Another quickie...

Sorry for the lack of material this month, I really am finding it a struggle to find time to draw at the moment! I can't believe it's the 28th of June already...

I started at my new job on Thursday just gone. Handing over everything in my new job was every bit as stressful as I thought it would be. Starting was equally as stressful, I've gone to a large company where there are lots of employees, and I was also invited to a team-building event after work on my first day. I felt like a lemming stood in the Rounders playing field, but the BBQ they put on was nice. I got on well with my new colleagues better by the Friday though, they seem like a nice enough bunch :)

I am so envious of their designers as well, as they do proper designing, not the half-arsed repro attempt I've seen in both of my long-term jobs in the past. One lady was even drawing owls and foxes for some promo material. So jealous. But they've all been to Uni, and I haven't. I can see now why no company would employ me as a designer. But I quite like my new job, it's all about being organised, which I love doing.

In other news, we're slowly getting ready for going on holiday. The trailer tent was put up properly for the first time in our local park on Tuesday:

I'm glad we've got all of the arguments out of the way now! I just hope the weather doesn't turn typically British while we're away. Also, as part of my leaving present from my old job my colleagues got me the following book. I've had a read through it, and it's frickin' amazing, it's definitely coming with us!

They also got me a Festival kit full of goodies like a bright pink poncho, cleaning stuff like shampoo and baby wipes, lip balm, glow sticks, etc, it's really cool. Also a nice box of chocs (already snaffled) and some bottles of cider. The sales reps who looked after me got me a bottle of rum (they know me so well).

I do miss my old work friends, but I really am quite anti-social. After going out with some of my colleagues for a leaving meal and with the gifts everyone got me I feel I really missed a trick not socialising with my old colleagues. I'm going to make more of an effort with my new colleagues (whether they like it or not, ha!). I have let my old colleagues know about some good perks I get with my new job, but I've not heard back from them :( Oh well, if they don't want to abuse my perks after I'm gone I'm sure I can get them used instead :D

Well, aside from Fat Fighters tomorrow I don't have any plans for the week ahead. I get to finish 30mins earlier than my last job, so there really should be no excuse for a lack of art next week. I think I have a bit of an art block going on at the moment, but I'm just going to find things to draw to get me back into the swing of it.

Until next week!

Being ill and not doing much art, more research

I've been lazy again this week and not done any art except a small logo mock-up for my freelancing (which I will post at a later date). I've also been ill since Friday (nothing serious, just a sore throat but it knocks me for six...), and usually most of my art time is on the weekend, and I've just not felt up to it :( I have been doing some browsing and researching instead though, which I will share with you :)

A few months ago I downloaded the Freelancing Handbook by +Creativebloqq, which is immensely hepful. I've printed my own version and scribbled and highlighted all over it, and this is what properly kickstarted my interest is going freelance. Now there is a new book, although I've not downloaded it yet: Pay Me or Else free e-book at http://thenuschool.com/pay-me-or-else/ I'm not affiliated with CreativeBloq at all, but I follow them on twitter and they usually have something of interest for me to look at every day.

I've been toying with the idea of doing an art collaboration after inspiration in my home town where someone has opened a venue for this kind of thing (although it seems to be for sculptors). I've also been toying with the idea of joining the local art community. They have a free exhibition at a church where I live, I was going to go this weekend but I really don't have the energy to talk to people with me being ill right now. Hopefully I'll get down there this coming weekend.

I've also decided I don't draw enough AT ALL, so I am going to try and make drawing a daily habit, even if it's only 10 minutes. I've found a community on DeviantArt which seems cool, so I'll give them a go: http://improvementdaily.deviantart.com/

Also I know my library do free magazines, but they've never had a good selection. However I checked again this weekend, and they now have Artist's & Illustrator's, and Imagine FX :) So I can now read these magazines for free, happy days!

Anyway, last week I forgot to show you my WIP of my Rainbow Art & Design logo, please see below, enjoy!

