This mechanical crab is about to get a new home, but not before some electronic handiwork. Visitors of the MacArthur Park Nature Center will be able to experience just how crabs interact with their environments thanks to this engaging exhibit.
Matt Crotts, Illustrator at Creative Arts Unlimited
Matt Crotts joined the Creative Arts Unlimited team in 2009 and has since provided a wide range of illustrative talents on various projects at our studio. His contrasting painterly and graphic styles impressed Roger and the team right from the start, so we decided to sit down with him now that he’s been in the studio for a few years.
How did you start out in design and illustration?
At first, I wanted to go in to film. I realized in my freshman year that I really liked the art of film and that it was called illustration. I liked telling stories and exploring narratives visually. I went to the University of South Carolina for one year and by week one, I was getting stuff ready to have a portfolio so I could get in to Ringling. I ended up going to Atlanta College of Art my next year before they got bought by SCAD–but I didn’t want to go to SCAD, so I thought “let’s try Ringling one more time”.
What brought you to Creative Arts Unlimited?
I saw Duncan give a presentation in my Junior year at Ringling. It got me interested in the company because he seemed like a neat guy and I liked his work. Every year, my art got younger and younger; I wanted to do really serious, detailed stuff my Sophomore year and by my Senior year it was all kids’ art. I got more and more interested in Creative Arts because, in the back of my head, I was remembering Duncan’s presentation. They seemed like a place that was doing things differently. You weren’t only sitting in front of the computer all day, you were also learning. You got to see the final product get made in the same building. I went to the Creative Arts presentation again my Senior year and almost didn’t submit my work in time for an interview. I remember being really frustrated in the presentation because I had only turned in really painterly stuff, but their presentation showed a lot of vector work. I thought I’d really messed up my chance, so I came to the interview with a second portfolio of just vector stuff. I remember Roger saying “This is great! We liked you anyway, but this really shows that you care”. I came here for an interview the next day, did some freelance until I graduated, took a short break to travel, and then came here that Summer.
Can you tell us about the work that you do at Creative Arts Unlimited?
I do concepts for sculpts, flat illustrations (painterly and vector), graphic design… there’s a focus in illustration, but I’m not just an illustrator.
What experience at Creative Arts Unlimited shapes what you’ve done over the years or what you’re doing now?
I’ve done some freelance outside of Creative Arts, mostly for Disney, and learning professionalism in this environment let me deal with clients over the phone. I never lost my cool or got frustrated. The art skills here have to be professional, but you still get to do your interpretation of something. It’s more about professional communication and being able to explain myself.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve gotten while working at Creative Arts Unlimited?
“Get it done”. You learn that in school, in a way, but here I will also have to make it reach professional criteria. It has to be something I’m proud of while getting it done. It’s a little more than just some assignment where you’d otherwise just say “the teacher will probably give me a B on it so it doesn’t matter”. Because there’s less structure here on my artistic investment, there’s more structure on me getting it done, so I have to take it personally. No one’s telling me to add lighting or make the shadows nicer. My teachers aren’t here to tell me, so I have to make it look good for myself.
What is your favorite part about being an illustrator?
Ever since high school I realized that I liked a lot of things that didn’t seam to merge into a single profession. With illustration you’re always doing the drawing or painting side, but in addition to that you’re always doing the research. There’s always a secondary hat that you’re wearing to make sure that you’re doing it correctly. I’m always getting to look into things that I wouldn’t otherwise get to. Being an artist that has to do a lot of nature scenes, I get to pretend to be a scientist while I do art – informed art.
You can find more work by Matt online or see his contributions to many of our projects in galleries throughout the Creative Arts website.
Creative Arts Unlimited would like to share some exciting news with our clients and coworkers: a selection of our work from this past year was recently announced as a Merit Award Winner in HOW Magazine’s Your Best Work Design Awards. Creative Arts Unlimited will be included in the May 2012 issue of HOW Magazine and featured on the HOW website. Our submission highlights work for Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital, the State College of Florida, Mosaic, the University of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler, and the Venice Archives. Thank you to all of our clients and hard working staff.
Duncan Barton
Duncan Barton is a talented illustrator and designer who has recently leveraged his skills for companies like American Greetings and Zynga. While attending Ringling College as an Illustration student, he worked with Creative Arts’ clients such as The Mayo Clinic, New York Public Library, and the South Florida Museum.
We caught up with Duncan to reflect on how he transitioned to a life as a creative professional in today’s competitive arts industry.
