Hello all, my name is David Schwinghamer and my company is Third Dimension Design, LLC. Way back in the early days us draftsmen used pencil and paper, doing our work on a drafting table. This type of table was designed with a straight edge that can slide up and down on the angled surface and the 24×36 paper we used for plans. Technical drawing tools include and are not limited to: pencils, erasers, rulers, compasses, protractors and other drawing utilities. Drafting tools may be used for measurement and layout of drawings, or to improve the consistency and speed of creation of standard drawing elements. I remember using lead holder’s rather than pencils, they gave the draftsman a better way to portray his designs because of all the different lead types. The range was from soft to hard or B for soft and H for hard. With this range of lead, it made it easier to give your designs definition and character! These tools were the rule when it comes to drawing plans for a house. This to me is the true form of becoming a designer and that is where it all started.
I guess that was my vision for the future when I was very young. Not knowing anything about drawing for a living, back then it was all about drawing cars in the most ridiculous and hopped up ways. Big tires, fast lines, super stacked blown engines popping out in front. Don’t forget the smoke, fire, burning rubber and the crazy insane googly eyed drivers shifting to the moon! Yes, I was a creative kid with big dreams and many crazy thoughts, you know Rat Fink stuff. In my mind, that was drawing at its finest or better yet a funfest. I don’t really remember how long I was in this fantasy; I believe they were my teenage years up until high school. That is where I met my teacher, Mr. Thomasakis. He showed me another way to draw with a future!
Getting out of high school the summer of 86’ I found myself wondering where to go to get more training for the architectural kind. I knew I didn’t have the passion to attend a college taking all the basic classes that I felt wouldn’t help me anyway. Talking with my friend Joe, he told me he signed up for a trade school called Phoenix Institute of Technology learning CAD. That was the answer, I would follow my friend and learn CAD straight away without the extra BS classes. I attended this fine educational institute for approximately one and a half years, after graduation I was ready to get out into the workforce because PIT helped with job placement.
Joe landed a job with an electrical engineer which I first thought was bogus, I wanted architecture only. My good buddy Joe got me hired at Burgett and Associates quickly so I took it. I realized I could get some experience doing electric, then move to other areas later. The commute was tolerable and the work conditions were nice so I stuck around for about a year or so until I landed my second position still in the electric industry. The company that hired me was called TOR Engineering, named after the owner Tom O. Radnoti. TOR dealt with much higher power requirements and did some work on electrical substations, I’m sure you have seen them around, chain linked fences saying High Voltage. You probably look at it thinking what does that group of grey thingumabobs with thick wires connected do? This is where the high voltage cabling on high poles gets transformed down to voltage for houses like 120/208 for single phase power and also three phase power for heat pumps, ranges and dryers. TOR also did their fair share of underground power cabling with close ties with SRP and APS.
I started there in the summer of 1992, my work life there came to a streaking stop in Friday February 13 when I found myself in a coma for 7 weeks! Back then it was easy to go down to Mexico to have fun on our dirt bikes, we frequently drove down, our friend’s dad had a house on the beach in Puerto Penasco. Not one of my friends saw what happened to me. At a pit stop they noticed “where’s Hammer” so they went back and found me lying on the ground playing tiddleywinks. All laughter aside, I wasn’t moving at all…
We think I hit something on the trail which sent me over the handlebars landing on my head, too bad I had to buy a new helmet.
Anyway, Carlo my friend since before high school took the reins and thought Hammer needs help! If you have ever been down there and visited the local hospital, you know it isn’t like here in America. One person there said to Carlo, go read what it says on the wall where the stars are. It said “call this number if you are in big health troubles” in serious sloppy writing. This number was for Air Evak which means high tale yourself to the border fast so we can pick you up in a helicopter and take you to America.
