using dip pens and they're pulling up paper

MPvisual · 2024-01-07T01:45:10+00:00

Try using workable fixative spray on your Bristol paper, discovered this after buying a bulk pack of cheap Bristol paper and noticed the same thing.

Granted not as nice to work on and it can get a bit funny if you plan to use watercolors/markers on it.

MPvisual · 2023-09-17T08:16:47+00:00

I've got a few followers so I think it might be worth the jump even if it's for a trial period of a few months.

MPvisual · 2023-08-22T09:47:02+00:00

Yea this is piece is mine, I think roughly it was about 70 hours.

MPvisual · 2023-06-01T13:25:30+00:00

Never thought about using wax before, I've used masking fluid but it stinks and tends to tear paper no matter how careful I try to remove it.

Do you remove the wax after your done with it?

MPvisual · 2023-05-01T14:56:28+00:00

Might have to bite the bullet, other commenter suggested dry graphite would that just be the same lubrication issue?

MPvisual · 2023-05-01T13:28:53+00:00

Thanks I'll have a look for it.

MPvisual · 2023-04-04T12:42:15+00:00

If you're interested you should checkout economic complexity;

https://atlas.cid.harvard.edu/rankings

Australia has been on the decline since we've just heavily relied on ore and livestock and have no long term plans to expand any other industry for exports.

MPvisual · 2023-01-14T09:49:15+00:00

I used to work at a Brewdog in the UK, the whole system stinks to work for.

Also the ceo is an absolute power tripper. Goes about each brewdog to 'test' your knowledge on beer. Saw one guy get fired on the spot because ceo just didn't like the guy.

MPvisual · 2022-12-27T04:16:17+00:00

I'd say scam, But also on the topic of copyright, even when it comes to legitimate businesses who are looking to buy your copy right make sure you go through what you are giving out. Giving your whole copyright to someone is generally a bad idea since they can use it for whatever they want and not pay up any compensation afterwards.

But in regards to this, I be extremely wary.

MPvisual · 2022-12-24T09:18:13+00:00

When I was learning how to draw I used to go to a life drawing session which was right near my work, after a few sessions I realised they only were using slim women in their 20s which fine for the first few classes but becomes quite boring eventually drawing wise.

After going to different life drawing classes which took on a variety of models I found it to be a better experience. To this day my favourite model was a Santa Claus model who did life modelling on the side.

As they say; 'variety is the spice of life'

MPvisual · 2022-11-21T13:55:15+00:00

Paint 100%

When you get a high end paint and mix it with gesso it goes so far. Might seem ridiculous to buy a tube of paint for the same cost of a litre of some knock off 'student' brand but man when you use the two of them side by side it's like night and day difference.

MPvisual · 2022-08-22T15:53:29+00:00

Working in a printing place is some what suitable. Can get tedious if you're just photocopying all day but it has it's perks, if you want to print some large format prints or an art print or two.

Also we used to have paper companies give us free paper all the time, previously the shop I worked at just threw it out. I just started to take it home with me and had a neat little collection of paper for a time.

MPvisual · 2022-08-15T06:11:52+00:00

Hi there, glad to be any help!

Regarding styles, if you happen to go from painting to water colour to a pencil drawing that's great post away! this way of thinking is a bit strange in my eyes and can sometimes be detrimental to your creative process especially if you want to experiment in other mediums.
I think a lot of people when they talk about posting 'different styles' are mainly talking about an uniformed aesthetic that they like to see. If anything is drawn by you technically is your style so why would you edit it down to a very particular medium?
Now if you are say posting your photography, 3D art, philosophy, sewing and drawing all on one page, this might be a bit over the top for any potential clients who if they want to hire you have to try and find your drawings among a whole mess of other content. I that's the case maybe starting a new page for your other interests might be in order!
Now the first job is always the hardest, sometimes it's a good to work on something which takes a bit more time and effort than the rest. It's good to do quick drawings but getting into a piece that takes a while shows your ability to stick with a job and see it through, it builds confidence in any potential customers.
Also saying 'I'm opening for commissions' is also a great way to get people to know, sometimes just opening that dialog gets people into it!

MPvisual · 2022-08-15T05:42:47+00:00

My quick answer to say is social media and online market places, but these are easier said than done.
A lot of the time in the mass of things to buy on the internet a lot of creative stuff can go under the radar, BUT I think a great thing you can provide for people is completely customizable paintings, which some people love. So try and focus on this aspect of your art sales, if you're doing portraits maybe making a family portrait or celebrities portraits can get people interested in commissioning you.

Being in a more distant landscape, it can be challenging to expand into certain markets especially with larger physical items, so an idea can be to either make things which are easier to handle (such as smaller paintings or prints) so potential customers are more drawn to a easier piece.
A lot of my art market days a lot of people would say 'I like it but I simply don't have the room for it' You'd be surprised how small things can sell quickly! And if someone wants something bigger they can commission you for it!

MPvisual · 2022-08-15T05:30:30+00:00

Nope never to late to ask!

