Hello! I am Jose Emmanuel Bernardo, a multimedia artist from Manila, Philippines. I do graphic design, motion graphics, video editing, digital art, animation, and sometimes even photography.
Ever since I was a kid, my dream is to be an artist, not just by learning how to draw but also by learning art in various forms. My progress towards my goal started during elementary. I became an editorial cartoonist for our school newspaper. Continuing this in high school, I competed in various contests even though at some point, I didn't find competing entertaining at all. This eventually led me to learn graphics design and video editing. It started as a pure hobby, posting content online and building a branding out of it. My peers began to notice my work, and I started accepting small editing commissions from them. Fast forward to college, I wanted to take a Multimedia Arts course but due to our financial capacities, I decided to take a Computer Science degree instead. During my freshman year, I was scouted by my seniors from an organization; this eventually led me to work for the Office of the President at my university as an editor. During these years in college, I gained connections and my content online attracted more clients, kickstarting my career as a freelancer.
I've been a freelance editor for almost six years now, working with clients across the globe. However, during the pandemic, editing commissions slowed down, and clients became few. It eventually led me to explore Web 3.0 and the world of NFTs (Non-fungible Tokens) and digital assets. It reignited my original passion, improving my skills in art in general. I met new friends, mentors, and clients through Twitter / X, who helped pave the way for my career as a digital artist. Fortunately, I managed to collaborate with other artists in the space, leading my work to exhibits and curations in and out of the Philippines.
From arts to design, video editing to VFX, and photography to animation. I am constantly in pursuit of learning new skills to add to my palette. I am now in the process of balancing my passion and work without leaving behind one.
Supposedly, I wanted to separate my social media identity from my digital artist identity. "19eMB" is pretty new, I used it to rebrand my old identity as a content creator (Les Friend Visuals). "19" being my birthday and "eMB" are my initials. Which also sounds like "19 megabytes", a play of words that can relate to my computer degree.
On the other hand, my artist name "dedMan" is known in the Web 3.0 space. It may sound dark, but it has a deeper connection and meaning to me. It relates to my dead artistic self ("dead Emman") who I am now trying to revive. I thought that I killed my artistic passion because I focused too much on work and other things back then. This is why I am pushing myself to work hard for the dreams I wanted to achieve ever since I was a child.
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