Well, that's all for this week, I was contemplating sorting out my greenhouse, but I haven't got the energy to do much at all today (it's taken me 3 attempts over the day to get this blog entry written!), so I'm going to watch the re-run of Britain's Got Talent, have a bath and have an early night, hopefully I'll be better next weekend, have a good week!

No internet!

We've had no Internet since Friday! So this will be a quick post as in writing it on my mobile.

I haven't done anything in the way of art this week, except do a ton of research for going freelance.

I did buy an artists' easel, of which my blank canvas now sits on :) Now I won't get backache when I paint!

Anyway, I've thought of another name to trade by,  but no designs yet. We should have Internet for next week,  so I'll post pictures of design process of creating my initial logo. I'll also be researching more still for going freelance, but I'm getting itchy fingers again to do more art, so i should have something to show you next week!

Have a fantastic week!

Portrait of a boy - finished!!

I'm writing this entry a few hours earlier this week, as I'm sat down watching the Grand Prix and waiting for my Sunday dinner to cook.

I've finished my Portrait of a Boy piece, and submitted to the competition:

I couldn't get the contrast I liked, as both the paper and coloured pencil were poor quality (yeah yeah, I know, a workman blames his tools...) but when the total cost of the paper and pencils were about £1.55 what do you expect? I'm at least upgrading to Crayola's next time!

Once I had finished the above I've done some research regarding going freelance, and thought of a much better company name to work from. Although it seems being self-employed is a huge minefield to get set up! I'll keep chipping away at it, but for now I don't have any projects I'm working on. I've not even watched any inspirational video's, all week I've been working on getting the Trailer Tent we bought last week ready for summer. We've run out of waterproofer, so I've got some more on order, and we made the best of the bank holiday weekend by spending all of last Monday in the sun waterproofing the canvas and scrubbing the upholstery.

I've found a few art conventions to go to in the UK throughout the year. There's one in Brighton which seems the most suited to me, but it's miles away! There's also one in London (and I need to take a trip to London to go to the V&A), and Sheffield hosts a design week, which is much closer to home.

I think if anything this week I'll work on a new logo for my new company name, and once I've got the files sorted for my old name I'll post the pictures on here so you can see the design process I went through. I'll also update my Behance profile with the images too.

Lighter nights and portrait WIP

Not much to report on this week, I've gotten further with my coloured pencil drawing of my best friend's little boy:

When I drew him in pencil I didn't think his cheeks looked chubby enough, (as he has cute chubby cheeks), but now I've fleshed him out a bit and done a bit with his hair it doesn't look so bad now.
I spent ages trying to get the shadows correct on his face, but then I wanted to lay down some different colour, so I have a quick 10 minutes on his hair and started his hoody. I'll carry on working on this during the week.

The clocks went forward an hour today, so it's 7.31pm and it's still light :) I think the sun has set now (hard to see behind all of the houses on my estate), but it means spring is finally here :) Although it is going to be miserable and rain tomorrow. Ha, I'm a typical Brit, talking about the weather!

I've gone back on Tropico, it's nice to have some chill-out time on that. That, and the fact I haven't gone anywhere this weekend. I've bought a trailer tent so I can holiday in the country when the weather gets better, and that's about it!

And at Slimming World last Monday I reached my first half-stone award! In 5 weeks I've lost 7 pounds, keep it coming!

I've finished reading the Freelance Handbook, and made LOADS of notes. I've downloaded Evernote, so I have lots to research now, such as legal stuff, setting fees, wellbeing, resources, etc.

I did manage to critique a couple of pieces on DeviantArt last week, but I think for now I'm going to give my weekly tasks a rest, as let's face it I don't really do them despite trying to make myself accountable on here. Instead I'm going to focus on research the Freelance Handbook, and carry on with my WIP.

Have a good week everyone!

