LASERS.

So having pretty much settled on the idea that I'm going to get some promo packs made professionally, I thought it'd be best to do a bit of research into who does what best.

I was firstly recommended a company called CutLaserCut based in London, who famously did most, if not all of the work for the recent Roald Dahl film: Fantastic Mr Fox. This to me, screamed out best of the best. I had a quick look on their website to see if they had any quotes or price lists but I couldn't see anything. I dropped them a quick email explaining what I was after, along with a rough sketch on the net with dimensions. They were rapid at replying back to me and spoke about a number of different options we could laser cut the pack but it all depended on the chosen material. They recommended their own finn board (a mixture of ground and pressed wood pulp) in a variety of different weights. With this, I would be able to engrave into the board without completely cutting through giving me the option to burn type into the surface. This would however, bump up the cost a substantial amount.

After a good 10 or so emails, the nice chap gave me a call and we talked prices. It was near impossible to hear him over the loud machinery but in the end we came to the conclusion that it was going to be much more then my budget had to offer and wouldn't be able to complete the cut get it delivered to me in time. He was very understanding and said if I was ever in London and wanted to go along to the cutting studio I was more then welcome and to contact him if I required any other cutting in the future. All in all a very nice man indeed.

Next I looked into the free FabLab services that they have to offer full time students. I'd never really heard of Fab before but knew that Manchester ran a number of free workshops to do with art and design. I decided to get in touch with them, again via email and we discussed my proposal. They said that it all seemed perfectly achievable, I just needed to book an induction to cover health and safety to get started. I liked the idea of this more so then the previous option as it enabled me to learn how to use the machinery myself and see the process whilst it was happening. I attended the induction which was dead interesting and helpful. They showed me around the building and what facilities they had on offer. I didn't realise the extent of machinery they had, ranging from 3D printers, plastic mold making, wood cutters (on a huge scale), vinyl cutters, sewing equipment  and loads of other CAD CAM bits. I learned that Fab isn't just based in Manchester but has a large community running all over Europe. It was pretty exciting to see how busy it was and seeing the projects that other people were working on.

I booked myself in for the following week to do a trial run of my net to see if my material would work and hopefully not set on fire. It wasn't going to cost me anything to make it, just the cost of the card itself. The only thing that Fab ask is that you take pictures of your finished piece, write a brief description about it and upload it onto their website so that other people can make it if they chose.  Before I got round to testing this out, a company I had emailed a good few weeks back about getting some business cards got back in touch and spoke about being able to help me out with laser cutting. For the time being I put Fab on hold, but had every intention of going back.

Duke Studios describes themselves as being a multi disciplinary creative space in the heart of Leeds that offers studio spaces, co-working membership and services. I had spoken to Lord Whitney about who they'd chosen to cut their business cards as I thought they looked pretty slick indeed and pointed me in the direction of Duke. I replied with excitement of prospects of using their "motherfreakinlaser" to get my work produced. They were more then helpful when speaking to them about my plans. I must have filled their inbox with idiot emails about basic things that I had no idea about but they were great and gave me a lot of their time and patience with it all. We spoke about costs and it worked out more beneficial to get more cut at once as they charged a very very reasonable hourly rate to use their machines. They recommended a brilliant stationary service down in Brighton for material that they had used before and new would work well for the finish that I wanted. I therefore ordered a huge pack of recycled card from SeaWhite with a express delivery sticker slapped on and rushed up to Leeds for James to start cutting. I explained that I needed a really fast turn around and they said it wouldn't be a problem. To make things even better, Lord Whitney have been amazing and said that they'll bring it all over once its done as they're big friends with the people at Duke and save me a pretty penny on delivery. 


Everything seems to be going to plan now. I'm just waiting on the final packs that should be ready next tuesday. Can't wait to start screen printing on them now.

FINANCES.

The thought of VAT, invoices, taxes and accounts makes me want to crawl into a hole and ignore it until it goes away. Unfortunately, this probably isn't the best approach and needs addressing sooner rather then later. To give us a little bit more insight into the real world of illustrators, our tutor sat us down and gave a thorough, in depth lecture on how to transform from being a poor student, to a slightly less poor professional designer.

