“Husband. Father of two. Horror Junkie.”
Welcome to the Blue Lab Pro Podcast. On today’s inaugural episode, Adrian chats with designer and horror enthusiast Derek about his love of all things spooky and how it has inspired him to create horror based Instagram art and communities, all with the goal of bringing horror fans far and wide together.
Derek explains the philosophy behind his design work, why he’s compelled to share and create the way he does, why it’s important to have positive spaces for your passions, and how he manages to balance it all between his duties as a father, husband, and his day job.
Connect with Derek and his work on his Instagram @horrorjunkie103178
About Derek
Hi, I'm Derek and I run the feed Horror Junkie 10-31-78 on Instagram. I spend most of my time being a husband and dad to two girls as well as working a full-time job and on the side, I'm a total horror junkie! I was born the last week of 1979 so I associate myself as being an 80's kid through and through. I remember being into horror at a very early age loving non-horror movies that terrified me like Return to Oz, Alice in Wonderland, and The Peanut Butter Solution. All of these came out in '85 (hell of a year for a five-year-old!) and all gave me nightmares...and I loved it!
Growing up, I was never much for sketching or painting and couldn't draw very well. It wasn't my thing even though I really wanted it to be. But when computers became available (yes I'm that old!) that's when my creative side became triggered. It all started with newsletters and clipart! I loved taking a flier and recreating it on a computer to see if I could get it to look exactly the same. Tech moved very quickly and by my late teens, I was crushing design programs like Microsoft PowerPoint, FrontPage, and publisher. We've come a long way since then for sure!
While I was creating on Microsoft, I was feeding my horror side with computer games like The 7th Guest and Nintendo's Castlevania. And late at night I'd sneak and watch my intro to horror movies with Joe Bob Briggs on Monstervision or Gilbert Godfried and Rhonda Shear on USA Up All Night. These shows along with hosts like Elvira are how I was really introduced to horror movies. And that’s an incredible way to have been introduced to the genre growing up!
You may be surprised to know that my designer/creative side and my horror side didn't actually meet until I was in my late 30s. I just never had a need for the two to coincide. I'd been self-taught with design and did freelance work growing up, but never had a need to create anything with horror. Like most people I've met in the horror community on Instagram, I found that more and more I was being rejected by the people around me for loving the genre. The people I knew just didn't get me and didn't understand what horror meant to me. So sometime in 2018, I decided to start a profile on Instagram. I had come across a few horror-centric pages on there and it opened up a whole world of possibilities for me to have a creative outlet. I started out with no plan and a cheesy name. 3 years later and I basically still have no plan and still have a cheesy name! But I've loved every day of doing this feed.
About the Podcast
The Blue Lab Pro Podcast is all about pop-culture and those inspired by it. Hosted by introverted digital geek Adrian Meza (@bluelabpro), take a listen as Adrian finds pop-cult pros from all over and chats with them about how they’re inspired by their favorite films, books, shows and more to create and do great things. Pop Cult AF.
Credits
From Blue Lab Productions, this is the Blue Lab Pro Podcast. Edited and Produced by Adrian Meza. Music by Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio. A special thank you to all guests of the show. Please rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google and anywhere you listen to your podcasts. All Rights Reserved.