About Me

When you invite a web developer over for dinner, where do they eat? On the floor, because there are notables.

In 2005, I had just graduated from UBC with a Bachelor of Music in trombone performance and was already immersed in live concert photography. Around then, I decided to expand my skillset to learn the fundamentals of design so I enrolled at Langara College and completed a certificate in Electronic Media Design. Here I learned a range of design fundamentals, including layout, colour theory, and typography, along with tools such as Photoshop, InDesign, Dreamweaver, and Flash, plus, yes, hand-coding.

Since then, it’s been a meandering path, where I've worked on a wide range of projects from tradeshow booths, to massive photoshoots to more restaurant websites, social media apps used worldwide, and marketing products.

Looking back at those stepping stones, the common thread is pretty clear: it’s all been creative work, and it’s all been in service of people. As a musician, I performed with bands of all sizes to create something for an audience. As a designer, I worked with teams to connect with the people we were designing for. As a builder, I’ve built both teams and products around what people need and want to use. That same strand has woven its way through both my personal and professional life.

A city, far from being a cluster of buildings, is actually a sequence of spaces enclosed and defined by buildings.

One way to read this quote is that architecture is not the design of buildings; it’s the design of the spaces they create. This way of thinking carried forward when I became a manager. I keep thinking of this quote and how much it applies to Engineering Management. It isn’t a thing you do; it’s the space you create for others to do their best work.

If you’re looking for the official version of this, there’s a website for that. What follows instead are a few anecdotes that don’t belong on a CV.

What’s not in the CV

As a professional musician, I played mostly jazz, commercial, and salsa music. Along the way I performed, recorded, and appeared as a featured soloist with Grammy and Juno-award–winning artists. Two shows stand out in particular: one with The Temptations, and another with Don Rickles.

When I turned 30, I quit my job and backpacked through South America for three months. After exploring through Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, and Chile, I missed my flight home and decided instead to head to the Amazon. I hired a cook and a guide off the street, traveled eight hours upriver and another eight hours into the jungle, and saw electric eels, caimans, more insects than I could count.

As a photographer, I’ve focused on live jazz. At this point I’ve shot over 500 shows, had my photos featured on more than 80 albums, and had my work published in every major Canadian news outlet, as well as international publications like DownBeat.

Over the last fifteen years, I’ve spent roughly ten percent of my time traveling. Along the way I’ve bribed boat captains to reach remote islands, been stranded with no clear way off, dealt with altitude headaches, taken a 35 hour bus ride, and eaten whatever unique and unusual (to me) foods I find.