On a mission

Currently... 

May 2, 2019

Haven't posted anything for over 3 years. No problem. Seems like no one reads this anyway. So I'll use it as a venting board.

I named this thing Drawing Inspiration. Only problem is, I haven't drawn anything substantial in 5 to 4 years. I've been too busy utilizing my creativity for my business for the last 4 years, Rebel River Creative.

After being in the publishing world for almost 10 years, my colleague from the Billings Gazette and I started a new venture in February of 2015. A marketing design studio. I hate the term "advertising agency" because I don't like advertising, too many damn stats to review, strategy to determine and subjective analysis that really doesn't mean shit. 

My forte is creative, even though it is advertising (and when I have to, I do the stat stuff...), I think of it as art. I love to create things from hearing people's visions of starting their dreams and making them successful. We work with new businesses or enhancing established businesses with creative marketing strategies. We have a number of clients that allow us to get real creative and use our marketing experience to help them grow. So far we've been pretty successful in doing that and having fun...on a daily basis.

Here's some projects we've been working on. I've been doing the Mexican Fiesta posters for the last 5 years. It's always fun. I should go one year. Last time I went, I painted faces on little kids. A professional face painter I am not. But the kids liked what I did. Gotta like kids to do that job. Fortunately I love 'em.

These things have been my world as of late. Stylescapes. This is how we present visual / creative direction for identity and website projects. I call them "mood boards on steroids" They are not mock ups, but can contain mockups within them, especially if it's an identity branding project.

We sit in a 2-4 hour discovery session with the client and take a deep dive into their business, learning their goals and objectives and learn why they want to do and why. Once we present these, the creative direction is set and when they see final creative, 95% of the time they approve the finished project with minimal or no changes. It's an awesome process and they are really a blast to work on.

These stylescapes were done for a business in Belfry, MT. Our first hospitality client. It's a no frills type place to stay in the shadows of the Beartooth Mountains with amazing views from a working farm/ranch. We got to name the place and do the entire branding/identity and website for them. It's been a fun project and we're continuing to help them grow.

Here's something I'm working on for the Exchange club I belong to. It's a fundraiser for an art event we hope to hold in September...A massive undertaking if we get it off the ground.

More stylescapes. This is a glass artist in Bozeman. Very talented lady whose work is inspired by nature. Her website should be dope. It's in the developer's court now.

I'll be posting more as the year goes on and go back to posting some of my "inspirational" stuff mainly my drawings. I've come to the realization that I will never be a Michaelangelo or Rembrandt (who was born on my birthday, BTW) but I am a damn good cartoonist and pen and ink guy...not as good as Tommy Kane, but gotta draw a heck of alot more to get to be.

Ciao for now.