Category: Blog Posts

Selling Yourself Short


I cannot count the times I have heard the following from fellow artists:

“Raise my prices?? But then no one will buy my work! I have to be competitive!”

“I just don’t think I’m good enough to charge more.”

“If I charge less, I’ll sell more!”

I have thought these things myself at one point in my education as an artist. After all, we all start at a level which is inevitably not as good as professional and well-established artists who are painting masterpieces in oil when we’re in class learning about the color wheel and the basics of line, shape, form, etc. When we decide to combine money with art in order to sell our work at this early point in our careers, we look around and decide that it’s better to sell ourselves and our work for cheaper because we think that’s all that people will pay for it.

This works for awhile, as people tend to pay that $25 for a character sketch or a portrait of their dog. It brings in a little extra money for pizza and art supplies. However, as an artist grows and enters the level that their work is taking more time, is of a consistent higher quality, and the artist decides that art is a career and not a hobby, they need to evolve past the point of accepting less. Artists, please get serious about your prices!

When you continue charging less for more, you not only undersell yourself, but make it harder for other artists to make a living and lower the standards and impression that customers have of artwork. This pattern of underselling is especially rampant in the community of fantasy art, my personal port of call. It seems the general attitude is that fantasy art is ‘cliche’ and therefore is not worth as much as fine art displayed in a museum or gallery.

Fellow Fantasy artists, I encourage you to fight this stereotype! Charge what you are worth! Show those who don’t know fantasy art just how talented and professional we can be.

No matter your genre, if you expect to be professional, this means acting professional and pricing professionally. Some may disagree with me and say that pricing competitively is the only way to sell, but when it comes to selling original work, I personally refuse to back down on charging what I’m worth unless I am really not proud of the piece. If I want to make a quick buck, that is what prints and ‘fluff’ pieces are for.

To be certain, it is smart to price your work to be fair for selling to a certain audience. For example, I would not charge more than $100 for a piece at a smaller anime convention, as the general attendee at an anime convention is in their teens, is still dependent on their parents, and is not independently wealthy. On the other hand, larger fantasy conventions tend to attract more eccentric audiences of all ages, including older independently wealthy fans, therefore it is easier to sell a higher priced item. These are just the trends, however! You never can predict when someone will buy a work if they connect with it. I had a person buy a framed print of mine for $80 at an anime convention, a truly surprising thing! This was a print of a piece of mine that hardly EVER sells anywhere else. I tend to fit the pieces to what sells at the convention, which means I will generally have less original work at anime cons, as they are naturally too high priced to sell there due to the fact that they are original paintings.

I myself am at the point where I have now stopped taking commissions unless they are near the prices suggested by the Graphic Artist’s Guild, the organization that sets the standards and ethical guidelines for professional artists. My prices are negotiable based on the budgets of the commissionee but I use the GAG guidelines as a reference point. I did this for many reasons, including the fact I no longer have time to charge less for commissions and also for the fact that the work turned out for these commissions, due to their underpriced nature, was decent, but not what I consider to be portfolio quality with the exception of a very select few. As an emerging professional, I need to pay more attention to building a successful portfolio with work that I have taken great time and care on. This time and care was cut short on my earlier commissions to help them be cost-effective, something which I find myself no longer willing and able to do.

In the end, we must temper competitiveness with fairness to ourselves and to our work. Foster an attitude of positivity and faith in your own talent and success. Be honest to yourself and never sell yourself short. Raise your prices as you develop and grow your talent so that others will not be dragged down by the expectations of buyers who see cheap prices for quality work.

It may be hard to do this at first, but you will be thankful in the future when you finally reach the point where you can be paid fairly and are considered a ‘professional’ in your field instead of yet another starving artist in need of a handout.

Heart of Ink

I saw Inkheart last week and it really got my pondering juices flowing. If you haven’t heard of it, it’s the latest in Brendan Fraser’s stream of young adult novel to movie adaptations. Not the best flick, but it had it’s moments. I loooved Paul Bettany as Dustfinger. As a movie, it falls short of really hitting the nail on the head for an adventure flick, but what I found the most intriguing about it was the concept of the “Silver Tongue”.

Silver Tongues are individuals who, by the act of reading aloud, can bring anything into existence. Now imagine that you are an author and you are suddenly confronted with your own characters, who are quite tormented and angry that you’ve put them in the situation that they are in (something which occurs in the movie).

What would your characters say to you if you met them face to face? What inspired you to make them the way they are? If your characters suddenly became real, how would they react to the ‘real’ world? It was interesting to see how villains in the Inkheart world adapted to use the technology of our world, which made their jobs of being thieves that much easier.

The whole concept got me to thinking about the relationship between an author and a character. Why do we make them? Why do we torture them?

Personally, I started creating characters as a young child in order to sleep at night. I always needed a good bedtime story to get to bed and I never grew out of that. If I’m not dreaming up a story before I’m sleeping, I can’t sleep at all. Every night, I imagine a scenario of some sort, my prince Ramah racing across a moonlit beach in his desert kingdom; Melakim hunting a dangerous adversary through a dark wood; Aurora diving off of a skyscraper in some elaborate aerial maneuver to penetrate a building’s security. There are all manner of stories and situations that end up fueling my art and writing at some point.

Where would the fun be if you didn’t put them in danger? Everyone needs a little tension, though I will admit being a bit of a sadist when it comes to torturing them. Aren’t we all?

