Josh Cornett is a graphic designer, web developer, writer, and creative manager in Dallas and Austin, Texas.
When I was a kid, I wanted to do one of two things when I grew up. I either wanted to host "Family Feud", that old TV game show, or drive a bulldozer. Along the way, something went awry and I ended up as a designer. But, that's ok. This is probably the better fit.
Graphic design sits squarely in the crossroads of art, technology, marketing, and business. At first, it might seem like these studies would mix about as well as oil, water, marshmallows, and marbles, but contemporary graphic designers have to find harmony among all four. Some of us remain close to the road we came in on, and some of us find ourselves thriving on the very multidisciplinary nature of our work. I'm of the latter group.
For the most part, I came in on the art road by way of writing (long story), but an interest in technology has always been in tow. I grew up in a family of artists and writers, but came of age during the dawn of the mainstream personal computer. While my friends played Atari, I spent countless hours writing BASIC programs that generated random color patterns and music. Yes, it was a nerdy thing for a kid to do, but it was also art. I can look back now and see the mind set that was being developed and I'm still part nerd and part artist. I wasn't sure where I fit in until I found myself settling naturally into graphic design.
As for marketing and business byways, most of my time on the clock has been spent in small agencies and creative departments where I've worn many hats and the clients have been comprised mostly of small, to medium sized businesses. Being a member of small teams working very close to clients has required me to always keep a marketing mind set while designing, and working close to clients has given me a thorough understanding of how my work can impact a business.
I conceive, design, and produce print and electronic media. My portfolio includes logos and graphics, icons, business cards, identity kits, direct mail, catalogs, brochures, flyers, posters, T-shirts, promotional items, packages, signs, website interfaces, HTML email, motion graphics, kiosks, and a variety of other items that can be printed or displayed on a screen. The majority of my work, including the collection of examples on this site, is self directed.
Harmonizing image and text is a big part of graphic design, and I enjoy coming at it from both angles when the opportunity presents itself—and working on small teams, the opportunity presents itself often. I have experience in writing incidental headlines, tag lines, slogans, product descriptions, instructions, fine print, and scripts for narration.
I photograph as an extension of design—design through a lens. In addition to straightforward studio and product photography, my experience includes propping and styling for catalog work and covers, and basic portrait work.
I've been a Mac user since the 80s, and even did a short stint as a Tier 1 technical support guy for Apple. And, although I'm not a huge WinTel advocate, I'm comfortable on the platform. I've been working with Adobe Photoshop since Photoshop 3, Illustrator since Illustrator 5.0, and InDesign since Beta. I used Quark from 4.0 to 6.5, and got on board with Dreamweaver starting with version 3 and the same goes for Flash. I also have experience with a few other interesting creative tools such as Director, ProTools, FontShop, and After Effects.
I make my XHTML and CSS from scratch—hand coded, though I think Dreamweaver is still a great editor and site manager. I'm pretty handy with PHP, MySQL, and Javascript because it's a lot more interesting when sites actually do stuff. I have experience building, sending, and managing HTML email campaigns. I've even worked up a bit of AJAX here and there and I'm a shade tree ColdFusion tinkerer. I am conscious of basic SEO and usability standards while building sites, and I am used to managing domains, site hosting, email, etc. when needed.