Design Net ShebangLeslie Hinton, owner of shebangdesign.net, was trained as a graphic designer early in life. The youngest daughter of an award winning art director and photographer, her father taught her the first and best lessons in design. He was a master at syntheizing concepts into a single thought-provoking and clever image. This synthesis of themes became the hallmark of what separates great design from the merely good. The greater part of this approach, aside from the nimble cleverness, is a belief that a designer must always respect their audience and reach for the highest common denominator. Hinton received her Bachelors Degree in Visual Arts in 1984 from Illinois State University where she studied both Design and Theatre Arts. She began work at a sales promotion agency in Chicago but was lured into the world of feature animation. She worked on animated title sequences, commercials and then animated feature films such as: FernGully: The Last Rainforest, the Academy Award Nominated animated short, Technological Threat as well as Disney blockbusters The Lion King, The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Pocahontas, and Warner Bros.' Space Jam and Quest for Camelot. While working in the animation industry as a color stylist, she was able to immerse herself in the use of color to create mood, lighting and character. She learned a great deal about design during these years while working with some of the finest draftsmen and most creative animation artists in the world. When she returned to graphic design, her work was invested with a bolder, more energetic quality than it had known before. Hinton remain fascinated by the raw and expressive quality of the gesture drawings that make up the earliest stages in the animation process. Before they are cleaned up, painted and subjected to the camera, these drawings contain a beauty that rivals the finest master's works for their ability to capture movement in a static image. She tries to bring some of that organic hand-drawn warmth to my design projects whenever possible. In a field littered with bad clip art and cold, mechanical perfection, she amuses herself by remembering that the human imagination is still the greatest tool at our disposal. Read More Read Less