Taxman by John Royle

To start the day, we saw two accountants from a Stockport based firm that had been invited to speak to us about managing our accounts, keeping books and business plans. This was aimed at the people that were contemplating setting up their own business or declaring themselves as being self employed, rather then full time work at a studio. It seemed a little pricey, but sounds as though its pretty easy to get snowed under by not keeping tabs on everything so could be worth the money spent. Saying that, I think if you're careful and committed, you can always keep on top of things as long as you start of that way (speaking from someone with no experience in finances at all).

Ian's lecture was specifically aimed at us as illustrators, not necessarily just business people, so focused more on charging fees and copyright issues. I found it helpful to hear how an effective business structure should be set out by covering topics such as business summary, market competition, pricing and promo, financial requirements and operations. It was daunting to hear how much needs to be put into projects like this and gave me a slap round the face as its something I'll have to be dealing with very shortly. Covering the basic knowledge was good to prep us all for whats to come and how to deal with any legal problems that might arise. One of which is making sure you get correct payment for you commissioned work that only comes with using contracts and invoices. One of the most important points covered was make sure a contract is written up and signed prior to working so clients can't get one over on you. This ensures payment for multiple print runs and cancellation fees.

I read a interesting piece on Computer Arts about how illustrators can get more for their work that can be found here. Definitely worth a read if you have a spare 10 mins and want some extra dollar for your drawing.

Pricing up a commissioned piece is something I haven't yet had to deal with and imagine could be a difficult obstacle to start with. When charging for a job, we were told to consider the following factors : the time it takes to make, the size of the print run, the exposure for both you and the clients profile, how much you actually want to do the job and finally, the going rate for a commission that size. It makes it seems more manageable once broken down but still think its an issue that will come easier with time.

The day was very eye opening and has switched me on a little more when considering work as a freelance illustrator. Overall, it seems that as long as you're careful and cover your traces, you don't have to worry too much. It seems to be worth the hassle in the end and its an aspect of work that I'm dreading, but at the same time wanting to tackle it and become a "real artist".

MADDEN'S ADVICE.

In prep for our London trip in a couple of weeks, I've started to contact clients and agencies that might be kind enough to spare some time for me to show them some work. I've got a rough idea of the sort of people I'd like to see but I'm still a bit sketchy to some degree. So far I've been in touch with Nobrow and The Church of London but struggling with associating my work to specific clients.

With this in mind, I thought I'd drop my 'graphic guru' Chris Madden a quick email to see if he had any suggestions. With him being in my shoes a few years ago, I thought who better to ask then the man himself! He was kind enough to send me a detailed set of wise words that helped me out a great deal. His email consisted of the following:

Alright Kris,


Good to see you at DNW even if it was brief. Sorry I didn't get a chance to chat to you properly.
Your work is looking really nice at the minute, its matured a lot over the past 3 years. I remember some of the drawings you did in your 1st year and they were completely different to what you're doing now! Looking forward to seeing what you put up for your degree show.


With regards to portfolio viewings I wouldn't  suggest avoiding anyone - even if they don't print work like yours in there mags/papers, it is another professional giving you critique and feedback. That is invaluable and something you don't often get once you leave college.


In my opinion, your work would lend itself well as book jackets/covers more than editorial so maybe make attempts to visit more publishers as opposed to Art Directors. A good place to start might be 'Random House', as I think they have an in-house design team that might let you have a look round too.  Try Harper Collins and Macmillan too. Don't write off editorial by any means though, all Art Directors are different and have different tastes. The AD's I deal with day to day may not commission work like yours but here are hundreds that will!


I think the best thing to do is send out as many emails and make as many phone calls to Ads/publishers as possible. The worst that can happen is they will say 'Sorry No, I don't have time' (which can also be good practice on how to approach/speak to professionals). Contact a few illustration agents too, most of the time they are more than willing to meet 'fresh' illustrators and from personal experience I have had some of the best advice from them.


I hope this is all helps - the more people you contact, the more people see your work and the more advice you will receive. There isn't really a downside to this process, mate!


let me know how you get on and if you have any other questions, just send them over.