That was definitely much easier to say than to do, my friends had to put gas in the ambulance! It didn’t go very far as it broke down. Now lying back down in the back of the truck going super slow as I have been told we finally got to the border and flew straight to St. Joseph’s hospital in my home town Phoenix, Az. It was slow for me to come back to reality and when I did, I had many visitors most every day. One good memory was that I got to see a lot of my father on a regular basis. He lived in Flagstaff but didn’t see him often. My memory is still foggy around this time but they tell me I had to learn how to do life’s basic all over again. Walk, talk and eating, it’s like I was a newborn all over again.
My mother took me in so I could finish my therapy up in Prescott at that time. It was nice although the more I was there, the more I wanted my life back. Quickly I finished therapy enough to move back to Phoenix, that time it made me happier although I was still dazed and confused a lot of the time. I’m not sure then if I was ready to get back into the workforce, it took me some years I think to feel ready. Luckily, I was living in a townhouse my grandparents owned rent free, thank you Papa and Mama.
This time now is a blur, forwarding to 1995 I started doing CAD drafting again, with little success. My computer speed now was lacking and missed a bunch of details so I got let go often! Hey Dave, why don’t you take some refresher CAD classes at the local community college, and that is what I did. I attended Phoenix college for a few semesters. I heard they had a 3D CAD class and for a long time I was curious with drawing in the third dimension. I must say, 3D is cool, I liked drawing houses in wireframes. This is what it’s called putting anything in 3D, think of it like a skeleton. It produces surfaces that can be colored or rendered for lifelike results. At this time, I was feeling more confident with myself, this new way of drawing is brand new so I thought I’ve got to master it and after a few years, in 1997 Third Dimension Design was born!
The first thing I did to get clients was to go talk to architects and home builders. It was a fairly easy process to become instantly excited plus working for myself gave me much more time to get a project completed. In the beginning, I did a lot of work for free, I didn’t care I was working! The beauty part of this type work is I was open to doing residential, commercial and landscape, no license needed.
Life was grand again up until I accepted a CAD drafting job in Flagstaff, Az. I guess I was feeling ambitious wanting to do more, I accepted the job with Clyde’s CAD drawing homes for the rich and shameless and with promises of doing both CAD and 3D, I was set. At this time, I wanted to be totally transparent about my brain injury accident so there would be no surprises with my work. About the same time, I met a woman in a chat room, she had man troubles in Tucson with her three young children. Soon after I met her cute kids, I instantly fell in love (with the kids first) and asked her to move in with me at my townhouse. So now I have accepted this job out of town and these four new people were in my life. It worked out pretty well, unfortunately my job with Clyde’s ended after six months, it still was a good experience.
Back in Phoenix again I worked 3D, doing side jobs getting my CAD skills on the up and up. This type work kept me busy for about ten years along with raising my new kids because in 2001 I was married with an instant family. It was now oh say 2010 where I saw the decline of my grandfather, he was in need of daily care so Valerie and I moved in. We were feeling a little snooty living in Clearwater Hills, an upscale community in the heart of Paradise Valley. We saw my grandfather pass in 2012 and my grandmother made it to the summer of 2014. After the trust was liquidated to me and my three brothers, I ended up getting their home as my own.
This is a 3d rendering of my future vision
Great memories happened there and the view of downtown Phoenix was nice but it did need some work done and I didn’t have steady employment so we decided it was time to sell. I sold the home to a group of house investors with big plans to renovate, I think now it was all hearsay, I have looked at this home many times with no improvements done. I think they are sitting and waiting for someone to give them 1.2 million for it.
Now we are in present day in a home near Shea Blvd. and 64th Street. Just like my grandparents did, I found a home that was in need of remodeling inside badly, plus it sits on an acre with a huge double door garage in the back. It took us about 8 months to renovate, totally transforming the inside. Knocking down walls for a 1600 sq. ft. main area that is open!
I’m now slowly transforming the outside with features such as grass/desert in the front. I built a really cool mail box column with lights, check it out.
Well that’s about it, now in 2020, can you believe it!
You are welcome to go explore my website at 3ddd.net, I have a product page being developed with ebooks, home accessories, house plans for sale, discount software and soon we will be offering a course about how you can get into your own thriving home design business!!