A Polk State College student is using his experience from the Air Force and his talent with a paintbrush to dominate a national competition.

Scott Whitley said he was taking a break from painting when he saw an ad on his Xbox about a design competition.

He entered the Forza Horizon 2 design competition and is now one of the four finalists. He designed a car for the competition using only the materials on the screen.

“There’s an advertisement,” Whitley said. “And if you just click on it, then it just takes you to the page and there’s four different car designs and mines one of the designs.”

The 37-year-old said his creative juices flow well after he turns the game system off. Whitley is an art major with some pretty impressive work under his belt.

“I put two pieces in the Polk State art show,” he said. “Like a student exhibit and they were photographs that I took for class and the school bought one of them and the other one won best in show.”

Some of his artwork captures his time he spent in the Air Force and helping others.

So you can see why his time playing video games isn’t something his professors at Polk State discourage.

“Actually I didn’t even know he was playing video games that much,” Polk State Professor, David Woods said. “I had no idea and then when he came in and told us, that it was quite a surprise, and when I saw the artwork -- the design of it is beautiful.

"So I think it’s a great example of what he’s learned and what he’s moving on to.”

Whitley says he just changed his major to art last semester, and he already knows it's the career path that’s going to take him to the next level. He said he never thought his career in the Air Force would lead to a career in art or land him in a video game competition.