Heyo all peoples who are finding me from artgrind!

If ya wanna join, please make sure you read this post: http://community.livejournal.com/artgrind/11623.html

and send me your info *EXACTLY* as I've laid it out. Either post it in that thread or send me a private message on LJ and I'll add you to the participant list. If you must reply in my journal here, please only reply to this message so I can keep everything strait. Its hard when there's hundreds of people posting in like three-four different places!

Posting in the proper thread helps me keep track of peoples and makes sure that everyone who wants to gets included! Thanks!

The shifters forums live again: http://www.shiftersonline.com/forums/index.php

for those of you who care.

I'm posting this here because I know more people watch this journal than the actual shadowsden one. Back in November my server died. Its taken much time, scrounging and frustration, but we have it working again and shadowsden.org exists again. It's still not a full recovery, as we haven't been able to get the databases back yet, but for now there are forums and page to direct people to them while I'm re-building the site. It probably will not be as it was, but I'm going to try to recover the forum data. I'm still working on the other sites that were hosted on my server, but one at a time.

So if you were on shadowsden, you can at least go back and there is something there.

Your Superpower Should Be Manipulating Fire

You are intense, internally driven, and passionate. Your emotions are unpredictable - and they often get the better of you. Both radiant and terrifying, people are drawn to you. At your most powerful, you feel like the world belongs to you. Why you would be a good superhero: You are obsessive enough to give it your all Your biggest problem as a superhero: Your moodiness would make it difficult to control your powers

Your Superpower Should Be Super Speed

You're quick witted and fast to act. You're mind works at warp speed. From your perspective, everyone else is living in slow motion. You get so much done, people have accused you of not sleeping. Definitely not a couch potato, you feel a bit crazy if you're not busy doing something. Why you would be a good superhero: You're be the first on the scene... and likely to finish the job before anyone else shows up Your biggest problem as a superhero: Being bored by everyone else. Including other superheroes!

Now that would be pretty cool..

And in other news:
http://www.mcall.com/news/local/all-vampire0208-cn,0,6717961.story

wow. Just.. wow. Many people will know why words fail me on this.

There are some people in this world that just really need to stop existing. Whoever was responsible for this is one of them.

In my workplace there was a classified put out to foster two pups. Their story is heartbreaking.

Apparently a bag of seven pups were thrown onto the highway, and before anyone realized what was in the bag, five of the seven pups had been run over, squashed in the sack. Only two of the seven remained alive after it was realized what was in the bag and what was going on. They were rescued and taken to a humane organization, and my co-worker is fostering them while homes are found.

But seriously, what kind of cold, heartless, black souled monster do you have to be to do something like that to pups like this?

( Cut for pictures. )
They figure they are about 6-8 weeks old, and both male. Not sure about their breeding tho.

There are tons of organizations and ways of getting rid of unwanted pups (they should have obviously fixed their bitch...) that will find them loving homes. But to throw living babies onto a highway to be squashed?? WTF?

Honestly makes me angry and ashamed to share the planet with people like that.

Omg. this guy is my hero.. seriously. I could not stop laughing. Anyone who's worked in the graphics industry should appreciate this too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5igTIBSnV7c

TRUST YOUR GRAPHIC DESIGNER!!

I yoinked it from Bulletwolf after much laughing.


5 Things Meme:
Here are four truths and one lie. See if you can pick out the lie, and post it in a comment. First person to get it right gets a LJ Icon.

1. I have taught a class at a university.
2. I have rescued someone from a cult.
3. I drove through a forest fire.
4. I lived for a month in a foreign country.
5. I have won an prestigious art award.

Because it is just ALL the rage and everyone and their dog (or cat.. literally) is on this thing, I was sort of shanghaied into joining it. Now, its a social networking site, and if you haven't heard of it yet, well, get with the times. I was forced to, now you should too dammit.

www.facebook.com

Anyway, you are supposed to put up a profile picture and so forth and I went off looking for a profile picture and I realized... I have no pictures of myself. Not on my computer or anything. What does this say about me? I'm not sure, but its probably not good.

Anyway, there was this welcome back 'company' type BBQ at my work and someone got a snapshot of me on the web. When I saw this picture I remembered why I don't have any pictures of me. Because I look like a doof in 99.9% of the pictures I'm in. I don't know why, but it seems every time I have a camera in my face I end up looking like a complete retard. That, and I'm fat, and reminded of this in every photo thats taken of me. I wish it was a motivation thing, but as it is right now, its just depressing.

