Story first · titles later

Dennis Arriaza

Born June 1987. Mayan, Guatemalan, first generation, raised in Southern California by people who crossed a border on faith alone. Fourteen schools, a lot of broken bones, and a permanent inability to leave a thing unopened.

I'm a dad of three girls first. After that, in no order that matters: photographer, audio engineer, rider, drummer, fixer, the guy people call at 2am, and someone who has never once looked at a broken system and been able to walk away from it.

This is not my business site. This is the actual person — the whole timeline, the thoughts, the half-finished ideas, the stuff I don't say out loud. How much of it you see is up to how well we know each other.

Pick a door Start at 1987

Dennis Arriaza

Pick a door

Different sides, same guy

Eight of them. Tap one — it opens right here, and it opens further the better we know each other.

1987 → now

The long way around

Montclair to Rialto to Texas and back. Fourteen schools. Drums at church at fourteen. A camera at twenty-four that redirected everything. A brother I lost in 2015. Three daughters. It's all in order, and it opens up as you go.

Read the timeline

Right now

What I'm actually into

Two wheels and anything with a motor. Drums, and four other instruments I'm worse at. A Celestron pointed at whatever's clear that night. Hiking. Gaming since the Atari. Playing sports, never watching them. Taking apart things that were working fine. Writing a biography my grandkids will read.

And yes, I work

The business half

Elevated Media Group

Photography, video, audio engineering, design, AV consulting. Since 2008. One operator, every discipline.

The work side

Everything else in flight

Elevated Collective for artists. Nimra, the software. Sunday mornings at the console. A studio getting built one wall at a time.

All my links

Further in

How far do you want to go?

The public version of me is honest but shallow — it has to be. Everything past that is by clearance: you ask, I decide by hand, and the site opens up. Doors get deeper. The timeline fills in. The blog stops being polite.

Request clearance