Congratulations, Ken and Yasuko, on your Graduation!! I am happy to hear you survived the rigors of art school. I assume you have a whopper of portfolio now, yes? What are your plans for the future, in terms of art? Work for a design firm and run the show? Or, maybe go into business for yourself? Are you still working at UPS? I am eager to hear your plans. As for DLa, the website was out of commission during the move. As you know, Thane and I have both moved to the Portland area. It was impossible to keep anything going with DLa during the chaos. But we did manage to squeeze out DLa 21 before we left, and have recently sent email to Barry about the website. So, now that everyone is mostly settled, we are going off on business again, with many plans for artzaz. It is inspiring to think that you are interested in getting back into business. I think the three of us made a great team, and could still go off… But, of course, before we go any further, please share your take on DLa. For example, what is up with DLa 20? Will we ever see it? Or should we just forget it, and move on…?

Thanks.

Relieving to hear stuff is still going on in them their noggins. Yes, you will see DLA 20, I am taking my time on it now to do it up tuffer than planned during school,… consider it taking DLA to the next level. I, personally am tired of the same little zine that has come to be (re)gurgitated onto our platters… we are capable of so much more if we put our minds to it. since the mag has slowed to one in a few months anyways, why not switch to a quarterly EVENT, a bigger, buffer book-like mag with only the choicest, or complete or polished things. nothing to do just for the deadline. Like whole comix, or at least complete chapters in mini-series form, Bigger and better articles, with everyone involved in making them. More colaborative stuff, if even in the planning of the entire production. And thats just the main publication… I have other ideas for extra things we could produce which would be very BIG projects, but I think could put us on the map somewhere. but I will save my ranting for subsequent correspondence. At the moment, we are enjoying the fact that we don’t have to to anything(aside from find a job to pay the bills in the future).. So we are being lazy about life at the moment. Cleaning and organizing the hurricane of a pad which took over sometime during our second year. Yes, we have portfolios too. But only a very small portion of things are posted online. oh, we have websites too, www.kennethschrag.com & www.ynakamuradesign.com. Check them out for a laugh or two, they were just assignments, so will be reworked extensively. I still have to upload a movie clip of a bug box, so dont click on that link just yet. ( I should get that up tonight.) Well, now I suppose I should get busy searching for my next money making venture… wish me luck. So, since we will be job searching, we might not have an EXTREME amount of time for DLA, but will fit some in. When our lives get settled, I am gonna be all gung ho about that in my free time though. Well, I will leave it at that today. nice to hear from ya. Well have to figure out how and where we will be meeting again.

ken

Wow! I really like your website. I tried checking out Yasuko’s website, but it never finished downloading (even after 25+ minutes), since i am dialing up these days.. I especially liked the stamp set and the photo-book cover. It would be e-sweet to check out what else you have done. How much contracted graphic design work have you done? Is there a future in it? I mean, is it possible to make any money doing design work these days? What does it take to make a little money? a lot of money? I know how to make no money at all already. I would love to get into the field, but i don’t have a degree or a portfolio. Too bad we couldn’t all partner up again and do some professional work. As for DLa, we are kind of in limbo until we hear back from your brother about the website hosting. He changed the password and so we are locked out of the internet..

Sorry didn’t get back to you last night, got a bit busy. There is money in the field, you just have to have the right portfolio and good connections. Well see how far I get, then I can tell you better. Freelance hourly rates should not be less than 45 bucks though others charge based on their current living situation. I charge 75 an hour, and yes, I have done an actual job at this rate!!! doing illustrations, and not very good ones at that! actually still working on the job. I see the website is back up, Hooray. whats this about a High school dla presentation??? Ron called me and wished me congrats yesterday. trip. well, gotta get ready for the grunt job at UPS, still doin that. the bennies are too good to pass up at the moment.

ken

is the 45/hour because of non-labor costs such as health/insurance/taxes? if so, then how much does the 45 - 75/hour translate into after it’s all said and done? i would be interested to hear about what job/client/project you are currently contracted to do. sounds like you (and yasuko?) will be making plenty of money doing design work. inspiring.

yes the website is back up — put it up last night, matter of fact (over a modem!). the hs presentation is another one of those ml hs art-class presentations we gave about dla. we did a nother one in 2003, and it went very well, so the teacher asked us back this year. it was fun and educational, but we did the work for free, and it was a lot of work (sort of..). them hs kids tripped out on us and our work! anyway, the reason we mentioned it on the website was because we pimped a special little hs zine for them and invited the different classes to the dla website.. so that little blurb on the splash/intro page was on their behalf. we were going to link the blurb to the slideshow they students saw in class, but we ended up running out of time, what with the move and all..

anywayzaz,
have a good one at uncle ben’s today
– don’t grunt too hard!