Temi Coker on Starting Before You're Asked

0:00From the Association of Registered Graphic Designers, this is the DesignThinkers Podcast. DesignThinkers is Canada's largest graphic design conference. Originally launched to mark the conference's 25th anniversary, the podcast now reaches a global audience of designers and creatives. Join our host, Nicola Hamilton, as she connects with DesignThinkers speakers to explore the work and ideas shaping today's design industry. This week on the Design Thinkers podcast, I'm joined by Tamey Coker, a Dallas-based designer, photographer, and the multidisciplinary artist behind Coker Studio. Tamey's client list includes Adobe, Apple, Google, HBO, Peloton, Nike, and the Oscars.

0:45But almost none of it started with a client brief. It started with a self-assigned poster a day challenge in 2016 made for no one but himself. And it led Tamey to a belief that you should be making creative work just to make it. In this conversation, we trace that thread through his whole career, from a stint studying biomedical engineering to please his parents, to pursuing digital media for himself. From making a pillow because his wife thought his work would look good in people's homes, to a full-fledged home collection at Walmart. From teaching photography and design at his former high school so that students would have a model of what a Black creative professional looks like, to finding the nerve to ask the Academy if he could steep his Oscar statuette artwork in Black history.

1:29This episode is for anyone with an idea sitting quietly in their mind, something they haven't started yet. Tammy's whole career is proof that the things you make for yourself are often the things that end up mattering the most. Hey, how's it going? Good, how are you doing? Nice to meet you. I'm good, thanks. Yeah, you too. We're really excited to have you come to Design Thinkers in the fall. So your talk is going to be called, and I won't hold you to this because it's still a couple of months out, but Make It Exist. Yes. The idea being that so many of your biggest opportunities, I'm assuming like the Oscars or the recent Walmart collaboration, started as things that you made for no one, like with no brief, like just things for yourself.

2:16And I kind of want to see if we can like trace that thread through your whole career. Of course. Yeah. I think we might be able to do it. Let's do it. Okay. So that I maybe want to start at the beginning. You didn't come up through art school. You actually started pre-med, biomedical engineering. Yeah. Yeah. You've done your research. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I, oh man. So in our culture, in the Yoruba tribe, really Nigeria, really Africa in general, they want you to be a doctor, lawyer, nurse, accountant. All of these like things that they deem professional, quote unquote. And so, but I love music. I started, I feel like my first entry to creativity was through music.

3:05My dad's a pastor. So I think when I was like maybe eight, between eight and 10, I started learning how to play the piano. My dad had a teacher come to the house to teach us. And then I started playing the piano at my dad's church. Every church he started, that's how we moved to Calgary. That's how we moved to Texas to start churches. And so when it was time for college, I remember talking to my dad that I wanted to study music. And he was like, we didn't come from Nigeria to America for you to go study music. You know, pretty much saying like we didn't leave Nigeria for you to come to America where there's endless possibilities for you to go study music.

3:45You can do that on the side. Go find, go do something professional. And so I picked biomedical engineering. And when I look back, I realized that I picked it because I wanted to do something that helped other people in a sense, like gave them hope, gave them joy. And so what got me into biomedical engineering was like, oh my gosh, I can go to the biomedical department that focuses on prosthesis and help someone get a second chance at life and giving back to people and allowing them to still feel part of humanity despite whatever they're going through. and so that was what intrigued me and um a year in I was like absolutely not this is not for me you know I mean I'm sitting in science class and you're talking about the periodic table and then it's like you're doing math but it's not really numbers math it's like scientific math and then there's so many rules and I wasn't doing well in my science class and I barely passed that class and I think yeah I was just like I'm doing this to make my parents happy I'm not doing this for myself like if my parents pass away I'm not going to know who I who I am because I'm doing things for other people and so yeah that's kind of how that dream for biomedical engineering started and died very quickly.

