#for the record i don't use tumblr on my phone it's just easier to draw. great perfect thank you

[jichanxo]

thank god it's so easy to get sound legal advice in kamurocho (and sorry for killing you @passthroughtime)

[kaeru-kobold]

Kaeru Kobold-Dear Tumblr #1

I finally decided what I'm going to do with this Tumblr Account! Aside from the typical reposts of my art, self-promotion and such, I'm going to use it primarily as a live, public diary of my adventure in Vtubing, streaming and content creation, so here goes my very first entry. I think I'm going to try to do this daily, at the very least I'll make one weekly and on big events.

Dear Tumblr,

it's currently 1:22 AM, 12/11/23. I've been interested in becoming a Vtuber for roughly a year now, and have slowly done tons of research, watched hours of Vtuber content for fun and advice, built up art and assets, came up with a new Sona design, customized models, and have spent hours upon hours of work making art and assets related to that goal. Boy they really don't tell you how much work it is to be a streamer/content creator, especially when you're broke and doing it all by yourself. Speaking of broke... I'm currently out of work, money is very low, and I'm very stressed out. I made the mistake of leaving my old job for a new one that I hoped would be a good opportunity, but I had to leave on day one for moral and public health reasons I won't get into. I have put in dozens of applications the last two weeks and have mainly only received automated emails; I have done 2 Zoom interviews for two different jobs, and then was never given a call or email back. My old job won't take me back for reasons beyond me. I admitted this in an OkayDonuts stream a day or so ago, and he said similar issues motivated him to start streaming. This gives me so much hope that I can have the great community and career success that he has that I so desire-If he could do it, so can I! Right? I just really like making stuff, I've always liked learning new techniques both physical and digital; crochet, clay sculpting, wood carving, painting, graphic design, 3D modelling/Texturing, game design. I wasn't good at much as a kid, but art was my passion, and the best part was seeing how happy it made other people. I just want to make cool things that make people happy and create a community of similarly creative people to share our passions and bring more kindness and cool creations into the world. I don't want to be an uber rich Mr. Beast level celebrity, I just want to make enough that I don't need a menial job I suffer at. Simply making a decent living in this world off my art would be a blessing, it would be so much better for my mental health. Speaking of which, if you're reading this....did you know I take commissions? Please commission me, I hungy :'( But seriously, as of writing this, I have $43.20 in my bank account. My phone bill alone is $45. My partner and I have family support, so we'll get by ok, but the struggle and having to ask for help is really getting to me. On the bright side, since we should count our blessings- I have a really nice microphone since my partner tried streaming a couple years ago and is letting me use it whenever I need! I have a really good laptop from my college days that can run everything I need without getting TOO overwhelmed. I have a really good drawing tablet that I bought a couple years ago when I was doing a little better financially (It's much easier to save money when you're living with your parents and work 40 hours a week for $13/hr and your parents pay for everything) Losing my job may be a blessing in disguise because In my stress I have gone into a manic state and began going crazy getting my custom stream Overlays done, fully animated Stream Opening, BRB and Closing Screens, stinger transition animation, a functioning PNGTuber, and multiple drawings/animations for alerts/emotes/rewards/etc. and yes that includes things I didn't know I needed to be a Twitch Affiliate to even use...lol...I'm currently working on an animated lore video for my debut that I will also record a voice-over for. Lastly, a more recent thing-My partner found a gamer chair in the dumpster at our apartment last week after I had spent a couple months trying to find one-the cheapest ones on Facebook Marketplace in our area were like $80-and it's in near perfect condition, only a bit of scuff/rip on the seat and arm rests. How crazy is that? I gave it a good scrub-down and its good to go. I choose to take that as a sign from the universe that I'm on the right path. Wish me luck! With lots of love, Kaeru Kobold

[resinatingbeauty]

To my dearest supporters on tumblr. - Update For March

New Listings

Update On Delays / Runes

Plans for the Future

You have helped me achieve my dream. As of Saturday, I have requested temporary leave from my standard job to focus more on my passion. This may become permanent if I find that I can sustain myself running my little witch shop alone. I went from working two jobs to just one that I LOVE. If that's not magic then I don't know what it is! My leave starts March 27th 2021, so if you're still waiting on an order you can count on production speed picking up!

