I had planned on joining the SVS community eventually, but this virus and quarantine sped up my plans. So here's a bit about myself.

My name is Lauren, and I am a high school graphic design and animation teacher from the Central Valley of California. I've been wanting to get my freelance career off the ground since I started teaching five years ago. My original plan when I was in college was to go into the animation/illustration industry, but plans changed. Now that I'm settled into my teaching job I have been able to work with a local author illustrating story ideas, which has been both stressful and fun. In fact, it's one of the reasons I wanted to join SVS, to sharpen my skills!

Here's a couple of examples of my work (some things I did for Inktober, and a character design for one of my DnD characters....one of my favorite pastimes!). I'm so looking forward to being a part of this community!

When I was in college, my dream was to get good enough to become a VisDev artist at a major animation studio. But my time in college was extremely hard; I quickly learned that my skills were not developed to the level that they needed to be to stay on track to graduate within the program's timeline. So my dream of working in a major studio...basically went out the window because of my skill set, which was hard to deal with for a long time. So I studied, became an art teacher and tried to get better, until a family friend saw some designs I had done for Inktober and asked if I would illustrate a children's book.

So now...I think my perfect art world would have me be able to get to a point where I can teach part time and freelance, and that my skills would be in such a place where creating art didn't give me a lot of anxiety most of the time I work.

When I did my first book (self-published through Amazon by the author), the author put in the text themselves, but it didn't look as good as it could have. The second project I did with the author, I offered to do the typesetting myself in InDesign. MUCH more difficult. While I'm glad the author gave me an increase in pay (and was happy to do so), adding the type myself was hard and tedious. I wish there had been an opportunity to work with a graphic designer to help with the text rather than my doing everything myself. On the one hand, I felt more in control over the quality of each page. On the other hand, it increase the stress of working on pages (and I had the lovely task of having to fit both English and Spanish translations of huge paragraphs).

So I'd say, if you haven't discussed text, and especially if it's not in your contract, politely discuss this with your client. Hopefully they'll be understanding.

@carlianne Thank you! I really enjoyed making him and he's actually been something I've been able to exhibit in a gallery!

I loved this episode! It inspired me to keep improving in between books.

When I have worked with an author to self publish, their firm has paid be 2500-3000 depending on the book (the second project I worked on was more complex). This was based on research the author and I did about reasonable pay for beginning professional illustrators.

For me, it's always been a bit difficult for me to gauge prices because this is not my primary source of income (I'm a teacher who illustrates on the side). After discussions and research, the amount she paid me seemed fair to me. I agree that it depends partly on what your time is worth. You don't want to earn so little that you can't live on.

@j-sienkowski I would have to ask my author, her firm was the one who did research and determined $2500 (though she was also open-minded enough to tell me "if you need to be paid more, I want to pay you what you're worth"). She also was the one to help me find a contract template that I plan on using for other clients.

I should mention that the author I work with is a close family friend, so I have been very blessed in that regard.

I went to school with Maaike! She's got a lot of great information to share.

I loved this episode! It inspired me to keep improving in between books.

I went to school with Maaike! She's got a lot of great information to share.

Hello everyone!

I'm in the process of working on some gifts for our two pastors who will soon be leaving. My idea was to draw pictures of them and their wives doing their ministries. I've tried to stylize them a bit (based on the "Stylizing Human Characters" course), but also wanted to keep them in the realm of realistic. I was wondering if I could get some thoughts/critiques on each or any of the drawings? I've included the reference photos that I was working off of and would welcome anyone wanting to draw on top of them to demonstrate what you're talking about.

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Thank you so much in advance!

Working with my self-published author, I realized pretty soon that she'd have to sell a couple thousand copies of the book on Amazon before she made back what she paid me, much less my receiving any royalties.

What I did find helpful was that, even though the author own the rights to the book (obviously) I believe my contract states that I am free to use the images separately for my own portfolio, gallery displays, etc. I'm not 100% certain if I'd be able to license the characters (I believe it is spelled out in my contract), but what was reassuring to me was that I am still able to use the work I created.

I agree with everyone on here; the painting is definitely a work in progress, but it's on it's way to being good! I like what you're doing with the painting. Personally I wish I could block in colors and values the way you are. And as everyone says, you're learning!

The biggest thing I see is to work on proportioning, especially in the face. Still, though that comes with time.

Take it from a person with GAD and who frequently spirals because of Imposter Syndrome...that much self-loathing is unkind to yourself and more importantly unhealthy! You have to be your biggest advocate.

@j-sienkowski I would have to ask my author, her firm was the one who did research and determined $2500 (though she was also open-minded enough to tell me "if you need to be paid more, I want to pay you what you're worth"). She also was the one to help me find a contract template that I plan on using for other clients.

I should mention that the author I work with is a close family friend, so I have been very blessed in that regard.

When I have worked with an author to self publish, their firm has paid be 2500-3000 depending on the book (the second project I worked on was more complex). This was based on research the author and I did about reasonable pay for beginning professional illustrators.

For me, it's always been a bit difficult for me to gauge prices because this is not my primary source of income (I'm a teacher who illustrates on the side). After discussions and research, the amount she paid me seemed fair to me. I agree that it depends partly on what your time is worth. You don't want to earn so little that you can't live on.

@Neha-Rawat thank you! I use Adobe Portfolio for my website so I'll have to play around and see what I can mess with.

@Eywin I really like the tree. I agree the car looks a bit rough, but that's why we keep practicing. I've just started this course myself so I'm looking forward to seeing more work.

@demotlj I totally get not feeling inspired these days. It's been hard for me to create and not feel intimidated by all of the awesome artwork I see around. But I like the watercolor you did! It's quick, feels very loose (something I've always struggled with myself so I admire people who can do that), and is very sweet.