5:16Have you thought at all that prosthetics is like kind of an area of design in some way? Yeah, I don't know if you've, there's a project I did with By Way of Dallas and Scottish Rite Hospital, I think three years ago, I made a prosthetic design that kids could pick, and I actually got to meet the girl, and she picked my design, and I got to surprise her, and so I brought a bunch of like Coker Studio stuff, basketball scar for her and her mom, and And it was like a full circle moment, you know, because I think about like what got me into wanting to study biomedical engineering. And it was that. And so I got to tour the Scottish Rite Hospital and even talk to the girl.

6:02And, you know, she plays volleyball, so she's wearing it while playing volleyball. And it's like, oh, my gosh, like now people are coming to her, not asking what happened to your leg, but more so asking like, yo, that's so cool. Where'd you get that from? You know what I'm saying? And then it's like, it was such a full circle moment. I cried. It was probably still one of the top five moments in my design career, I would say. That's so cool. But also to be able to like bring some of that home is so amazing. You know, there's no useless experience, you know? Exactly. Everything happens for a reason.

6:37And for me, I feel like it was just God's divine timing to bring everything full circle together. there. And then what makes you actually make the move into, it was digital media originally, right? Yeah. I was really curious about like, really what got me into it was people kept telling me I had an eye. This was when the iPhone 3G or 3GS came out. And I was taking pictures of my iPhone. Like, oh, you have a unique eye. And I was downloading all these apps and like stacking layers and layers on different pictures just to create something. And I remember a friend of mine, Dennis, was like, hey, I got, I think he worked at like a Best Buy or some tech company where you can buy stuff.

7:20And there was a camera on sale, the Nikon D3100. And I remember I was always taking pictures of my friends. And I was like, man, I didn't have a lot of pictures growing up of myself. So I was like, let me document my college experience and my friends. And then I I think the camera was like$3.50 or$3.75. All I know is after I bought the camera, I had like$5 or$10 left in my bank account. But I was so happy. It was a big purchase at the time. Yeah. And I remember it was December 2011, the same time I was about to switch my major, the same time around Christmas that I would be home. But yeah, I was taking pictures of all my friends and I had this idea of like immortalizing their experience.

8:05Like what I liked about photography was I could look back at this and remember what I was feeling, what I was trying to capture, remember that moment, relive the moment. So in a sense, I was immortalizing my friends and my experience. And I took it with me to church, took it with me to class. I took it with me outside when I went back home. I still have the album on my Facebook from 2011, which I love that I did that because now I get to, when I get to speak, which you guys are going to see like I love to show people how I started because I think a lot of times it's I don't like going to talks where people talk about what they're doing now we never got to see the beginning because now it just feels like you're bragging but if I show my when I do my talks I always want people to like see themselves in my journey to encourage them in theirs as well because I started with this but here's where I'm at now but this is the whole journey um and so that's I really feel like that's kind of what inspired me to just keep taking pictures and digital media I started getting um curious about like photography design video so I took all those classes web design even even printing like we had to go I had to take a printing class that was like where you would use the old printing press.

9:32I hated it, you know, but I learned so much about the process, color, things like that. And I'm thankful for my digital media courses because I got to be exposed to the different types of digital media. And I feel like what I got drawn to was photography and design. You mentioned just sort of in there, in that answer, like about wanting to know a little bit of history about people when you're hearing them speak. And it made me think about how I'm also always interested in that. Like, I want to know how people got into this. I want to know like how people got started, how they sort of found their way to this place of success that they're at now, right?

10:14Like, you know, you end up as a guest on a podcast, you end up speaking on a major design conference stage. Like you've, there's some level of success there, but it makes me think about how none of us really know what we're doing for really big chunks of our careers. Yes. And that's okay. You don't have to know everything. I think that's why I always say the journey is the reward, not the destination. And sort of back to this idea of doing things for no one with no brief. At the end of the day, you're the person that has to live that life. You're the person that has to put in the work and work through that career.

