Best posts made by Melissa Bailey 0

“Yeti cooked with flare...” First, that unintentional typo had me giggling, then it inspired this spot illo. Funny how one word can change the meaning!

So here’s my yeti, chilling out “alone” on his Nepalese hillside, cooking with flare(s)...

Right now I'm up to my eyeballs in 3 different children's books, all in different stages of done-ness and all for small publishers or self-publishers. (This is a sneak peek at one of them.)

Big plan for this year is to get ready to submit (and hopefully submit) to bigger publishers.

Been encountering technical difficulties and haven’t been able to post until now. I know this is late, but hopefully it can be included ... if not, that’s okay too ... just wanted to share with you all.

What if I was hired to illustrate a nonfiction / informational fiction picture book about yetis? That supposition fired my imagination, got me diving into internet research, and it snowballed from there!

Looking forward to feedback. Thanks so much!

LOVE seeing what everyone is working on this month! This is SUCH a talented group, as we all like to keep saying.

This month, I've been holed up working on a new book that is pretty much a rush job but such a rewarding project and an honor to illustrate. For it, I'm trying out something new: a mix of traditional and digital. The book is set at sunset, so I wanted to utilize watercolor for that (and for me, it's just easier to render sunsets in watercolor), but to work quickly and efficiently by starting and finishing the illustration digitally using Photoshop and Procreate.

This is the test illustration to see if that would even work, and I'm liking this approach so much I'll probably start using it more.

(@Tiffany-Thomas & @xin-li -- this is my first experiment using that mix of traditional and digital we talked about.)

Hi, @davidhohn, @Michael-Angelo-Go & @NessIllustration -- just thought I'd add a little clarification since I did (unfortunately) start out my freelancing art career on Elance (now Upwork -- NOT something I'd recommend, but that's a different story and at the time I needed a paycheck).

YES, Upwork is a nonnegotiable work-for-hire situation -- lousy terms. However, all the clients that I worked with on Upwork were more than happy to give me permission to show the artwork in my portfolio. (And honestly, that's all I would've used that artwork for anyway.)

Yes, the client probably did say 22-page book, and yes, they probably didn't know what they were doing. This is VERY common to see with newbie self-publishing authors.

And yes, self-publishing clients are the "boss", the editor, and the art director. Most of my clients had very little knowledge about the illustration process or the process of publishing a book, and most had no art experience. It does make the process a little challenging, to say the least.

A note about 24-page books. Most self-published authors choose to publish their books using print-on-demand services like KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) and Ingram Spark, which have a minimum page count of 24. PODs have different printing specs since they print books using inkjet printers rather than offset printers. They print in multiples of 4: 24, 28, 32 pages, etc. Both KDP & Ingram Spark require the last page of a book to be left blank for their use. So if you're hired to illustrate a 24-page PB that will be POD, you actually deliver 23 pages of content, as page 24 needs to be kept blank.

Hope this helps clear things up -- or muddy the waters???

@davidhohn you're very welcome, and thanks for being the voice of reason and pointing out that freelancing comes in all forms.

Reading over my previous reply, it came across more negative than I intended (but, yeah, I'm not really a fan of Upwork, so that bias came through loud and clear!).

In the interests of sharing information so anyone reading this can come to their own informed decision, the following are some pros and cons of working on Upwork. (Disclaimer: this is based on my own personal experiences. Other freelancers have had other experiences and may have different opinions.)

PROS

• Jobs are posted in a way so you can easily find and bid on them.
• Upwork's escrow and payment protection services ensure that you'll get paid.
• You get to choose what jobs you apply for and work with clients from all over the world.
• You get to work from home and do what you love.

CONS

• The freelancer does not retain copyright. Upwork is a work-for-hire site and their general contract overrides an individual client/freelancer agreement. If a freelancer works on Upwork, they're agreeing to give away all rights to their work. If they want to show the work in a portfolio or on social, they need their client's written permission to do so.
• Upwork fees. For the first $500 (USD) you make with a client, Upwork takes 20% (i.e. you make $400); from $501 to $10,000 earnings, Upwork takes out 10%; from $10K up, there is a 5% Upwork fee.
• It takes a LONG time to get paid. Most of my jobs were fixed-price jobs where the milestone was funded in advance and the funds held in escrow. Once the client released those funds, it takes 5 business days for Upwork to release them to the freelancer, then it has to be transferred to your external bank account, so I wouldn't get the money until at least a week later. For me personally, this was a major downside of using Upwork.
• It's a "budget" type of site, so the prices for most jobs are well below market prices. (The last time I looked, most job postings for children's book illustration are $1,000 or less.)
• It's a worldwide marketplace. That could be a pro, but for most US-based freelancers, it's a con because of the higher cost of living in this country. It's difficult to earn a livable wage while competing for jobs with freelancers who live in a place with a lower cost of living.

