This past weekend, I drove down to Dallas to play in the Frostbite Open. Most fun I’ve had playing a tournament in a long time. Thanks to Greg and Jed for such a greatly ran event. And thanks to the Shockwave homies for having me out.
I’m Justin Willingham and I ride with Dale
I am going to attempt to touch on all the relevant / cool stuff that’s happened in the last two weeks. I officially moved to Austin December 29th into a cozy 2 story apartment off of 35W & 290, just 5 minutes from downtown. I moved in with one of my good buddies, Josh who I did a little touring with in the past summers.
A few days later, I brought in the New Year with Josh & his girlfriend and Dilly & Tara. We waited for the countdown at a bar on Rainey Street then made it to all the madness on 6th Street. I spent the next day finishing unpacking and got ready for my first day of work at my new job.
I was overly stoked for the public transit that Austin has to offer. I got up early for my first day of work, made breakfast and walked a few hundred feet to my bus stop. It was about a 15 minute bus ride to downtown and it was awesome! I was under the impression that I would just be filling out paper work and get shown around what they do at GetMeFriends. On the contrary, I was writing blogs and monitoring all of the 40 social media accounts for our clients. It was fun and exciting.
I got on the right bus home but headed in the wrong direction. What was a 15 minute bus ride downtown to get here turned to a 3 hour ride home.
The following week of work was great. A little more repetition of work and I already feel like I’ve the hang of it. The following weekend, Mollie got back to Texas from her Christmas vacation in Switzerland. She came down to Austin for the weekend to visit and it was very refreshing seeing a pretty, familiar face again.
Welp, as you can read below, my blogs have been pretty few and far between. It was in fact one of my resolutions to try and keep up with this blog a little more regularly. Two weeks into the new year and I’d say I haven’t too too bad yet 😛
Let’s rewind just a little bit. 2013 was a killer year! I graduated from UNT, I got to travel and study in London & Paris, met an awesome lady, landed my first “big boy” job and moved to a new city. With that being said, I am continuing my ambitions and running head first into 2014. I don’t have any half-hearted resolutions for the new year, but there are a lot of things I will accomplish this year and I look forward to sharing them with you.
– Trip
Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve updated my website. Allow me to fill in the gaps from the last few months! So, this summer I attended the Mayborn in London study abroad trip through my university. I had the time of my life. It was the most humbling, eye-opening experience I have had in all my traveling experiences. But, less talk… More rock! Here is a link to my blog about my travels
Friday Jan. 25th.
Some SWOOPers took a visit to Clampitt Paper’s creative department and got to see first hand how all sorts of ads, brochures, and pamphlets came together on more types of paper and finishes that I even knew existed.
It was bitter sweet watching one of my favorite bands thrash the stage in Dallas, Texas one last time.
Lets rewind a little bit. The year was 2004. During my early years of high school, lost and trying to figure out who I was, the things I was into, etc. I found myself playing Greg Hasting’s Tournament Paintball on XBOX. One of the soundtracks on that video game happened to be Reinventing Your Exit by Underoath. Outside of my father’s metal (AC/DC, Metallica, Skid Row, Steel Panther, etc.) that was the first time I had heard music of that genre and I was instantly hooked.
This was the pre-Myspace days. I had at this time also discovered PureVolume.com and began frantically searching for screamo/heavy music. I started going to shows at the local skatepark and eventually filled in on bass in a band with some of my best friends that I still have today. At this point in my life (and mostly now, as well) my life revolved around music.
After a couple of years of being a constant show-goer around the DFW local scene and after having my parents consent, my best buddy Tyler and I attended our first Vans Warped Tour in ’06. The first festival that I had ever attended and one in which Tyler and I made fake lamies to get into the show. Believe it or not, it worked. The fine people at DHL Event Security aren’t the sharpest tools in the shed.
