The Long Journey Here
I have long desired to get into the world of publishing. The journey has meant determining how best to bridge the distance between home and work to maintain a manageable daily commute.
While living in Tsawwassen, I trained in graphic design from 1986 to 1988 at Kwantlen College in Surrey, gained experience in felt-pen layouts and mechanical paste-up and pioneered the adoption of Macintosh computers at Doug Fleming Graphics (now Fleming Design) in Vancouver. I started my own freelance business, Bauhouse Visual Communications in 1991 with a top-of-the-line Mac IIfx maxed out with a 250Mb hard drive with 8Mb of RAM. I dreamed of creating a magazine, but I had skills to develop before I felt ready to taken on the challenge.
At that time, I joined the Society of Graphic Designers of Canada (GDC), and met with members of the GDC/BC Chapter who were meeting at the Vancouver Rowing Club boathouse at Stanley Park. I remember a small group of die-hards including Dave Coates and Rod Roodenburg of Ion Design, Matt Warburton, Miles Walker and Linda Coe. Things have changed a lot since then when the question often asked about the GDC was “What are the benefits of joining?” In my humble opinion, the GDC 2004/2005 Annual Report puts to rest that question.
Feeling as though I needed a deeper theoretical background for my work in design, I studied Communications and Fine Arts at Trinity Western University in Langley until the money ran out and I found a part-time job as a Graphic Designer for Force Four Productions, a video production company in Vancouver. When the part-time work just wasn’t enough, I found a job at Vivid Graphics on the south shore of False Creek, but after four months found the commute from Abbotsford just a little too much to take.
Design One gave me the opportunity to bring my Mac IIfx to their studio in Langley, a mere half-hour drive from our home in Abbotsford, and there I worked for 7 years for clients such as Oak Bay Marine Group, the City of Langley, Pacific Coast Airlines, Surrey Metro Savings and Coast Capital Savings. Meanwhile, I worked on freelance projects for Love Abbotsford and International Christian Response to keep my soul from shriveling up and dying.
Then came the opportunity to work from home. International Christian Response offered me a part-time position as Graphic Designer and Administrative Assistant and I decided to fill the rest of the time with freelance work, reviving my freelance business, Bauhouse Visual Communications. I somehow found myself building two websites, riding the wave of the changes being brought about by an idea that was taking off: web standards. It was then I began to learn names like Jeffrey Zeldman, Douglas Bowman, Dave Shea, Shaun Inman, Ryan Sims and Jon Hicks.
The question of whether to learn to code in ActionScript or Cascading Style Sheets loomed large in my mind. I did both, and developed a Flash site for BPA Group and a CSS/XHTML site for Pacific Coastal Airlines. This led to web development work for the International Day of Prayer, Canada (IDOP), Hilfsaktion Märtyrerkirche (my first foray into working with an open source content management system, TYPO3), and International Christian Response (developed with Textpattern and featured on Stylegala).
Now the freelance work has taken over, and I find myself in a new home, having cut my commute in half from two flights of stairs to one. I also find myself in the position to be able to publish as I once dreamed. But now, with the web and blogging software, the need to spend large amounts of cash to create a printed publication may no longer be necessary, though it remains a possibility and still probably the best means of achieving some level of credibility. Now, one question is, do I register for an ISSN number? (Dave Shea of CSS Zen Garden fame once remarked on his struggle to establish mezzoblue as a bona-fide periodical.)
So, here begins my next step in my odyssey to develop a publication that truly lives up to the title, “magazine”—a storehouse of knowledge. Only time will tell whether I can live up to the high aspirations I have for my dream.
| 
posted Thursday July 7, 2005