Cheers


Chris

I've always been a little unsure as to what sort of format my work would benefit most from, but I haven't ever really considered book sleeves. I'm hoping to produce some editorial pieces in the next few weeks, initially to speed my working pace up but will definitely start to look at publication work. I've only really scratched the surface when working with typography and feel that it could be a chance for me to have another go at that. When I've played about with type in the past, I've always found it quite a challenge to get the right balance with the imagery, in a way that compliments one another. I think its time to start adding to my ever growing folder of stock imagery of typefaces I like and take it from there. Thanks again to Chris for being kind enough to get back to me and give me some fresh thoughts.

SECOND ROUGHS.

I've just received feedback on the rough ideas I sent over to SingRamonaSing last week and it wasn't the best. They stated that they loved the concepts being what I'd sent over but they weren't really what they had imagined for their EP. When I firstly asked them what sort of thing they were wanting for the design, they replied with see it as an open brief as they didn't really know them selves what they wanted and to go with whatever. I tired to narrow this down by working on some lyrics that they sent me to try and make sure I was sort of going down the right path. They had now decided of a number of things that they wanted in the design so that I could work on more designs and ensure they were right.

It was slightly frustrating to hear that my designs weren't right and a list of new things they wanted when I hadn't been specified anything at the start of the project, but it's just one of those things hat I can imagine will happen a lot with freelancing and I need to plod on with. The new requirements consisted of a list of imagery linked to each track and a number of my illustrations they liked from my site.

From this I sat down and brainstormed again and had a few more ideas then the first time round. However, in order to stick to my time plan that I had made from this project, I couldn't afford much more time making rough designs. To overcome this, I drew three designs that in my head, ticked all the boxes that they were after and made a neater version of the one that I preferred and hoped they might pick. It turns out that I was more pleased with these ideas as they seemed to have more depth to them in comparison to my first sketches. In looking back, a positive has come out of a negative set back, providing I don't have to re do they again ha.

I've sent the ideas over to the lads earlier today and am waiting to hear on their feedback. Hopefully I'll be hearing from them relatively soon as I'm already slightly behind schedule due to this little set back and need to push on with the making side of things.

COLOUR TEST.

I'm constantly trying to adapt my method of working when colour is concerned. I've always pushed it to the back of my mind to a point where I can't ignore it any longer as I find it hard to get a good balance of tone. I slip in to the trap of using a huge colour pallet and it looking like a colouring book. I think that it is one of the downsides of working digitally as decisions can be careless. With the option of changing a colour scheme at the click of a button, its too easy to change your mind and become sloppy or maybe this just applies to me. Anyway, rather then dropping colour behind my work digitally, I've started to play with working on top of a painted background. The graphite doesn't blend as smoothly as it would on tracing paper (how I usually work), but I much prefer the texture and colour tones the gouache creates rather then a solid block of colour. It's definitely going to be a process that I'll have to keep pottering about with until I'm happy with. I really enjoyed pushing some paint about as it feels like a lifetime ago since I last had a paint. Good times indeed. 

EP ROUGHS.

After two weeks of frustration, drawing and redrawing, I've finally got something to send over for the band to have a look at. I wasn't sure how rough my roughs actually should be as I haven't had a live client before but think they'll get my ideas across. I chose to focus the majority of my imagery on the song Adviceberg as I think I mentioned in an earlier post and combined them with elements of winter. It's been a good week of drawing that I've enjoyed loads, as the pressure of working for a client has kept me on my toes. I don't usually spend much of my time drawing the human form so it was a good chance to knuckle down and practice. I'm hoping that if all is good, they'll choose the weird face mold image as I really got into it and feel I could push it a lot further given the opportunity. I'm quite nervous as to what their reaction will be towards my work but fingers crossed I'm on the same wave length.  Just a case of waiting now.

SING RAMONA SING a.k.a THE EIFFEL TOWERS.

The band formally known as The Eiffel Towers have been in touch today to inform myself that they have had second thoughts on the name. I had started to play about with typographic logos but I guess I'll just have to scrap them and start again. They're now set on being called Sing Ramona Sing. Personally, I think it works much better and typographically, gives me more to play about with. All I want to know is, who's Ramona??