For me, the cons column outweighs the pros and I'm no longer looking for work on Upwork but have been getting jobs from other sources, the majority of which have found me on SCBWI's illustrator gallery. But everyone has different circumstances, and what doesn't work for me may work for you.

*** FULL DISCLOSURE. ***
I haven't deleted my Upwork profile -- call it not wanting to get rid of a safety net -- so from time to time I still receive job invites. Usually, I decline and remember to go back onto my profile settings and mark myself as "unavailable for work". But recently, a job invite came across my inbox that touched my heart and I accepted -- it's a beautiful story, the client is wonderful, and it's an honor to work on this project. The client actually doubled their budget and I lowered my price to one we were both happy with -- they have been a sheer joy to work with even though the project is a heartbreaking one (it's a children's book commemorating the life of a child with a terminal illness). When we communicated about the project, the client expressed shock at Upwork's TOS and the fees they charge and wished we could work off of the platform -- however, once a client finds a freelancer on Upwork, they agree to work exclusively through Upwork for 2 years unless they pay a $1,000 (minimum) opt-out fee. So I guess even though I'm not Upwork's biggest fan, I'm still grateful because I never would have gotten a chance to work on this project otherwise.

@miranda-hoover looking good! Love your color harmony.

For me, what feels off with the baby yeti is that its head and shoulders are a different silhouette than the mom yeti’s. The mom yeti was drawn very stylized with smooth lines, no separation between head and shoulders, which works beautifully for the character. But the baby has defined head and shoulder.

It seems that a juvenile yeti would mimic the same overall shape as its parent, only smaller and rounder and fuzzier/plumper. At least that’s how I see it.

Really looking forward to seeing this spot all finished! Two thumbs way up!

@Michael-Angelo-Go it sounds like it was a good decision to make. When I've had a similar experience in the past, it helped to chalk it up as a chance to learn something and perhaps adjust things that need adjusting.

Some things that you might find helpful if you continue to look for clients on Upwork:

• Figure out how much you want to make per hour, how many hours the job will take to complete, and bid accordingly (this formula works for both fixed-price and hourly jobs). It may mean asking clarifying questions. Don't forget to build Upwork fees into that price.

• Clearly state your terms. Yes, you've agreed to work for hire, meaning that you give away all your rights to the work. But even within Upwork's terms, you still can write your own terms into your bid. For example, specify that you would like permission to show the work in your portfolio. Specify what work the price you're bidding includes, and what it doesn't.

• (Related to terms) Don't offer unlimited revisions. (Unless you're okay potentially working with a client who abuses that provision.) When I bid for work on Elance/Upwork, I made sure to specify what was included in the price, including 3 rounds of revision -- along with the wording that if more than 3 rounds of revision were needed, I would be happy to continue revising at $25 per round of revision. After I started doing that, I don't think a client ever went over 3 rounds of revision!

• Communicate! (This really applies to working with all clients...) Communication, especially at the outset, is actually difficult to do on Upwork because they don't allow you to contact the client with questions before you place your bid -- depending on your Upwork membership, they might not even let you see who the client is. What I would do is place a bid, sometimes even specifying that this is a generalized bid because of a vague job description, and ask to chat (there is a built-in chat feature) or communicate further with the client before accepting the job.

Implementing these 4 things really helped make the Upwork experience better for me and my clients. While there were some frustrating clients, I never really had a BAD client experience on Upwork. My last few years on Elance/Upwork, I didn't really search for work; mainly it came through job invites. And if the client didn't give enough information in the job description (very common) and balked at providing more information, or if they told me I didn't need to read the story before accepting the job (one of my nonnegotiables is reading the MS beforehand), or if they told me how long it would take me to do the work and so they wouldn't need to pay me more than $X ... I politely declined. So maybe that steered me clear of "disrespectful, bad-attitude" clients?

Hope you find my experience helpful in some way. All the best!

@Jeremiahbrown so many options here!

