Education

Central Michigan University
Graduation date: May 1995. (Cum Laude )
Bachelor of Fine Arts, (Human Figure Drawing, and Oil Painting)

Northwestern Michigan College
Graduation date: May 2007
Associate in Applied Science, (Visual Communications)

 

Objective

Sharing the knowledge and experiences I have gained to give my new company a boost in energy with relentless effort, a greater sense of camaraderie by being positive and establishing strong lines of communications with all departments, and providing a new vision of creativity stemming from my fine arts background and visual communications studies.

 

Professional Experience

1997	Moomers Ice Cream, Traverse City, MI. Freelance Graphic Designer. Corporate identity work (logomark and logotype for #1 ranked ice cream scoop shop in the United States -as awarded by "Good Morning America" for the summer of 2008)
1997 - 2000	Media Wave, LLC, Traverse City, MI. Freelance Illustrator. Provided spot illustrations for their two publications: "Prime Time News" and "Prime Time Business News".
1998 - 2000	Jenkins Group, Traverse City, MI. Freelance Illustrator: Spot illustration work for the book,"It's your deal", 1998. Artwork for video cover, "Four Seasons of the Sleeping Bear", 1998. Cover art for the book, "When the Breast Fairy Comes" , 2000
1998-present	Traverse City Record Eagle, Traverse City, MI. Freelance Illustrator. Illustration work for "Active Years" section, and seasonal publications: Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall - Guides. Cover art for the "2009 Wedding Guide".
2005-2006	Oakwood Cemetery, Traverse City, MI. Freelance Graphic Design. Catalog/price list provided for local cemetery.
2006-2007	Hickory Hills Ski Area, Traverse City, MI. Freelance Graphic Design. Corporate identity, promotional video and brochure work for the ski area.
2008	Ida Elementary School, Ida, MI. Freelance Graphic Design. Re-created school logo mark to be applied to business cards and the "Principal's Award" signs.
2009-present	Pickle Print and Marketing, Lake Ann, MI. Freelance Graphic Design. Illustration and graphic design for "Sparticles" animation short.
2009-2012	Cliff Keen Athletic, Ann Arbor, MI. Assistant Art Director. As a production artist I excelled at working with Illustrator and Photoshop to create images and prepare artwork to be printed either by screen and/or sublimation printers while meeting all deadlines in a fast paced production environment. For the past year as the Assistant Art Director, my duties included (but not limited to): quality control - inspected all art files prepped from the production artists, and maintaining the art files on the server (both proper placement and file size) teaching - provided assistance to current and new production artists with knowledge of the software, understanding the procedures for the file creation, making templates to ease the learning curve, and the creation of a training manual for the artists. networking - developed strong lines of communication with customer service, IT, & sales teams. production - maintained a high quota of completed jobs per day. creativity- brainstormed new wrestling products and clothing designs, assisting with theme/concept of the annual catalog, and assisting with promotion materials such as mock ups templates of products, and printed flyers for the sales teams. acting as Art Director when needed - distribution of daily orders to the production artists, attending the weekly production meetings, and working directly with customer service, screen printing manager, sublimation manager and sales teams to ensure that all orders are flowing through the art department properly.
2012	Talking Crow Publishing, Gaines, AK. Freelance Illustration. Illustrated 23 pages for the upcoming children's book, "Squirt the Otter". The book will be available for the fall of 2012.
2012	Fair Haven Elementary, Fair Haven, MI. Freelance Graphic Design. Banner design for their 2012 Michigan Department of Education Award.

 

Programs/Skills

Adobe CS2 (Windows and Macintosh): Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign
MS Office: Word, Excel, PowerPoint
Fine artwork skills: ink, graphite, colored pencil, marker and oil paints
Amateur photography: both digital and traditional

 

Achievements

Member of the Golden Key National Honor Society (CMU-1994)
Recipient: Evelyn Fry Smith Scholarship. (CMU-1994/1995)
Recipient: Jill Hinds Scholarship. (NMC-2007/2008)
Volunteer for mentally disabled adults @ Fitness for Life Enrichment
Soccer Coach: TBAYS boys team (Traverse Bay Area Youth Soccer) ages: 12-14
Soccer Coach: YMCA, coed-ages: 1st and 2nd graders
Softball Coach: Kingsley Recreation League, (2) female teams, ages: 10-11, and 8-9