#another design that will hopefully end up printed to be sold at cons!

[sylvrndoodles]

[climbdraws]

How does an artist whose never really posted art online go about making a successful online store the same way you have? I'm not sure how to even start, do you open a store and pray? Get an endorsement from another artist? Am I gonna need a twitter? I guess im just looking for any tips, if you're willing to share. (BTW I got a a few of the holo skull stickers, ADORE them!)

hi! glad you like the holo stickers - hopefully gonna add more real soon!

(long answer so under cut)

I think the first thing you need to ask yourself is - how much effort do I want/have time to put into this? ((*For reference, my store would be categorized under upper-medium/high effort as I am doing art full-time))

Low Effort - POD service (print-on-demand) such as RedBubble, Society6, Teepublic (you upload your work, they handle everything else.)

PROS: They handle everything from site listings, product photos, product creation, packaging, shipping & handling, and customer support. They have brand reputation so people trust the site & your products. Offer a lot of custom printing (shirts, pillows, blankets, mugs etc) that would be pretty expensive trying to do yourself starting out. Very little involvement besides uploading your work & sharing it to your followers. 

CONS: Artists only receive a very small percentage per sale and it might take quite a while to earn anything substantial. Product quality varies (RedBubble sticker quality is hot garbage imo) as they are usually cheaply produced. A lot of stolen artwork/designs are sold on these sites and nothing is done to regulate it. 

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Medium Effort: Online marketplaces such as Storenvy, Etsy, Shopify etc. A PLATFORM for you to sell your goods - you are responsible for creating, packaging, shipping & marketing your products. 

PROS: Convenient marketplace shopping allows people to easily browse your store alongside other vendors/artists. Allows you to brand your own store & products so that they are uniquely yours. A true “small business” as you are handling essentially everything except for the online store-hosting platform. Allows you to include personal notes/touches or freebies in your orders as you are packaging & shipping them yourself. 

CONS: Usually have to pay a fee for every sale/listing. Website/Storefront design are limited to what the platform has to offer (some don’t have custom HTML options). Requires YOU to create your own merch - whether it’s original art, prints, stickers, enamel pins etc - which means a lot of time spent talking to manufacturers, figuring out shipping rates etc. Can involve a lot of $$ investment upfront. 

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High Effort / Full-Time: Creating your own website/storefront OR Patreon Clubs. Handling everything yourself & releasing new content quite frequently - good for artists with a following/brand reputation/full-time. 

Basically everything from the ‘Medium Effort’ tier but requiring quite a bit of time/effort (usually) daily. Monthly Patreon clubs are becoming pretty common - backers pledge every month for a ‘tier’ level and receive merch at the end of the month (which requires you to factor in manufacturing time, shipping time to you, packaging & then shipping to the customer which can be difficult for people who suck at meeting deadlines ((sometimes me but I'm working on it))

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Honestly there is no “correct way” to go about creating a shop for yourself. I know a lot of artists who run their own stores & also have merch on RedBubble/Society6 as it’s just another revenue stream that’s quite low-key and the more visibility you have as a ‘brand’ the better. Some artists have shop openings with their store only being open for a week or two and then closed for a couple months and then re-open again (youtuber BayleeJae does this & is quite successful at it) 

There’s honestly so many factors that go into a store - what kind of merch/art you want to create, what your fanbase is, who you’re marketing to, how much funds you want to invest etc etc. It can be quite overwhelming which is why I really recommend those just starting out to start slow/small and test the waters with just a few items first before rushing in and spending a bunch of $$$$ on products that might not end up selling as well as you hoped.

Since you said you don’t really post online - I would suggest starting with a LOW EFFORT store like RedBubble, Society6, TeePublic etc and really focus on building your social media following & presence. Make sure your social accounts all have same/similar handles (mine vary a lil but it’s always ‘Climb’). Posting frequently can be hard but it’s really important to start getting people to notice you & gain interest in your work. 

