Design

I went to art school. I did. Three of ‘em in fact. Can’t say it did much for me. I went in to study graphic design, switched over to painting early on, and, by the time I graduated, I returned to photography which I discovered in junior high. That painting over to the left (50″ X 75″) was the last painting I ever did in 1992.

But I still always had a hankerin’ for graphic design. One of the ironies of my education was that I gave up on graphic design in 1987 because everything was starting to be reliant on computers which I had no interest in. I wanted to work with my hands. Now, I usually spend 8 to 10 hours a day doing work on a computer.

I started with computers mainly because I wanted to have an on-line gallery of my own photography. I grabbed a copy of Flash and a couple of books and taught myself a bit of programming. I found that I enjoyed it enough to continue to learn as much as I could about web development. I not only wanted to design the layouts, but I also wanted to know the coding that went into the sites. I think that really helped me as a designer.

I am currently the head of the web department at Creative Images in Roseburg, Oregon where I am also the in-house photographer.

With most of my work being created for web viewing, I still like to get work that will eventually be printed, like posters or CD covers. I have yet to be commissioned for a book jacket but that is something that I would like to do at some point. Being able to hold your design in your hands is, to me, so much more satisfying than viewing your work on a screen