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The Interview Series: Foster D. Coburn III, in Arizona. Unleashed Productions and CorelDRAW Expert.

My Interview series continues with Foster D. Coburn III, in Arizona, USA. I interview people I have come to know through Corel forums, and who are fellow beta testers of and fellow CorelDRAW users. And some of us have met in real life. Like Foster and Myself in Arizona.

Many dont know, but one of the first names I came to learn about back in 1997-1998 when I started out to learn CorelDRAW and Photo-Paint parallell with Photoshop at the time, was Foster. He is one of those I first learn from, always friendly to help out on the then Newsgroups (NNTP) at Corel. You can still find Foster on the forums, one being the official Corel community forum www.coreldraw.com. Foster is a writer of numerous books on the subject, and well sought after instructor and today publish and sell his excellent and highly respected DVDs on CorelDRAW and Photo-Paint through his company Unleashed Productions.

In 2010 (started working on them in 2009) I got comissioned by Foster at Unleashed Productions to create and draw a the new character illusstrations for his famous “CorelDRAW Unleashed Training Boot Camp”. Read and view more about the illustrations and the campe here >

Your Name:


Foster D. Coburn III


Website:
http://www.unleash.com , http://graphics-unleashed.unleash.com http://www.facebook.com/graphicsunleashed , www.youtube.com/coreldrawunleashed





Style & type of work you produce?

My main focus is products to aid other graphic artists. That includes training materials, additional artwork
content or add-ons.


You like myself is a user of CorelDRAW Graphics Suite. What was it that made you discover, and drew you to CorelDRAW Graphics Suite?


I was first introduced to Corel Corporation by the package of add-ons they created for Ventura Publisher that included Corel Newfont and Corel Headline.



What year was it?


1988




Which Programs do you use, Corel and non-Corel programs?




The full list is too long to put them all here. I’ll focus on those I use most often.


CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5


Adobe Creative Suite CS5.5


Microsoft Office 2010


Camtasia 7


WeBuilder 2011


Bibble 5




Do you use any analogue tools in conjunction with your work?


I take a lot of notes with a pen.


Which year was it you started your business, your work?


1993


What, more importantly, made you begin working with the work you do today? After all you could have made a career as a hairdresser or something in that line instead, like any other human being.


I think it is a career that chose me rather than me choosing a career.


What is that you like with your work?


I like that I do different things all the time. The most satisfying moments come when I know that I’ve given a user the knowledge they need to further their career.


In an interview in the Digital Artist Magazine, who interviewed me a few years back, I was asked what I would like to see in future versions of CorelDRAW Graphics Suite. Is there anything you would like to see?


My list is long and varied and I make sure that the folks at Corel are well aware of those features. What I don’t want to see is CorelDRAW trying to do everything. For example, it is not a layout program. For that Corel should revive Ventura. It is not a program for designing Web sites.


Do you drink coffee or tea in the morning?


Coffee.


What do you think is important to think about running your own business or in your line of work, to think about. Is it discipline or and something else? 


When you are self-employed, your income is dependent on the work you put into the business.

For someone just starting out, what do you think they should think about?


Training! I see too many users buy an expensive piece of hardware for output and CorelDRAW to create artwork for output. They don’t budget any time or money on actually learning how to use CorelDRAW. This leads to wasted materials and wasted time.


Is there any big change in how and what you worked with when you first started out. Have the business changed in any way?


The Internet would be the biggest change as it gives us a better platform for reaching users all over the world.




Thank you Foster, it was a pleasure to talk too you as always, thanks for letting me interview you.




Stefan Lindblad, January 2012
Copyright Foster D. Coburn III & Stefan Lindblad

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