Hello, I’m

David Newkerk

From wrestling with 90s-era HTML and quirky web browsers, to crafting custom themes and plugins for popular CMS platforms, to full-stack development for startups in Video on Demand and Finance — I’ve thrived as a web designer and developer for 25+ years.

The web has reinvented itself many times since I started — and I’ve loved adapting and growing with every wave. Elegant, modern tools like Vue and Tailwind, trusted frameworks like Ruby on Rails, and AI coding assistants have become essential parts of my toolbox.

Helping others level up through teaching and mentoring has been part of who I am since I started publishing tutorials in the early 2000s. Need help with something? Feel free to ask.

I’m passionate about building things that challenge what I thought I was capable of. If it solves an interesting problem, makes a meaningful impact, and is a delight to use by the real people on the other side of the screen — I want to be part of it.

View Resume

GitHub LinkedIn Email

/ Career

2018 – Present

Full Stack Engineer

TagniFi

Owned full lifecycle development of web application features — from ideas and wireframes through UI/UX design, implementation, and production deployment — collaborating closely with domain experts in financial data.

Designed and built a powerful search interface with Nuxt.js that enables customers to explore and analyze billions of financial data points, integrating seamlessly with a Rust/PostgreSQL/Snowflake backend.
Translated direct user feedback into full-stack features, iterating closely with customers to refine how they search, organize, visualize, and work with financial data.
Redesigned and rebuilt internal tools for staff analysts, replacing a slow, error-prone legacy system with a modern, user-friendly solution for processing SEC filings, mapping financial data, and managing customer accounts — significantly improving efficiency and team satisfaction.
Engaged directly with customers on video calls to troubleshoot issues, while also owning DevOps responsibilities including API performance diagnosis, release rollbacks, and system reliability.

Nuxt.jsVue.jsRustPostgreSQLUI/UXDevOpsAWSGoogle CloudCloudflare

2012 – 2018

Full Stack Engineer

Filmhub · Santa Monica, California

Co-developed the core platform for a video distribution marketplace serving Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, Apple TV+, and dozens of other major Video on Demand services, enabling filmmakers to upload once and distribute everywhere.

Built a high-performance, resumable, multi-threaded video ingestion pipeline that processed hundreds of terabytes of uncompressed video for cloud-based transcoding and delivery to streaming platforms.
Designed and built tools that simplified complex workflows for filmmakers — including metadata submission, distribution rights management, legal documents, and international tax compliance.
Studied and reverse-engineered subtitle tools written in other languages to design and build a Ruby-based solution that automatically validated and converted caption files across the format requirements of different streaming services.
Built the initial Drupal-based MVP, then led the full platform migration to Ruby on Rails, including user data migration, to support the company's growth and scaling demands.

Ruby on RailsPostgreSQLJavaScriptUI/UXAWSCloudDrupal

2011 – 2025

Full Stack Engineer

AnalystForum

Sole engineer behind all technical design, development, and operations for the world's largest CFA candidate community — supporting over 40,000 users, 100,000+ discussions, and millions of posts.

Designed a modern, responsive UI/UX theme that transformed the platform's look and feel — delivering a polished, intuitive experience that belied the utilitarian Drupal system underneath.
Led the full platform migration from Drupal to Discourse, building a custom data migration tool and SQL queries to seamlessly transition over 100,000 discussions and millions of posts.
Developed custom Discourse theme and plugins that enhanced the community experience and optimized ad placements that were a primary revenue driver for the site.
Implemented advanced caching, Apache Solr search, and Linux server performance tuning that dramatically improved page load times, search speed, and overall uptime.

UI/UXDrupalDiscoursePHPSQLApache SolrDevOps

2010 – 2012

Web Developer

Klaus Badelt Studios & Labelzero · Santa Monica, California

Transformed high-fidelity design comps into a responsive Drupal theme and custom modules for award-winning film composer Klaus Badelt (known for Pirates of the Caribbean and other major Hollywood scores), managing multisite deployment and ongoing development across the studio and its independent music label.