[ellaucatwo]

My Evaluations through the weeks

Week 1 

For this week i have spent most of my time researching into children's books. I looked into how to create a children's book and it seems a lot harder than I expected to be. There are a lot of things to consider when creating a children's book. You firstly need to make sure your characters stay consistent throughout the book. This is one thing that I am nervous for as I only ever design one character for one frame, but for the book it will have to remain the same for about 30 pages. Another big thing to consider is colour, I have found out that colour is very important to children as their eyes are still developing. This means they don’t see all shades of colour properly and thats why they're drawn more to brighter colours. They also associate colour to certain things, so if I wanted to make my monster red kids could instantly make the kids not like the character as it reminds them of blood. This means I will need to make a lot of decisions thoroughly before deciding them. 

This week has made me realise how hard it is going to be to create a children's book, as I thought it was going to be an easy task. I thought kids minds aren't smarter enough or even cared enough on some features of a book, which would make it easy to make one. I am excited to find out more on how to create a children's so I can do it properly. 

Also this week my step dad has begun the writing for the book ‘Monster Twins’ with the two main characters of Bella and Bertie. So next week I will starting drawing ideas on how to create them. My plan for next week is to start developing my ideas to something.

Week 2

I have enjoyed week two quite a lot as it has been a more of a designing week. I have been designing monsters for what Bella and Bertie will look like. I have started on my sketchbook which has been a lot of fun because its hand on drawing and I can see all my ideas coming together. I’ve use a whole range of materials when creating my monsters, I’ve used watercolour, acrylic, biro, cardboard and pieces of paper. I really enjoyed using numerous materials for my monsters, it allowed me to see them in a new perspective. I enjoyed using watercolour for my monsters the most as it was the easiest to use and I was able to shade in a way I like. All though I wont have the monsters in the watercolour effect for the book, I will go for a more sold colour effect. 

This week I have made an important decision of what colour Bella and Bertie should be. I did research on the psychology of colour, I have found out the positives and negatives of each colour. From all the colours I looked at and the pros and cons of them and decided that magenta will be best for Bella and orange will be best for Bertie. It was very interesting looking up the psychology of colour as there was a lot of negatives about colours which I never knew. I didn't know that blue is seen as an unfriendly colour so it was one I couldn't use even though it would've suit Bertie very well. 

As I started the final project very late I now only have four weeks left to the deadline to hand in all of my work. So I am starting to feel a bit stressed that I wont be able to get it all complete, as I still haven't started my final piece and even haven't decide what body type to choose for Bella and Bertie. Next week I am hoping to have the body type decided for them and to have an official page finished and ready to print. My step dad has got quite a few pages written now so I have an option of choosing which page to practise on.

Week 3

This has been my most productive week out of them all as I have actually finished a couple pages of the book, which are ready to print. I am more than happy on how the pages turned out, the pages have come out so much better than I thought they would. It’s so amazing see the pages coming to life and seeing how they started from just the pages been written. To come up with the designs of the pages, I started designing them on my sketchbook. And I done this so I could see the pages forming together like a proper book and to sketch them quicker. 

Procreate is the app I have been using for drawing my pages and it has been so amazing. It makes drawing them so easy, there are so many features to the app which give so many options. 

I am happy with all the work I have done this week and think at the rate I’m going I might be able to get my book finished. I feel confident with how the pages turned out and I don't see anything needed to be changed on them. This week I have also done some research into different artists and illustrators so I could get some inspiration on how I could develop my monsters, but I didn't do as much research as I wanted to do this week so that wasn't good. 

My goal for next week is to starting sketching designs for what other characters should look like and hopefully by the end of the week I hope to have a rough idea of what they would look like. I would also like to get a couple more pages completed by next week.

[faeuniblog]

Official Script For Visual Essay

Page 1

Hello there fellow melons, I’m gonna be educating you guys on the joys that are the publishing industry!

So, Melon Sandy, I see you have your book there!

If you’re a writer that’s just written the best story ever, you’ll probably want to share said book with the world so you can make lots of money and be really famous, right?

But almighty voice in the sky who sounds super amazing and cool - like it really sucks that this is a written visual essay and not an audio one - I here you cry!

How do I go about share my creation with the world?!

Well, you have two options little Melon Sandy. You can go to Publishing Company or Self-Publish your work.