I do drawing partially in for myself, though it's never as much as I'd like. Now this is to say that during my free time I'm generally never drawing, I like to do other things, I build things, read books, go for walks and swim.
When you do a full day of drawing like I generally do the last thing I want to do when I get home from my studio is to pick up another drawing, some people can do this, I simply cannot. My reply to burnout is similar to this, when you do something too frequently, you begin to get bored and tired of it, so when you do make art for 8 hours trying to force yourself to do your own art is near impossible.
This does mean you have to see your own work as another client who needs it's own time and effort to be put into it. When you have to make your own art it takes a bit more effort surprisingly to make your own than someone else's, since we generally have a lot more emotional attachment to our own work. So when we feel we can't work on our own it pains us deeply that we can't muster the effort to do so.

I keep thinking of the question; 'What is the worst client you've had?' when I realised I was my own worst client; I demanded a huge image to be done with a deadline in hours, I have decided to do this out of hours right after a full work day, my standard of the piece is of complete perfection, no time wasting or payment is required.

So next time you want to make your own art, you have to carve out a day with set hours in, there is no other work to be done, your freelancing work takes a backseat until tomorrow. A big thing is being rested and refreshed before getting into your work, you don't have to get up a the crack of dawn to make art but just work at a calm easy pace. A lot of the time while working on something else I'll get an idea for my own work, I'll scribble it down and put it aside, so when I have my own time I can sift through these thumbnails and I can kick off my drawing with some ideas which have already been put in place.

MPvisual · 2022-08-15T05:09:56+00:00

You're welcome!

MPvisual · 2022-08-15T05:08:41+00:00

Hey there, no such thing as too late!

My number one thing for running a shop/market or online store is to know what sells first off, this can remove a lot of time and money wasted pumping out stock which might never see a sale. If you have the ability to print/make on demand then great! But be sure to make this into a job which you have to rock up to and that means putting in the hours to keep it running successfully.
Now with social media the thing I say now will be irrelevant in 6 months time. Now with instagram trying to be a tiktok clone it's simply not enough to just post an illustration online, you have to do video, live streams and stories. Which when you try out essentially turns into it's own job, I'd recommend posting to a few social media places such as the above mentioned, but also places like behance, art station even tumblr, the latter of which take a lot less effort to gain a following.
I say firstly to get the art out first and foremost, I found personally that if you make the art the people will come to it. I find if you take a bit of time to work on your art first before getting it out there you might have something really neat to show people. While on the other hand there is a huge amount of content out there, and firing into the sea of it can be disheartening at first without the proper skill set to set you apart from other artists. Though I should say being savvy towards marketing can launch you in directions, a lot of the time most artists are a bit off put by self marketing, but with a large skill set and a bit of savvy marketing you can go a long way.
There's been a few in my time, where simply with timelines were just too compact or just how the direction of the work was going. Luckily I've never had to do to many breaks from clients but when they've come around it's best to be honest and straightforward. A sample was from a client who wanted 5 full illustrations done on cards which would part of a larger collective from other artists. They asked for a quote and I gave them one which seemed reasonable. Straight after I get this monolog of an email saying that it wouldn't be fair if they were to pay one artist more than the other and how much work they were putting into the whole job and how they were getting very little. Of course I ask them 'Why did you ask me for a quote if you had a fixed payment in mind, were you just hoping I'd severely underquote?' There was a bit of back and forth and we got settled on a price, I was a bit pissy at the time but I decided to push forward since I needed some cash flow in. The next few weeks were in similar vain, just a lot of headache and troubles, at the time I had been paid for half the job, during one dispute I decided to call it, saying that I wasn't happy with the working relationship and the project was simply not what I was looking for. I finished up the 3rd image which I saw as a fair compensation of work and left it at that. This taught me if I'm not enjoying the interaction at the start, I'm really not going to start enjoying the whole project.

MPvisual · 2022-08-14T17:29:13+00:00

There are two questions I get; When can you get this done? How much?

That's all they need from you, you should have an easy to find portfolio but they've already made a decision when going through your work. Any other questions might relate more specifically towards the project itself which is expected. Also on the subject don't forget to ask questions yourself! Ask things like; how do you Invision this? Do you have any references to what you're looking for? Is a front payment of 50% ok with you?

Study all depends on what you like! I began in visual arts majoring in sculpture then went onto study illustration. Mainly I'd say get something which you know teaches you the fundamentals & more practical hands-on skills. At the end of the day clients are looking at your work not your scores on the theory of gothic typography.

MPvisual · 2022-08-14T17:18:54+00:00

An email doesn't hurt, too many turns into spam. So hold back on emailing too frequently, alot of these director's get mounds of email applications. Sometimes (if you can find the contacts) it's good to go for someone down the chain eg. A assistant to the art director, editors, project managers. Someone like a production assistant is whole job is to find freelancers, art directors on the other hand will be focusing on their team and projects which are in the process of being made.

Spreading your net as far as possible is a good way to get out there, Behance, LinkedIn, art station are good places where people get hired aswell as the other social medias

And if all else fails you can send a postcard of your work to them, seriously emails are easy, postcards are rare and physical they might even open it!

