Don Vierstra
Buena Park, CA
714-209-6398
_______________________________________________________________________________

Objective/Summary:

Join a team that creates challenges and expands my creative, professional and interpersonal skills. Therefore, allowing me to have a direct and positive impact to the success of your business. I have over 20 years of design and Illustration experience and would like to contribute my expertise adding to the growth and success of your company.

Professional experience:

• Coastline Community College - Feb 2007 - Current
   Illustration, design, animation, implementation of animated, interactive,
   voice recognition project (funded by the Hewlett foundation). Interactive
   program Teaching Chinese students English. Creation of educational   promotional material and Illustration work for classroom instructional media

• BDA Marketing - Jan2006 - Feb 2007 - Creation of marketing materials to
   various clients in Southern Calif.

• Verizon Directory - May 2005- Oct 2005
   Display Advertising: Custom designing clients' business presence in
   Yellow page advertising utilizing the latest software, working directly
   with sales.


• Avalanche Publishing - Jan 2005 - April 2005
   Design calenders, gift Items, etc.

   Freelance - July 2003 - Jan 2005
• Illustrating children's books, Logos, sticker designs. Member of the
Children's Society of Book Writers and Illustrators.

• Immix Graphics - April 2003 - June 2003 - Art Direction/Graphic Design
Creating banners and outside advertising.
• Organize and streamlining work flow therefore, saving money. Identified  problems within the work flow.

• Consolidated Seed & Pet - June 2001- April 2003 - Art
Direction/Marketing/Graphic Design
direct Marketing, design & promotion of pet food and related industry
product.
• distribution of promotional materials to pet stores having direct  effect in increased sales.

• Keepsmart.com Sept 2000 - June 2001- Graphic artist, Illustrator and
animator (Flash) Conceptualized and designed online training courses..

• Digital Graphics Advantage - March 1988 Sept 2000 - Graphic artist,
Illustrator. Specialized in original art creation utilizing traditional media  as well as digital. Speculative advertising, coordination between sales and advertisers to facilitate an efficient work flow. Attended conferences, sales campaigns, gave presentations and participation in team building exercises.
• Meeting difficult deadlines.
• Increased sales.
___________________________________________

Windows & Mac literate:
Photoshop, Illustrator, Quark, Kais Power tools, Streamline, Freehand, Flash,MS office, Word, basic HTML programs. Always willing to learn more!
Motivated self starter with great organization skills. Design, illustration, cartooning and logo design. Years of Photography experience, excellent photo retouch, image manipulation, cataloging, color correction of stock and custom images. Strong sense for aesthetics, eye for color, detail, balance & proportion.

Freelance & Achievements:
• Gold Winner for 2008 MarCom Award - for Anthropology Preview mailer.
• Planning, design, and participating of An automotive TV Pilot. ("What's it Worth?") 2007-2008
• Permanent Impressions - pi7.com (Huntington Beach, CA)
2d illustrations of custom cabinetry design. Also worked on a Foose
project (Rumblebee sticker) for 1967 Dodge Coronet.
Design custom Displays (Illustration) 2007
• ALSA Corp- www.alsa.com - (Vernon, CA) Design
Magazine layouts for their product line (Rod & Custom Magazine -
Hawaiian Hues - Aug 2006)
• Creative imaginations www.cigift.com( Huntington Beach, CA) •
Scrapbook Times (Florida) 2005-2006
• Orange County Register won contest for "Cool Car Contest." (OC
Carfinder) 2005
• Monster Garage/Discovery Channel - Designer/illustrator for episode
called " Slingray." (air date: July 14, 2003)
• Jeff Patnaude www.whiterhinopress.com - Illustrated , Published children's
 book called "Penny." 2003
• Trade wind Graphics - Hawaiian Island Images - Realistic illustrations for

• clip art collection. (Maui, HI) www.islandimages.com 2001-2006
• Motor Trend design contest Sept. 2000: entered a design and received
honorable mention among the top 25% of 500 entries. My work was
displayed at the Anaheim International Auto show Nov. 2000.

Education:
• Cypress College: Art History and drawing 1984
• Santiago College: Basic HTML, web development and design 2000.
• Air Force: Aerospace Photography & Basic board electronics 1980
• Platt College: Graphic design 1987 • New Horizons: Graphic software 1994
• Pacific Bell Directory: Editor training, quality control and color correction for newsprint material 1999.