INTERVIEW WITH DANIEL EMEKA

	Interview with Daniel Emeka ‘Da-vinci’ – Creative Genius
	Posted: 27, Jul 2010 by Possicon
	In our continue effort to showcase young Nigerians doing great stuff, we keep discovering more talents than we’d expected. We got in touch with this young, energetic and creative guy, Daniel Emeka, popularly called “Da vinci”. He’s a digital art expert, with message-drive illustrations… I must emphasize, this guy is world class. Let’s go on a journey to his world… WTN: Let’s meet you Daniel: My name is Daniel Emeka, a 22 year old graphic designer/digital artist, a proud Nigerian and the vision bearer of DANIZCONCEPT WTN: What inspired you to go into design and when did you start? Daniel: I got into design to evoke an emotion and also cause a reaction in the minds and hearts of people. That’s what makes it interesting, I started designing in 2007. WTN: Your designs are message-driven, what drives you to developing concepts for your designs? Daniel: Love for arts and the beauty of the world I would say is really what drives the message in my art. When deep messages pop in my head I jot down and meditate on the idea before I start designing WTN: How has the market been so far in Nigeria? Daniel: The market is getting tougher everyday because of the emergence of new talented graphic designers. Access to the internet has really helped the growth of graphic designers that it is becoming hard to make a choice out of a lot of us. But only a few of us have carved out niches for ourselves in-order for clients to differentiate each designer’s quality i.e: There are different kinds of graphic design skills, namely: Visual art, page layout, interface design and typography. WTN: What are the challenges you face as a designer? Daniel: Challenges exist everywhere and in different ways but to me, my biggest challenge as a designer is poor acceptance in the corporate world. It is really annoying that they give credits of branding, advertising ads, collateral designs to their marketing executives instead of the graphic designer. Why can’t each company have a creative director the same way they have marketing executives or something… just my opinion. WTN: Can we really draw a line between web designer and graphic designers? Daniel: Even if we do, the line is so thin, that it will soon be a criterion to be able to do web design as a graphic designer. The best websites in the world are done by graphic designers’; the only problem is that some of us (me inclusive) are either worked up or too lazy to study some little programming. That aside, there is really no difference. WTN: Tell us more about Naija Design Challenge? Daniel: Yeah, it’s a project that I and David Osaige is working on. We really want to show the world that there are talents in abundance when it comes to graphic design here in Nigeria. We will be posting more info on our Facebook page, but for now we are still sealing our lips on some details. Not to worry, it will be BIG! WTN: Which other project(s) are you currently working on? Daniel: Nothing serious just improving my skills, and praying to God to be better with each passing day WTN: What is your view of the creative design market in Nigeria? Daniel: Number one is we are not being supported at all. Not just from only the government but the corporate firms too. The second issue is, we keep hearing complains of “we are too creative to the general public”, or our clients are too archaic. Until that is tackled, I doubt we will be able to grab international recognitions like, Cannes, Pencil, Grammys, Mobo’s, Oscar’s etc. WTN: In the global/world scale, where do you place Nigerian designs in terms of design professionalism? Daniel: hmmm on the global scale we are not there yet, but we are getting there, but here in Africa, maybe the best after South Africa. WTN: What’s your view about web/internet market in Nigeria? Daniel: It is a very large, lucrative and effective market. There is a wide space for anybody to play with and Nigerians are taking full advantage of it. And there are still a lot of places to explore but we are definitely going in the right direction WTN: What’s your view on digital art in Nigeria? Daniel: Digital art here in Nigeria has not yet gained its ground mostly because most of our schools are yet to embrace it into their curricular. The few of us that practice such art are either self trained or trained outside the shores of this country. WTN: What words do you have for upcoming designers? Daniel: BE YOURSELF!!! Do not ever try to be like Daniel or any other designer. After learning the basics, try and build your own style of art and improve on it. And lastly, its all about self expression, but remember you do not owe it to yourself alone but to everybody looking at your design. Accept critiques, good or bad, but do not let them kill your zeal or put you on a comfort zone because it could kill your talent faster than you imagine. Connect with Daniel on Facebook here. View His design works here