10:50So it has to matter to you. Exactly. And I think it's just, if you think about creativity, it's a form of expression. So if I'm not expressing the type of things I want to see in the world, then what am I really using my creativity for? You know, how am I inspiring people if I'm not using my gifts to create the things I want to see in the world? Well, or maybe sharing them. Because I also read online that you spent a little bit of time as a public school teacher. Yeah. Yeah. When I graduated college, I went back to my old high school to teach photography and design because I wanted the kids to know that it's possible to have a career in creativity.

11:32At that time, I wasn't really doing much design. The only exposure I had to design was like, which was starting in college, I would take pictures of people for graduation. And then I was like, wait, I'm editing the pictures in Photoshop. I can use Photoshop to make a flyer or a graduation announcement. and so I was like oh so I started doing that and offering that as a package and then got into engagements and got into weddings and then now I'm designing a wedding album I'm designing the wedding invitation announcements and so I was still doing all those things on the weekends while I was teaching and so I was wanting the kids to know that it's possible to have a career because I didn't have a blueprint there was no one I could look up to while I was you know in the trenches with my parents trying to tell them that this is the career I want to pursue and they were not understanding not supportive at the time but yeah but seeing the younger kids and being able to like hone in and help them see their gifts and their craft was just it just brought me so much joy I mean there was an African kid that his parents told him he wanted to that he needs to go study engineering but he was like no I love photography and I love design and my teacher is amazing you guys have to meet him because he's he's doing the things I want to do and so I finally met the parents and I told him I was like look I understand where you guys are coming from my parents were just like you the reason I came back to teach was because I want to kiss another that's possible to have a career in this and this is the work that I've done I've shot with Pizza Hut I've done work with Estee Lauder blah blah blah they're like oh interesting we didn't know this was possible and for me that was like oh my gosh this is exactly what I'm supposed to be and some of the kids graduated some went to SCAD some went to UNT one of them just graduated so I feel really old now and I was 22 I had just turned 22 when I got the job and I remember the principal God rest her soul she she gave me a chance you know because I was like, I'm 22.

13:41These kids are 15. Are they really going to expect me? But because I kind of was a little bit closer to them in age, I was able to notice the trends, come to class and talk about what was happening, different things that were coming out that people could try. And so it was fun. People got to learn not just photography, but also design. But the most important part I wanted them to understand was the business aspect of starting a business in photography. And so we would use fake money in the class. They would start their own agencies and it would be fun to see how much they have by the end of the week.

14:17Some of them went broke. Some of them were able to like team up and start their company together. So it was really cool to just see them think creatively because creativity is not just about your art, but it's also about like using wisdom and using your gifts and your art to make a sustainable business that solves problems. Or sometimes building a sustainable business that then lets you get to make your art in another channel or in another way, right? There's so many people that have those parallel portfolios, the one that they scream from the rooftops and the ones that feeds their bank account that they don't share as widely.

14:57Exactly. Exactly. Does that period of time show up in your work now, in the way that you work or the way you mentor people or how you show up in the industry? Yeah. I think I'm very passionate about – I always tell people, I want to be 60 and create because I want to, not because I have to. And so what am I doing right now to set myself up for that? I wish I had more time and I've been thinking about it, maybe doing a series about just like financial literacy for creatives. because I have read a bunch of books. I know what it was like to negotiate without an agent. I know what it's like to negotiate now with an agent.

15:40I know what people are looking for when they're hiring you. I also know what to push back on as far as pricing because it's like, okay, I want you to design. People are like, oh my gosh, yes, I love to design. But the questions a lot of people are not asking is like, where is this going to live? Is this going to be on TV? Are you guys going to put this on the book? Do we need to have printing rights? Do we need to have social media rights or licenses? And those are the things that people forget. Because you can do a design for a company and then five years later, you see it on a billboard and you don't get paid.

