The History
In 1989, my family got its first real computer. While I had had video game consoles for years now, an actual computer was quite a different story. My dad was a graphic designer so we didn’t end up with a base model PC, instead we got a Macintosh IIci, with a whopping 12mb of RAM and a mind-bogglingly massive 80mb hard drive. Even at the age of 12, I intuitively saw the power and potential inherent in this magical device and immediately threw myself at learning all I could.
Forgoing cartoons, the Nintendo or playing outside, I investigated every aspect of the Mac that I could. I had the great fortune of installing Photoshop 1.0 (off of 4 floppy disks!) and spent untold hours trying to figure out how to create and retouch images.
I was there for the early days of the BBS networks (the 28.8 baud modem noise connecting will forever be etched into my soul) and I somehow managed to download the Mosaic browser just a few months after it came out. Looking back, I was unintentionally among the very first of those early internet adventurers, creating “web pages” and learning HTML. It was all incredible fun and a huge challenge, since there was no Google or YouTube and learning things took some real gumption.
Halfway through college, having already been freelancing to create websites since 1994 or so, I had the opportunity to take a job as a web designer with an entrepreneur that I had done a few projects for. At the time, he offered a generous salary and I figured that if it didn’t work out, I could always return to school after a year, having made some decent money. Little did I know that 25 years later, I would still be working for that same company, now as the Director of User Experience.
In those intervening years I have seen my company go from two people, to a dozen, back to two, and now a several dozen. I have had the amazing opportunity to be awarded two Adobe Max Awards for my work in the early days of Flash, creating sophisticated web-based simulation tools for physicians (to this day I'm still stunned that as the sole developer of those programs, my work beat out companies like Toyota, Yahoo or the Wharton School of Business). Now, I work with a talented team to develop a SASS and websites that help colleges and hospitals manage their continuing medical education.
Looking back, that 12 year old me is still very much present. I continually try to learn new things and dive into a wide variety of topics. I branched off from purely digital work to create tangible, collectible items (read more about that below) and explore the world as much as I can, both online and by experiencing the world through travel or being in the outdoors.
Nondescript is just one little corner of the web where I can play and get some creativity out. I look forward to many more years of learning and adventure because there is always something new to explore in our incredible world.
Paul Carpenter
Blog
It seems that part of being a generally creative person is that the interests and experiments never really end. There are so many amazing things to learn about, try, or make and while I have some definite core interests there are always new things to investigate.The Side Biz:
Encarded Playing Cards
You can learn more about Encarded via our social media accounts:
The world of playing cards is full of amazing decks, but even with the variety currently available there are ideas that no one has produced, designs that no one has seen, and features that no one has considered yet.
I founded Encarded in 2011 to explore these new design ideas. My first project was funded by the Kickstarter platform and was the 6th playing card project on the platform (there are now more than 3,000) and that deck went on to set the Kickstarter record for a playing card project. In the decade since, I've designed over a dozen different decks and have sold tens of thousands of decks to collectors all over the world. Encarded strives to make beautifully usable decks that any card collector, cardist or magician would be excited to have. My projects have become highly coveted by collectors and are known for their intense attention to detail, innovative visual features and unique motifs that make each deck release an exciting new experience.
The decks designed by Encarded are printed by the the finest playing card manufacturers in the world, such as the United States Playing Card Company (USPCC) and the Expert Playing Card Company (EPCC). All Encarded decks are produced to the highest standards, in limited numbers and will never be reprinted. I've kept this design promise to my loyal followers for a decade and the results are some of the most valuable collector decks in the market. Some of my early designs are so hard to find that they routinely trade for hundreds, or occasionally thousands of dollars each.
It is very exciting, and also a little humbling, to be able to take a random thought that was once only in my head and transform it into something that people from all over the world treasure and appreciate. Designing playing cards has been very fulfilling and lets me explore ideas that I probably would never think about in the digital design world. While it's a lot of work to design, manage, market, fulfill and support a business on my own, the rewards of that hard work are worth it.
Interests
Everyone needs something to do and think about, right? Some of us occasionally go a little overboard though. Here's a few of the things I like to collect, experiment with or get out and do.Click a topic for details and pictures...