If you have an Adobe Creative Cloud subscription, it includes access to Adobe Fonts that you can use for commercial use. Other places to get free commercial use fonts are Google Fonts and fontsquirrel.com — but one thing to mention: you need to check on what license is offered with that font and make sure it covers everything you want to use it for. Sometimes paying for the exact font you want to use is the way to go — usually fonts are pretty affordable but they can get expensive. Fontspring is another font website that I recommend.

Some illustrators and book designers use hand lettered titles or even hand letter the entire text. Philip and Erin E. Stead create woodblock or monoprint titles for their books. Some illustrators (Dan Santat being one) have created their own handwritten font and use it in multiple books. “Millions of Cats” by Wanda Ga’g (generally considered to be the first children’s picture book) was entirely hand lettered. I’ve personally been hand lettering my own titles for the last few books I’ve worked on (using Procreate and/or traditionally with some Photoshop help), since it’s easier to achieve a cohesive composition that works with the byline and other fonts that may be used on the cover.

There is no one rule. It really seems to be what works best for each individual book.

Love your storytelling! Great expressions and really well rendered.

For me, the text in the speech bubbles was all I needed to get a gist of what's happening in the scene. Your art is strong enough to stand on its own without surrounding text.

Putting myself in the shoes of an art director or someone looking to hire an illustrator, having to scroll past lines of story might be more annoying than helpful. If it were me in that situation, I probably wouldn't read it (though I did read through all of it just now).

Just my two cents: let your art stand on its own. Your storytelling skills carry the art.

@Michael-Angelo-Go this is a very intense piece, and I agree with everything @NessIllustration says!

Want to point out a major problem area in this composition for me: the finger pointing at the main character, coming from the upper left of the composition. For 2 reasons:

1. It's very, very easy for finger pointing to be misconstrued, as it is seen as incredibly rude. Yes, you're looking to illustrate rude behavior, but is it too close to (or even crossing) the line?
2. It looks ... phallic. Definitely don't want any viewers to mistakenly think that it's NOT a finger!

As far as how you might adjust this piece so it is less intense for an art director or anyone viewing your portfolio, here are a few suggestions:

• Tone down the trauma in the main character's expression. What if she's not clutching her head? What if she's not crying puddles onto her desk, but welling up with tears instead? What other emotions would a bullied character be feeling, other than intense grief or trauma?
• Do ALL the background characters need to be bullies? What if only one or two were the perpetrators? Or one or two were laughing/going along with the bullies but not really participating? What if some students stood up against the bullies and were actually empathetic and supportive? That would be a less traumatic-feeling scene and would show a range of emotions, of acceptable and unacceptable behaviors.

As always, whatever you choose to adjust/not adjust and wherever you choose to take this piece is totally up to you!

@carlianne -- totally agree.

@Kori-Jensen -- according to art directors' comments in recent webinars I've watched from SCBWI, most don't mind if you work in two different styles, but they want to see them organized, perhaps splitting a portfolio into different sections. They also recommend leading with your strongest piece and ending with another of your strongest pieces.

For me, your portfolio would read better if it was organized. For example, place the Ninja pieces together so that they appear as consecutive or narrative art from the same book.

Otherwise, nice work! Love the expressions you give your characters and LOVE the Fang and Mittens piece -- I'd lead with that one! Do you have other pieces from that book? I'd love to see more of that one!

Google fonts is a great free resource! If you have an Adobe Creative Cloud subscription, they also offer Adobe fonts in that subscription. Many of the same fonts can be found in Adobe fonts and Google fonts. YouTube also has some great graphic design tutorials that you may find helpful.

@carlianne @Braden-Hallett --just my personal preference, but I love how Carlianne has warmed up the palette. The purpler (is that a word?) mountain really plays off the yellow, the characters pop, and you have that nice contrast when playing with complimentary colors. (The rabbits might be a smidge too red, but again, this is all personal preference.)

Both palettes work beautifully. Warming it up does change the feel slightly and adds some background depth. But Braden, do your thing! This piece is going to be amazing no matter what you decide to do.

@sigross it depends on the scope of the project. For a typical 32-page book with a mix of spots and spreads, anywhere from 3 to 6 months. But if the book is really simple & mostly spots, about 2 months. If a project is really involved, it could take a year or so, like the 48-page PB/journal I illustrated that was rendered traditionally in a realistic style with lots of detail. (Note: I usually have more than one illustration project going at a time; I actually try to work on 2 picture books concurrently because there's always some down time. If I was just working on one project at a time, I would be able to finish it quicker.)