16:19And I've learned the hard way through that. And so now, of course, me and my agent, my agent is so good at what she does. And I'm learning a lot from her. I've been with her now since 2020, so six years. She knows everything. And so I have been very passionate about like, yeah, helping people. And I think social media is just distorted so much when it comes to the creative industry and freelancing versus nine to five. And I just tell people like, yo, if you have to go nine to five for a season, do it. If it's going to feed your creativity which I know for some people it's like draining to have a nine to five but man I'm like if it's draining then go do something that gives you life at the end of day if you can I know I'm speaking from a part of privilege but I was a teacher I used to work nine to five I know what it's like I know what it's like getting paid once a month and as a teacher and waking up at 5 a.m.

17:23to get the class ready and things like that and you know it's three o 'clock and you're drained but I'm like oh I get to make a poster today that's the one thing that's going to give me joy you know and so I started a whole poster day series and um yeah I just I just I'm just very passionate about that because I think a lot of people right now they have this infatuation with freelance which I get but if you're not careful you're really not you might still be working nine to five and call yourself a freelancer and just switch the only difference would be you have a different boss which is like the clients that you work for and so with freelancing you have to also set boundaries you have to understand finances.

18:16No one talks about how when you freelance, you have to be the one paying for your own retirement. You know what I'm saying? Paying for your own health insurance. And then when you have a family, it just adds up. But then some people are freelancers, but their husbands or wives or partner, they're the ones making the money for the whole family. But then online, you think this person is making a living off their freelance. So it's like, yeah, I just want people to be aware of all of these nuances and the good and bad, the give and take from both sides so that we don't start feeling like if you work nine to five, you're a failure.

18:57And if you freelance, you're amazing. Both things have their ups and downs. So. Well, talk to me about like the, for you in this moment, like if you're really thinking about like the way you want to educate some folks or help share some of the knowledge you've gained as a freelancer or a solopreneur, someone who works for themselves, right? Because like freelancer also, you know, you work for yourself. You're not a freelancer going into other people's teams necessarily. You're sort of setting the tone and taking on projects. But what are some of the biggest things you've learned? Our next Design Thinkers event is happening in Toronto on October 20th and 21st, 2026.

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20:15That's PODCAST, all lowercase, for 10 % off. Tickets for Design Thinkers in Toronto, both in person and live streaming, are on sale now at designthinkers.com.

20:28one of the biggest things that i always tell people is know your numbers you cannot be a freelancer if you don't know your numbers you're just you're a ticking time bomb at that point and what i mean by know your numbers is how much does your business need to survive every month how much do you need to get paid to survive every month for your bills what is the bare minimum What are your fixed costs that like this has to get paid no matter what? For both sides, personal and business. How much are you putting aside for taxes? How much are you saving for your business? So that's for me, that's like the number one thing you got to know if you're going to be a freelancer.

21:09Secondly, create the type of work you want to see in the world. I think a lot of people sit down and they just wait for Nike to reach out to them. That's not going to happen. Absolutely not. I've seen people graduate college and the only thing on their portfolio is what their college professor gave them and I'm like that tells me that you're not a self-starter that tells me you wait to be asked what to do and I kind of have that type of person on my team so people are looking for that so what I mean by being a self-starter is like hey you have a favorite Nike shoe go make a poster about it go make a video go make something and just put it out there and say this is like spec work or, you know, tell us the story behind what started this whole thing.

21:48Because when I tell you like a lot of the work, the Oscars, I just talked to the guys that hired me. They started their own agency now, Vocabulary Agency, I believe is what it's called. But they, when they reached out to me for the Oscars in 2021, they had been looking at my work for a few years and they were just waiting for the right opportunity. you know so you just don't know you don't know who is looking but one thing that I can assure you is that if you put your head down and work what I also do is I make a folder of things I've done the previous year then I make a folder for the next year and the next year so that way I can go back and see the growth because sometimes it's hard to see the growth if you're just like running a gun especially in the freelance world you're like oh my gosh where's the next gig where's next gig and I'm seeing some of my style from 2016 to what I do now and I'm like wow 10 years that's crazy or I've seen what I have started doing this year versus last year and it's like wow and you just like never know so that would that would be another thing and then I would say try to find like like-minded people who are in this journey as well because sometimes freelancing, you almost feel like you're going insane, especially the last, I think, two, three years.