Or maybe it’s just me…

Productivity in a Can

Latest Developments in Angela’s Checklist to Take Over the World by Art Storm:

  • Updated my eBay shop with more original artwork and matted/signed prints.  Felt really accomplished after 15+ postings!
  • Currently reading 3 Weeks to Ebay Profits. Extremely helpful thus far!  Will post more once I’m done reading.
  • Posted my first ever video tutorial on Color Pencil Tools!  I need to learn how to not curse when I mess up my dialogue so I don’t have to shoot so many takes.  Perhaps an outtake reel is in order?
  • Making concrete plans to attend more conventions and saving up to hit more Artist Alleys for networking.  Already sent out to Katsucon, for starters!
  • Huge plans in the works to start on several longer series of illustrative works.  Time to see if I can balance those muses and to focus my artistic ADD.
Because sometimes it’s just easier to list things rather than ramble about them.  I got alot done this week and I am only full of hope as I slowly, yet surely, begin to see all these efforts pay off. I still have a long way to go, but it’s great to finally be able to check off a few things that have been on my to-do list for years now.
Plans for this week:
  • Put the finishing touches on glass tile pendants and list them on eBay/Etsy
  • Dig the original art out from under my bed and mat them.  Need to start working harder on presentation!
  • Practice more digital media with some orthographic concept sketches.  Practice more watercolor techniques while I’m at it.
  • Start prospecting galleries in town to see if any will display my work. Gotta give my local galleries some love!
  • Start looking for academic publishers for the thesis paper, if there’s time!
I promise a meatier, more thought-provoking post the next time!  I’ve recently seen Inkheart and it has my ol writing urges simmering again.  More on that later!

Sorry for all the exclamation points in this journal. It appears I’ve had about four times the quantity of Dr.Pepper than I usually allow myself!!!!

Balancing the Creative Muses

Well it seems I’ve been gearing up for ages here to really sit down and work on my writing projects, but I’ve just been too caught up in working on my current slate of commissions to really sit down and give my stories the attention they crave.  “Feed me!” My darling writing muse says as she rattles her chains and is shut back in her cage in the basement of my mind.

It occurs to me that eventually I will need to find a balance.  I’m hoping to be a writer, to illustrate said writings, to be a self-represented artist as well as a self-marketed author…and somehow amid all this still maintain a sort of life that involves socializing with friends and family.  How the heck do I balance doing all of that?  So far, I’ve found it easier to focus if I take on one project at a time, but then I find it hard to sleep at night thinking about that big project on the horizon and how it’s not been accomplished yet.  My friends call it my ‘endless project fairy’ who grows a set of wings whenever I think of something new for myself to do.  I have a mental image in my head of this poor fairy dragging herself and her hundreds of wings along with a ‘kill me’ expression on her face.
Along the same lines, I’m curiuos about any of you who may be a slave to both writing and art muses.  Just what are you inspired by first?  This is probably a ‘chicken or egg’ argument, but I’m really curious to know what muse dominates you.  Is your art inspired by your personal story first, or do you make your stories based on a nameless image that pops to mind?   If you’re ruled by both, how do you balance them equally?  Or is there no winning the battle against muse and time management?
More often than not, I find myself inspired by stories first.  I need a character I can sink my teeth into before I can get the inspiration that gives me the drawing itch.  Occasionally I’ll think up a cool look and make up a story inspired by thing that was too cool to resist making a story out of, but that is rare for me.  I am never more inspired to draw than I am when I’m writing or reading a good book.  How about yourselves?
In the end, I offer no solutions here.  My best guess being that any solution will differ for each individual.  For me, I think a swift kick in the butt will do.
Work it, Angela, work it!

The Jumping Off Point

So here I am…doing that thing that I swore I’d never do.   You know…that horrible, trendy thing they call ‘blogging’.  It never occurred to me till recently that perhaps blogging isn’t just a trend, but a viable way to reach someone who I may never have reached if I just sat at home trying to communicate with you all via magical mind rays (which are easily blocked by foil caps).

 
This blog is what I hope will become a record of a journey to success (or at least to self-satisfaction).  For those who don’t know me, I am an emerging artist with aspirations of writing, illustrating, and publishing my own books alongside meager plans to start my own art studio.  In my younger days, I was one of those morbid children writing creepy little stories about dead prom queens accompanied by creepy little illustrations.  I gobbled up the sordid tales of the Brothers Grimm before I reached the age of 10.   And yet despite my love for the darker side of things, you’ll find a Disney song or two on my playlist.  I am a lover of contrasts and twisted archetypes, of raw tension and otherworldly delights.   Of hamburgers with just ketchup.
 
These days, I’m coming off of graduation from the Savannah College of Art & Design with a Masters degree in Arts Administration, a lint ball in my pocket, and a glint in my eye to start weaving the grand design of my fate.  I’ve had my fill of doing dime character portraits and tattoo designs and have finally decided to start treating myself like a professional.  This is my declaration of indepence from the stereotype of the tin cup artist.
 
So here I am.  I will try to spare you my rambling on existence (which you can find at my forum or on my livejournal instead) and stick to the good stuff.  IE. Previews of new artwork & writings, advice for other artists, convention stories, and whatever else you’d like to know!  I will try to post weekly, or at the very least when I have something interesting to say or new to share.  Stay tuned for the video blogs that will link from these posts as well once I figure out the finer points of video editing.
 
Let the madness begin!  I’m looking forward to seeing what the future holds.