About Me
I am a graphic designer living in the Nashville, Tennessee area. My interest in art started from reading the newspaper – well actually the Sunday comics. I drew my favorite characters and even came up with some of my own. My family noticed my interest in drawing and showed their support by buying me many water color sets, markers, color-by-numbers, etc. Somewhere buried in my basement is a story book I wrote when I was in Kindergarten. Which reminds me…. I really should go look for that.
Though I never took art lesson per say, the first time I was taught how to paint was in art class in middle school. In seventh grade I competed in my first art contest, the Fire Prevention Poster Contest and was the city winner. During high school, I spent most of my l time in the art hall. I had wonderful teachers who inspired me to develop my skills. Plus, I was able to work with so many different mediums. Some of my favorite projects that I wish I still had were the “Terminator inspired” silver man made of paper mache and my Axl Rose bust made of clay. Others like my self portrait won Gold in the Scholastic Art Awards and a drawing I did of Slash won Silver. I was a huge Guns N’ Roses fan back then. It was also during this time I started getting paid for my craft. One day a classmate asked me draw a portrait for her and then a couple of other people asked me to do portraits for them and it just kind of grew from there.
I graduate one semester early from high school and started college the next. During senior year I was chosen to be apart of an internship program at a paper company. As a recent graduate I thought this was going to be the first step to the dream job that included an office with a view, benefits. But being that this was my first job real job, I was just happy to being working in my field. Plus, I got some great experience working along side the advertising/promotional team in the paper sample department. I kept clients up to date with new products and gave them guidance on paper selection.
I then went on to work at a publishing company as a graphic designer. Each person in the graphics department was put on their own project. My project was designing drink coasters for a new client. Eventually, I started doing some freelance work designing flyers and invitations for a non-profit organization. After a short stint with the first publishing company I worked for another one mainly typesetting and designing hotel directories and restaurant menus. One of my coworkers and I became really interesting in digital art after viewing some really amazing online portfolios. We started doing tutorials and reading books & magazines on photoshop, illustrator, flash, etc.
Due to the economic conditions in the past couple of years, I was laid off. One of the advantages of being a designer, whether that be web or graphic, is there is always someone who needs design… no matter what the condition of the economy. All one has to do is adjust. It seems to me, that in these times there are many professions that will grow and prosper because of the economic conditions. Lawyers, counselors, spiritual organizations, health industry, various financial institutions, higher learning institutions (teach), etc. These are the markets I plan to target. In fact, I’ve already begun to do that, and as a result I have a couple of possible projects. Stepping out of the problem and moving into the solution is the answer.
After endless searches, I did get a job at printing company. But they closed down the production end of the business. From my research, freelance for now is the way to go. Since most larger firms are either in hiring freezes, or downsizing their design departments.
