Dubtastic has now managed to find it’s way into it’s 8th version.  This site was started nearly 7 years ago in mid-2001 and it is interesting to look at the progression of the site through those years.

The site first began as merely a digital playplace.  After becoming immersed in ThinkDan.com’s forums, it inspired me to create a humble space for my own extremely amateur portfolio.  Dan’s site was, at the time, one of the few on the forefront of offering aspiring digital artists tutorials on programs such as Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. 

From that point, which I would consider the beginning of this site, I have been involved in a wide array of projects, experiments, online projects, sites, friends, forums, and the like, all of which I feel as if were opportunities created by having my site.  Co-authoring New Masters of Photoshop: Volume 2, I feel was due to the artwork and resources available on the site.  It was a great project and I am extremely proud to have been involved in it.

I have seen sites and forums come and go and seen my traffic come and go as I have gone from pushing it heavily in the community to not giving two craps about it.  Maybe that is strong, because I have always cared about it, which is why I could never just “let it go”.

What I have always tried to do with the site is shift it from time to time and keep it as aligned with my personal interests and goals as possible.  With each new version I would frequent my usual online hide-outs and try to promote the site, again, hoping other designer buddies would mention the site on their sites as well.  They usually did and that was another reason I can attribute to the staying power of the site.

Recently, my interests have moved more toward photography than just digital art.  Working full-time as a graphic & web designer, I am not as interested in pursuing that in my free time.  Photography however has proved to be an amazing outlet for me, so with v7 of Dubtastic I moved it toward that.  Though I took many questions about why I removed my art, I still felt the change was good.  As blogs became more and more popular, I started one of my own, but never truly settled on the look and feel.

What v8 of Dubtastic brings is a fusion of my interests, new design, blog, portfolio, and other interests all into one site.  I wanted something very clean and easy to read but also an area to display past artwork and photography.  Additionally, I wanted people to be able to directly interact with what I am doing, thus the full switch to a blog. 

Thanks for reading and I welcome any and all feedback.