From Tagging to Tag
After an early fascination with graffiti art, Clive's first legitimate role in the commercial art world was as studio junior at Drawers visualizing and illustration studio. Progressing through several disciplines including run down artist and black & white printer his first taste of retouching came as junior BARCO Creator op at Style Studio 10 circa 1990. When Clive was invited to join the boutique start up retouching studio Nucleus in 1993 this paved the way to him becoming senior artist and his first dabblings with cgi. Still working with Creator for retouching he was drawn towards Alias Wavefront to solve some of the more complicated imaging problems and then a stint working next to maverick computer illustrator John Harwood saw him begin to champion Lightwave, software he still occasionally uses today.
By 2000 when Nucleus had merged with The Adplates Group (TAG) Clive and his team had developed and pioneered the use of Photo-real cgi as a serious solution to everyday problems whilst continuing to develop close relationships with photographers and art directors and also dis-spelling the idea that cgi for stills was a black art!
Tag's acquisition of Smoke and Mirrors in 2003 meant the team could climb onto a bigger stage - merging Tag Creative cgi with Smoke & Mirrors produced a formidable team and access to the best hardware and software available.
Now based in the heart of SOHO in sumptuous surroundings Clive heads up to team of talent that includes Rob Lanario and Garen Robinson, both retouching/cgi genius's in their own right, and continues to develop relationships with photographers such as Jim Fiscus, John Parker & Chris Frazer Smith and art directors such as Juan Cabral and Bil Bungay.