Hello!

I’m Ben Dunkle. I go by @empireoflight on Twitter and WordPress.org. I’m @dmaprof on Instagram.

I’m a professor in the Digital Media Arts program at Canisius University. When I’m not teaching, I contribute to WordPress, make plugins, organize community events centered around WordPress, make art, fonts, icons, and WordPress plugins. I build websites and other stuff as Field 2 Design.

Occasionally, I post content here. Please bookmark and/or check my site regularly for updates!

Posts

  • Summer cloud

    Summer cloud

    Watching a cloud move slowly across the summer sky

  • Rethinking web design instruction

    I’ve taught Web Design for many years now. I started out teaching students how to use the now defunct Adobe GoLive. I realized quickly that wysiwyg editors such as GoLive and Dreamweaver were effectively bad ways to teach students how to build websites, and moved into html and css. I”m seeing a new trend in…

  • xmas

    Xmas in the 70s seemed warm. Maybe it was the smell of pine or what always seemed like bright sun outside. I liked all the electronic games we got.

  • Speakers

    The speakers are good, but it is hard to sit still for hours at a time. I like workshops much better.

  • WordPress

    So I spent the night getting the basics down of wordpress theme customization and as I figured it is easy, but there were a few hurdles. It was definitely easier than Drupal, and I think this will be my focus of study for a while…

  • Typography

    I’m at the typecon conference and a lot of people are talking about how to teach typography in the education forum. My take: Tap into the love of typography students had when they first learned how to write. My kids all scribbled and stuff, but the revelation came when they learned how to write their…