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Bio
I liked to draw when I was a kid. Illustrating ideas for cars, boats, houses, cities, creatures and other worlds. It is easy to see how I got here from there. Along the way the journey has included remarkable opportunities to wear many different hats and be inspired by many incredible people.
Inventive and a bit of a perfectionist, I have a mantra: "don’t let perfect be the enemy of good”. I achieve a balance of innovation, efficiency and quality through collaboration and appreciation for other points of view. Building good relationships is the key for success and has become my motto professionally and personally.
Beginning my career as Research and Development Artist at Nasco, a catalog sales company, I created art for proprietary games and did catalog layout. After a few years I moved on to Famous Footwear where I worked first as a designer, then supervisor in the Graphics/Fixtures shop then in the corporate marketing department.
In 1986 I followed a long time dream to live in the pacific northwest. I volunteered to do do illustrations for a friend of the family’s children’s book and illustrated one of my own. Shortly after moving I met my wife and began raising a family.
After doing a short stint at a sign and graphics company I pursued and was hired by Will Vinton Studios (now Laika), where I did marketing, graphic design, illustration, photography, sculpture, animation and developed the award-winning Claymation Clay and other products. Eventually I became a contractor creating digital illustrations of M&Ms and other characters for print advertising and packaging. Many of these illustrations are still being used today.
In 1998, during the heat of the dot-com boom I began doing contract design work for the e-commerce start-up 800.com. They went on to hire me as part of the small team to launch the website. My role developed into print marketing and supervising product photography as the company grew.
After the demise of 800.com, I worked for Aztech Sign and Graphics doing design, project management and large-format print production and began my long-running relationship with the Hillsdale Farmers’ Market, initially as a volunteer and most recently as developer of the new web site. Following that, I partnered with Sauvie Architectural Illustration (SAI) marketing and branding the business while creating architectural illustrations for projects like the John Ross condominiums in the South Waterfront.
In 2006, I was hired to create illustrations for Burgerville’s kid’s meal plates and bowls. This was the beginning of a long and successful relationship with the Holland Inc./Burgerville where I eventually became a virtual one-man agency art directing and producing everything from billboards and point of purchase to training materials. During my tenure Burgerville rocked with an industry-beating 10+% growth in sales all while saving thousands from agency costs.
In 2007, I moved into an office space inside Greenworks landscape architecture. Later that same year I volunteered to be on the Greenworks team that took “1st place” in Metro’s international “Integrating Habitats” competition.
In 2010 I worked as a Technical Illustrator at Xerox in Wilsonville as a contractor for Filter Talent. Currently I share an office with Delaris Technical Consultants in Hillsdale and have great and successful clients including a yet-to-be-revealed startup, Linbit USA, Hammer and Tuffy's Granola and of course the Hillsdale Farmers' Market. I am always looking for my next opportunity to build relationships and do great work!
I can be contacted at: bruce@brucerodgersdesign.com.
www.http://brucerodgersdesign.typepad.com