Not sure if anything at http://www.dynamicdrive.com/style/layouts/category/C10/P10/ may help you. Im currently just learning myself so unable to provide detailed explanations yet.
I actually found that I can make the all the columns static. And then the white space left I can just change to the color of my background image since its a since color drop shadow. The problem I'm having now is 100% height Faux Columns, and trying to get the drop shadow to work with the middle column. I don't require a header or footer because it would then break the drop shadow.