23:12Work has slowed down for a lot of people. And that's kind of why I started this whole thing of creative, what's to say? Department of Creative Equity. And also I have another one, forget what I put there. The back of it says, check on your creative friends. and it was sparked it sparked from having conversations with my friends who on social media they look everything looks fine and then you get on facetime with them and they haven't had a job for six months and they had to move to their mom's basement and but they don't want to show that online because they feel embarrassed and you realize that people are really struggling and if you're not in this community you're gonna feel like is it just me does my work suck but then And when 10 people around you are like, yo, what is happening?

24:01You start to feel like, okay, I'm not going crazy. And so I think that's so important to have. But yeah, those are some of the things I would say. Find a good CPA who understands. I could go on. I'm a numbers person. So I'm just like, and I've had good CPAs. I've had bad CPAs. So I have been in the spectrum. Yeah. So there's just if I could write a book about everything I learned, I would because it's just a lot of things to think about. And some you just have to go through the fire to learn. So, yeah. And sometimes you don't have to do it the same way as everyone else, too, right? Like sometimes there's a slightly different way to do it that works better for you.

24:45Exactly. And sometimes that way it's longer. And that's OK. I think everyone is trying to have a microwave career. What can I make that can go viral? and it's like viral is only going to take you so far like you want to develop relationships slowly or fast and when I mean what I mean by fast is like okay let's let's have coffee with this person and let's send them an email every other month or something and slow it's like I work with this person once end of the year I send the end of the year gift and then maybe they'll have it in their office, which literally has happened. I sent someone a scarf.

25:22They wore it to a briefing that the company was having. And they asked them, hey, who designed this? And they said, oh, it's this person named Tammy. And now my name is in the room. My work is on the board. And then I get hired. And I asked him, hey, how'd you guys find out about me? Oh, someone was wearing a scarf you made or something and you know and you just never know and so it's just like those little things and I made the scarf for fun and now people want it and people have it in their homes and in their closets so it's just it's just amazing and again that's why I'm I'm going to talk more about that on the talk but it's why it's important to just make the things you want to be hired for.

26:08Yeah. Make it exist. Okay. Speaking of, let's talk about a poster a day. So it starts in like October of 2016? Yes. Yes. And from what I can tell, it was a dare? A friend dared you into it? Yeah. A friend inspired me. My friend Magdiel Lopez. We're still good friends today. So before I was teaching, I briefly was a graphic designer at a church. That's where I met Magdiel. And you should check out his work he is phenomenal um and the creative direct at the church would ask us to make like new sermon series and by the time i finished one design mac deal has cranked out like five and i was like what and so he was so good at what he does and so i i really wanted to learn from him and i saw that he started this thing called a poster day and he was just making a poster day after church after work for fun and we met for coffee and I was like bro I kind of want to start that I want to be as good in design as I am in photography and I was known for photography but I was also scared because my Instagram was portraits of people weddings everything and picture heavy and I was like man I'm gonna lose followers for him he was just posting whatever he was posting pictures of the sky the sun shadow so his page was never really like curated so he didn't really have nothing to lose and I already built a following I was on I was one of the Instagram suggested users from our photography and so I had a bunch of followers and and I was like okay I'm just gonna start it today hold me accountable and he did I think he was like on day 60 and I then I started and he showed me like how to make glass texture and I'm gonna show it on the top but like that was my first poster you could not tell me anything it was the best poster in the entire world I was so proud of it and if you see it on the top I think I put like inspired by Macdale Lopez at the time and then I started making posters and it was fun and I was learning a lot of new things a lot of tricks some of the patterns that I use now my work you know I I was using it back then and MacDale taught me a bunch of things, a bunch of tricks in Photoshop.