Page 2

Now let’s talks about what a Publisher is and does.

Publishing Company – Basics, Pros and Cons.

If you decide to go with the Traditional method and get published by a big publisher, you’ll need to have your work accepted by a literary agent first. Once you get an agent, they will take care of selling your manuscript to the big publishers (2).

Literary agents take 15% of your total income from the first sale. (1)

By going through an agent you’ll be paid an upfront advance for your work. The advance could range from £1,000 to over £100,000 (2).

Having an agent take care of shit is nice, but its damn hard to get an agent to take your work and even then, there’s no reassurance that they’ll even be able to sell your manuscript to a publisher (3).

If you're lucky enough to get a publisher interested.

The publisher will take care of editorial, copyediting, and design work, as well as invest in sales and marketing (3). Depending on whether you’re with a small or large publisher, the budget on these things can range from £15,000 to £50,000 (2).

However, one down side is that Publisher might make you edit you story in ways you don’t agree with. (3).

You probably won’t get a moving or TV deal but you stand a much higher chance by going with the traditional method (2).

Your book will be released both in physical and digital shops (2).

So, you get a load of support from a Publisher and Agent but in return you will have to give up a percentage of your earnings and control (2).

Page 3

Let’s look at J.K. Rowling as an example for publishing with a Company!

The first Harry Potter book was rejected by the first literary agency she applied too, and to add insult to injury, they didn’t give back her folder! (4)

She would luckily be accepted by the next literary agency, Christopher Little. Little sent the manuscript to 12 different publishers (who all rejected it!) before finally ending up with Bloomsbury (4) (5).

As when you go to a publisher, J.K was told to change the title of the US version from ‘Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone’ to ‘Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone’ as they didn’t think America’s would know what a ‘philosopher’ was would think it sounded boring (6) (7).

Hopefully, Melan Sandy, you won’t have a much trouble getting you book published as J.K. Rowling did.

Page 4

Self-Publishing – Basics, Pros and Cons

If you decide to go with Self-Published, there are two types of self-publishing: Digital and Old-fashioned (2) (3).

Anyone can be an artist or writer with the internet around.

Amazon charges nothing for you to upload your work to its worldwide audience, and websites like Tumblr give you a place to post your art and stories for free (2) (3).

By Self-publishing, you have complete creative control over your work, meaning it can be about anything with no one to stop you!

And all the money you make, is your money, no sharing with a big company!

With online shops like Amazon, you won’t get a money advance like you would if you’ll with a publisher (2).

Your book won’t be in bookshops and you’ll still have to face some costs like editorial and copyediting (2).

Remember, Amazon has over 5,000,000 e-books in its store and your book will simply be one of them, so it might be hard to get attention (2).

With free websites like Tumblr, you’re not going to make any money unless you go to separate sources such as Patreon or ko-fi but you have basically no limitation on what your work is about.

Page 5

An example of the Old-fashioned method would be making, printing and selling Zine, at conversions or online.

A zine (short for magazine or fanzine) is a small self-published work made up of text and images and is usually reproduced via photocopier (8).

They can be made by a single person, or a small group. An example of some popular zines are ‘Aint-Bad Magazine’, ‘Home Zine’ and ‘Record Culture Magazine’ (9).

Examples of people who have done shit with Self-Publishing

The Martian is a science fiction novel written by Andy Weir in 2011. Weir started writing the book in 2009, and was rebuffed by literary agents when trying to get prior books published. Weir decided to put the book online on his website in a serial format (10).

Fans of his book later requested him to make an Amazon Kindle version for 99 cents (the minimum allowable price he could set). The Kindle version sold 35,000 copies in three months, quickly rising to the top of Amazon’s best-selling science-fiction list (10).

Podium Publishing an audiobook publisher, signed for the audiobook rights in January 2013 and in March 2013 Weir sold the prints rights to Crown for over US$100,000 (10).

Homestuck is a webcomic written, illustrated and animated by Andrew Hussie and published on MS Paint Adventures. The comic is a combination of static images, animated GIFs, instant message logs and games made with Adobe Flash (11).

