My name is David Smyth and I grew up in a small town outside of Chicago. I am the 5th of 7 kids of a Irish/German family. Which basically means that I have the tenancy to wait to the last minute but I am never late.

I worked my way through college ( this should read Pell Grant and secondary loan Program)and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree from Illinois State University. It was there that I met my wife, Cathy. She is a teacher of the visually impaired.

After graduation moved to Chicago, where she worked in the public school system and I worked first in a bakery and then at a record store while I looked for work in my field.

In May of 1987, my mother passed away after a series of strokes. In 1988, my father died from cancer and we moved to Rochester, New York. We figured it was out chance to move...otherwise we would most likely still be in Chicago.

She worked in the public school system and I worked for a global imaging company that was located in that city.

In the 12 years I worked for that company I was a photographic assistant , a photographer and then a member of a digital lab team. When I started there the web was still for the military and academics. Digital cameras, the DCS 100, had it own storage unit in the form of a suitcase that you carried over your shoulder.

After continuous downsizing, the corporation was scaring me. The public school system was more about getting paid to teach than teaching so we decided to get out. First to find their dream job and the other would follow.