About Steve

I started behind a camera in upstate New York, shooting stories as a photojournalist and never quite figuring out how to make mittens and camera equipment work together. A personal highlight was covering the Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, which almost made up for the lack of feeling in my fingers.

Eventually I traded snow for Clearwater, Florida, and started blending photography with design, creating brochures and campaigns for hotels and resorts. That was 1986, back when an 8.5×11 page stayed 8.5×11 and nobody argued about whether it looked different on their phone.

Over the next few decades, I moved through commercial photography, retouching, branding, and web work. Along the way, one thing kept showing up: most projects don’t fail because of bad design. They fail because the right assets don’t exist.

One photo where five variations are needed. A product shot with no environment. A scene captured in the wrong season. A campaign that needs consistency it was never given.

I spent years solving those problems the hard way, pixel by pixel, pass by pass, late night by late night. Photoshop was the tool. Patience was the method. Coffee was the fuel.

Then AI changed the math.

Not the thinking. The math. The same visual decisions I’d been making for decades, what to extend, what to build, what to hide, what to correct, suddenly took minutes instead of hours. The judgment stayed the same. The tedium didn’t.

That’s why Savvy Rooster exists. I teach practical AI-powered visual workflows that help people create what’s missing, adapt what they have, and get projects across the finish line faster, cleaner, and with a lot less frustration.

I began my career in the film era, survived the early days of Photoshop, and now use AI not as a novelty but as the most helpful studio assistant I’ve ever had. The goal is simple: better visuals, faster and easier, and maybe a quiet laugh when AI decides your subject needs a third arm.

When I’m Not Working
I love exploring new destinations and disconnecting at state and national parks. I always travel with my camera. (Once a photographer, always a photographer). I’ve hiked all 46 High Peaks in the Adirondack Mountains in my younger, more ambitious days, and I share my home with a cat who’s convinced he’s the CEO and I’m just the guy who opens the food cans.

My travel wish list includes all the places with spectacular scenery: Alaska, Austria’s Lakes District, England’s Cotswolds, France’s Burgundy region, Italy’s Tuscany, New Zealand, and Switzerland. Plus about a dozen national parks across the American West.

My steadfast conviction? If you’re going to do something, do it right.