Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Josue Perez. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Josue, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

It was sort of like reverse engineering where I would take an image or poster that I liked and then try to recreate it by playing with different tools on photoshop and illustrator to approximate it. I was terrible at first, but over time I learned how to use and combine different tools and software to create more sophisticated designs. After a few years of doing this, I learned many of the principles of graphic design but I felt lost without a formal education. I didn’t really understand the rules of design and how to apply them, so I decided to seek formal education via online courses to help give me guidance. The online course taught me not only the basic principles and how to apply them, but it also gave me the historical background behind many of the design trends that have impacted our lives and the designer that have made large contributions like Paul Rand and Moholy-Nagy.

Something that has really hurt my professional development is not implementing a creative process or flow for my works. Virtually every design in my earlier stages took a lot longer to complete because I would always start from square zero. I would put all this hard work into coming up with a concept, developing the different aspects of a design, then implementing it without recording any of the steps that I took to get from point A to point B. If I could do something differently, I would take notes about my thought process and ideas so that I could formulate a creative process and evolve as an artist and designer.

When I started graphic design, I wanted to make sure I got my point across, so every aspect of my designs would be turned up to 11 and when everything is that loud, the message can’t really come through. The single most useful thing for me is restraint. Usually, your message comes across much clearer when it’s surrounded by silence. By having a clear message and direction, all other aspects of the design operate in service of the main idea and as a result fall into place with much more ease. I finally get what designers mean when they approach a design as a problem to solve. You have to put a lot of the work into the set-up and preparation of the design by asking what the message is, what medium will it be on, etc. but it makes the rest of the process run smoother.

Josue, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I’m a big metal fan that likes supporting the local metal scene. I mainly go to Doom Metal shows but I really like all things heavy and psychedelic. I’ve always been fascinated with band merch. I’ve found some of the coolest art in my life at merch tables on t-shirts, posters, and album covers so I draw a lot of inspiration from those kinds of things.

I truly owe my my graphic design career to my multimedia class in high school. If it weren’t for that class, I never would have discovered photoshop. Back then I would practice photoshopping myself with the gorillaz, making mountain bikes with pizzas for wheels, dumb stuff like that. Fast-forward 13 years and I get an itch to try to create album covers and gig posters for fun, maybe I was just seeking a new hobby. It’s been over 3 years now and I haven’t really stopped. Definitely taken breaks, but never stopped.

I sell my designs in the form of stickers, posters, t-shirts, buttons, and patches. Sometimes I like to do commission work if the project is intriguing enough or if it is in support of up-and-coming bands that kick ass but need a little help with getting the word out of their music.

The thing I’m most proud of is my “Lord of Doom” t-shirt. I learned a lot about the logistics of getting a t-shirt made, but I had a lot of fun in the process. I couldn’t have done it without the help of my wife Wendy so I’ma shout her out real quick. But yea, that was a lot of fun to do. I had a crazy moment packing shirts for shipment and thinking “wow, I can’t believe all these people spent money to buy this thing I made”. It’s still crazy to me, but I’m grateful that something I made brought that much happiness to people.

As I continue my artistic journey, there are two main things I wish to accomplish:
1. I want to continue improving and evolving, getting better at communicating my thoughts visually and
2. I want to use my skills to help prop up local/independent bands by translating their sound into a visual medium

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

A lot of my inspiration comes from Black Sabbath, so I’ve made several designs inspired by their music and aesthetics. Apparently, a lot of people like Black Sabbath as well so my designs got a lot of attention from that corner of social media. Once I hit some success instagram, I shared my work on other platforms like facebook groups and reddit and my numbers improved. The thing about Doom Metal is that it draws a lot of inspiration, like I do, from Black Sabbath so naturally there is a lot of overlap there with my design choices.

My advice to anyone trying to build a social media presence is to find your niche. Identify the thing you are good at, the thing that makes you unique and stick to it. When you post, be consistent so that your audience knows when to expect your content. One thing about building your audience though, is to not let your pursuit of growing your audience impact your art. It can be fun trying to grow your audience at first, but it can quickly become an obsession that consumes you and before you know it you’re spending more time on social media than creating art.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

Society can only really support artists when it acknowledges the role art plays in everyone’s lives.

Contact Info:

• Website: josueperezdotcom.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thedoomdealer/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4DwyPX_wiON6O7s8cX-Phg

Image Credits
Wendy Faz Deleon Residency Records Jack Absinthe