The Designer

Hi, welcome to my design studio. I’m Shanna Blasingame, designer, artist, computer junkie with with about 22 years of hands-on experience, working on design projects of many types. I’ve been teaching myself computer software since my first job, and have worked in Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Word, Quark, Acrobat, Excel … many many … these are just a few. Some you’ve never heard of because they’ve gone to the dumpster. Whatever it takes to get the job done is what I’m currently learning. In recent years I’ve been doing a lot of photography for the websites I work on, since the design is in my head, so are the shots I’m after. There are a few folks who have helped me over the years with more complex computer programming, photography, illustrations, and writing. Mostly these things are within my scope but when they aren’t or there’s a work overload, help is on the way.

A-Typical Studio
Driving to work in traffic, paying to park every day, and working in an office with central air controls, cubicles, community refrigerators, and account executives attempting to interpret communication between myself and the clients was not for me. At all. So one year, during employment at a very large ad agency in Pittsburgh, a vacation to Alaska changed my life. I’m an outdoorsy sort, major hiker, played sports all my life, love to enjoy all of the things nature has to offer. That downtown work environment was cool, but it wasn’t me. There was one place of employment that didn’t even have a window! How am I supposed to see the trees while I work if there aren’t any windows?

As great as it is to be in Pittsburgh, sorry, the traffic and office environment had to change, so I moved to the outskirts of the city into a cabin. I work for clients one-on-one, assisting with projects of all types. Communication is my business, and that comes in a lot of forms. Put it all together and you have a a kind of one-stop-shop here at Hot Designs.

Educational and Creative Background – just for kicks
My college education was incredible, at East Texas State University* where I majored in fine art with an advertising minor, learning directly from ad professionals in Dallas agencies who just kicked our behinds and gave no mercy. Then for some reason, I changed majors to business administration. Here is where I really got the full gamut of left-right brain training.

I’ve had full and part and time jobs in design studios and agencies, and freelanced in a variety of situations for many years. I feel that the formal training in school where we did logos, get this – by hand with a pencil!! gives me a little design edge, because I had to learn the basics of design without the computer to help. That along with a solid understanding of marketing, psychology (this is so important at so many stages of design and communication), computers, budgets and accounting, and proper English makes for a pretty good combination for a variety of businesses.

*East Texas State University is now called Texas A&M Commerce