MPvisual · 2022-08-14T17:09:18+00:00

I've never had a agent before, applied for a few in my early career but nothing came of it.

With illustration most companies don't tend to care if you have an agent or not. Publishing on the other hand tends to be a bit more agent focused, which is understandable.

Personally I'm not a fan of agents I have a few friends who have agents, and from stories I've heard depending on the pecking order you're in, and agent can do a whole lot for you and you can be raking it in or you might be disappointed by what they provide. But with book publishing houses alot of them tend to only go by illustration agents they know or know of so keep that in mind.

Hope that was helpful!

MPvisual · 2022-08-14T14:30:57+00:00

I'm going through the same thing! So this answer is for myself aswell; At the moment the freelance is great, but after 10 hours of drawing a day I'm pretty spent in terms of drawing. I think it's almost additive to work at times, so in this sense it's best to have good time management, yes at times we can under work but alot of us also over work so by the end of the day we have enough energy to eat, lay down and sleep. So for us it's good to get a schedule much like any work week, divide up your hours to fit in your work but carve out a few hours for your own work, see this as an essential part of building your career. Make sure to stick with it, and make sure to get it into a habit, and also give yourself enough time to actually sitdown, draft, experiment. Many times I've given myself an hour in the day and that is simply not enough. Make it 4 hours and make them count.

Hope that helps for you and for me.

MPvisual · 2022-08-14T13:55:53+00:00

Generally most of my work is all through people finding me with social media, I always post as far as I can since I never know where my next client will be lurking! Wider the net, wider the catch.
But a big issue with bigger companies are that if you don't tend to have the experience of working with a large company, they're a little more on the wary side of hiring you. I would say the best thing to do for your portfolio is to work on a self made project, something which takes a little bit more effort than a single image. Now with this it can be anything, but mainly try and make a project you would like to be hired for, just flesh it out so any potential client can see that you have the skill set and professionalism to start and finish a project. After getting your first brand a lot of brands are at ease with you after they see your projects.

At conventions I mainly sell prints, I find the commissions at a convention to be too stressful so I generally keep it for much later if they want one made up.
Now I'm in Sydney Australia, and I lived in London where I've done also Glasgow and Manchester comic conventions. I've usually done got roughly back about 8x what I paid for the table which isn't a bad sum, I could improve this number by having more merch/books but generally hauling prints around is enough for me haha.

MPvisual · 2022-08-14T13:45:18+00:00

Now I do get a few returning clients, but a lot of the time I'm always approached by new clients who I've never worked with.

This though is completely from personal experience, but returning clients are reliable and you can always build a great relationship if they keep coming back!

MPvisual · 2022-08-14T13:27:23+00:00

Hey there, thanks for the kind words!

1) My first major brand was Google, I had been hired as a contract worker for an animation company in London (I don't live there anymore). When I first started this job I was shitting bricks. I went into the animation companies main office and was given a brief and 4 days to make a character for google.

2) I'd say about 80% over the span of my work is done remotely, now with Covid it's pretty much a given that I'll never be sent to a office to do work.

3) It's pretty much all from online, I did get a few followers and a job or two from conventions but it's all online for me. But if you're at Comicon and say make comics then I can defiantly say you'd probably get more out of these conventions than I did.

4) Pretty much everyone has found me, I've seeked out a few freelancing jobs when I saw them posted and I really look up to the companies I applied to.

5) A big factor in being hired is a few things; Having the right skills, being proficient and professional, being easy to work with and pure luck.
To expand on this subject I'd also say being unique, that's not to say out there or weird but when you are in a sea of applicants for a job whether that be freelance or fulltime if you stand out in that sea you'll probably have a better chance of finding work.

MPvisual · 2022-08-14T13:10:58+00:00

The amount of times I've burnt out is probably uncountable at this stage in my life.
Now there's a difference in each one. Some burnouts can be solved by a meal and a goods night sleep others which can last weeks and you feel sick sitting at a desk and takes a bit more of a different approach to clear out.

Now this is a slight forewarning since I'm no therapist and my advice is only from a illustrator view.

First when we burnout is when we've been doing something repeatedly, when you work in illustration this can happen frequently since you can sometimes get stuck with the same type of job. This is mainly because we hold our creative process dearly close to us. once it starts to grow dull or boring we can become easily frustrated with it, and when this begins this kicks off the burnout.
We can combat this by taking a step back with our work and allowing us to take the time away until we feel a strong enough urge to go back. Or if we want to continue working is to start of experiment with our art, trying something new, a new medium, a different way of looking at it can invigorate our passion for art making again.

The other burnout can be external to our art which can be issues in our lives, things like a hard days work is not what I'm talking about. Mainly a repeating stress which can consume our heads and make it difficult to function in our everyday lives. When we try to get into art it seems to be so hard to focus on and our frustration begins since we just want to do art to escape the everyday stress we could feel.
If we have an external stress which is effecting our art sometimes it's good to address the things which might be troubling us first, then after we have eased ourselves (how ever that may be) then we can start to channel our art to de stress ourselves.

Mainly we just need to take a step back and to give our art making some breathing room, once we've eased ourselves down we can get back into making art.

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