These beautiful 'Witch Runes' are the newest rune design to be added to the shop. I was super excited to get this mold and do something different than the standard Elder Fulthark set. This 14 piece (including blank tile) set features common esoteric symbols and is a bit easier to start with for beginners, especially those more experienced with tarot / oracle cards who are used to working with imagery over learning a new language. As you all know, I love adding special effects to my creations to make them truly unique, and you can see by the photos above that this set features both Thermogenic. pigments and glow in the dark pigments.

Also added these adorable wish bottle pendants, each one filled with crystal chips hand selected just for their future owner wire wrapped with Selenite to create what I've dubbed 'Bottled Rainbows'. I have had so many bottles around the house for herbs and spell jars that I wanted to do something different for my jewelry section. These crystals are spiritually cleansed and positive energy charged before they arrive in your hands.

-Shipping, Processing & Fulfillment

I know that some of my customers are still awaiting rune sets and I'm sure if you're waiting on an order that you're wondering why I'm using my time to make new things and not your set. This is, unfortunately, part of the game that is selling online. I create many things in advance and wait to list them because newer listings draw more traffic on Etsy. This must be done to stay relevant. Since I am not depending on other sources of income any longer, it is important to maintain my presence because I cannot afford to flounder now. It is still just me until I summon an army of Fae to assist me. I have been asking for everyone's patience at this time while I continue to fill backorders from the end of February when I was recovering from temporary blindness and light sensitivity in my left eye. All affected orders will receive special extras for their patience!

If you have placed an order and are curious when to expect it, please don't hesitate to contact me. I often purchase shipping labels on my phone which triggers an automatic shipping notification through Etsy. This does NOT mean I have shipped your order- I will update you personally when I have. Until I find some way to turn off those notifications when labels are purchased, please only go by my contact with you.

I have been triaging orders according to complexity. If your order is only for one or two small items, I will try and assemble it in time to reach shipping expectations. I have been attempting to notify everyone that their order may take longer than anticipated and have updated the shop policies and announcements to relay this message.

WHAT TO EXPECT

• Rune orders, mystery boxes, and orders containing multiple items will take longer depending on your request and demand at any given time.

•Spell Kits & Spell Jars are generally shipping on time depending on quantity. + 2 days max.

•Jewelry & Accessories are generally shipping on time, depending on quantity and complexity.

•Customized & Personalized orders depend on what your request is. When you place your order, I will give you an ETA.

•Large Items (Trays, Skulls, incense burners, candle holders etc) will be affected by the delay. These items take 1-4 days to create and finalize with shipping on the next business day. If you have ordered a large item your order will be triaged as if it were a rune set. The current wait for runes and other large orders is estimated to be 2-3 weeks.

I will NEVER sacrifice quality over quantity. I would rather have a customer complain that it took them a year to receive their order BUT it was everything they had hoped for and more. Out of over 200 sales this past year on Etsy since I shifted my focus from Mercari to building my Etsy presence, I have only had ONE customer complain that their item was not up to standard and it was immediately replaced, free of charges to them, with one that was. I would like to maintain this track record, even if it means taking extra time to do it. :)

The Future

Creating Mystery Boxes has allowed me to explore some other ideas that I hadn't otherwise elaborated on before because I wasn't sure anyone would be interested in them. One of those ideas was creating themed 'satchel blends' of pre packaged herbs and botanicals hand selected for a specific element, purpose, deity etc. Because I have had many customers come to me saying that they are beginners and not sure what is what, what they need for spellcraft, what they should put on their altar. I originally put these together for Mystery Boxes, but now that I see they may help those of you exploring the Craft and spirituality, a larger version of these satchels may be available in the shop soon.

