SDC22: Chris Shomo of Infinity Watchfaces Shares His Experiences
Chris Shomo
Founder, Infinity Watchfaces
My name is Chris Shomo and I’m the owner of Infinity Watchfaces - creator of dynamic, animated watch faces designed to "wow" the wearer and portray some of the powerful capabilities of the Samsung Galaxy Watch series. I graduated from the Savannah College of Art and Design in 2005. Here is a clip about me and the school.
My experiences at SDC
My SDC adventures started in 2017 and the awesome part was that Samsung invited me. I had been creating watch faces since the previous year when the Gear Watch Designer beta came out (now called Galaxy Watch Studio). My original intent was to start making them for myself because back in February of 2016 there were not many watch face options on Galaxy Apps (now Galaxy Store).
While experimenting with the design software I happened to read that I could create a seller account and start selling my designs. How cool would it be to make watch faces and let others experience them as well, right? Well that’s what I did. Millions of downloads later, people everywhere are wearing my designs. The most rewarding part is hearing back from the amazing folks from all over the Earth about how much they enjoy having Joe the running dog, Fred the Butterfly, dancing tigers, lighting bolts, unicorns, grooving astronauts, surfing aliens and more on their wrist. If I can bring a smile to someone’s face for a moment — offer them a happy escape from this crazy reality we are living in for just a bit, then I have accomplished my goal.
But back to SDC, WOW, can you imagine the look on my face when an email came in from one of the developers of Gear Watch Designer!? The Samsung Developers team was getting together a group of watch face and theme designers to have booths at the 2017 conference in San Francisco and my designs had sparked their attention. Not only that, they wanted me to speak during a session called Become a Gear Watch Designer! Money Making Tips and Tricks from Top Designers. How cool is that!?
When an opportunity like this presents itself, you have to jump at it. No hesitation. Throughout the Summer of 2017 I worked back and forth with the Samsung team, prepared the presentation materials, and I was off to San Francisco in October, excited and I’ll admit a little nervous. This was my first tech conference and words can’t describe how honored I felt to embark on this journey with Samsung Developers.
SDC 2017 was brilliant! Not only was Stan Lee (of Marvel Comics fame) there, but there were tech professionals from all over the industry, and from all over the world. Quickly, I discovered that this is the place to be if you want to reach out and network with other like-minded designers and developers. It’s a chance to be among the movers and shakers that have partnered or are looking to join up and be part of the Samsung family. The Samsung Developers team was so welcoming and soon most of my nerves had changed over to excitement... except on the day of the presentation.
I was thankful the Samsung team prepared us for the presentation so well and helped with a practice run-through before the audience and going live on YouTube. This allowed me to get all those butterflies out of my stomach and the experience went smoothly. So well, in fact, that this session’s presentation inspired many designers to jump into watch face design for Samsung smartwatches. One of my favorites, Avee, who has USA Design on Galaxy Store, later told me that this presentation is what got him started. He had developed a really cool hamster rolling game for the watch and I remember thinking—wow, he’s got a great future ahead of him. Well, now he has some of the most amazing watch faces out there!
In 2018, I was asked to participate in a watch face/theme gallery that was located at the entrance exhibit/booth area. Again, another amazing experience and a chance to reflect on how much Samsung Developer has grown to embrace the watch face design community. What started as a small section of designers the year before, introducing what can be created on the Galaxy Watches using the software, turned into a phenomenon of designers uploading their designs into the newly named "Galaxy Store" for people to enjoy.
In 2019, I was also able to attend and reconnect with awesome people I met throughout the years, and also got to finally meet some more designers and friends I knew from online chats.
By creating the Galaxy Watch Studio and wonderfully curating Galaxy Store, Samsung sparked a design community that ignited into brilliant designs dancing on their watch screens, which has truly set their watches apart from any other. I love showing off my Galaxy Watch with one of my dynamic, animated designs on it and the first thing out of their mouth is, "Wow, what kind of watch is that!?"
Thank you Samsung!
Chris Shomo, Founder of Infinity Watchfaces
Resources for sellers at Galaxy Store
We'd like to express our sincere thanks to Chris for sharing his experiences with us. As a notable seller on Samsung Galaxy Store, his success is an inspiration to all designers and developers looking for new channels to monetize their work.
For more information on signing up and selling on Galaxy Store, look into the Galaxy Store documentation. For assistance with setting up and starting your sales campaigns, the Galaxy Store discussion forums are where you can get great insights from Chris and other sellers.
We look forward to SDC 2022 in a few weeks. Join us online to watch the keynote and learn in the technical sessions at samsungdeveloperconference.com. Join us on Twitter, FaceBook, LinkedIn, and YouTube to continue the discussion.
