The Man Behind TBODC

Hello and welcome. My name is Doug Cloud and I am 49 year old graphic artist who specializes in branding, illustration, and character design. For the moment I live and work in a small resort town called Grand Haven in the Great Lakes State (otherwise known as Michigan). Below you can see some pictures of where I live...

Arial view of Grand Haven

The Musical Fountain

Most of my life has been spent in Michigan. The only other place I've been to is Tennessee and that wasn't for very long. Currently I reside in an apartment in one of the town's more established neighborhoods. Life is peaceful and practically crime free here so it's a perfect place to live and do my work. Below is a pic of my little design "corner".

It's not much, but it works for me.

One of the comments I hear quite often is, "Doug, your life is like an X-File." Well, I'm here to tell you, after forty-nine years many of the things that have happened to me seem like something Mulder would pull out of his file drawers.

My life started out strangely enough. My clearest memory from my youth is of sitting in the waiting room of a plastic surgeon named Albert Kislov. I remember this room, full of dark wood and golden light, and being both afraid and anxious. Afraid because the majority of my childhood involved sitting in doctor's offices, and anxious because my parents had informed me that this man was going to create a left ear for me. I thought this was the most amazing thing I'd ever heard.

I had been born without a left ear. There was nothing there but skin — smooth like the rest of my face. The doctor who delivered me had told my mother that this was most likely a congenial birth defect, but in reality the missing left ear was actually a side effect of a rare endocrinological disorder called Klinefelter's Syndrome, which would not be diagnosed until I was twenty-one years old.

At the age of six my parents started looking for a doctor who could make a left ear for me. I went to a couple different doctors who tried a couple different procedures which failed pretty badly. My parents were quite upset about this (not to mention me). Finally, they took me to see Dr. Kislov.

Kislov was a big German man with bushy dark eyebrows and huge hands with knuckles like the joints of tree roots. In a very deep but soft voice he explained to me how he was going to make my new left ear. He had pictures in his office of the miracles he had performed for other people and the one I remember most is of a man who had lost his thumb. Dr. Kislov had taken the long toe off this man's foot and sewed it onto his hand in place of his thumb. The man could actually use this toe-thumb just like a normal one.

I was in awe. He was a man with an incredible gift, and even at the age of seven I could recognize this. During the course of seven years (from the time I was seven until I turned fourteen) Dr. Kislov worked on making me a new left ear. To this day no one can tell I have an ear that was manmade, unless I tell them.

It was during this time spent in and out of the hospital that I first began to draw things. I had been drawing since I was a three years old, only now I began to draw beyond stick men and random doodling. I drew out of an inner need to be somewhere else, because it was pretty lonely being up there in that hospital. So I would go down the hall from my room to the play area where all the other kids in my wing would gather and sit in a chair in the corner with my sketchpad and pencils (a gift from my folks) and just draw. By the time I was done with my stay in that hospital the nurses had my drawings pinned up on the walls all the way around the playroom. I left there with a brand new left ear and a sense of wonder and awe at the attention and notoriety my talent had brought me. Large thoughts for such a small child.

I believe my life and my talent both evolved from that single moment in time. My mother always said I was gifted. I can remember her telling her friends when I was three years old, "Look! My son can color inside the lines! He's a genius!"

I don't know about being a genius, but from the time I could first wield a pencil I have always been fascinated with art. In school I was always drawing things for the other kids – usually it was Snoopy on his dog house chasing the Red Baron or sometimes I would draw my own characters. I was really into cartoons. My favorite TV series was Underdog. I used to drive my mother nuts running around the house in my skivvies with a towel draped around my neck yelling, “Have no fear … Underdog is here!”

Cartoons and comics were a big inspiration while I was growing up. I spent countless hours with the great Charles Schultz, Walt Kelly, and Johnny Hart. Naturally this influenced the direction and style of my work. I think deep down I’ve always been a kid at heart. My work has character and personality. It makes people smile. And in the end that should be the goal of any great design – to make people happy.

I started out drawing all my artwork with good old fashioned paper and pencil and I still do this today, but in 1998 (after purchasing my first computer) I began to design graphics for the Web. It was just for a few friends at first who wanted web buttons, guest book designs, and page elements. Pretty soon people started paying me for this and that has led me to where I am today.

I love helping people take their ideas and giving them life on the Web. If your are in need of my professional design services you can visit my business site Doug Draws and tell me about it using my Design Inquiry Form. You may also visit my portfolio to view samples of the work I have done.

Thanks for taking the time to visit. If you would like to know something else about me or my design services please get in touch or you can leave a comment for me below.