Each Mylar bag contains a unique selection of herbs and botanicals that focuses around a specific purpose / intent, theme, element, etc that may be used all together or a la carte for whatever you choose. Each bag is unique with all selections chosen based on their properties and alignment with the subject. I decided to create these inexpensive 'grab and go' bags as a way to make spell craft, talisman creation, and witchcraft in general less daunting for those who are just starting. They are also great for more experience practicioners as they feature at least 1g of herbs and botanicals you can integrate into your Craft so long as you know what you want.

The above is a sneak peek at what will be the basis for the future 'Air Elemental Rune Set' as I have already created Earth, Fire, and Water. This particular variation was requested as a custom order (hence the addition of stars per her request) but the overall theme will be available in the shop soon to complete my handmade elemental series.

I expect to also add more inexpensive selections like this for general use to make magick more accessible and less intimidating for all, putting my knowledge to work for you to make everyone's life and practice a little easier.

I would love to hear your opinions on some of this! If you like these ideas or think they are garbage- I am happy to listen!. I just wanted to take some time today to thank you all, for without you,I do not believe I would see the success I have had over these last few months. I appreciate ALL of you and it has been nothing but a pleasure to serve you and pursue my passion.

You can find these creations and more in my Etsy shop- all listings are hand crafted and each made to order / one of a kind from my hands to yours @ blursedbaubles.etsy.com

Now, back to work. Wishing everyone a blessed week!

-Samantha Luck (Owner / Creator)

[checanty]

Hi! I studied illustration and graduated this year, now I'm trying to get my foot into the professional illustration and character design world. My work goes more into the spooky and pulp art direction, I'm also quite introverted and have social anxiety and you seem like an introvert too. I just wanted to ask how you deal with interacting (mails, phone calls) with clients and I'll glady take any tip how to find clients in general and to network. I just feel like I don't really know how to start.

Hi there! Yes, I’m an introvert as well. And socially anxious. All that stuff you’re mentioning right there sends a shiver down my spine. So let me tell you about how I deal with it ...

