Money, money, money

Mood is.......: thoughtful
Listening to..: something the roomie is watching on TV

Was updating my commission price guide/examples of my work and I realize....1) I don't draw enough single character work and 2) I don't charge enough for what I do draw. It's really a shame. I need to up my prices but I realize that 95% of my commission pool comes from my friends. And I would hate to price myself out of work.

Obviously, I need to expand my pool of commissioners. I have been hemming and hawing over Ellen Million's Portrait Adoption site. On the one hand, after the paperwork is done, I am free to do as much or as little work as I like. However, it's fantasy-based, which means armor (BLEH!) and the fact that after I complete an image there is no guarantee that it WILL be sold/make me money. And we all know time = money, especially to an artist. So back to the circle.

Then there is the eBay route. A friend of mine does fairly steady work via selling comic book character portraits through it. I would dearly love to get back to my roots but I can't see to find a good template for how to go about selling via eBay. Most of the art there is traditional media and the person is receiving an actual good. Which is not what I would be doing. So would anyone bother to buy something from me?

Bah. It's so funny, I've had no intention of being a 'real' artist for many years now....but it's my only income at the moment.

I hate irony.

And so not to have a post without art (this blog is not my ranting blog!) I leave you with my current commission WiP:



I'm fairly pleased with the background. I need to edit it a bit after I get done with the central characters (color harmony, shadows, etc) but overall I think it looks like an environment without being overly busy.