DrupalTheme Development

2009 – 2020

Web Designer / Developer

Grip Media

Core developer for a full-service web agency, converting Photoshop and Illustrator designs into responsive websites and custom themes for WordPress, Drupal, and other CMS platforms.

Notable clients included VanderHouwen, Oregon Medical Association, San Mateo County Medical Association, The Art of Mike Mignola, GiGi’s Café, and Green Giant Fresh.
Managed multiple concurrent projects across an 11-year engagement, delivering consistently from design handoff through launch and ongoing maintenance.

WordPressDrupalUI/UXAgency

2005 – 2006

Director of Multimedia

First Family Church · Whittier, California

Led the Media Department of First Family Church, overseeing all aspects of multimedia production including video editing, graphic design, print materials, web design, and live production.

Managed a team of volunteers, from camera operators to live production assistants, providing training and guidance to ensure high-quality multimedia content that aligned with the church’s mission and vision.
Produced engaging video content for weekly services and special events.
Created promotional materials and event graphics that supported the church’s outreach and engagement efforts.

PhotoshopIllustratorInDesignPrint DesignWeb DesignVideo EditingFinal Cut Pro

2005 – 2012

IT Department

Power Plus · Anaheim, California

Provided IT support across all Southern California locations for Power Plus, a leading national provider of temporary power solutions, industrial generator rentals, and maintenance & repair services.

Built, upgraded, and repaired workstations and laptops, ensuring reliable performance for day-to-day operations for employees.
Resolved employee technical issues on-site and remotely.
Assisted with the rollout of VoIP phone systems across all locations.

HardwareIT SupportSecurityNetwork

2001 – 2009

Co-Founder

TutorialForums.com / Neverside.com

Co-founded TutorialForums.com, which grew into a popular online community for web designers and developers during the early web design era, then led its redesign and rebranding to Neverside.com on a custom-built platform with new features for sharing and collaborating on artwork and photography.

CommunityCustom PlatformWeb Design

1999 – Present

Founder

AbsoluteCross.com

Founded one of the leading independent resources for Adobe Photoshop tutorials and seamless textures in the early 2000s, publishing guides and design assets downloaded hundreds of thousands of times.

Grew the site to 10,000 daily visitors through SEO and competitive keyword rankings, while owning all design, development, content strategy, and ad monetization.
Recently migrated the site from legacy Drupal 6 to Hugo on Netlify using Claude Code, modernizing the stack and eliminating long-standing security vulnerabilities.

PhotoshopDrupalHugoNetlifySEOContent Strategy

1998

Web Design Contractor

Big Time Media Inc. · San Clemente, California

Contracted as a web designer for a web development agency while still in high school, building websites for the agency’s clients during the early days of the commercial web.

HTMLPhotoshopAgency

2018 – Present

Full Stack Engineer

TagniFi

Designed and built a powerful search interface with Nuxt.js that enables customers to explore and analyze billions of financial data points, integrating seamlessly with a Rust/PostgreSQL/Snowflake backend.
Translated direct user feedback into full-stack features, iterating closely with customers to refine how they search, organize, visualize, and work with financial data.
Redesigned and rebuilt internal tools for staff analysts, replacing a slow, error-prone legacy system with a modern, user-friendly solution for processing SEC filings, mapping financial data, and managing customer accounts — significantly improving efficiency and team satisfaction.
Engaged directly with customers on video calls to troubleshoot issues, while also owning DevOps responsibilities including API performance diagnosis, release rollbacks, and system reliability.

Nuxt.jsVue.jsRustPostgreSQLUI/UXDevOpsAWSGoogle CloudCloudflare

2012 – 2018

Full Stack Engineer

Filmhub · Santa Monica, California

Built a high-performance, resumable, multi-threaded video ingestion pipeline that processed hundreds of terabytes of uncompressed video for cloud-based transcoding and delivery to streaming platforms.
Designed and built tools that simplified complex workflows for filmmakers — including metadata submission, distribution rights management, legal documents, and international tax compliance.
Studied and reverse-engineered subtitle tools written in other languages to design and build a Ruby-based solution that automatically validated and converted caption files across the format requirements of different streaming services.
Built the initial Drupal-based MVP, then led the full platform migration to Ruby on Rails, including user data migration, to support the company's growth and scaling demands.

