Hello and welcome. First, let me thank you for taking an interest in my work, and taking the time to explore my website to learn more about my creations, products, and myself.
A little about me; I spent most of my life in a small industrial city by the name of Nanaimo, located on Vancouver Island on Canada's west coast. While I have worked and lived in other parts of the world, from the Middle East to the Arctic, I have always migrated back to Vancouver Island.
I presently work at a great military base as a contractor, and because I am always inspired by my surroundings, engaged in a major project portraying Canada’s maritime helicopter program…telling a story of the people and equipment. I am occasionally asked by my military friends if I have any background in the forces. The answer is no, but I do have some air force blood in me because my father was a B-17 navigator in WW 2. A tattered old group photograph of him with his squadron hangs on my office wall with pride.
Art Production
I started painting as a young teenager, creating mostly landscapes and seascapes using oils. This was a non-serious hobby between the mid seventies up until around 2008.
In 2008, I moved to the artist-friendly city of Victoria, located on the southern tip of Vancouver Island, where there are multiple venues for artists to create and show their work. I loved going down to an isolated beaches - there are lots of them on Vancouver Island - with my easel and paints. There's just something uplifting about being surrounded by nature and painting things on a canvas that catch your eye and inspire your spirit.
I had created lots of paintings with oils and acrylics over the next ten years, displayed my work many times at a variety of venues, and sold many paintings.
During that time I had been dabbling with 3D digital art platforms and by the time 2020 came around and the technology had massively improved, I decided that 3D digital platforms would be my preferred medium. This was after some life changing experiences when I searched deep inside my soul in an effort to understand what drives me to create artwork in the first place, and more importantly, what elements of that endeavor are most important to me.
When it comes to elements of my art, the top of my list includes composition, content, color, and contrast. So, with that revelation, I found the perfect 3D digital art creation platform that works for me. Currently using POSER for character creation and posing, and VUE for the main creation or production canvas.
I create art on the fly, or by the seat of my pants, same for my music productions. There's no outline to follow - just an initial idea, thought, or inspiration. So with VUE and POSER, I can easily and quickly place objects, characters, ecosystems, and terrains on the digital canvas. If they don't look or feel right, I just delete them, or change the colours, position, textures, parameters, etc.
Printing of my my art creations is performed by a small but mighty company called Canvas Plus, located in Ladysmith BC. I sell standard sizes but if you want a certain piece in dimensions not listed, then just drop me a line and I'll do my best to make that happen, and provide you with a price quote.
Music Production
I was the youngest of four siblings by four years, so when they were all away at school for the day, I would sit down at the old upright piano and play whatever came to mind. I did this many times in a given day beginning at the age of three or four.
I played the piano at pubs when I reached drinking age (and maybe a little before that), parties during the college years of the late seventies, played in cover bands during the eighties, wrote and produced music in full service recording studios during the nineties.
I produced my first full album, Florencia Bay, in 2012 under my music brand name, Coast Café Soundscapes. And I have done song writing collaborations which generate royalties from SOCAN almost every year, to date.
At this point in my life, I am what is referred to as a closet music producer. This means that I produce music but have no ambition to market it or collaborate with others - I do it because I have a passion to do so. So, I have a little music studio where I create and produce music in a small number of genres including Bossa Nova Chill, Ambient Spa, Celtic Fusion, and Symphonic Folk. And, believe it or not, the production values and instrumentation for these four genres are surprisingly similar.