I don't usually get much to bitch about in SL. (secondlife) Generally speaking, most people leave me alone or are fairly polite when they want something, even if I tell them something they don't want to hear. But today.. I dunno, tis just been something of an odd day in general, perhaps I shouldn't be surprise when suddenly the dumb on SL finds me.

Here are a couple of shining examples.

Sler: Hi ^_^ I"m in your shop right now and I'm looking at the evil eyes series pictures. I see that the one on the picutre has decapitaion marks around her neck....could you tell me where to get those? Thanks in advance ^_^

Me: Those are on a custom version of the female 'deadskin' I did for my ghost character. They are not on clothing, they are directly painted into the skin.

SLer:ah okay, thanks
SLer: so i can't buy them for myself?

Here I hear a massive 'dhrrrrr' noise. I just told them they are a part of the skin. :P

I had to continue explaining that it wasn't a tattoo and was the actual SKIN. Eventually I sold them a custom skin, which solved the problem. Next winner:

SLer: may i have a copy of your china house
Me: China house? I'm not sure what you mean.
SLer: chinanies
Sler: house

Okay, I have several places where I use asian buildings, although none of them are chinese, they are all japanese inspired buildings. And I have many. This tells me nothing.

Me: I'm still not sure what you want. Where did you see it? What region? What is it being used for?
SLer: in werewofl place

So I'm figuring this guy is talking about in Therianation, I have a BUILD called "The house of crimson wings" its a horror setting loosely built off of Project Zero/Fatal Frame sort of idea. This is not a HOUSE, this is a BUILD. I couldn't give it to him if I wanted to, its not linked, and I certainly couldn't link it together NOR would I give it to ANYONE. I wouldn't even sell it! I love the way SL peeps think you can just give anything to anyone. If I did ever sell it, it would be for moi lot of cash. Like thousands of dollars. Thats months of effort there, and several rebuilds. Screw that.

Okay, I'll stop ranting now.

Behold! the Sterling plushie!! Bask in its almighty cute-but-pissyness! Okay, so maybe not, but hey, we tried. Isn't he cute? Hand sewn and stuffed with microbeads for extra soft and squishy. Those are real metal chains he's got on, black to boot. They are poseable and are tipped with red glass beads. He's got red enamel eyes and because each one is sewn and assembled individually they each have their own 'personality' as such.

We will be taking orders for these guys, but they will be limited and we aren't sure of the price, but it will be under 20$ USD. So if you are interested in ordering one, please send me an email (shadowsmyst at gmail dot com), or leave a message here. We'll keep you informed for when we start taking orders. It will be on a first come first serve basis, so if you want to be kept in the loop, be sure you get your name in the pot.

Otherwise, enjoy his cuteness. :)

The Psychology department can't recognise an inkblot test?

I mean come on people. Its bad when the *designer* is more cerebral than you. Apparently they saw it as 'weird spray paint'. I wonder what that says about them?

Check it out:

Brymstone got featured at DrunkDuck.com!

Still on the front page if you want to check it out yourself. I guess this means I need to update Brymstone more often than once every couple of months. :P Damn, I need extra hands and the ability to function without sleep to keep up. *falls over* Least Brymstone doesn't have death enviroments like Shifters.

Right now I have a nasty case of sinutitis and bronchitis. As a result I can barely breathe, nor can I smell anything. My sinuses are so swollen, I can't taste anything, since ya know, most of our taste is influenced by the ability to smell.

If you go on what the toungue actually has the ability to taste, you can taste precicely five things. Sweet, Sour, salty, savory and bitter. (and hot, if you count burning mouth for spices.) After not being able to taste going on 4 days know, I've come to realize that if we could not taste but those four things, we'd probably eat differently. Without the taste, you have only the texture and basic tastes. Processed soup becomes unbearably salty. But then, if you look at the package, it told you that, but normally you can't taste it. Meat has a very pleasent texture, but you can tell when the spicy BBQ sauce is too much from the burning sensation after about three bites. Veggies have a pleasent crunch. Juice is WAY too sweet, as are candies. Most foods do not have a very good blend of the four basic tastes. They seem to err heavily on one particular taste, and have no 'range' of the basic tastes. It makes eating with no smell a very unpleasent thing, but rather enlightening too. I have to wonder, if no one could taste based on smell, how we would eat. I imagine that it would be very different, because processed foods become umbearably salty, bland or sweet. They have no range to satisfy the pallette. I've yet to come across something that tickles more than just one of my five tastes.

