Duality, thy name is Chip.
I'm a hybrid designer/developer equally at home shoving pixels around in photoshop, coding away in my favorite IDE, scribbling with pencil on paper, or using my hands to make something tangible. I straddle the divide of the standard multimedia work flow, an artist who likes math, a developer who makes appealing interfaces. I like to make logic and creativity lay down and snuggle.
I started with a formal art & design degree where I learned to make things pretty, then after college I taught myself to program so that I could also make those things work! I'm a creative thinker and problem solver, I build tools to solve problems and get things done more effectively. All to add interest in the mundane and beauty to the ordinary.
Developer
I've always been a problem solver, I love puzzles and taking things apart to see how they work. I learned to program out of curiosity as much as necessity. While I'm strongest at programming visual interfaces and interactions, I am also competent with application flow, back end logic and relational database design. I understand Object Oriented Programming and Design Patterns.
- HTML
- CSS/SASS
- Javascript/ES6
- jQuery
- PHP
- MySQL
- React.js
Designer
I have a compulsive need to make Stuff. I've been drawing, building and otherwise creating as soon as I could hold the tools. I knew early on that my path was a creative one. In college I began with illustration and photography, but quickly gravitated to multimedia design. Never content to limit my creative desires, I've done work professionally in most creative fields at some point.
- Web design
- Interface design
- Print design
- Animation
- Illustration
- Photography
- Sculpture
A true renaissance man, I occasionally wear tights and tall boots, but only in the name of business, mostly.
Beyond creating interesting things on computers, I also span the virtual/physical divide and make interesting things for real. I'm a leatherworker, blacksmith, carpenter and electrical tinkerer.
Since 2007 I've focused an increasing amount of my time on Brown Cow Art, my seasonal business selling hand made leather items primarily at renaissance and celtic heritage festivals though the summer and fall. It has been my primary income since 2014. I have a collection of minions (friends and associates) that help me produce my products. I'm used to managing multiple people in both a production and sales environment, while prioritizing and delegating tasks.
My primary product lines center around a proprietary embossing process which allows me to get the pretty stuff onto items at a price people can afford. The unique quality of my embossings comes from my die making process. Standard dies are machine made and remove all the life and character from a design, while my dies are cast from a hand tooled original, which carries over the character and feel of the original tooled piece. In developing this process I designed and built many custom tools including a vacuum chamber, pressure chamber, and a 20-ton hydraulic press. I always look for a better way to do things, and build what I need to make it happen.