How did you start out in design and illustration?
Duncan: I was one of those kids who didn’t have a plan-B. I was always drawing and interested in comics. Once I got into college, Ringling flushed out a lot of those industries for me: they showed me what it would really be like working for an animation or production industry. Working for a newspaper comic strip, as a business, didn’t seem fun at all, so I knew I needed to do something else.
What brought you to Creative Arts Unlimited?
Duncan: Josh Pearson, Creative Director at Creative Arts, came to Ringling and gave a presentation. He showed a really fun range of work: cartoon style work, but then natural history as well. It spoke to a lot of my interests. I thought it would be really fun to do a job that met those interests in combination.
Can you tell us about the work you did while you were at Creative Arts Unlimited?
Duncan: Children’s Libraries were a big part of it. At that point, they weren’t doing shop store windows as much. I worked on various children’s themed large-scale graphics and did graphic design for natural history exhibits. I got to do a lot of realistic mural painting as well.
Roger: I was impressed that you jumped in and did the graphic portion of the Mayo Clinic project.
Duncan: That was graphic design 101–trial by fire! One of the great things about a place like Creative Arts is that they depend on their people and they expect them to do a lot of different things. You might be handed a job and, although you may not know anything about it, you’re given the opportunity to put your mind to it and do it. It was rare when we found ourselves with a project where they thought “maybe we should hold off, this person isn’t ready yet”. Creative Arts was always willing to let people try it out and let themselves grow. I hadn’t seen that type of thing happening at larger companies that I worked for so I realized pretty quickly that Creative Arts was a special place. During your career, you definitely want to work with people who are willing to take chances and help to develop your skills.
What experience at Creative Arts Unlimited shaped what you’ve done over the years or what you’re doing now?
Duncan: Getting to work so closely with Roger, Chuck, and lead designers. I worked directly with them and got a feel for many more pieces of the business. There are jobs where you’re just put in the corner to do your blind piece of the project without seeing the big picture. At Creative Arts, you’re watching the whole thing unfold. Meeting clients face-to-face, sharing the information you have to make the client happy, and seeing how relationships are fostered–it’s all so incredibly important. It helps an artist, who would otherwise be doing their thing and handing in their product. It was much more personal at Creative Arts. Leaving school, I had to go sit in the desert, talk to a snake, do some soul searching, and say “Oh god, now what am I going to do?!” Coming out of Creative Arts, I was so much better prepared to communicate my skills and what I was able to offer each client.
What’s the best piece of advice you got while working at Creative Arts Unlimited?
Duncan: Do things that you’ve never done before. Tackle things that you might not be trained or well-informed about. There’s an initial fear, something that makes you think “I might not be qualified enough to do this”, but you learn to approach it with a level head, use the people that you’re working with to help you make the right decisions, and do a little bit of research beforehand. You could learn to do something well enough to get the job done and walk away with a new skill. A lot of what I do now wasn’t learned in school. It’s all things that I picked up afterward while doing different jobs. Each experience helped me develop my skill set and improve it over time.
Roger: We attract the Duncan-type personality that says, “I’ve never made this before, but how hard can it be?” That’s typically how we make our best stuff, just jumping in there and doing it.
Duncan: Most people when they’re starting out get inspired by Disney films, Pixar stuff, and big name companies that put out well known work. In school, I was looking at that kind of animation work, but my teacher painted a pretty realistic picture of it for me. One person he met at a large company did eyebrows, he was the eyebrow master, and I realized that I didn’t want to be Mr. Eyebrows for the rest of my life. That’s not a really life-fulfilling goal. With Creative Arts having a smaller operating system than something like Disney, you can pull back from that. You can surprise yourself, finding out what you’re capable of doing, if you’re given the chance.
What is your favorite part about being a designer/illustrator?
Duncan: One of the most satisfying things for me is when people ask me what I do. I just tell them “I draw pictures”. Some will come back with a long-winded answer, but I go the simple route. If they want to know more about it, then we’ll get into the range of things that I’ve done. I started out in museum exhibits, painted murals, and installed things, worked in greeting cards, moved into e-cards and animation, tackled video game design, and made things interactive. I like that I can say it simply, but it becomes an incredibly broad range of things.
Daryl Mosher, Exhibit Manager at Creative Arts, took a minute to tell us what it’s like working on realistic animal sculpts for MacArthur Park.
