An introduction (sorry it’s a bit long)

[lizardillo]

Hi all,

I am new to the forums so would just like to say hello. My name is Liz and I am from Tamworth, Staffordshire in the UK. I am using England’s never-ending lockdown as an opportunity try and restart my career and to follow the path that I always wanted to do.

I graduated as a Graphic Designer and have worked for some international design and advertising agencies full-time and freelance for the past nearly 20 years but I feel now is the right time to make the change. When I left my full-time job in 2014 and set myself up as Lizardillo (‘Lizard’ was my nickname and ‘illo’ is for illustration’) I had originally aimed to become more of an illustrator. I have ended up just doing my old graphic design/Artworker job as freelance but now it’s time to work as the ‘illo’ part of my name. When working for advertising agencies any illustration work was mainly for large corporate companies so I had to adapt style to the project and the client, I’m just getting back to finding my own style again. I feel my actual rendering is a bit too mainstream but I like to try and add personality and lots of little jokes/details to my illustrations. I like humour and to try and make people smile.

I have been listening to SVS podcasts and watching the courses for the past year and now is the time to put them into practice.

I have been looking through the posts and absolutely loving everyone’s work and comments. I am really looking forward to joining the community of like-minded people and hopefully contribute some practical advice from my general design industry experience as well as learn from others.

My website is lizardillo.co.uk which is a bit of a jumble of styles and projects at the moment.

Looking forward to joining you all.

Sorry about the long post - here is a duck eating a doughnut (donut?) to say thank you for reading (it’s a Eurasian Teal).

Thanks

Liz

[Kim Rosenlof]

Welcome!
Wow! Your portfolio looks great! I especially love the t-shirts! They are really fun and I want to hang out with those animals ! Great job!

[hayleyannececil]

Hi! I'm just jumping in after a year of lurking also!

[lizardillo]

@Kim-Rosenlof thank you

[lizardillo]

@hayleyannececil hiya!

[hayleyannececil]

Just had a look at your website, looks great! And I agree about the tshirts, super cute

[lizardillo]

@hayleyannececil thank you, I’ve just had a look at your lovely IG. I really can’t draw people so avoid them but your characters are great.

[KaraDaniel]

Welcome Liz!

[KayPotter]

Nice to meet you!

[Jacy13]

@lizardillo Welcome! I love the duck, haha. Can't wait to see more of your work

[Valerie Light]

Hello, welcome! I'm new here too. Thanks for sharing your portfolio- I really admire it! You have such a strong set of skills, and your website presents them well. Nice work!

May I ask, since you're new and have figured this out already- how do you change your forum icon into something cool, like your Lizard illo logo?

[lizardillo]

@Valerie-Light Thank you for those lovely comments, I have done a lot of corporate illustration while working at design agencies so I have to be a bit of a jack-of-all-trades and draw in what style fits the client brand and brief, so there are quite a few different styles on my site. My work has dried up recently (yeah, thanks covid! ) so I'm using the opportunity to be the real me and do the career I set out to do many years ago, although I have been trying to do this off and on for years! Big brands don't seem to want donut eating ducks for some reason

To edit my profile pic I clicked on the profile pic circle, went to edit settings and it says "change picture" under the profile roundel on the profile page

[lizardillo]

@KaraDaniel Thank you

[lizardillo]

@Jacy13 Thank you. I've just looked at your Instagram and thought you may be interested in drawing challenge I'm doing this month called "Amfibuary" but I've just noticed you've already seen about it. Looking forward to an amphibious month

[lizardillo]

@KayPotter Hiya Kay, nice to meet you too

[Jacy13]

@lizardillo Yes! I'm very excited about it, haha

[Nyrryl Cadiz]

@lizardillo hi! welcome to the forum!

[Lynniesketches]

@lizardillo Hi Liz! Nice to meet you. I'm quite a newbie here as well. Totally agree with comments above, your t-shirt designs are awesome!

[lizardillo]

@Nyrryl-Cadiz hiya thank you

[lizardillo]

@Lynniesketches hiya, thank you. I’m loving to forum so far, I don’t know why I waited a year to join. I’m loving meeting new people and seeing their art. I enjoy doing designs like the shirts. They are sold by a third-party to add to his merchandise range so I have no idea how well they sell unfortunately I would love to try and have my own character-based range one day but I think I have a lot to work on before that point.