Lawrence Boxall's Page

Profile Information

About Me: I finished an apprenticeship in the printing industry as a photogravure engraver in 1975 at a printer that used hot metal. I went through the change to cold type and moved from photogravure printing to offset lithography and did colour separations on a reproduction Camera before the days of the scanner.

Next, I went through the move from cold type to the digital revolution in the printing industry and eventually expanded beyond simply printing to building web sites. Currently I work as a freelance graphic designer and my annual “defining” contract is the production of the Vancouver International Film Festival’s Film Catalogue.

I have always loved teaching and was made pre-press apprentice instructor at Nasionale Tydskrifte in Cape Town, South Africa as soon as I had finished my apprenticeship.

I came to Canada in 1981. In the mid 80s I started teaching reproduction photography at the school run by the Graphic Arts International Union in the evening while continuing to work full time in the industry. When the Mac arrived on the scene I realized that theory would have to be introduced into a school that focussed solely on hands on training. I developed and taught the first theory course given by the school, Colour Reproduction Theory. It was a course necessary for understanding what one was doing with the then new program called Photoshop.

In the late 90s I taught a six month session in the printing school that used to be run out of the Downtown Campus of VCC and subsequently taught a session in the Digital Design department of the same campus.

I have recently begun working with the Harbourside Institute of Technology, a school for recording engineering to help them expand their course offering with a program on digital communications.

I have found it useful to teach parttime while continue to work in the field I teach as keeping abreast of developments in my field means that I am able to provide my students with the most current information available in the field.