“Working on the MacArthur Park project has been challenging because we’re recreating natural environments. Brad, our sculptor, creates the various animals from oil-based clay and I make silicone molds from those sculpts. They’re eventually cast in plastic and painted to look authentic. One thing about this project that goes above and beyond our normal work routine is the osteological bone specimen of a manatee. Mike, one of our exhibit fabricators, is piecing together the detailed manatee sculpture that will eventually be displayed in the final exhibit.”
Our latest sculpt of The Michelin Man receives a hardcoat automotive finish.
Jay Rogers, Owner and Creative Director of Jayro Design & Illustration
Here at Creative Arts Unlimited, many talented artists join our team during their professional journey. Jay Rogers is one such Creative Arts alumnus who worked for us during his time as an Illustration student at Ringling College. Currently, Jay works as Owner and Creative Director of Jayro Design & Illustration, a full-service design studio with a particular knack for youth and pop culture, animation, and entertainment. His talents have enabled him to work with numerous clients such as BBC America, Cartoon Network, Cartoon Network Latin America, HIT Entertainment, and Radio Shack, to name a few.
We sat down with Jay to see where he ventured after leaving the Gulf Coast and what he took away from his time at Creative Arts Unlimited.
How did you start your journey in design and illustration?
Jay: I originally had my sights set on Disney in high school. I was a huge fan of their feature animation, so after contacting them about how to be an animator, I put together a portfolio for Ringling College, applied, and got in. Until I got to Ringling, I didn’t really know a lot of other things were possible as an Illustration major aside from comics and animation. Ringling really opened my eyes to what other options were out there and what other possibilities there were. While I was a student at Ringling, I worked at Creative Arts and got a taste of what it was like to be a professional in the field. After graduating, I moved up to Atlanta with a few friends of mine and we all worked at CNN for about a year or so. From CNN I moved over to Cartoon Network and I was there for 11 years or so. After that, I started my own thing in 2010 and I’ve been doing that for about a year-and-a-half. So, basically that was my road map.
What brought you to Creative Arts Unlimited?
Roger: I think it was in your first year at Ringling. You showed up and, I remember, I was impressed: here’s a guy who can put on a tie, he’s very sincere, and he can draw. You may have answered a job board.
Jay: Yeah, it was through the Career Services, a job posting.
Roger: You worked every free day that you had until you graduated art school.
Can you tell us about the work you did while you were at Creative Arts Unlimited?
Jay: We did a lot of stuff. I recall a lot of things that were developmental work for Marshall Field’s Christmas displays, the Macy’s Christmas windows, and a Parisian store’s space-themed kids’ section. There were a few projects for FAO Schwarz NY, including when the Matthew Broderick Godzilla remake came out in ’98. Creative Arts was gracious enough to send me up to NY to work with the Creative Directors at FAO for a few days to help concept various things for their visual merchandising. Also, the things that came through the shop: there were museum exhibits, Treasure of the Tzars at the St. Petersburg International Museum, the antique museum, and I did something for the Greek History Museum–the Alexander the Great museum exhibit, a wall that I painted with Roger. It was a really nice mix of more kid-friendly cartoon stuff and more realistic things. I know there was a lot of time spent out in the shop just helping the guys pack stuff and do things. Faux painting, distressed finishes, faux bronze, and a lot of things like that.
What experience at Creative Arts Unlimited (process of working, professionalism, etc.) shaped what you’ve done over the years or what you’re doing now?
Jay: First, Roger served as a great role model for what a professional, creative business leader looks like. He taught me how to interface with clients, as well as creative staff. He has a great balance between tempered authority, relating well with people through directness and humor, and a strong creative vision. Even though he was a Principal of the company, he would still roll up his sleeves and was competent enough to execute the work down in the shop to lead by example. Although I took painting classes at Ringling, but I have to credit Roger for truly teaching me how to paint.
After all that, the major thing as a student was just being a professional in our creative field. To see what it’s like to work with clients, what its like to sit down and develop things, and see the entire process from start to finish: it’s an idea, it’s a sketch, it’s a tight ink drawing, it’s a rendering, then it goes down to the sculptor, or then it goes down to the CAD people and they route something out of a big block of foam. It was a lot of hands-on experience and I pretty much touched everything, except for some of the dangerous stuff. I really got a rich secondary education from being at Creative Arts.
What’s the best piece of advice you got while working at Creative Arts Unlimited?