Homestuck arguably has the largest fan community out there, which has said to reach in the millions. Unlike the other authors on this list, Homestuck never got involved with publishers, this may be because it’s the only one on my list that’s a comic (11).

If you go almost any conversion, you are likely to find a Homestuck fan there either cosplaying or selling zines or art (11).

Page 6

By going with a publishing house, they will bear the costs, such as editing, marketing and paying advances, but they also take a substantial share of the profits can take control away from you to better suit their ideas of what is best (2) (3).

The changes the published made you do could arguably be for the better, but they could also be for the worst.

While is you self-published, if you want help for advice, you’ve going to have to pay for it with your own money.

With Self-Publishing, the author bears all of these costs but gets the benefit of all profits being exclusively theirs.

I think another one of the appeals of self-publishing is the control you get to keep over entire process. The writer decides the price, distribution, marketing, and public relations, they can also outsource these tasks if they want guidance or support (2) (3).

A lot of people who go for Self-Published end up with a Publisher anyway, but with a lot more control and say over what your product is then you would normally have.

Is this detour into Self-Publishing this just an extra, unnecessary step to get a Publisher?

Page 7

The method you decide to go for should depend on what type of story you are publishing.

For someone like J.K, the internet wasn’t a viable option while she was writing and she wouldn’t be able live off the slow money that comes from publishing on the internet.

She didn’t have the means to advertise her book by herself either, going to a Publisher was the only option.

Andy Weir tried the publishing root first, but they weren’t interested, so he started writing his book in a format that worked well with the internet (10).

Homestuck, could only really be a digital comic, there might be a physical one somewhere down the line but the original could only ever exist on the internet.

Both methods have the negative and positives.

But hey, whatever method you decide.

Good Luck

By Fae-Jinni & Melon Sandy

Ending

Page 8

So Melon Sandy have you decided how you’re going to publish your awesome book?  (I turn to look at Sandy)

(There is a crushed Melon in the floor)

“Melon Sandy?” (Confused)

(It have bow like Melon Sandy)

(I look down to see a knife in my hand with Melon blood on it…)

(Camera movies to show my face. It is coved in Melon juice…)

 References

(1)  Staff, W. (2017). How Literary Agents Get Paid: Standard Commission Practices And Payments For Literary Agents - Writer's Relief, Inc.. [online] Writer's Relief, Inc. Available at: http://writersrelief.com/blog/2014/02/standard-commission-practices-payments-literary-agents/ [Accessed 18 Nov. 2017].

(2)  Writersworkshop.co.uk. (2017). How to publish a book: a guide | Writers' Workshop. [online] Available at: http://www.writersworkshop.co.uk/How-To-Get-Published.html [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(3)  Here!, S. (2017). Pros And Cons Of Traditional Publishing vs Self-Publishing. [online] The Creative Penn. Available at: https://www.thecreativepenn.com/self-publishing-vs-traditional/ [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(4)  Flood, A. (2017). JK Rowling says she received ‘loads’ of rejections before Harry Potter success. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/mar/24/jk-rowling-tells-fans-twitter-loads-rejections-before-harry-potter-success [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(5)  Kennedy, M. (2017). JK Rowling posts letters of rejection on Twitter to help budding authors. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/mar/25/jk-rowling-harry-potter-posts-letters-of-rejection-on-twitter [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(6)  En.wikipedia.org. (2017). J. K. Rowling. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._K._Rowling#Subsequent_Harry_Potter_publications [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(7)  Theguardian.com. (2017). Why the name change from "Harry Potter and the Philosopher''s Stone" in the UK to "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer''s Stone" in the United States ? | Notes and Queries | guardian.co.uk. [online] Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-18387,00.html [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(8)  En.wikipedia.org. (2017). Zine. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zine [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(9)  Format.com. (2017). 11 Cool Artist Zines You Need to Own. [online] Available at: https://www.format.com/magazine/galleries/art/11-cool-artist-zines [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(10)          En.wikipedia.org. (2017). The Martian (Weir novel). [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Martian_(Weir_novel) [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].

(11)          En.wikipedia.org. (2017). Homestuck. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homestuck#frb-inline [Accessed 21 Nov. 2017].