A digital artist. Drawing, graphic design and animation.

I’m Ian Potash, a digital artist from Syracuse, New York. I studied Digital Media and Animation at Alfred State College with a minor in Information Technology, and I’ve been drawing, designing and animating since.

I don’t think of those as separate skills. A strong foundation in the principles of design carries into any medium — a storyboard needs the same sense of weight and staging as the finished shot, and a poster needs the same eye for composition as a drawing does. That’s why the work here moves between drawing, graphic design and animation rather than staying in one place.

Drawing is the medium I’ve been in practice with the longest, and it’s still where I’m most careful. Graphic design is where I spend most of my working time. Animation is what I trained for, and what I want more of — it’s the discipline where everything else I know has somewhere to go.

I work in the programs the industry uses, plus a few more specialized ones, but the software is the last decision I make. What matters is whether the composition holds and whether the idea is clear before I start rendering it.

I like showing my strengths and I like being out of my depth, and I’ve tried to include both here. Some of the work was made with other people, which I’ve kept in deliberately: a short film or a commissioned piece only works when everyone involved is solving the same problem.

Outside of art I’m a musician. I played first chair tuba in the West Genesee Wind Ensemble and was a section leader for the Wildcat Marching Band, then went on to play in the Alfred State Instrumental Band and Jazz Band. I was also inducted into the Phi Kappa Phi National Honor Society.

My work has been shown at NYSATA/NYSSBA, Feats of Clay, Scholastic Art & Writing, and the Bret Llewellyn Art Gallery, and published in Ergo Magazine and Rolling Stone.