Bel-Mark Lanes Squarespace Website
Bel-Mark Lanes was up for some classic fun in the redesign and launch of their new website on a new platform. And boy-howdy did they get a humdinger! Retro Inspired, Future Facing The owners Caroline and Marc wanted to communicate to the outside what they knew was on...
read more
Harvest for Freelance Designers
Harvest helps me run my business. Check them out. I've been using Harvest for several years now, first at a marketing and design agency with about 10 employees, and for the last 4 years as a sole proprietor. It saves me so much time, it's like having an employee. In...
read more
Team Scream
24 Hours of Lemons & a Bunch of Nuts Another fun project came my way this Spring: I was asked to create a graphic for a race car. Not just any race, the 24 Hours of Lemons race where competitors are asked to buy a lemon, fix it up and send it around the track....
read more
10 Things I’ve Learned from Playing Candy Crush
I’ve learned a few things from playing waaay too much Candy Crush… Work hard to get lucky. A problem may often seem impossible, but if you keep at at it, attacking again and again, relentless, as much as your energy stash will allow…eventually things will fall into...
read more
Constructing a Website for A.Z. Shmina
The A.Z. Shmina project has been one of the smoothest website projects I’ve ever worked on and I’m proud of the final result. Working with Mike Bell Creative, John McQuillan Creative, and Foundation, we created a contemporary site that fully integrates messaging and design, and stands out from the competition. This blog post details the process from start to finish.
read moreU of M School of Public Health T-Shirt Project
I recently had another opportunity to create a t-shirt design, this time for the University of Michigan School of Public Health's Innovation in Action competition. IIA is an annual interdisciplinary competition...
read more
Karen & Walt & Dolly
A Dollywood Anniversary T-Shirt Every now and then you get to do a project that is just fun to do... A friend of a friend emailed me asking for some custom tee shirt art for his in-laws 50th anniversary celebration. The family was planning to meet up at Dollywood, so...
read moreBirdbrook Logo Process
Here is a quick sampling of the stages that I went through to create the Birdbrook Design logo and identity. Send me a note if you'd like to discuss how I can put this process to work for you.
read more
Thanks, Dave!
On May 29, 2015, Hile Creative closed its doors when owner Dave Hile retired. I started working at Hile almost exactly 10 years ago, just out of WCC and eager to learn what real-life graphic design was all about. Over the years I morphed from production designer, to designer, art director, project manager, web director, sr. designer, and director of operations. I loved the variety and enjoyed the opportunity to work on everything from board games, to cleaning products, candy packaging, tradeshow booths, animated ads, to university websites. The staff were good people and fun to be around, and Dave became a friend and mentor.
Some of the things I learned during my time there, in no particular order:
How to produce clean, printer-friendly files
How to design not just by instinct, but with conscious reasoning and purpose
In a past life…
In putting together my portfolio for this site, and dealing with the self-reflection that goes with that process, I decided to dig out some photos of work from my life before digital design. I worked with Barney Judge as an assistant muralist for 5 years, painting signage, residential and commercial murals, and even faux-tiled outdoor fountains. Had it not been for a couple of specific projects that required Photoshop skills, I may not have gone into graphic design. But because we took on those projects, and I was able to learn as I went, I decided to sign up for the Graphic Design courses at WCC, and with the encouragement and guidance of a particularly helpful advisor (Kristinne Williman, thanks!), I found my way to my into the much cleaner world of digital design and it’s magical “undo” button.
Here’s a sampling of previous work.
read more