All About

What I Do

Welcome to my studio. I’ve become a designer, graphic artist, photographer and website developer, over many years, spanning a huge variety of creative projects.

Taking on complete branding projects including websites requires knowledge of marketing, economics, communication, computer coding and much more. In this business you get to be a quick study, on many subjects, so I’ve become somewhat of an expert researcher because each new business brings a new set of information to absorb. 

My goal is to help you:

Create a memorable professional image,
Find your best points, highlight those,
Identify and Reach your target audience,
Deliver your message creatively and effectively,
Entice your customers to react (call to action),
Within your means (stay in budget).

That last one is where some creative thinking really comes in handy.

I work in WordPress for websites, however, when sites are already developed in something else, (Joomla, Shopify, Google Sites) that can be handled also. 

Since 2002 another developer, Kirk Peters (https://www.kirkpeters.com), has worked with me on many projects. He jumps in with me to do advanced coding, troubleshooting and all things technical to make sure nothing ever breaks. The websites are conceptualized, written, coordinated, illustrated, photographed, by me mostly, but also with other professionals when needed, including illustrators.

Once a site is up, it requires continual maintenance. WordPress itself needs updated constantly. Hosts (GoDaddy etc.) will offer automatic updates, however I’ve seen sites break when that happens. It’s like updating your computer constantly, all of the parts have to keep working together. On a website, there a lot of parts. Some are in the servers, way over people’s heads… better to have someone you can trust help with all of this.

The maintaining of sites can be whatever level of hands-on work you can or want to do on your own. It can consist of me coaching you or your staff, on how to take better photos for usage on the website here, how to create posts or any other parts of the ongoing maintenance, in full or in part, I can fill in the gaps, show you the simple steps to keeping your articles or any other rapidly changing content current. You don’t need to know how the website is built (unless you want to), but you do need to have the ability to call someone to tell you exactly what you need to do your business in WordPress right when you need it. I do that too. 

Desktop apps used mostly: Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, Excel are most used now. Some minor in-house video projects in Keynote.

A-Typical Studio
My creativity requires nature.

As an active, nature driven, adventure seeking dog lover, working inside a building without a window was torture. A capped salaried position that required an uncapped amount of my life didn’t work for me either… too many hours a week, away from my dog(s) for long stretches… I had to seek my own path. One year while employed at a large advertising agency in downtown Pittsburgh, I went on vacation to Alaska, saw people living more remotely and simply, with nature, in cabins and realized something. The president of that agency made a big speech one day, “I heard some of you are sneaking out of here at six o’clock. If you want to leave at six, there are other agencies on the other side of the river!”

I took that advise eventually and went over the river. 

Being born and raised in Houston, Texas, cities just weren’t for me anyway. We went camping a lot, nature was where I connected, not back home in the concrete. Going forward, decisions would be based on this. I planned to take my experience now and go on my own as a freelancer. 

Now I live in a more natural area with trees outside the windows, dogs in the office, free to work where I feel creative, not rushing into traffic for a stressful start of a new day. Nope. Not for me. When inspiration is needed I go outside, to the trails or just my own wooded backyard. I believe in working with nature, not against it and that includes not being on a regimented time clock. Artists and creatives get this.

Background: On the Job Training was the KEY

I got my first job as a graphic artist / production artist in the early 90s professionally, but learned to code in C+ in high school, when desktop computers were being introduced in the 80s, then later in college; and in both cases learned it fast and then tutored the others. It just stuck. Maybe because my grandfather bought one of the first Apple computers in the 80s, where my brother and I played on games that came on floppy disks using stick figures and a keyboard with no mouse. Or because we played Asteroids right when it came out; technology was encouraged in my family.

Learning graphic design software was all hands-on at jobs where it was asked “can you do this project in Freehand?” Me: “I’ll figure it out.” That was enough to get every job because that software was new, and no one else knew how to use it yet either. I was paid to learn Photoshop, Freehand, FrameMaker, Pagemaker, WordPerfect (wrong! worse software ever) on the job, on projects, figuring out software as I went. Numerous projects on PCs and MACs before those two worked together, converting files back and forth, ran a linotronic image output machine which required constant technical troubleshooting. Rock solid foundation.

Worked in another agency in Shadyside for awhile, many places around town when there was a Mac temp agency to hook me up with jobs. I stayed consistently employed, downtown, in various offices, on site at Robert Morris University in their marketing department, at ad agencies and did catalogs, design projects, many of them. Working at Electronic Images on the strip was how the agency work began, they sent me down to Station Square to MARC Advertising where there was a lot of experience to be gained.

After freelancing in a variety of companies for many years, some full or part time as an employee, I began to freelance full time from home in 2002, which is now Hot Designs.

Education at a school geared for advertising and fine art  
College provided the building blocks for me to work as an entrepreneur. The ability to combine all of the business and creative processes that it takes to run a business, to be in service of others to help reach their marketing goals with a good solid grasp on the whole picture- not just the fun design stuff- really did come from the college experience. Working jobs almost the entire way through, it wasn’t a piece of cake.

Bachelors in Business Administration: East Texas Sate University (now East Texas A&M University) Fine art major/ advertising minor. We learned from adjunct professors in Dallas ad agencies:  illustrators, designers, art directors who were employed in Dallas drove an hour to us, and at some point all of them held classes in Dallas agencies. We were taught by, and got to see some legends. We drew logos by hand with a pencil and used press type lettering and pantone paper sheets to create a brochure, the basics of design without help from a computer. A very fortunate thing to learn design principles with no desktop help.

I switched majors to Business Administration, such a crazy switch. From air brushing and ceramics to calculus and economics. My brain was so fried by the time I got out, in the 5+ years, more time was spent in the art and advertising part, but the last two years was all of this upper level math and computer coding (which I liked) and it hurt my head! Computers stuck, the rest was awful. 

The switch was just to get a broader picture because, I mean fine art? How to make a living? We kinda learned that money doesn’t frequently come to great artists, until after death, yikes. You still need a business head to sell it. And after all of those classes in advertising, they said about 1% of us would go on to make it there, (and here I am) so, I switched to business and got out of there with that. 

In 2020 I had some time (and the need) like a lot of us, to find another source of income. Over the last few years I’ve organized the thousands of photos I’ve taken around the Laurel Highlands, and started a second business. Nature Rocks Designs making greeting cards, wall art, stickers, yard signs, natural sprays and other nature driven things.

If you would like to discuss your project, Contact me.