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A
Little About Me:
Hell
O!
It's
been a long time coming,
but I think I have finally stumbled across my true calling in life.
Either that, or I just have a very innovative way of wasting my
precious time! LOL!
Anyway,
I'd like to introduce myself here. My real name is Matthew Gaddy. I
was born on September 12, 1971. Yup, that makes me 29 years old. Yikes!
I
remember when I was in junior high school and into high school, I
had a bit of an artistic flare. Even, my mother had wanted me to go
to college and possibly pursue it as a career. At the time, though,
and even to this day, while I can look at something and be able to
make a decent rendition of the object and/or person, I have rarely
been able to take something from my imagination and be able to put it
on paper. Subquentially, I never did go for the college idea.
Ever
since I was about 17 or so, I have had several passing ideas come to
mind as to what I would like to eventually wind up doing with my
life. First, I wanted to be a musician, but other than liking music,
I don't seem to have much talent for it. Although, there was this
time, I played the opening part of Guns 'N Rose's "Paradise
City" while I was in the army. That was way cool! I had also
thought of getting on the inside of the music biz, perhaps as a mixer
or recording engineer.
Unfortunately,
here in Iowa, there's just not as many oppurtunities to really do
much of anything beyond facory work, fast food, or almost anything in
the medical profession. So, currently I work through a temp angency
here out at General Mills and in almost all of my free time off from
work, I am on the computer.
I
had got my computer almost 2 years ago now. When I first got it, the
only thing that I knew how to do was double click on the games icons
to play card, tetris, or whatever. Since then, I have taught myself
through various means on at least some of the inner workings of my
computer. Not the hardware end of the spectrum, sadly, although I am
working at it. I'll be the first to admit that what is underneath the
hood confuses me a bit. But, with working the computer itself, I have
come a long way.
Currently,
I know most of the basics of html and java script. Even if it's
something I don't know, I at least know what it is I'm looking for.
Then, earlier this year, around January sometime, I had started
playing around with graphics utilizing the computer.
It
all started when the adminstrator of one of the bulletin boards that
I used to frequent, Kiss Asylum, had asked if anyone wanted to, we
could make some Kiss smilies and send them to him. Well, I thought,
what the hell, right? And made a set of Gene, Paul, Eric, Vinnie, and
Ace. He loved them! And you can see them on his bulletin board still.
They were a big hit!
I
also have my own bulletin board now, also since January. I started
out using backgrounds that you can find on the net. But, my creative
juices soon took hold of me. I started to create my own backgrounds,
my own banners, and I've even created banners for another fellow
bulletin board administrator.
Inside
each of these pages, you will find much of what I have created in
the past months. And I should be adding more to them as time goes by,
too. All of the artwork within, I have made by taking different
images that I either find on the net or by scanning, combining them,
throw in some photo alterations...whatever brings out the desired
look that I want. Some of the stuff, especially with the banners, I
have add to cheat by using online logo makers. This is simply because
none of my current photo programs have the capability of doing some
of the things that I want to do. I do have one that does a bit, but
it keeps wanting to crash on me all the time, though.
So,
what do I use then? Currently, I use Ulead Photo Impact 4.2 (the one
that crashes), Adobe Photo Deluxe 2.0, Micrografx Snapshot, Ulead
Morph Studio, and Megalux Ultimate Paint in various combinations.
I
do hope that you all enjoy what I have created here, as I have had
much fun in the creation of the artwork here. Although, the banners
here won't do you much good, anything else may be used for your
personal websites. Just save the image that you'd like to use to your
own computer and place it on your own site, though. And if it's in
your heart, throw a good word this way. :)
Care
take!
Matt
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