In the past year, I did something I thought I'd never do: illustrate a book completely digital (using Procreate on an iPad Pro). And it does streamline the process so it takes less time to illustrate. So now, if a client has a tight deadline or a tight budget, I work completely digital.

The client also affects the timeline. If your client has a tight timeline, that might mean a rush job, which would cost more, of course. Or sometimes a client isn't time conscious or has a hard time making decisions -- in that case, communication with them will take longer which will delay the entire project. I've learned to build client and communication time into my estimates, because a project isn't dependent just on how fast I work. (For example, if I think I can get sketches done in 1 month, I tell the client to expect them in 2 months because there are always delays and something always comes up.)

That's how I try to estimate how long it'll take me to illustrate a book. As far as client expectations on Upwork or similar platforms, I think it's really a case of a client not educating themselves, not knowing what goes into creating a book. They don't realize that it typically takes hundreds of hours of work. And most clients looking for a picture book illustrator on Upwork have low budgets; sometimes it's all they can afford. And the fact is, they can post a job to illustrate a 32-page boook for $300 and get multiple freelancers bidding on it. Great for self-publishers who want to put a book out on a shoestring, but not so great for the freelance artist community.

As far as how long these budget books take to illustrate, usually I see unrealistic timelines of a few weeks to a few months. Some freelancers on Upwork (not all, but some) use stock art or cut corners by copying and pasting or using premade backgrounds over and over. Maybe that's what allows them to work for so cheap. Not having asked them, I can't say -- just reporting on what I've seen in some freelancer portfolios.

@xin-li Looking really good!

Just two little nitpicky comments:

1. The main light source -- the pool of light is offset from the lantern. If the lantern is the light source, the pool of light would have the lantern at the center. Perhaps move the lantern closer? The brightest spot of light should be the center of the source, the lantern.
2. The secondary light sources are lovely. But maybe consider brightening up the "campfire" tea light? It seems that it would be a little brighter and have a larger pool of light. Even strengthening your secondary lighting a bit won't detract from your main light source, since it's so strong.

Love your interplay of warm and cool colors! This is a beautiful piece.

Thanks for sharing! Definitely going to watch this, like, right after I finish typing!

For a while now, I've been contemplating adding secondary sources of income. Currently, I'm leaning towards adding a shop to my Squarespace website instead of using Etsy. Your video comes at perfect timing! Thanks!

@Kevin-Longueil yep! As you'll probably guess, I really like what @chrisaakins suggests. In fact, I think if you get rid of the background altogether, the piece will read better as a spot. The focus will be directly on the characters and action, where it needs to be.

However, I understand where you're coming from, wanting a portfolio piece too. But are you asking this one little spot illo to do too much? What if you modified the composition for a spot illustration, then even further expand your original idea into a full page or even spread illustration? There's no reason why you couldn't do two versions. That could be really interesting!

@Michael-Angelo-Go I hear ya! The pandemic has really affected all of us.

If you have the updated version and your tools are still in working order, there's nothing wrong with using what you have and updating when funds are available. When funds are available, there are affordable programs and tablets that might be a good "in between" purchase until that time when your career or budget allows you to invest in top-of-the-line equipment. While I use an iPad Pro now, that's only because I'm leasing the equipment for business use. And my first iPad was a "regular old" iPad that I didn't get until 2018, 8 years into freelancing. There's no shame in utilizing what you have until it makes sense for your business or budget to upgrade.

And, if you're not currently working on a project, you don't really have to worry about the CMYK issue, since right now you're probably focused on updating your portfolio. So that's a bonus!

When the next job does come in, that may be an opportunity to upgrade. If you buy something specifically in order to do a job, it's a legitimate business expense and you can also work supplies into your price. Until then, keep your chin up! These tough times won't last forever.

@hayleyannececil -- first off, your yeti is adorable! Love how you're saying so much with so little.

There's something charming about the "no lines" version. However, the values are so similar, details get lost and the neck fades into that darkest part of the swash.

Being a fellow line lover, there's also something nice about the lines, as they define the shapes and bring the character forward. But I agree with @Laurel-Aylesworth-0, perhaps instead of having stark black lines, you lighten them or color them?

Really sweet piece, and I love how you're playing with shapes in the composition!