After all this time, I’ve learned that the most valuable thing you accumulate isn’t software, credentials, awards, or even a portfolio.
It’s perspective.
Knowing when an idea is working.
Knowing when it isn’t.
Knowing when to push.
Knowing when to simplify.
Knowing when to listen.
And, occasionally, knowing when to tell someone that the problem isn’t the logo.
I’ve been a creative director, art director, designer, photographer, strategist, producer, educator, entrepreneur, consultant, manager, mentor and, depending on the day, the person who gets called when nobody else knows quite how to make the thing work.
A designer who takes pictures. A photographer who designs. A professor who still makes things. A musician who probably should know better.
I’ve built brands, developed campaigns, written copy, directed creative, photographed people and places, produced work for print and screen, managed teams, solved complicated problems and taught classrooms full of aspiring creatives and entrepreneurs. Along the way, I’ve learned more software than I’d care to admit.
The work has taken me through print, radio, television, digital, social, interactive, photography, video, motion and, more recently, generative AI.
And somewhere in the middle of all that, I’ve spent a lifetime playing guitar and bass, recording, engineering and making music.
Good things, preferably.
Useful things.
Interesting things.
Things that communicate, persuade, clarify, entertain, solve, connect, teach, sell, or occasionally just make someone stop and pay attention.
The medium is secondary.
The idea isn’t.
Some of that work is here.
A lot of it isn’t.
Some of it is confidential. Some of it lives in archives. Some of it happened before everything was photographed, documented and immediately posted to the internet.
And that’s okay.
I currently develop and teach curriculum across several Canadian post-secondary institutions, covering everything from graphic design, typography and portfolio development to entrepreneurship, business design and generative AI.
I enjoy it enormously.
Teaching keeps me curious.
It also has a useful side effect: it forces you to explain what you know, reconsider what you think you know, and stay reasonably current in an industry that has never been particularly interested in standing still.
And I’m still making things myself.
Still photographing.
Still designing.
Still writing.
Still learning.
Still experimenting.
Still making music.
Still occasionally wondering whether an idea is brilliant or completely ridiculous.
Usually both.
Because apparently after three decades in advertising, design, photography and education, I decided what I really needed was another discipline with an unreasonable learning curve.
The goal is to earn my pro card and eventually teach a game I’ve been playing most of my life.
So no, this isn’t really a reinvention.
It’s more of an evolution.
The experience is still here. The curiosity is still here. The desire to make interesting things is still very much here.
What’s changed is simply the perspective.
I have a much better idea now of what I enjoy, what I’m good at, what I’m still learning, and where I want to spend my time.
That’s a pretty good place to be.
And after all these years, I’m still curious about what’s next.
Which, frankly, is probably the whole point.
Have a project, an idea, a question, or an interesting problem that refuses to behave? Maybe there’s something to make, something to solve, something to learn, or a conversation worth having.
Make contact. Bring me an idea, a problem, or even pure, unmitigated chaos.
I’ll bring an opinion.
Photo Credits:
@ Russ + Daughters, NYC: Rachel Slaven
@ Delphi Beach, Collingwood: Julien O’Malley
@ Gibson + Company Laneway, Collingwood: Julien O’Malley
@ Industrial Park, Newmarket: Justin Lawrence