Ruby on RailsPostgreSQLJavaScriptUI/UXAWSCloudDrupal

2011 – 2025

Full Stack Engineer

AnalystForum

Sole engineer behind all technical design, development, and operations for the world's largest CFA candidate community — supporting over 40,000 users, 100,000+ discussions, and millions of posts.

Designed a modern, responsive UI/UX theme that transformed the platform's look and feel — delivering a polished, intuitive experience that belied the utilitarian Drupal system underneath.
Led the full platform migration from Drupal to Discourse, building a custom data migration tool and SQL queries to seamlessly transition over 100,000 discussions and millions of posts.
Developed custom Discourse theme and plugins that enhanced the community experience and optimized ad placements that were a primary revenue driver for the site.
Implemented advanced caching, Apache Solr search, and Linux server performance tuning that dramatically improved page load times, search speed, and overall uptime.

UI/UXDrupalDiscoursePHPSQLApache SolrDevOps

2010 – 2012

Web Developer

Klaus Badelt Studios & Labelzero · Santa Monica, California

DrupalTheme Development

2009 – 2020

Web Designer / Developer

Grip Media

Core developer for a full-service web agency, converting Photoshop and Illustrator designs into responsive websites and custom themes for WordPress, Drupal, and other CMS platforms.

Notable clients included VanderHouwen, Oregon Medical Association, San Mateo County Medical Association, The Art of Mike Mignola, GiGi’s Café, and Green Giant Fresh.
Managed multiple concurrent projects across an 11-year engagement, delivering consistently from design handoff through launch and ongoing maintenance.

WordPressDrupalUI/UXAgency

2005 – 2006

Director of Multimedia

First Family Church · Whittier, California

Led the Media Department of First Family Church, overseeing all aspects of multimedia production including video editing, graphic design, print materials, web design, and live production.

Managed a team of volunteers, from camera operators to live production assistants, providing training and guidance to ensure high-quality multimedia content that aligned with the church’s mission and vision.
Produced engaging video content for weekly services and special events.
Created promotional materials and event graphics that supported the church’s outreach and engagement efforts.

PhotoshopIllustratorInDesignPrint DesignWeb DesignVideo EditingFinal Cut Pro

2005 – 2012

IT Department

Power Plus · Anaheim, California

Provided IT support across all Southern California locations for Power Plus, a leading national provider of temporary power solutions, industrial generator rentals, and maintenance & repair services.

Built, upgraded, and repaired workstations and laptops, ensuring reliable performance for day-to-day operations for employees.
Resolved employee technical issues on-site and remotely.
Assisted with the rollout of VoIP phone systems across all locations.

HardwareIT SupportSecurityNetwork

2001 – 2009

Co-Founder

TutorialForums.com / Neverside.com

CommunityCustom PlatformWeb Design

1999 – Present

Founder

AbsoluteCross.com

Founded one of the leading independent resources for Adobe Photoshop tutorials and seamless textures in the early 2000s, publishing guides and design assets downloaded hundreds of thousands of times.

Grew the site to 10,000 daily visitors through SEO and competitive keyword rankings, while owning all design, development, content strategy, and ad monetization.
Recently migrated the site from legacy Drupal 6 to Hugo on Netlify using Claude Code, modernizing the stack and eliminating long-standing security vulnerabilities.

PhotoshopDrupalHugoNetlifySEOContent Strategy

1998

Web Design Contractor

Big Time Media Inc. · San Clemente, California

Contracted as a web designer for a web development agency while still in high school, building websites for the agency’s clients during the early days of the commercial web.