Logo design, imbalance in work life, and competitions

This week during my lunch breaks I've been working on a logo for my brand if I ever decide to go freelance. However just in case people try to plagiarise it I've decided not to add it on here just yet. When the time is right I will. All I will say is for the logo I seemed to finish it very quickly, and I'm not sure if this is a good thing. I did 4 sketches for variety. chose one design to run with, mocked it up, changed it some more, and now I'm happy with it. Luckily I hid the text layer which has the same on just in time for when the office manager interrupted my lunch break! :) But I'm guessing the process above is similar to having a paying client: mock up designs, finish a rough, make amends and finalize design.

Also my partner and myself have talked of going into the mobile catering business. We've both agreed the company name needs to be witty, but I'm not happy with what we've come up with yet, so I've yet to start any work on the logo design for that. At least if I go freelance I can start that whenever, but I'm loathe to start up the mobile catering business until we've bought a house. If we are self-employed it will be very difficult to get a mortgage, but we can do our research in the meantime.

I'm pretty jaded with work at the moment, I don't feel like I'm ever going to get anywhere than where I'm at now. Just to explain my current situation:

• I left a floundering company in my home town to work out-of-town at a company that is doing well for itself. I was hoping to side-step into the same job, but I knew I had to start in a menial job in customer service.
• Despite numerous efforts to get back into a studio environment I've pretty much been ignored by everyone who would help me achieve this. I've been stuck in limbo like this for the past 3.5 years.
• A new person has been appointed to create a new studio, and even though it sounds promising the new studio will be a 1.5hr drive away (or 50mins on the train), and even though they want me to be the 'middle man' between customer service and the new studio I honestly don't think it's going in the right direction for me (or even a change of job for that matter).

The new person wants me to be the go-between, but I already do that, so I don't know if my job role would change at all, and I'm getting very frustrated not getting anywhere in a creative role. My manager has washed her hands of the situation (she has told me herself), and I feel the only way I'll get to do what I'm passionate about in life is to go freelance. I've even put myself through a home-distance learning course and put myself through exams for Adobe, all at my own cost and time, and it feels like it has been for nothing. It's not changed anything in my job role, and it hasn't garnered any more attention for new jobs. So I will persevere in going freelance.

When I went to stop with my nan last month she handed me an article out of the paper on drawing. It was on how to draw in perspective, and how to colour with coloured pencils. Even though I didn't find it much help I did notice a competition to draw either a place or a portrait in coloured pencil, so I've decided to enter it.

The subject is my best friend's little boy, and he's quite hard to draw as he's so cute! I couldn't find a brilliant photo of him, so I've gone with the best one I could find. The ones I like of him are where he takes selfies with his mum's phones, but they're very badly focussed and lit :) I finished the pencil sketch today, and intend to colour it in:

Apologies for the awful lighting, I've tried my best to make it look OK. I haven't done much with the hair as it's blonde and curly, so I just wanted the general shape on paper

The competition doesn't end until April. After chalk my favourite medium (in school) was coloured pencils, so I hope this turns out good! I asked my partner for his opinion, and I phrased it like this 'Did you look at my drawing and think 'that looks like X', or did you look at my drawing and think 'that's X!'. He said he thought the second options, which is good, although I don't think it looks anything like my subject!

I've not played Tropico since last weekend now, but I haven't done much in the way of art either, oops!

And just on a side note I had my family over for a roast dinner today (Sunday dinners are an institution), and I had to take a photo of this massive potato:

This bad boy made enough roast potatoes for 5 people! The photo doesn't do the size justice, it would've made a wicked jacket potato!

So going to my usual theme of tasks I set myself for the week and usually fail:

Critique at least one piece of artwork - didn't suceed, I did look but didn't critique anything.

Contribute to an active art forum - I still don't think I've joined one yet, any suggestions? Was thinking Conceptart.org, or the Sycra forums, but I'm quite intimidated by the high standard of work on both of those forums. I'm not keen on DeviantArt, even though I have an account on there.

Start work on a logo - done, and even finished it!

Drawing for the competition - started

So tasks for this week are to carry on with the coloured sketch, and join an art forum. I'll try to critique too, but I get to this time of the day (9.37pm) and I'm usually pretty tired so I'm off to bed.