A bit more about me.
Problem solver and creator of experiences at the intersection of technology, art, and design.
I'm currently a lead product designer at DistroKid, where I'm on the distribution team, designing products to simplify music distribution for millions of artists around the world. Previously, I was a senior product designer at Snapdocs, where I drove 0 to 1 product development efforts on the growth team, designing a title management platform that simplified one of the most tedious steps in the mortgage process. I'm a self-motivated designer, consistently learning new approaches for creating experiences and developing innovative solutions to problems.
In my limited free time, I'm an avid traveler, photographer, and filmmaker. I enjoy exploring creative methods to deliver purpose-driven designs—creating meaningful experiences, inspiring fellow travelers and photographers, and showcasing breathtaking destinations.
Work.
Extensive experience. Exceptional skillset.
UX & Product Design
UI, Video, & Visual Design
Front-End & Mobile Dev
- Drove the product design for our Title Management platform, integrated machine learning and automated workflows to reduce our customers time on tasks.
- Helped grow the product from 0 to 1 in six months, and the number four firm priority in less than a year.
- Led discovery and user research to uncover customer insights and validate new product opportunities.
- Produced user flows, system flows, interaction maps, product demos, and other deliverables to explore ideas and communicate direction with team members, customers and executives.
- Organized design reviews and workshops with our team to discuss product features, ideas, direction, and implementation.
- Lead our internal design system tiger team, focusing on developing and maintaining our pattern and component libraries.
- Conducted time studies and authored a high-visibility internal report detailing how well-informed design decisions can lead to a reduction in COGS.
- Championed the initiative to refactor the UI of our live-streaming and enterprise video platform, landing it on our 2021 roadmap with sizeable resource commitments.
- Conducted a heuristic evaluation of our existing platform, led workshops to uncover pain points, and iterated towards a high-fidelity, fully functional prototype of our next-gen platform.
- Led the research and design of numerous key product features and enhancements, including our native video editor, WebRTC experience, VOD analytics dashboard, livestream analytics dashboard, translate & transcribe, webcast layouts, webcast in-room experience, custom thumbnails, and more.
- Conducted product demos with customers, stakeholders, and executives to communicate design and platform direction.
- Partnered with product and engineering to develop and implement our internal design process.
- Led the creative vision, user research, and experience design for all digital properties.
- Managed the design and rebranding efforts for the SRI Conference & Community, leading to an increase of first-time event goers.
- Collaborated on the user experience and front-end design of our B2C stock trading platform for novice investors, with over 200,000 users.
- Led the migration of our digital properties into HubSpot, strengthening and simplifying our marketing efforts.
- Established an in-house production studio to produce case study videos.
- Managed a small team of designers and contractors to handle print and content production.
- Championed our move to responsive frameworks and the introduction of mobile design.
- Partnered with customers, sales, portfolio, engineering, and compliance to reimagine our fund pages.
- Led the digital art direction on all of our corporate initiatives and marketing campaigns.
- Developed an award-winning educational website focused on alternative investments.
- Produced showcase videos for use at national meetings, NYSE launch events, and more.
Kind words from my colleagues...
Study.
Sometimes you know what you want to do with your life.
Sometimes, you don't.
Missouri S&T
B.S. Geological Engineering
Iowa State University
M. Human Computer Interaction
Design and evaluation of HCI Qualitative & quantitative research methods in HCI Ethics in design Design thinking Virtual worlds and environments (AR/VR) Emerging methods & practices in HCI Visual design in HCI Industrial design and machine interfaces Multi-dimensional digital design Diversity in the mass media
Play.
Flip Flops & Palms
Photographer | FilmmakerCreativity with a purpose.
Emerging Sustainable Destination
Antigua & Barbuda
Contributing to the production of Lonely Planet's "2021 Best in Travel" video on Antigua
As an amateur filmmaker, it's incredibly rewarding when your work gets noticed at any level. I had quite a bit of success with my travel film from Vancouver, which landed in numerous major Canadian media outlets. But as an avid traveler, as well, nothing is as exhilarating as having your work used by the top travel publisher in the world—Lonely Planet!
My travel film from Antigua has been quite successful over the years, and the video recently caught the attention of a producer for Lonely Planet, who was looking to produce a short film highlighting the sustainability efforts of Antigua and Barbuda as part of their Best in Travel awards. My footage is credited and featured heavily throughout the short film. Needless to say, it was quite the honor to be a part of Antigua's recognition as one of Lonely Planet's "2021 Best in Travel" destinations.
You can read more about this experience in my case study, "Harnessing the Power of Video to Inspire Travelers to Antigua."
Designing merchandise to help an island community rebuild their only school and health clinic
When Hurricane Irma ripped through the Caribbean in 2017, it devastated countless island communities—including one of our favorites, Virgin Gorda, in the British Virgin Islands. Despite being blessed with an embarrassment of stunning natural beauty, island life in Virgin Gorda can be tough, due in large part to its remote location. With the entire island quite literally flattened, and with limited aid and a slow response from the British Government, the Bitter End Yacht Club established the Irma Relief Fund to help rebuild the island's only school and health clinic—two institutions vital to the health and well being of many of the resort's employees and their families.