It was at that point that everything I had known about music, the music business, shows, and festivals would be forever changed. Most people that go to large festivals know that a part of the festival experience is the vendors. Tyler and I met a Rastafarian by the name of Inoch who sold random merchandise and trinkets. After some small talk and a nearly sold out crowd at that year’s Warped Tour, Inoch asked us to help him sell his merchandise for the day. It was that action that helped build a mutually beneficial relationship for the last 6 years of being able to work nearly EVERY music festival, tour, and radio show in the country.
Through meeting Inoch, I have been able to network and meet some of the greatest people ever, travel the entire country in a haggard van and eventually a tour bus.
All of this really hit home for me as I stood in a sold out Palladium Ball room surrounded by people that I had met over the years at all the local DFW shows. It was a very emotional, humbling experience. It was a little heartbreaking to see over a decade of influence come to an end, but when I look back and realize everything that Underoath had indirectly done for me, I couldn’t have been more happy. Thank you for the memories
Below is a link to my YouTube Channel where just about the entire set from Underoath’s Farewell Tour can be viewed.
ATTENTION all my creative/business (developers, desingers, marketers, etc.) friends: Startup Weekend is coming to Denton Jan. 18th. Interested in working with a like-minded, motivated and skilled team to develop a product or business in one weekend? This event is for you!
http://denton.startupweekend.org/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lPLbmrdz5cE
In the dim lit room of his apartment sat the skinny, clean-cut graphic designer. In front of him, his Macbook, which he had been working meticulously through Adobe Illustrator, laid the foundation of a new design. Several hours and nearly a pack of cigarettes later, Hunter Fitch has added another design piece to his Twin Arrow Design business portfolio for potential clients to view. This particular piece he has been working on: A dolphin with a top hat and a sneaky mustache.
The 20-year-old California native found himself in the Dallas/Fort Worth area several years ago. Fitch says he is a graphic designer and illustrator, with a passion for typography, fancy gadgets, cartoons, animals and nicotine
Upon reaching his adult years, Fitch said that he naturally turned to design work through everyday thought.
“I really started considering art and design as a career choice when I realized how much I thought about it in my normal life. I would always catch myself trying to rework the train of thought it took to craft every day advertisements, corporate branding, anything that needed to be created for a purpose.”
The normal design process for Fitch starts with a basic idea and outline from which he then recreates it digitally. As seen through a majority of his work, Fitch says that his main source of subject matter comes from people.
“I tend to draw and design a lot of work based around animals. Animals are much more fun to draw than people, because you have way more room to exaggerate and improvise, and have it still look like the animal you were trying to represent. Most likely my favorite thing to illustrate is a personified animal. A sea horse? Give him a personality. A dolphin? Give him a top hat and a sneaky mustache. I always try to remember to not take things so seriously, and just create exactly what I’d want to see in a piece of art or design work.”
The work of a graphic designer isn’t always easy and there have been many times when Fitch has been faced with adversity.
“It’s never easy. I learn new stuff every time I have a new commissioned project. I have wanted to quit a few times, but I always remember what I’m doing and that someone is actually paying me for it.”
Through much collaboration with various artists and graphic designers around the Dallas/Fort Worth area, many have sung of Fitch’s praises both as an individual and through his work.
“Hunter is one of the most driven and talented people I have ever come in contact with. When he gets in the zone there is no stopping him,” said business partner, Mason Wear.
At the tender age of 20, Fitch has many accomplishments under his graphic design belt. He has completed design work for numerous bands and clothing ranges in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. However, he still views himself as an amateur with room for improvement.
Fitch has high ambitions and goals set for him for the future, but when it comes down to it, he has a very humble and laid-back approach of where he wants to take Twin Arrow Design in the future.
“I always tell myself that I want to be the creative director for a big art firm or ad agency, but at the end of the day I really just want to sit and my desk and doodle in my underwear. The fact that someone would pay me money to do that makes me wonder how I ever wanted to do anything else.”
checkkkk it out boys!
Hello. I'm Trip 