Magnetize Media was, in many ways, the start of my professional learning process. In August of 2012 I had my first client; a senior portrait session for a high school classmate accompanied by his mom. This was the first time I was being paid, so the pressure was on. I came out of it with more knowledge and experience with dealing with people under delicate constraints and expectations. I went on to amass over 15 other clients in photography and expanded into web and graphic design. Since I had at this point started college at the UW, there was an extra pressure to balance my clients and schoolwork. It was at that time that I completed four different sites, including one for a consulting firm in Madison (ReSCI), Krueger Lumber Co., WCDEFA, and NS Longboards out of Sheboygan. Working directly with the clients, these projects were all rewarding in their own right and they all taught me something different about project management and execution.

The courses that I took at UW-Madison helped me to see things from a different perspective. While my curriculum was rooted in Chinese, I took a breadth of courses in Engineering, Computer Science, Digital Art, History, Sculpture, and Video Games & Learning. Juggling work with school was challenging, but properly balancing my time was a good skill to learn.

My work at Spectrom taught me what it takes to take things to the emerging technology market. They launched their full-color 3D printing add-on at CES 2015, so I had to balance the press, tech enthusiasts, and a group of people signed up for the beta.

My latest endeavor is Holos, an XR software company that I co-founded in 2015 with my partner in Madison, has kept me immensely busy with various activities, from marketing, to software and business development, and of course, design. The experience and craft that I learned during my time through Magnetize Media helped me immensely with the tribulations that come from running a startup. There were a slew of unique challenges that came with a software startup, however, that caused me to grow and manage even further. Raising capital, marketing and delivering a product, and convincing talent and partners to join in on our vision we’re just a few of the things that I had to juggle 24/7.

I have been lucky to have participated in a number of accelerators, including Discovery to Product on campus, gBETA (a gener8tor accelerator), and Madworks. These programs have introduced me to well over 60 mentors, and 40 investors, and they have provided me with the tools I need to be a successful founder. Moreover, I'm extremely fortunate to be able to call some of these people my best friends.

I am thankful and proud to have been on the forefront of user experience and design for this new medium. Understanding what works, what feels natural, and what feels powerful in XR has been (and still is) an immensely rewarding experience. Being a co-founder of the Madison XR meetup of 700+ has taught me the power and necessity of community; things are better when you build them with the support of others. It continues to be an amazing process of conceptualizing completely new designs and bringing them to people in the form of a product that they enjoy using everyday.

I know what it takes to get something to market. I have made and want to continue making things that people enjoy using and take in as their own. I approach design as a system, not as a tool. As such, I can author a variety of content, from overall branding to video, messaging, product flow, UI elements. I’m well-connected within the startup world, specifically in VR and AR. I’m an excellent communicator. I’m in it for the long haul. I’ll always be honest. I don’t round corners (unless it’s a button). I'm there for you.