Hello Rob and thank you for doing this interview with Colovision Magazine.
1 – To Start, tell us a bit about yourself where you were born and where you live…
I grew up in the D.C. area, and I’ve lived in NYC for about 15 years, working as a web designer, illustrator, and animator. I am married with children, and I like tea.
2 – How did you get started in the arts?
Art was a big part of my life growing up—I was always drawing, taking art lessons, and I did cartoon illustrations for my high school newspaper. I went to Cornell University and majored in painting. After school, I wasn’t quite sure what to do. I wasn’t interested in going for an MFA, and I had a hard time finding work in the fine art field. So, I started working as a junior designer for a New York book publisher, and within a few years I was familiar with graphics software. Then, the web started to take off, I got a job as a web designer, and I’ve been doing it ever since. I’ve been lucky to have had a lot of great opportunities over the years to use my illustration and animation skills, both at the places I’ve worked and for freelance projects.
3- Where do yo draw your inspiration from?
Lately, I’ve been sketching a lot of trees. It’s inherently more intuitive process than designing a web site or a logo. It’s not conceptual, it’s direct. Drawing more regularly in my sketchbook has influenced my cartoon and animation work, and even my web design work.
4- Can you describe for us what a regular day is like for you?
Oh jeez. Well, I wake up, tell my kids it’s only 5:45 and go back to sleep, then wake up for real at 6:30, make breakfast for the kids, eat my own breakfast, take the kids to school, or some days I hit the gym and my wife takes them… Get to work at about 9, make myself a cup of tea, do some web designing, go to a meeting, eat lunch, more web design, more tea, go home, read the kids a story and sing them a song, eat dinner with my wife, clean up the dishes, take out the trash, work on whatever project I have going on for an hour or two (longer if it’s a deadline), sometimes I watch a little TV, usually geeky PBS stuff, read, go to bed.
5- What is your most common approach for completing a project?
I try now to talk it through with the client, to understand completely what they actually want before I start. After this initial ‘discovery’ phase, I do a quick and dirty design, character sketch, or animation, and get it in front of the client, to confirm that we’re on the same page. Then, I will do a more finished version, and there will be a few rounds of tweaks. But it’s the up-front discussion and rough drafts that really are essential for making sure there are no surprises later on.
6- Out of all your work what is your favorite piece and why?
A quick sketch I did of a swimming pool out in Montauk NY is my favorite piece right now. It amazes me that I can look at a scene, drag a marker around my sketchbook, and the essence of that place somehow gets recorded onto the piece of paper.
7- Is it easy to make a living in the work that you do?
I am a web designer full-time, doing animation and illustration on the side. So, I wouldn’t say that it’s been easy, but probably easier than doing just illustration or animation. For me, I enjoy the mix.
8- Who is your biggest influence?
For the last few years, my drawing has been hugely influenced by Gary Panter.
9- How important is technology for the work that you do? What tools could you not live with out?
I use Flash to animate, usually drawing right in Flash. For illustration, I like to work on paper with pencil, colored pencil, ink, markers… so technology doesn’t really come into play (though I do sometimes make minor photoshop adjustments if it is going to be used for digital media).
10- How important is color in your work and why?
It really depends on the project. A lot of times I keep my illustrations black and white, or with very minimal color. I like keeping things pared down to the essentials, and maintaining a loose, rough feel. But when color is called for, I like to use a limited number of bright colors. So, it is important, but you might say that I sometimes use the lack of color for effect.
11- Whats your favorite color?
blue
12- Where can people get in contact with you?
