Literally the day I graduated from college, when I finished my internship, a friend of mine who worked here called me and said there was a cheap job here carrying photo stats from one floor to another. It paid $4.25 and even though it paid poorly, I said yes. From there I began to talk to my boss and I let him know I had an Associate's degree in art and advertising design. So I took a test they had, passed it, and became freelance paste up and mechanicals and from there I ended up getting on staff and getting into computers. I ended up going to night school for computers. Now I'm doing cover design. I then started color separation.

I was originally going to go back to get my Bachelor's degree and I haven't abandoned my dream of getting a four-year degree, but I put it on hold because I had got my goal of working at Marvel.

When I was small I wanted to be a doctor or a scientist. I wanted to be a scientist so that I could be a super hero. I used to tell my mom "I'm going to be a scientist so I can invent something so you'll never get old!" And then later on as I got older it was I want to be a scientist so I can turn myself into a super hero. So when I figured out that wouldn't work, I decided to go into comic books. It's the next best thing I guess. It's not real, but it's as close as you can get.

In high school I used to draw and I just ended up here. People in my neighborhood would always keep my drawings and say, "Yeah, I'm going to keep this so when you become famous, it'll be worth something." Well, I'm not a famous penciler, but they love the fact that I work at Marvel. Every time I see them they're like, "Man you did it, you work at Marvel" and that feels good. I'm not rich, but I'm doing something that they saw I wanted to do and I ended up doing it.

It [using computers] was basically learn or suffer. I decided to go take classes in digital design and Marvel paid for them and everything else I pretty much learned on my own through mentors here and myself just deciding that I had to do this. I learned I had a pretty good knack for computers. I actually wanted to be a penciler growing up, but I kind of gave up on that... not really gave up, but traded that for computer stuff because I enjoyed doing that more. Penciling I always had a hard time with and computers I didn't so I just changed priorities.

I would get frustrated drawing and I don't get frustrated on the computer ever. If I have a lot of work obviously I get frustrated, but it's just a lot of work. I enjoy solving problems on the computer more than trying to foreshorten an arm!

Success for me would be doing what I want to do and something that I enjoy doing. My personal vision of success for me at some point in my future would be doing video games. To be perfectly honest, to be allowed to create video games and take the stuff from my head and watch kids play my games and to think, "Yeah, I made that!", that would be success. Money is a factor, but not the most important part. I would love to say, "Hey do you guys like that game?" and when they'd say "Whoa." I could say, "yeah, I made that" and play it with them. Because it's almost like I got to create a small little universe for kids to mess with. Plus doing it in the right way is important. I'm a Born Again Christian so doing things the right way and keeping my faith helps make me successful.

My real dream was to create. While I get to color here, I don't get to create so much. In video games I'll get to create. That's my character and that's my world you're moving around in. Maybe it's an ego thing. So I guess my career has been a natural progression to create new worlds. If I can't pencil them, I'll create them in three dimensions.

You can't hang out with negative people. All my friends [growing up] were positive. I had the bad friends, but I never did what the bad kids did. Actually, believe it or not, the kids I used to hang out with in the projects wouldn't let me do the things they did. They knew. It was like, "This kid's not going to be like us. We don't want him to be like us. We want him to do something."

You've got to want to stay away from the negative influences. Like I said I have another faith that drives me to not do the negative things and to be involved with people more like myself and my values. I try to be positive, especially to kids. Right now especially Spanish kids, not to exclude non-Hispanic kids, but they don't have as many positive role models out there.

Be persistent. Don't give up and don't let people tell you you can't. I had college professors who pulled me aside and say, "Don't go into comics. It doesn't pay. You'll fail. They're too many kids out there who want to get into comic books. Don't try to work for Marvel because I did and it didn't work out. You're better off working in advertising because that's where the money is." All these things. Now they want me to talk to their classes and are praising us. Don't give up. I think it's a basic principle for everything you do.

Don't get mixed up in what everybody else is doing. If everybody's out there getting high or drinking, it may make you unpopular to do those things, but you have to decide what you want. If you want success, it doesn't come through that kind of stuff. For me, I don't drink or smoke. I don't even curse, so I'm the poster boy for unpopularity in high school and college. I'm not telling people to live a pure... it's hard to say that without sounding preachy, but try to stay away from the negative influences. Look to do what you want to do and never give up. You will at times feel like giving up, but just believe in yourself and what you're doing and you will do it. It may not be in the time frame you want it, but if you keep fighting you'll get it.