But let me tell you, we are not uncommon in the art community! Back in school I was warned being an artist would be twice as hard because I’m horrible at selling myself (ok my work, but the lines blur nowadays.) and it made me feel terrified of the future. There was safety in knowing I could always work on my craft and get better at it, but I’d never been able to figure out to be that outgoing person I thought I needed to be. (My whole time at school was pretty much people telling me ‘you’re good, but you’re quiet, so you’ll never be good enough. Over. and over. and I never managed to change and it fucked me up good.)But, as I said, lots of illustration folks are introverts and a lot deal with anxiety issues. It’s good if you can find a forum of working pros (facebook groups, etc) that talk openly about problems they face, so you can realize once and for all you’re not the odd one out and a bunch of the people you admire and thought had it all figured out have been hiding and crying in hotel rooms, too, if that one convention that was supposed to be life changing turned out to be too much to handle.Also, praise the internet! There are basically no phone calls to make! Writing e-mails … well, that one gets easier! You end up having to write about similar things a lot of the time and learn some go to phrases (if you are very clever you can write and save some template mails, e.g. for what your quotes are, things people ask you a lot in interviews, etc. to save some time!) and start caring less about every mail to be perfect. It also gets easier to weed out the mails that are worth an afternoon of composing and which are not.When e-mails are especially scary and I have a lot of emotions and feel I need to answer without much delay, I boil my reply down to the essentials. What is the person actually asking? People often write a lot, but really they only ask: Are you interested in this? Are you available?So I just answer something like: Hey XYZ, thank you so much for reaching out! I’d love to be part of the project. Could you please fill me in on the details?I sometimes feel bad basically ignoring 80 % of an e-mail, but often it’s simply not relevant at the time. Just make sure you *do* filter out the important information/questions. (Asking for details when the e-mail is filled with everything you need to know doesn’t make sense. But quite often people try to gauge interest to see if they need to continue looking before they take the time to delve deeper into it.)If people ask you for a quote, feel free to simply ask them for their budget in return. My e-mailing solution is usually keeping it polite and to the point. The simpler the better.I used to not write simple ‘thank you!’ or ‘got it!’ e-mails and write only when I had something I felt was worthy contributing because I didn’t want to disturb the busy people I was working with, but I noticed people did it to me and it’s just nice for them to know the e-mail got through and all. And it really doesn’t disturb most people. So I do it now.Generally, for a lot of e-mailing questions and art business questions in general I can only recommend checking out @dearartdirector where you have a bunch of art directors answering your questions. Make sure to see what they have answered already before asking away! They’ve already covered A LOT. It’s a super valuable resource and I have some of their answers, especially for e-mail communication, saved in my favourites here on Tumblr for reference.Oh and let yourself some slack. There’s a learning curve. Sometimes having WRITTEN that scary e-mail is the most important part. Just get the ball rolling. There’ll be so many mails more … and if you need to do a silly dance after sending a scary email, do it. Nobody’s judging. Unless you have a cat.So, phone calls. They usually don’t happen. If people want to call and it’s for a book cover or something similar tell them no and that you’d rather have all the information in writing. Which is better anyways. For your records and because it’s much harder to misunderstand or forget something typed. Now, I’ve had phone calls happening this year for my tv work. Sometimes it’s quicker to receive feedback and explanations ‘in person’ and people call. They’ll ask up front though and you can set a date/time. Nowadays you can usually opt for Skype, too, which was possible with one team I worked with, which I was very grateful for. Skype is for some reason easier for me than phone calls, probably because I feel more in control having the screen in front of me and being able to see other people’s expressions, gestures.Before the first call I was still incredibly nervous. Chattering teeth nervous. I couldn’t concentrate the whole effing day. But the job paid well enough that I could risk deciding to tackle nothing besides the call that day. (I made other plany for the day, but nothing important and I was fully aware I’d most likely end up not doing it. It was more a gentle … when you feel up to it, draw. But if you need to watch 4 hours of Netflix and then spend an hour writing down your worst fears to get through this that is absolutely FINE.) I know myself by now. Stuff like this will keep me from being functional for the whole day, so I won’t force myself to be it despite it all. Keeping it easy, prepare what I can, most of all deep breathing.The calls got less anxiety inducing with every time and I even started to look forward to them because the team was lovely to work with and I loved the job. (And it felt so professional! Like. Yes, fill me in on the news. I got this covered. Expect sketches in a hour. Expect final on your desk tomorrow.) So know what you can expect of yourself, don’t bring yourself down. You’re good at other stuff. I’m great at working by myself for a long time and it makes me grow fast as an artist. I’m not good at phone calls. One of these things is MUCH more important to find work.Nevertheless, I had to do an actual phone calls with another team. It was horrible. The people were perfectly sweet, but that phone was basically gliding through my sweaty fingers. Make sure to get all the important info in writing even if they’ve explained things to you on the phone. Even if you took notes. even if you’re afraid they’ll think you didn’t listen to them. Or are stupid. Better safe than sorry. I once didn’t catch that other people having a meeting was meant as a deadline for me which ended in one very relaxed evening and one panicked all-nighter to make it in time. So rather than do that write a ‘thanks for the talk, can you confirm this info I noted down, thank you’ e-mail. Especially when you’re like me and a part of your brain just shuts down when on the phone. (On the phone I can forget my name and birthday.)Finding clients … well most clients have found me. I’ve e-mailed some art directors I’d like to work with (find that address, Write ‘Hello, I’m an illustrator, would love to work with you some time, here’s a link to my portfolio. Maybe add 2-3 (low res) jpgs.) and sent out postcards, but I’m not good at doing that regularly and most jobs come from people finding my work on the internet. So submit your work to blogs and magazines (e.g. illustration age), be active on social media. Put your e-mail address somewhere where people can find it easily. I’ve actually had some good job inquiries from people who’ve found my work on Behance. I update that portfolio maybe twice a year, so it doesn’t take as much effort as Facebook or similar sites.Oh this got quite lengthy. There’s a cup of tea getting cold somewhere …Seriously, check out that Dear Art Director blog. It is invaluable info, no matter which part of the industry you want to work in.