About
Digital Deceptions has been live since 2001 and it’s in its sixth version. It started out as a static HTML site, morphing into a heavily animated Flash page to the database driven Wordpress Content Management System (CMS) that it is today.
It is just my little playground and a place to showcase some of my work both personal and professional. Since it wouldn’t be much of a website without an about page and a little information to go with it so without telling you my whole life story here it goes.
Turbulent Times
Let’s go way back to the mid seventies to Belfast Northern Ireland where it all began. I was born in the height of the troubles, but because of the turbulent times and the political situation my family decided to leave all they ever knew and immigrated to Canada where I live to this day.
For as long as I can remember I have been very creative and aware of anything visually stimulating, always spending a little extra time looking at the detail.
I have known what I wanted to do in life for a very long time which is to be creative but it took me awhile to figure out which medium to focus on. I have been drawing and painting all my life, picked up airbrushing in my teens then played with photography which eventually led me to Photoshop.
After reading everything published and online about how to use Photoshop I found out that you could actually take courses on it in college so I enrolled in a Graphic design program. I have to be honest and say I never really knew what a Graphic designer was; all I cared about was the Photoshop part.
To make a long story shorter I ended up excelling in the course and really enjoyed all the other aspects of Graphic design but a small unit that was just touched on towards the end of the program really peaked my interest, it was Web and Multimedia design.
I just got a little taste of Multimedia at the end of my first course and after I finished that I enrolled in a Web and Multimedia program. Even though both disciplines pretty much use the same software and have similarities they are vastly different from each other, along the way I also learnt quite a bit about the way we as humans see things and what influences our choices.
Schools Throw Design Graduates to the Sharks
My one gripe about going to school to become a Designer is the lack of common business skills they teach, if you don’t want to work for the man and wanted to go solo and freelance you are pretty much left in the dark.
Now I know that most programs today offer some sort of class on the subject of basic business and you would think that most of it is common sense but when you are applying it to art, math and science (which is what design is) the lines get blurred very quickly. That whole subject is a future project in itself which I promise will be discussed.
Let’s Get Back to the Story
I have been based out of the Durham Region since 2001 when I earned my last certificate and I have been freelancing in some form or another ever since. I have an ever growing interest and knowledge of Web programming and technology, this website was built with the new tools I learnt this summer at a Wordpress course taken to upgrade my skills.
Digital Deceptions may be a small freelance business but I provide clever, imaginative and cutting edge graphics and web designs making your company’s presence stand out from the crowd. I am educated, experienced and although most of my customers are from such local communities such as Ajax, Pickering, Whitby and Oshawa I also do work for clients from both the United States and United Kingdom.
