'The most satisfying moment in making art is not the final idea, but the process it took to get there. I'm inspired by the world around me and the hundreds of talented artists living today pushing my skills to grow in the arts. I hope my artwork inspires others to dream of the unknown realm, to travel to fantasy worlds, and to look into themselves to call upon their imagination.' At around the age of 5 or 6, I began to create imaginative characters and landscapes, bringing them to life through drawing and writing. A very dear childhood friend and I spent hours of free time drawing characters, writing scripts, creating props and costumes, and then acting out our adventures in the forest behind our homes. That was the beginning of a very long road in the arts. In 1995 (during my high school years) I received the honor of being appointed California Art Scholar, which afforded me the opportunity to attend a summer art seminar in traditional animation at Cal Arts. The broad experience of that seminars influential in steering me toward illustration instead of animation. After graduating from high school I spent a year at a local college, taking life drawing and writing classes, before applying to Art Center College of Design. During that time I landed the job as body double for Pete Postelwaite, and an extra on the set of Lost World Jurassic Park. The movie was being filmed near my hometown and this close up file experience of working with the crew, and meeting storyboard artists helped me realized that working in the entertainment industry is what I wanted to do. My education at Art Center College of Design began in the fall of 1997. I majored in illustration, and quickly found myself surrounded by hundreds of students who shared the same passion for drawing and painting. Inspiration came from all directions, and I found my own interests blossoming in my personal work as well. With an interest since childhood in creating original works and designing everything in them, I enrolled in Entertainment Design courses. It was here that I fell in love with concept art, sketching, building models and writing. During my last year at Art Center, I interned at Klasky Csupo (Rugrats) as a background Artist and prop Designer for three months before graduating. My time at Art Center was amazing and helped me grow beyond anything I had expected. Following graduation from Art Center, I worked for six months freelancing for ad agencies, and storyboarding for commercials, including Hallmark and Got Milk. In December 2002 I was hired at Stormfront Studios as their concept Artist. During my time there I worked on many projects including 'The Lord of the Rings Two Towers', 'Forgotton Realms Demonstone', and 'Eragon'. I served as Senior Concept Artist on two out of three games I helped ship before leaving the studio. In 2006 I decided to leave the world of games to pursue employment in the film industry and went to work for Lucusfilm Animation on 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' animated film and tv series. Creating artwork at Skywalker Ranch as a concept artist was a huge milestone for me and became one of the best times of my career. During my stay I learned a great deal about concept design relating to film production. After wrapping up season one on the show I decided to come back to the games industry and serve as Art Director. I'm currently overseeing development of an online virtual world called Blue Mars. Set in the future, on a terra formed Mars, the project has given me an opportunity to create a vision and manage it through production with concept designs and art direction During my off hours I continue to work on personal projects, including a CG Short Film, a children's book collaboration with author Sandy Gaser, and my own t-shirt/toy line.

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