I imagine tho, that to do that, the food would actually probably taste pretty disgusting or at the very least strange to those who had the taste by smell. But I wonder, would it be healthier? Would the limitation of the taste be enough to stear one away from these disgusting processed foods we consume? Maybe. I wonder if I can actually cook something that might be interesting to my limited palette tonight.

I got this one at work. Its the title more than the content that is funny.

"Man in hot pants struts in boots, cheers city"

Is that awesome or what?

I knew my old 17" CRT monitor was crap (well technically it was boo's but still.), but now with this beautiful 22" widescreen viewsonic before me, I see the old monitor was beyond crap.

This beautiful beast has me quivering with delight everytime I look at it. Games are amazing, you get a totally new sense of depth and realism. It feels like you are really MOVING in the game. I couldn't believe the difference. And OMG! I can SEE MY PAGES. I have room for all the palettes in Manga studio and in Photoshop. Its a visual joygasm.

The tablet was initially a bit problematic, but several installs of drivers later, it works fine.

I want work to buy me one there too dammit.

This should save my eyeballs and wrists from undo strain of trying to work on such a tiny monitor.

And I got it for a good price. :D Go me! I saved my birthday money for like three years to buy this. It was COMPLETELY worth it.

January: I can rely on my cat.
February: After you die... Purgatory
March: Yet again someone has broken the friends page.
April: Apparently I'm a greedy bitch.
May: Okay, so my PC exploded today.
June: I was browsing Deviantart's forums today, particularly the 'ripped' forum where they report all the stolen/art theft stuff.
July: I found this little gem in my Shifters guestbook today.
August: For those who enjoy drama, looks like the guestbook tard returned.
September: Fuck.
October: Kind of a weird combination, but eh, life is the way it is.
November: So the other night my BF and I went and saw the new James Bond flick.
December: I don't normally take design freelance.

I had much fun laughing at this. I realize I need to put my memes in the middle of the month if I want to keep doing this.

Have a happy and save new year all! Cya in 2007.

LMAO!



So very true.

You scored as Storyteller. The Storyteller is in it for the plot: the sense of mystery and the fun of participating in a narrative that has the satisfying arc of a good book or movie. He enjoys interacting with well-defined NPCs, even preferring antagonists who have genuine motivations and personality to mere monsters. To the Storyteller, the greatest reward of the game is participating in a compelling story with interesting and unpredictable plot threads, in which his actions and those of his fellow characters determine the resolution. With apologies to Robin Laws. </td> Storyteller 100% Character Player 80% Tactician 70% Casual Gamer 60% Weekend Warrior 20% Power Gamer 0% Specialist 0% What RPG Player (Not Character) Type Are You? created with QuizFarm.com

I don't normally take design freelance. Hell, I don't normally take freelance at all. And in the rare RARE occasion I do take some, I often regret it. And this is a rant as to why.

People have these weird misconceptions when they come to artists/designers. In this case, I'm going to go more into design and custom stuff than just artist in general. A lot of these people, business people, go to a designer to have things like a logo done. They think to themselves "Oh, its a logo, it shouldn't be that hard." As soon as that thought runs through their mind, they should be smited most verily by some unnamed patron goddess of designers. The next thing, "I'll give them a picture of what I want." Again, they must be smited.

I'm sure some must be reading this going 'Buh? doesn't that make your job easier?', but in truth, NO, no it does not. Here's why.

You go to a creative professional (designer, illustrator, whatever) because they are a creative professional. They take what you are trying to say and translate it into a visual medium so that when you want to say pickle, you say pickle and not tomato. You are presumably going to them because they know what they are doing. In even going to them it means you are going to have to go with two things. An open mind, and a certain degree of trust.

As designers, we are trained to take a set of ambigous goals and turn them into a visual that creates a desired emotional/mental response based on the needs of a given product/project. We have a very extensive visual vocabular to do this. We are trained in symbologies, cultural sensitivies, visual culture, marketign and competition knowelege in our realm of expertise that you a a client lack. To be really blunt, we have a bigger visual vocabulary that you do and we know what to say and how to say it. You are bringing us your problem and we provide a solution. Thats the service you are paying for.

DO NOT TRY TO TELL US YOUR SOLUTION, WE ONLY CARE ABOUT THE PROBLEM.

If you have a solution, then why the fuck are you coming to us? Because we are probably going to tell you that you are wrong, and that your solution is not going to work because of XYZ reason. You have a say certainly in how the problem gets resolved, but if you are bothering to contract us, then have some faith and work with us rather than treat us like a glorified grunt to do your bidding. We know you have ideas. We know you are in love with your ideas because they are YOUR ideas, but what you don't get and what we as designers have had beaten out of us years ago, is that just because its an idea you had doesn't mean its the best idea to solve the problem.

