Computer Engineer, Bill Atkinson

Created groundbreaking technology to draw objects on the Macintosh Computer

Man in green sweater sitting cross legged with computer resting in his lap. He leans on the computer. His head is resting on folded arms which are resting on the computer in his lap.

In the 1980s smaller personal computers were filtering into my college experience. In a digital animation class I used an Amiga computer to make digital stick figures walk across a pixel based background. To type papers for art history classes, I used a friend’s portable IBM DOS computer. It was like an anvil with a handle. I used a Mac SE to type papers too. I loved the Mac’s chunky keyboard, the clicky-clocky sound of its potato-sized mouse and its smiling Mac SE icon at startup on its little gray display. In its small rectangular box form a Mac SE was cute and (user) friendly. And the whole “What you see is what you get” was true.

In 1990s San Francisco I worked simultaneous part time jobs. At most jobs I used a Mac. I entered data into FileMaker Pro for a small business owner and set type with Pagemaker for a small run printer. Within a few years I worked full time managing a sign shop where I used Adobe Illustrator to design and cut vinyl graphics. As an art director for a leasing and event company Quark Xpress was my go-to software for designing and producing printed collateral. Through the Mac’s text editor I built a website. Graphics software was easy to learn and use on a Mac.

Meet Bill Atkinson (illustration). He was an engineer who played a key role in the development of the Macintosh and invented many of the conventions that still persist on today’s computers, like menu bars. Atkinson also created QuickDraw, a groundbreaking technology to efficiently draw objects on a screen. One of those objects was the “Round-Rect”—a box with rounded corners that would become part of everyone’s computing experience. Atkinson became an Apple Fellow after completing work on the Mac. He began work on the Magic Slate, a precursor to the iPad, and developed software for HyperCard, a forerunner of the World Wide Web, proof of the viability of the hyperlinking concept.

Bill Atkinson died this year. In honor of his brilliance I created the illustration with the Procreate App on an iPad Pro and Apple Pencil.