HTMLPhotoshopAgency

/ Featured Projects

Web Application / SaaS

TagniFi

TagniFi is a financial data platform that provides affordable access to public and private company data, M&A transactions, private equity information, and over 3 billion financial data points via its search console and Excel add-in, primarily serving middle-market valuation, advisory, and corporate development professionals.

Nuxt.js Vue.js Rust PostgreSQL UI/UX DevOps AWS Google Cloud Cloudflare

TagniFi Console

An intuitive web-based search engine for quickly accessing over 3 billion financial data points, including public and private company profiles, M&A transactions, private equity firms/investors, financial and legal advisors, people/executives, and economic/industry data.

Excel Add-In

Seamlessly connects Excel models to the full dataset for automating tasks like public comps, transaction comps, DCFs, interest rate/bond yield analysis, historical beta/volatility, and more. Includes a user-friendly Function Builder, one-click data refresh, and audit trails for standardized values.

Comprehensive Datasets

Public company fundamentals (standardized via XBRL for consistency).
Private company data (including middle-market and founder-owned firms).
M&A transaction comps and deal details.
Private equity data (firms, funds, investors).
Guideline public comps, transaction comps, and valuation multiples.
Additional data like closed-end mutual funds, corporate bonds, footnotes, and divisional/segment analysis.

TagniFi Research

In-depth industry reports covering 350+ U.S. industries and quarterly economic updates, integrated directly into the platform for market analysis and valuation support.

Saved Lists & Exports

Customizable saved searches/lists (with custom columns in enhanced versions), CSV exports, and tools for managing and analyzing datasets.

Other Tools: API access for custom applications, pre-built Excel models (e.g., closed-end fund tearsheets for DLOC analysis), and features tailored for valuation, M&A, private equity, and corporate development workflows.

TagniFi emphasizes affordability, data consistency, and being purpose-built for middle-market professionals rather than large investment banks.

Web Application / SaaS

Filmhub

Filmhub is a global film and television sales and distribution company that modernizes entertainment delivery by providing a tech-powered platform for filmmakers, producers, and rights holders to upload content, license it to streaming services and platforms worldwide, and monetize it while retaining rights.

Ruby on Rails PostgreSQL JavaScript UI/UX AWS Cloud Drupal

/ Multimedia

Commercial

Becks

Background music (unofficial) for a Becks commercial.

Trailer

Return of the King Trailer

Trailer music (unofficial) created for Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.

Commercial

iPod Commercial

Replacement music for an iPod commercial, created in the style of the original.

Film Score

Sci-Fi Film Score

Soundtrack for the short Sci-Fi film Divas of Novella, directed by Tim Russ (Star Trek).

/ Skills & Technologies

Frontend & UI/UX

Nuxt.js

Vue.js

TypeScript

JavaScript

Pinia

Vuex

Vite

SASS/SCSS

HTML

CSS

Responsive Design

UI/UX

Bootstrap

Tailwind CSS

Backbone.js

Highcharts

amCharts

Chart.js

Backend & Frameworks

Ruby on Rails

Ruby

Rust

Node.js

PHP

REST APIs

Database & Caching

PostgreSQL

MySQL

SQLite

Redis

Memcached

AI Tools

Claude

Copilot

DevOps & Cloud

Docker

Git

GitHub CI/CD

SendGrid

AWS

AWS Cognito

AWS EC2

AWS S3

AWS RDS

AWS OpsWorks

Google Cloud

Cloudflare

Netlify

Linode

DigitalOcean

Nginx

Ansible

Linux

Testing & QA

Playwright

Cypress

Vitest

Checkly

RSpec

Minitest

Capybara

Mocha

Chai

Design & Productivity

Adobe

Affinity

Balsamiq

OmniGraffle

Linear

Slack

Basecamp

Platforms & CMS

WordPress

Drupal

Discourse

Hugo

Astro

/ What I’m Learning

Practical Object-Oriented Design, An Agile Primer Using Ruby

Getting Started with Laravel

Pimsleur – Spanish

/ Contact Me

GitHub

github.com/dnewkerk

linkedin.com/in/davidnewkerk

Email

contact@davidnewkerk.com