Logos in particular are really really bad for this problem showing up with clients. People just don't get how complex and difficult it is to do a 'real' logo. Its not just a picture you slap on a business card. Its an identity. It is an instant feeling that is inspired in everyone who sees it. It can mean tbe difference between trust and suspision. It is a ball and chain that becomes irrevokably attached to your business and your name. It has a life of its own, and must be able to be used in countless ways on countless objects from business letterhead to T-shirts, to give away pens, to the side of a building, to the web, to a postage stamp. And it still has to be readable/legible, and it still has to reproduce. The logo is perhaps THE most important thing you will ever purchase for your business, and yet it is the thing you business people want to spend the least on. Never mind that a good logo can take up to 6 months to refine if the client is being particularly difficult or if there is a lot of approval stages required. Not to mention, that once established it becomes the foundation for your brand and any marketing person knows the mecca that the brand will become if you are a serious business person. Most of the entrepenurial sorts don't even think that far. What they don't get is a good, solid brand can mean the difference between investors taking you seriously, or kicking your ass out the door. It is as important as wearing a nice suit and polishing your shoes before meeting with the investors. If you hand them business materials that look like ass, they probably are not going to take you as seriously as if you hand them a well thought out, well laid out peice.

BUT YOU ARE A SALESPERSON. Do not think you can do this. A sales person does not walk into a courtroom, pick up a folder and play lawyer for a day. A salesperson does not walk into a doctors office and play doctor for a day. A salesperson does not walk into a mechanics shop and try to fix a car for a day. DO NOT TRY TO BE A DESIGNER FOR A DAY. You simply do not have the training or skills to do it right. Don't even try. The sales mentality and marketing mentality are two different things. It goes sales -> marketing -> designer. Sales people are not generally marketing people. They do not generally see the big picture in the same way a marketing person does. The marketing person understands the larger scope and vision, as well as the psychology that goes into selling the world on an image, and then THEY bring that to the designer in a language that is translatable into a visual image of some form.

A graphic designer is not a graphics grunt. We are not a digitising service for your ideas. We are the idea people. We are the creative people. By coming to us you surrender most of the creative control to us based on guidelines and goals you provide to us. You have to be willing to do this for us to do our jobs. In hiring us you recognize that we are experts in what we do. You trust us to come up with the ideas and concepts that can best represent your ideas to the world at large based on your NEEDS, not your WANTS. We will probably come up with stuff you don't expect. This is okay. This is where the open mind part comes up with. It is often said that designers think 'sideways'. This is that we are trained to think in creative ways that most people don't. Our creative process is fairly complex and it takes a lot of time and a lot of knowelege to do what we do. We do research, we do brainstorming, we do sketches, we do testing, we create a draft, we show it to you, you give feedback, we refine it, you give us feedback, we refine it more. And this goes on until we've got something we are BOTH satisfied with. This is a painful process if the client is difficult.

What is a difficult client? Someone who has a really solid idea of what they want that has nothing to do with what they need, and will not budge from whatever idea it is that they are stuck on. Case in point, my current client.

They want a logo for a large development company. This company will be doing a power development to begin with, with other developments to follow. He came to me via a friend. This is the only reason I took this on. I was not told initially that he had an idea, I was only told he needed some graphics work done, probably a logo. It turns out he had 'a sketch'. I shudder as soon as I learn this. He has it in his head that he needs a diamond in his logo. Lets keep in mind his company has nothing to do with diamonds, or anything they represent. It is because had an idea of 'facets' which has nothing to do with his mandates of his business or needs of his business. But he's dead stuck on this superman style diamond shape. So hard that I can't shake it (yet). I provided him 5 concepts and he's given me ZITCH in the way of feedback in terms of what he likes or doesn't like about each one, or how they feel to him, or what. Its extremely frusterating when you send stuff for feedback and all you get is "I don't think we are on the same page."

Well no fucking duh. You aren't telling me what book we are even in here.

I wrote him a big long email, no response. I'm going to have to phone him and set up a face to face where I can physically beat this diamond thing out of him and get REAL marketing strategies out of him. He's not trained in marketing, so I might have to pull on a marketing friend to be my 'translator'. I don't work well with clients that can't come around to that level and have to be 'trained'. I currently just don't have the patience for it and I come off about as blunt as a sledgehammer. Not exactly the most diplomatic thing to do.

I have similar frusterations in drawing/illustration commissions. I think many artist peeps on my list will be able to relate to this.