Jay: The advice in general was to play to my strengths, believe in myself, and do what I’m good at. I think those are the key things. I think that because I had the experience to try all of those things, from getting my hands dirty in the shop to sitting up in the office drawing things, it really helped me figure out what I wanted to do and the things that I enjoyed the most.
What do you enjoy about being a freelance designer and illustrator?
Jay:
- You get to play more. For me, when you’re locked into a corporate job, you’ve got a lot of masters and you are marching to somebody else’s drum. You don’t always get to do the things that you want to do and you don’t always have enough energy to do the things you want to do. Right now, I feel like I’ve woken up a lot creatively.
- The variety of things. I’ve got a lot of different skill sets and I can do a lot of different things. I’m finding myself happiest when I can get into a lot of different things and not do the same thing over and over again. That’s been a lot of fun.
- Trying to figure things out. Whether it’s a specific technique of how somebody achieves something on the computer or if it’s how to make a website, I find those things challenging. I spent a good deal of time in the print world and not enough time in the mobile, digital, and interactive world. It’s like a whole new set of toys to play with.
- Building teams. Being in the corporate world, you’re set with all the people that you’re hired with. On the outside, what’s been interesting is building a virtual team of skilled people. There are lots of skills that I don’t have and I’ve been finding some great people to partner with on certain projects.
- On the flip side, you’re your own boss so you can be as lax or as strict as you want to be. There’s sort of a danger there of falling into that trap of “oh, I’ll get to it tomorrow”, but you really do have to be self motivated, persevere, and get through your goal list, because it is very easy to get distracted by lots of other stuff.
Who would be your dream client in the future?
Jay: I’ve been trying to crack the nut with Nickelodeon. That’s going to be the focus of my year for 2012, to try and get in with them, leverage my experience at Cartoon Network, and see what business is available with them there. And recently, I’ve sort of reignited my love for Disney. I’d moved away from that a little bit, but have become more engaged recently. If you guys know Kid Robot, Disney’s doing their own version of Kid Robot’s Dunny vinyl painted toys. There are some artsy things that they’re up to that I’d love to get into and see if I can partner with them on.
I’m discovering new people, talents, groups and such every day, so I’m sure my dream client list is going to grow.
You can see more of Jay’s work on his website and, every Friday, tweet your drawing requests during his #TwifriDoodle sessions on Twitter.
We’re proud of our artists and enjoy checking in with Creative Arts alumni every so often. Come back and see more interviews and studio discoveries every Friday on our blog. Have a safe and Happy New Year!
Here are some candid photos from our Viva La Fiesta holiday party at Creative Arts.
For years, Creative Arts produced memorable animated holiday window displays for department stores such as Macy’s Herald Square and FAO Schwarz in New York City. This example brought to life Disney’s classic, Gift of the Magi for Macy’s.
Economic factors and shopping trends have reduced the demand for traditional animated window displays, so Creative Arts continues to explore new methods of animation based on our retail experience.
Our team looks to the future as new experiential interactive art utilizes LED technology, augmented reality, digital touch screen systems, and digital motion graphics.
Roger Barganier is a Principal
at Creative Arts Unlimited.
Recently, we hosted a group of students from the Ringling College of Art + Design for a tour of our operations. These were students from Ringling’s Business of Art + Design Program, led by faculty member, Wanda Chaves. I was very pleased at the response we received form these young people who were very focused, perceptive, and asked intelligent questions. This visit prompted me to think how far the school has come since I graduated as a Ringling Illustration Major a few years back (long before the concept of a BOAD program).
When I graduated art school, I had no idea how to apply my skills outside of school other than to look for a job at an advertising agency or design studio. Thus, corporate retail advertising became my first job and grad school. After a few years experience, I pieced this together on my own.
In order to survive, you need to have a client purchase your work.
In order to get clients, you must be able to do the following:
a. Be presentable, knowledgeable, talented, and well-spoken.
b. Be able to convince your clients that their project can achieve its desired
goals, and actually be produced to come in on time and on budget.
c. On completion of the project make sure you have met or exceeded your
client’s expectations.
d. Make your client a hero in the eyes of their superiors.
If you can do this consistently, many times for decades, you have a chance to be successful. Of course, there are always uncertain economies, personnel issues, evolving technology, changes in public taste, etc. So, you never really figure things out, but you keep adapting and following new business directions and learning all the time.
That’s what I’d like to have learned in art school.
Now, thanks to the Ringling BOAD Program, students will have a better idea of what to expect when they graduate and meet the real world.