28:27And still to today, like I, I really owe him my design career because I think he just instilled so much and inspired me to just like create, create, don't care about what other people are thinking, make the things you want to see. and I was able to find my style and grow. And, you know, when opportunities came that I couldn't take as I got bigger in my career, I am such a firm believer in like lift as you climb. So as you're growing in your career, the people beside you should also be growing. And MacDL is now the Photoshop splash page on Photoshop for 2026, you know, And he's doing amazing things with Adobe and other big companies.

29:16And I'm so proud because I was like, I know I'm good, but y 'all need to check out MacDL. If you think I'm good, that guy is crazy. So that's kind of how that started. And when I was teaching, every Friday I made it Funday Friday. So really it was an excuse for me to make my poster in class. So I would make a poster and the kids would also make a poster. and sometimes I'll show them how the tricks I'm using to make my poster and have them make something so it was it was it was really fun and I'm so glad for that time I still make posters now but I don't make them as much I think this year I probably made like four or five because I'm so busy but the posters is what got the Oscars what got me doing some gigs with Adobe peloton nike apple this year i did black history month design and also juneteenth design for apple and i'm just thankful for that time that was such a pivotal moment in my design career i would say because people always told me you couldn't do both they said pick photography or design yeah i think we all have multitudes in our creative careers and that's why i call myself like a multidisciplinary artist because now I'm doing clothing and a lot of people don't even know that I do music because I don't really put that out there.

30:36But yeah, it's fun to just have all these different outlets. I think it's also fun to have outlets that you don't put out there in the same way, like creative outlets that you're doing for yourself maybe and aren't sharing in the same way, like a creative process you're protecting somehow for a little while. yeah i think people that know me personally or go to the same church i go to they see me play there um but apart from that you know you have to really know me to know that side but i'm hoping one day i can bring it out i've thought about doing like a exhibition called tame me and friends and i'm jamming with my friends but i also made posters of my friends so that when they come people are looking at the walls and like yo is that you you know like again my whole thing is i want people to feel seen, loved, and cherished.

31:25And so that would be something I do in the future one day. Are you a big ideas guy? Like, are you somebody who's just like constantly thinking of new things you could do and have to like remind yourself that there are only 24 hours in a day? Yes. And I'm also, I also overthink. So it's like, I have these ideas and then I'm like, ah, that's probably not going to work. So let me just put that on the side. And I sometimes to kill my ideas before I even test them out, which I'm trying not to do as much. I want to talk about the Oscars project because there's this line, when you've talked about it in the past, you've told this story about being afraid of asking the Academy if you could make it black.

32:09And that as a line and even that idea, I think we've all been through an experience where we're like, okay, I actually know what twist would make this more interesting, but I'm not sure they're going to go for it. And I mean, can I make this black has many nuances to that question, but like walk me through that meeting. Oh man. Okay. So first I was just, when I got the gig, I was honored. They only picked seven people. I looked at the seven people and I was like, why am I even on this list? So first of all, I didn't feel worthy, which is another whole another conversation. A common experience for many creatives at every stage of their career.

32:51Yep. And then I look at what I made and I'm like, why were you nervous? But yeah, so the foundation of a lot of the work that I do is that I believe that Black is a beautiful canvas and I want people that look like me to see themselves in the work that I do. And your version of black skin, like the color palette that you use is so striking. Thank you. Yeah. And I, you know, I, I really, really like believe in the work that I do and the hope and joy that I want people to feel when they see my work and see themselves in it. It's colorful, which is really just comes from my culture. If you look at my poster day stuff, when I first started, I was using muted colors because I was scared.

33:40of like really showing who I was. And Muted at the time was like so popular. This was around the N5 VSCO era. And I was really trying to, yeah, not be too loud. When I look back, I'm like, what was I thinking? My culture is loud. We wear, I showcase to different events and it's colorful and families have their own woven fabric. And you zoom out at the events and you see so many different colors, so many different families, but it's so beautiful. And so that's where the inspiration for the color and stuff come out. And so going back to the Oscars, I think as a designer, as a Black designer, you have to pick a side when you're starting your career.