the correct use of colour, typography and graphics. I can confidently follow briefs from a wide spectrum of clients, and across mediums. I prefer to design for the web, and have an understanding of HTML markup and CSS to a high level. The designs I create usually begin life in Adobe Photoshop, a piece of software I feel very confident using. I am aware of the importance of accessible, semantic and standards-compliant code and do my best to follow this through in my work.
I use Dreamweaver daily for most markup and CSS tasks, which i then migrate to MS Visual Web Developer for .NET 2 work, resulting in .ASP based websites. I know my way around the .NET framework for working and can work confidently with developers in my team to deliver dynamic sites on this platform. Other software I use less regularly includes Flash (for animation only) and Illustrator (work for print). I occassionally use After Effects to compiliment my work in Flash.
Tom