Business of Illustration class is live!

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

@Rich-Green That's awesome that you got to meet Matthew Cordell, he does seem like a pretty great guy via social media etc...really awesome style.

All these questions about which way to go are all hard. I've spent many a night as you have too, trying to figure it all out. I've also watched your progression for sometime and it has been really great to watch. You should be really proud of all the time you have put in and what you are putting out.

One of the things I've done and it is a plus and a minus is I became really aware of my weaknesses ie perspective and detailed backgrounds. Keeping things simple from a design POV really helped.

When you look at my portfolio for the most part I'm highlighting my strengths ie simple designs/textures and people sort of, but at the same time as @Lee-White pointed out it highlights my weakness (perspective and backgrounds...I focus on characters way more then setting) so I'm working on fixing that in order to jump to the next level and let's be honest perspective may always be a bear for me. We may never ever get along! LOL But, besides maybe the forums, those illustrations where I am practicing techniques or experimenting a lot won't make it into my portfolio until I am much much more satisfied with the outcome.

I don't have any idea if that is the right way to go and Lee may say something different but I think for a portfolio overall you want to really analyze your strengths vs your weaknesses.

Does any of that makes sense?

Also if you love highly rendered styles keep pushing for it...overall I think it is a harder mountain to climb because it is way harder to pull of successfully and the level of competition is higher and since it takes longer can eat into your profit margins. Ultimately, you have to do what you love doing every day. What makes you wake up and put the brush to the canvas!! BTW, I LOVE your Bambi!!

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

@Lee-White I can certainly understand how being overbooked can spiral quickly. It's no wonder you set up a good time management plan, that is a ton to juggle.

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

I'm watching it for a second time. When you broke down all the ways to sell one image that blew my mind too and made me realize I should start doing more traditional paintings in addition to digital.

[Sarah LuAnn]

Just got finished listening (finally, haha). Lots of great info! But now I'm feeling nervous since I got through school with mostly B's ;-). I'll keep moving forward, though.

Definitely think the next thing on my list has to be to step back and not push myself to work for a week so I can get my office organized and functional, as well as setting a clearer schedule for what I want to do when. I'm pretty bad about keeping things organized but I definitely understand how it can help me.

I also wanted to share, for those who get easily distracted on the internet like me--I have a mac computer app I use called "self control" which helps me a lot. Basically it allows you to make a list of sites you want to block, and then you set a timer and it will just not allow you to use any of those websites for the amount of time you put on the timer. I bet this could work great alongside Lee's pomodoro technique--just set it for the 50 minutes or whatever that you want to focus on work, and you literally can't look at your email until the timer is up.

[A Former User]

Thank you so much for this class @Lee-White the information was great. My degree was in Fine Art, and I wonder what difference it would have made if a tutor had said to us "This is a terrible business model". It's so refreshing to hear honest and practical advice.

My biggest takeaways are that I definitely need to simplify my work process, put more figure work in my portfolio, and prove to potential clients that I would be a "safe pair of hands" for their project. The pomodoro timer has been amazing - it's like having a fitbit for creative work! Looking forward to the next videos!

[Rich Green]

It has been a few days since I watched this video and it is still having such a big impact on things here. I went into watching this course never expecting the section on being productive and efficient in your workday. I have been putting my version of the Pomodoro technique into use each day since and I can't believe how much I have gotten done. But even more so how much less stressed I feel too. I built in a daily walk with my dog, time out for exercise and a full day of work and it has been going so well so far. In these past few days alone I sketched and completed another full color illustration with the real life photo of a girl in it (this one was Alice in Wonderland) and it is probably some of my best posing/action of the illustrated characters along with some of my most detailed rendering work. I have completed many more of the base drawings for pages in one of the books I need to get completed. I am only a few pages away from having all 32 of them drawn out and ready for rendering. Here again some of my best work to date - taking into account perspective, character, environment - the list goes on and on but its all things I have been working on and become "aware" of from all of these courses here.

I have not yet figured out how I am going to approach rebuilding my portfolio just yet - but I am feeling so much more encouraged today than earlier this week. Thanks @Lee-White for such a great thought provoking class and @Charlie-Eve-Ryan for all of your input/comments here in this thread. It's all been so helpful!

[evilrobot]

This is clearly one of the best classes on the entire site. It's a must watch for anyone trying to break into any art related business or any kind of business for that matter. I'm also really looking forward to his upcoming water color classes.

[Dulcie]

@Charlie-Eve-Ryan Thanks! Yes you’re right that each market area can be SO different. For example, the current customers of our business (craft shops) are ONLY interested in craft products. They’re not interested in buying rights to the art itself, or buying products in other areas. So if I want to use the same art to sell giftwrap, art prints, greetings cards, etc (which would be nice), I have to go out and find a whole new set of customers..and I know from the experience of setting up the current business that it all takes a lot of time to build that up. Doesn’t mean it’s not worth doing, but I have to figure out how many plates I can spin at once and still keep it all going.

So yeah, I’d like to set up another website for the non-papercraft licensing, and then I think I’ll need yet another separate website for my children’s book illustration (my ideal destination!), which will be in a different enough style that I think it should be separate (judging from Lee’s previous posts about websites and self-branding and so on..). That’s been the tricky part for me recently - trying to work out how the different areas should be split up and branded.

[Will Terry]

@Dulcie Thank you! I think money often gets a bad wrap because often people do bad things with it or live a life out of balance in the pursuit of it.

Money is life. We can't live without it. Life is a good thing - so the pursuit of money can be a good thing. It takes skills to get more "life" with your art skills.

I embrace the idea of being a good businessman/woman because it means I can bring more life to my family.

People with jobs are glad that their employer is a good businessman/woman -so the notion that being savvy in business means you're not a good person is ridiculous and needs to be rejected.

I hope everyone who takes Lee's class learns skills that help them have a better life!

[Ace Connell]

Brilliant class @lee-white!

I'm addicted to Shark Tank now haha. It's like a show we used to have over here in the UK called Dragon's Den.

Do you broadly know what you have planned for the next lessons yet and also when the Editorial class is going live? I'm stoked to see a different style like that.

Take care Buddy!
Ace

[lyddie_lee]

This is odd I'm getting an error message on all the videos (Opps! that was suppose to happen. please check back) It's been about three hours now.

[Ace Connell]

@lyddie_lee I can't really help you, but I just checked and it's doing the same for me, too.

Ace

[Ace Connell]

@lyddie_lee Just checked again and everything's working again.

Ace

[lyddie_lee]

@Ace-Connell Thanks for the heads-up!

[Rob Smith]

@Lee-White Terrific class. I enjoyed every minute of your presentation. I really appreciate your "real life" examples. Thank you for putting this class together.

[kamiqueiroz]

Can´t wait to start this lesson! I´m doing Will´s Creative composition class and I´ll do this one after that.

[MOO]

@Lee-White I have a question. I've been watching the class a little at a time. I just finished it. I actually don't have a portfolio but I was thinking about putting one together. For children's book illustration you mentioned using 12 images. You also talked about sequential work. Would I put in three sets of four sequential pictures or something similar to that? I have some illustrations from an ABC book I illustrated but, should I be illustrating little bits of stories ? Do I just need to show that I can draw a character three ways in a setting that is like a story? I'm just curious. Thanks.

[karien]

It was a really eye-opener lesson and cant wait for the other lessons to be uploaded. Thanks for the great info!

[Kasey Snow]

Excited to take this class! Does this cover things like taxes as well?

[Ace Connell]

@Kasey-Snow No. Every country is different so it'd be impossible to include all. Nothing beats a good accountant. They'll save you more than they cost.

Ace