Robin Hayes

3dPE is a 3D OpenGL-based game engine written in Python. The main goal is to provide simple tools that allow anyone to make small, weird games. The website was tailor-made to support the engine. There are 30 active community members following development and others that check-in occasionally.

We chose Laravel for the back end, with the site providing an API for user authentication and project management. It interfaces with the project's Git repositories to show engine progress, uses GitLab to store the creators' game projects, and implementing a Discord server via a Node.js bot.

Each project has a landing page, news announcement system, user management, and a full forum-style message board.

The front end was built using Bootstrap with customized Sass, CSS animations, embedded background video, and other adjustments.

The design's main focus is to show a wide range of creativity for game creators, symbolized by rainbow colors on a neutral grey backdrop. We chose a red and cyan color palette to evoke anaglyphic 3D glasses.

I created the various 3D models in Blender, and the mascot 3bot's retro, loose- (or no-) limbed style is meant to foster a sense of playfulness and fun imperfection.

A dear friend asked me to make him a website that would act as a portfolio and attract students.

The back end is just HTML except for a bare PHP contact form.

The front end was kept deliberately simple and the site's background becomes a visualizer for the music pieces. Using colors drawn from the cover art, it uses WebGL to create a slowly shifting background and waveform and spawn music notes controlled directly by the audio file as it plays.

There is also a bare PHP administration section, where Mr. Freeman can log in and make changes himself, like uploading new pieces. All it takes is an audio file, a cover image, and a title—the visualizer system generates the rest.

I developed this site while working at an agency.

The client wanted to update the site to be mobile-friendly and freshen the design while at it—but this involved reorganizing the content. The original website had been added to monthly for almost a decade and it wasn't easy for a potential client to find the right product.

I went through more than 3000 pages and arranged all the content to match the company's internal divisions.

After working with a designer to present the pages, category divisions, and subdivisions as cleanly as possible, I rebuilt the site with a heavily customized WordPress/ACF installation and presented a guide for its use to the managing director.

I developed this site while working at an agency.

The brief was to rebuild and redesign the client's old website—updating it to be mobile responsive, improve the product search for customers, and revisit how the stock was tracked.

I heavily revamped the database and search system to keep queries fast and light while prioritizing relevance and the user experience.

There is a CMS system for the client to edit pages, as well as update products. The products are linked to their internal stock database via an XML API. Payments are taken through a SagePay gateway.

The front end is based around heavily modified Bootstrap. I was given designs for some key pages and developed the rest of the elements myself to match the style.

Five years later, the website is still going strong.