If you hire an artist, generally speaking, you are hiring them because you like the way they draw. This is a key thing to remember, because if you are hiring them because they happen to be popular or do a particular thing but you don't like their style, don't hire them. Its frusterating as an artist to be hired to draw something in a style that you either aren't familar with or can't do. Its extremely insulting and rude to hire and artist and then tell them to draw like someone else. If you like 'someone else's' drawing style, hire THEM. if they are too expensive or not taking commissions, tough.

Once again, if you hire a creative professional, you have to surrender a certain degree of creative control to them. This includes a drawing. It is infuriating to be given a set of instructions, take hours to draw something, and then be told a billion and one little things that are wrong. "The nose is too fat", "the belly is too big", "There are thirteen stripes not twelve", "Its not X enough looking.". It could be anything. If it wasn't specified in the original brief (instructions), the artist is not obliged to account for it. If its REALLY important that there be thirteen stripes, then that should be in the instructions. You should already know how the artist draws noses. If you don't like them, don't hire them, or reference a picture they've already done that you like. Its easier to reproduce your own stuff rather than someone elses as an artist.

As a client, you should realize that 1) artist are generally undervalued. 2) you reasonably should only expect two chances to make changes, and take FULL advantage of those two opportunities. 3) Once you 'sign off' and allow a piece to be completed, its done. Don't try to change it at that point.

Most commercial artists charge either per job or per hour. If you want to know my time, as a designer, is charged at 50$USD an hour. One illustration/picture fully colored and rendered might take me 4-5 hours to produce. (never mind changes beyond the first two, those cost extra.) If you are seriously considering commissioning me to do anything, you'd better have at least 200-300$ to spend. Sketches, just pencil sketches, usually start around 30$ and move up. Thats for clean sketches. Anything naughty starts at 80$. I have a con special where I'll do sketches for 25$ on the spot. That is the single cheapest place anyone will ever get artwork from me. Visit me a t a con, get a sketch if you want one from me. To even start on that logo job for my friend's friend, we negotiated 500$. People are probably reading this going "Holy fuck!", but this is reality folks, this is how much I'm worth. I'm in demand, my time is precious. If you want me to work for you, you have to pay me what I'm worth. Otherwise, I have other personal things I want to do with my time. Like make comics. Having to please someone is VERY STRESSFUL. I deal with it at my full time job, I don't want to deal with it on my time off unless its really worth my while. My prices set appart the people who are serious from the ones who aren't. I blatently refuse to do custom freebees. I simply do not have time and it devalues my work. Gifts from me are rare, but I do do them on occasion when I'm inspired to do so. But thats my choice.

Now, I've also done my time as a minimum wage sales grunt at a department store. I also did door to door sales for about 6 months. In that time I learned a lot about people. I've worked in my profession long enough now to also know how it works and how to protect myself. The way I work is non negotiable. You do things my way, or the highway. You come to me, you accept these terms. I do this for your protection and mine. I'm not easily intimidated, and I respond very negatively and poorly to the usual 'customer threats'. So don't even try it. Same with guilt trips and 'chumming'. Chumming, FYI, is when people try to pretend that they are friends with you so they can get something free from you. I charge my RL friends money for art mmk? Do not think you are special because I've known you for two seconds on an instant messanger. My 'friends' are people I've known for years. Usually at least 2-3 before I consider them truly a friend. If you've just met me, I am a nice person, but don't think you can take advantage of me because I'm very good at saying no. I am an artistic mercenary, I require money to draw for you. And if you do not offer enough to be worth my while, its not going to happen. I'm simply too busy to piddle around.

Another word to the wise, I always get half upfront. I don't start work on any illustration unless I have half the payment in my hot little hands. I'm pretty good about estimating my time, but if the client requests a lot of changes, I charge extra. I also never deliver the finished peice until I see the rest of my money. So i'll watermark or otherwise mar the picture digitally so that they do not get a good copy until they pay me, and I will not send the original. If they don't pay, I reserve the right to sell the original for the amount owing at auction. Most people are pretty good and pay up, I haven't had to deal with many deadbeats, but I attribute it to being very draconian and very serious about how I work.

But in the end I think it comes down to client interaction. If the client is good, gives me freedom to do my job and works with me rather than against me, recognizing and appreciating what I bring to the table, its a pleasent experience and goes quickly. But if the client is difficult, tries to be controling, is precious about their own ideas and generally unresponsive, it takes a long time and usually is painful and stressfull for both parties.

Bottom line, if you hire a professional, trust them to do their job and try not to be a dick about it.