As a kid, drawing, reading, and writing were my entertainment. Growing up in a small town on the outskirts of Phoenix was a constant reminder of how much there was to see in the world.

It's crazy to think I actually got to live all those Stranger Things vibes, minus the bitey monsters. Nights at the arcade playing Centipede and DigDug. Seeing ET and Star Wars in the theater for the first time. Watching MTV. Sure, life changes and reality is what it is, but I'm still holding on to everything that made being a kid awesome.

Here’s a quick summary of my areas of creative focus:

Illustration – I've cultivated a few techniques, such as hand drawn, vectorized, and a hybrid of the two. I work in different styles too – doodles, fine line drawings, and geometric constructs using positive and negative shape interactions. My primary illustration goal is: have fun doing it!

Design – With projects of my own initiative, I focus on game design, publication design, and identity design. In general, Art Direction is my day job. That means managing projects, working with other designers, and partnering with external resources. I read a lot, attend local events, and stay involved with our local AIGA chapter.

Fiction – I've been passionate about writing for a long time. I write poetry, short stories, and longer narratives too. All of the personal projects I create are grounded in storytelling. Fiction is make believe, but it holds the potential to clarify our reality. And that intrigues me.

Printmaking – I've only just begun to develop this skill. I'm in the early stages of growing a body of work in this area. I try to approach developing a new skill as an experiment. When I don't worry about being correct, and just focus on learning, there's no pressure!

I didn’t attend the best design college and I don't come from a place of privilege. But I do have a customer service background. I worked a lot of random jobs before becoming a designer – pest control tech, house cleaning guy, customer service representative at a call center. All those different experiences taught me different lessons about how to treat people and keep my perspective in check.

A mentor once told me:

“The customer is not always right, but they always come first.”

Turns out people are complex and so are projects. Being upfront and communicative about expectations and objectives is really important to me. Sometimes the unexpected happens. That's when creative problem solving matters most.

I’ve had the pleasure of working with and learning from some really great people over the years:

AIGA
Desert Schools Federal Credit Union
Harkins Theaters

Phoenix Comicon
Phoenix Suns
Arcadis

Toyota
UPS
W.L. Gore & Associates

I’m inspired by the world around us. Summer monsoon storms. Insects doing their thing. A hummingbird sitting on a tree. It’s one thing to work in a creative profession and another to use our personal sense of imagination to create things only we can make.

But we can do it. We’re human. And that's pretty amazing.