Wanting to help in any way possible, I designed a line of island-themed merchandise specific to the islands that were impacted, set up an online shop, and got busy promoting the items to my followers. The merch was a hit, and I eventually sold enough to clear just over $1,000 in profits, which was donated in full to the Bitter End Irma Relief Fund.
$1,000
raised for the
Irma Relief Fund
Engendering civic pride in Vancouver on one of the world's biggest stages
When I wrapped up editing and posting my video of our trip to Vancouver during the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup, I felt a kind of anxious energy—this seemed like it could be more than just another random travel video. Vancouver is an incredible world-class city, dropped into one of the most stunning natural landscapes on the planet. Throughout the film, I was looking to portray the discovery of the city through the eyes of young travelers, and it felt authentic. Media coverage of the region during the Women's World Cup focused heavily on the cosmopolitan nature and scenic beauty of the city, but at the same time, it was also well-known that residents often felt detached from that portrayal and were instead more focused on the many issues that affected their daily lives.
Sensing a chasm between how outsiders viewed Vancouver and how residents viewed their city, and knowing the Vancouver media was heavily promoting their city during the World Cup, I felt there was a slight chance somebody out there may be looking for a feel-good story. On a wing and a prayer, I fired off a tweet to Tourism Vancouver (now Destination Vancouver) on Thursday afternoon, then... crickets. Oh well, I thought.
I woke up the next moring with the view count on my video stuck at 301. Eight hours later, I was receiving interview requests from national media outlets... It was a whirlwind of a weekend, culminating with a live five-minute Skype interview on Global News BC-1 during their Monday morning broadcast. Afraid I sounded like a bumbling idiot, I was reassured by the producer in our post-interview debriefing. "Dude, you nailed it. Your last line, 'great showcase for the city.' PERFECT!"
He sent over the interview clip. I got caught up with reading and replying to many of the heartfelt viewer comments posted on YouTube and other social media outlets.
Upon reading the hundreds of comments and media headlines, a common theme emerged. With a quick change of perspective, residents were falling in love with their city again.
Helping to spread joy during the holiday season in the hurricane-ravaged U.S. Virgin Islands
I've met a lot of people during our travels in the U.S. and British Virgin Islands, and I've become close friends with many of them. When Hurricane Irma leveled the U.S. Virgin Islands, my heart was heavy. One of my friends, Captain Patrick Cena, who owned a small charter boat company in St. Thomas, had escaped to the mainland just a few days before landfall. Not content to sit idly by as his fellow islanders suffered from a lack of basic services and supplies for months, he decided to rent a 24' moving truck and drive from Boston to Miami, collecting food and supplies from his friends along the I-95 corridor.
Enlisting the help of my daughters, we ended up raising $500 from their elementary school, family, and friends. We learned that there was a dire need for bug spray, non-perishable food, pet food, and children's games and toys. We boxed everything up and met Patrick just outside of DC to load up our supplies. A week later, Patrick arrived in Miami, where he offloaded everything at the port and onto a supply barge, which shipped everything to Charlotte Amalie in St. Thomas—just in time for the holidays.
$500
in toys, food, and supplies donated to the USVI
Nearly $3,000 in prizes from our sponsors
Collaborating to inspire travelers to visit the BVI through our shared love of beach bars
I'd been a fan of the blogger Beach Bar Bums for a while before I started Flip Flops & Palms. In fact, he was instrumental in helping me get started. I noticed my posts involving drinks at a beach received impressive engagement, due in part to cross posting and sharing by Beach Bar Bums. An idea was hatched, and he was enthusiastically on board—a good old fashioned photo contest, with a twist! But... we needed prizes.
I called up one of my photography clients, who had just purchased several of my photographs of the BVI for use on their website, and chatted about the idea. They absolutely loved it, and even offered a full-day charter on their 45' catamaran as the grand prize! They put me in contact with several other businesses and resorts, and I was able to procure additional prizes.
The goal of the photo contest was now twofold—increase our collective brand awareness and audience engagement, and work with our sponsors to assist in their social media marketing. Our followers loved it! We received over 200 submissions, with nearly 3000 votes cast during the one-month contest. My follower count increased by nearly 500, and our sponsors received numerous high-engagement posts on our social media pages throughout the duration of the contest.
Code.
This site is 100% original & completely hand coded by me.
So... I've always wanted to build a website from scratch. Like, from literal scratch. No Wordpress, no Squarespace, no uxfol.io — just open up Visual Studio, type <!DOCTYPE html> and go. The result is both a showcase for my creative work, as well as a living, breathing passion project, developed to push my limits, expand my skill set, and test my sanity. Sure, there's still a lot of work to do — case studies to write, image optimization, testing, a bit of code cleanup. But so far, it's been well worth the effort.
Fun facts about my creative portfolio
4,500+
lines of handwritten code(and counting)
3,000+
lines of handwritten CSS(and counting)
120+
hours of late night and weekend design sessions25+
cups of night coffee(and counting)