amanda hall

John mentioned an illustrator, Amanda Hall:

Her work isn't really the style I am interested in, but it does fall into a market within children's books, and she has had a lot of experience. But what was useful about her site is her question and answer page - http://www.amandahall-illustration.com/faqs/

She goes through advice for approaching illustration as a career - agents, publishers, getting paid, portfolios etc. which is really useful. 

agents

Pros and Cons of agents:

Pros:

security 

- you are less likely to be messed around by clients if you have one

promotion

- they have a wide range of contacts and resources to promote you to

authority

- they have more confidence to barter clients for a higher price

advice

- they have experience and so can offer useful advice on portfolios, your future, and general related issues

point of contact

- agent will talk to client about fees for you

Cons:

control

- you may feel less in control there is a risk of not getting all the information thats being passed around, you won't know what is exactly being said on your behalf

contacts

- can't build a relationship with the client as agent sounds most of the time with them, yu just belong to an agency 

fees

- 30% of commissioning fee goes to the agent, that can add up to quite a lot, especially if they're not well paid jobs

art directors

- they often find agents unnecessary, they can find it off-putting having to deal with the corporate middle man

extra info:

- be sure to develop your style, they want to be able to see your work as consistent 

- some agents will ask for 30% of all the work you do, whether you get the work yourself or through them so be wary

- don't ever pay agent up front, wait till they get you a job

This was all useful information, I'm still unsure whether I will want an agent. For me, having one would be beneficial because I don't feel very confident with the promotional and fee discussing side of an illustration career, which they could do for me. 

John suggested some agencies to look at:

Heart Agency

the Central Illustration Agency

Jelly London

Association of Illustrators

Lemonade Illustration

Directory of Illustration

victo ngai

Victo Ngai came to talk to us! She gave loads of useful, interesting information about how the industry works, how to go about doing editorial, narrative, design, advertising etc. and she did have different approaches to each.
There were some pieces she spoke about that stood out to me, like:

This was an editorial about breast cancer, she said in New York they won't print anything with obvious nudity which is difficult when dealing with breasts, so she had to find a way around that, and used a maze of trees to map out the shape. Also, dealing with cancer is very sensitive as most of the readers could be patients, so she made the 'cancer creature' quite cute and non threatening because patients ant to feel that it is something they can overcome and treat. These are both things I wouldn't have considered, but make the piece so much more interesting.

Another editorial about the Egypt revolution, also called the lotus revolution which is why the main shape is a lotus flower, but what was interesting was the way the text and image works together. I thought with editorial, they give you the article and you work to their space but there was more communication with this between editor and illustrator which I liked. 






Also, you can tell a piece of work is good if it still looks good in black and white, that way it isn't all about colour; the composition and highlighting has to be good as well. 

editorial:
- business sections of papers tend to prefer more straightforward illustrations, not too conceptual

stories:
- its all about picking the right moment to depict for book covers and inner illustrations, it can be simple but still meaningful to the story
- foreshadow the ending without giving it away

which is what she did here beautifully; the story was apparently about a couple who go on lots of trips but eventually drift apart and break up which is a shock to the reader, but here she foreshadows that ending. The line of the boat splits the page, the swallows symbolising the freedom, which she is leaning towards while he is locked away, being grumpy in the car.







- she uses a lot of vertical perspectives which is often used in Asian art, where things that are far away are further at the top. It creates quite a surreal aesthetic but is interesting to possibly explore

advertising:
- the more money a job is, the less freedom you will have
- big companies have complete creative control over what you draw even if they don;t have any creative experience
- when working with big corporate companies it is important to have a small job on the side or keep a sketchbook to release creativity
- when working with editorial, they usually buy one print right and if they want to print in their russian version of the paper for example, they will have to pay you again. But with advertising, they usually pay for a time period of unlimited print run, e.g. three months, where they will get everything they can out of that design, and they can do anything they like with it for that period of time

tutorial with pat

We had a useful tutorial about our portfolios, what I got form it was:
- less is more in terms of amounts of work, we should have about 10-20 pieces of really good work in our portfolio
- there should be consistency interns of quality and content throughout
- I should have both a website portfolio and a print version
- I need to get a website, that way I can have several portfolios within it with different categories of work, and then keep my blog for WiP and current work with more description alongside it
- my website needs a statement which is reflective of my work and how the website works (how the work is organised)
- I need to have an image audit; order my images into relevant categories and take out ones that aren't as good

Print Portfolio:
- include different versions of a print (one in colour, one just line work, one more digital or hand crafted)
- show a range of application
- have prints no bigger than A3, for practical reasons
- decent printing quality is essential, thick paper that won't warp

Meetings:
- research the prospective client
- look at previous work they have commissioned so that I know what kind of work to bring in
- don't bring in examples of work that are irrelevant to the brief
- be honest about what I can't do e.g. type, ad say that I will need to work with someone who can
- before the meeting ask what the brief will be or for a creative steer in a direction of the type of work I will be producing so that I can alter my portfolio to fit that

zine for thoughtbubble

I started making imagery at the start of the term so that I could get back into making again. I had the theme based around fish and sea life; these were some of the initial bits I did:

I enjoyed making the fish but I left it too long to start back up again and lost interest in the theme so started again but with jungle imagery, which I got really into.

I decided against using text in the zine because I want the focus to be on the visual images and the process/textures, also text and type isnt really my strong point. Here are my final images:

I am really happy with the final images, I planned for it to be really quick and simple job but I actually ended up spending quite a bit of time on it. I had fun making the images and wanted it to look good, and I think I've ended up with some strong illustrations which I could maybe blow up into bigger, single prints or maybe even screen print some. Here's the zine with its coloured covers:

getting paid

tutorial

John gave me some useful things to look at that relate to my practise:

- Shotopop
http://www.shotopop.com/case-studies/
Which has case studies that shows the development of illustration work for big companies and projects. I often see finished product and advertising work and think I wouldn't be able to do something like that, but seeing the process makes it seem a lot more do-able. 
Also my process is my main focus within my work so seeing how big projects like this develop is really useful

- Creative Mornings
http://creativemornings.com
This site has lots of talks from creatives around the world. It splits off into cities with information on up-coming creative talks/events in that city, it creates a general community of creatives

I should be using LinkedIn to connect with people, he suggested contacting children's book writers and just talking to them, offer my services as an illustrator to a possible up-coming book they might have - the worst they will do is say no so I may as well try