been working like crazy here the last 2 months, and running around on top of it all. Finally finished another concept piece for my personal project though. It’s finally moving in the direction I want to end up visually I think now, which is part animated/part painted. I’ve been writing more script the last couple of months than I have been doing artwork, but now that I’ve finished this piece, I’m moving on to more design work for the various locations in the story, the other characters, props and things. In my copious “spare time” of course. Enjoy!
starting a new chapter in my life today. Headed back to a day job PT here for the first time in 6 years. It will be nice to get a steady paycheck every 2 weeks for a change I think. I’m looking forward to the opportunity of just putting in my hours and then leaving at the end of the day too. I’ll still be freelancing on the side of course, doing digital painting, sketch card and coloring commissions, and I WILL take on the occasional coloring project, whether it’s a graphic novel, comic book, mini-series or something along those lines. But I won’t be killing myself for companies anymore just to have books on the stands, and then to end up waiting months to be paid for them. If DC or Marvel come calling, maybe IDW or Darkhorse, I’ll consider taking on a project from them as I know they’re on more secure footing financially. Other than that, I’ll be taking on projects that I want to work on, and negotiating my own payment terms (which won’t be 30 days after invoicing, or publication or anything like that) I’m going to be in a position myself here now to require some form of upfront payment (33%, 50% or something) and then the rest on completion. If you can’t pay me any money upfront, I won’t be lending my talents to your project. And what I’ve learned really in the last 6 years running my own company, is that regardless of whether it’s illustration, web or graphic design, marketing, advertising…if someone is not willing to put any money upfront on a project, they’re likely not too fussed about paying you in a timely manner, if at all, when you get done with the work.
So moving on, I’m going to enjoy doing advertising design again I think, likely be doing some static web design, and other things as they crop up. I’m going to enjoy working on my OWN projects when I don’t have paying freelance work, and generally just enjoying my family and the great life that I have. There are 2 things that I am working on now, the Flobots webcomic, and my own creator owned project Sprocket: A Rift in Time. Working with long time pal and collaborator DJ Coffman, we’re going to really be focusing on long form story telling online, and then in GN format. We quite literally have all the tools we need, not to mention a plethora of idea between us in just about every genre imaginable, to keep cranking out awesome content for years and years on end. It’s going to be quite a change of pace that’s for sure.
So, maybe more blogging will be happening on a regular basis. Or maybe I’ll be outside on the patio by the water garden enjoying a tall glass of gin and juice and just forgetting about the problems of the real world.
Finally updated everything to wordpress, portfolio and blog, and have a uniform look for it all. much easier to maintain and to update now. Check out the new portfolio site, RIGHT OVER HERE! More to follow this week…maybe. I wasn’t planning on having to do all this right now, but I lost (or rather deleted by accident?) my main site database files, so I had to get my portfolio back up and running. whew…been a long couple days. Hoping tomorrow to get into some serious design and layout work on the graphic novels I’m putting together for a client. Right now, taking the rest of the night off is in order.
battled this crazy cold crap all weekend, felt marginally better yesterday. Today though, woke up with 2 kinds of headaches, a sore neck, a messed up stomach and am generally just exhausted. Hope I’m not really, TRULY, getting sick. It’s been a while since that has happened fortunately, but I’ve had this crummy, achy, stuff a few times in the last 6 months though.
Been real busy on the work front, just finished up colors on The Adventures of Sinbad #9, been working away on Take A Chance #5 here as well but thankfully we got quite a bit ahead on that book and this is the last issue of the first 5 issue mini-series arc for that. Have a few Grimm Fairy Tales splash pages to color by weeks end, Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretel and Jack and the Beanstalk stuff. Should be fun. I’m starting work on the Red Riding Hood one today. Can’t wait for some vacation time at the end of the month though, seriously in need of a recharge here. Then I’ll be on to Sinbad #10 when I get back from vacation the early part of next month, and finishing up TAC5. Really can’t wait to post some of my Sinbad work, it’s probably my best published work to date. My style is really starting to come into its own I think, and about time I guess. There is this hybrid sort of half painted, half animated sort of look that is emerging, and I think the thing that makes me most happy about all of it, is that in some way, it’s sort of unique. I can look at a book I’ve worked on and tell that it was ME who did the work, and that is a good thing I guess.
alright, time to start feeling better today already so I can get some work done. ugh.
I’m going to be offering $10 sketch card commissions on a monthly basis here through my blog, and the other blogs I have around the net (I also have a link on the Imagine FX homepage for A Mirror Image, which mostly just reflects what I post here)
So here’s the details. Some time in the next week, I’m going to have a paypal button made up for the site here. You’re going to be able to click on that and order a custom, full color, sketch card, on 100 lb bristol vellum, created with Prismacolor markers, colored pencils, ink and/or acrylic or watercolor paints.
-Shipped in protective covers directly to you, for only $10.
-Any character of your choice.
-Turnaround time will be 2 weeks on these. That means that within that 2 week timeframe, your card will be created and shipped directly to you.
-Card dimensions will be standard 3.5 x 2 inch sketch card size.
-ONLY single character cards, no adult themes, keep the requests at the PG-13 level please.
If you want to get your order in ahead of time, hit me up on the blog, or send me an email. I’m only going to be offering 10 of these per month, which means that if I get more than 10 orders in a month, your cards will be done in the order that they were received, and the following month will start out with any carryovers from the previous month.
Here’s a few samples of previous cards for your viewing pleasure.
