Artists of Flight Rising United

There are a few programs I use on an almost daily basis as an artist and illustrator which I find invaluable, but that seem to be unfortunately more secret than they deserve to be. Which is too bad, because they solve a lot of small workflow problems that I think a number of people would find useful!

I’ll keep this list limited to my big three, but it is organized in order of usefulness. (And incidentally of compatibility, as the latter two are Windows-only. Sorry! Please do still check out PureRef though, Mac users.)

1. PureRef

PureRef is a program specifically designed to make it easier to view, sort, and work with your references. I actually put off downloading it initially because it seemed redundant– couldn’t I just paste the refs into my PSD files? Indeed, the only real barrier to working with PureRef is that learning the keyboard shortcuts and the clicks to move around the program takes a little while. But getting over that hump is well worth it, because it has some distinct advantages over trying to organize your refs in your actual art program.

Firstly, you’re no longer bogging down your actual PSD file with extra layers, nor having to fight with said layers at all– PureRef has no layer panel, so you never have to scramble to grab the right one. All images you paste into the program retain their original resolution data, so you can resize, rotate, crop, etc as needed without distortion. If you find yourself needing to adjust the values, color, etc of a ref image, you can just copy paste it into Photoshop, make your adjustments, and copy paste it back into PureRef.

The other great advantage is that you can toggle the program as ‘Stay On Top’ and keep it above Photoshop (or whatever else)– which was always a problem when trying to make a reference collage in a separate PSD file. I find that I just don’t look at my references as much as I should when they are on a second monitor, and this solves that problem.

I’ve used it religiously for about a year now, creating a new PureRef file for every illustration I do, as well as a few for specific characters, cultures, or settings in personal projects. As you can see in the example above, I like to sort my images into little clusters or ‘islands’ of specific content, so that I can easily scroll out to see the entire reference map, then zoom in to the relevant cluster easily.

There is one big tip I would suggest for using this program, if you have the harddrive space: As soon as you get it, turn on the ‘Embed local images in save file’ option. This will make your PureRef files bigger, but you’ll never have to deal with a ‘broken link’ if you move around the source files you originally dragged in.

2. Work Timer

This is such a simple little app that it doesn’t have a very formal name, though I think of it as ‘Work’ or ‘Work Work’ (for some reason.) It’s a timer that counts when your cursor is active in any (of up to 3) program you set it to count for, and stops counting when you change programs or idle. No starting, pausing, stopping, or forgetting to do any of those three things.

I use this one to accurately track my hours, both to inform myself and for commissions or other client work. At the end of a work session, I take the hours counted and add them to the hours I’ve already spent on that image in a spreadsheet.

I have it set to count my three art programs (Photoshop, Painter, and Manga Studio), so based on the settings I use, it doesn’t count time that I spend doing relevant work in my browser (such as looking up an email to double check character descriptions or ref hunting), so to counter that, I set the ‘Timeout’ option in it’s menu to 360. This means it will count to 360 seconds of cursor inactivity before it considers me idle and stops counting. Since it instantly stops counting if you switch to ‘non-work’ a program, I figure this extra time just about cancels out relevant time that it ignores in ‘non-work’ programs by counting an extra minute or so when I walk away from the computer to grab some water or what-have-you.

3. Carapace

I use Carapace the least of these three, since my work doesn’t often have a need for creating perspective lines. But when there is architecture involved in something, this proves invaluable in simplifying that process.

Carapace lets you copy paste an image into it, and then drop in vanishing points and move them around to create perspective lines. (Though you’ll want to scale down your full res drawing or painting a bit to avoid lagging the program.) Like with PureRef, fighting the shortcuts is the worst part of it, though for myself it’s more of an issue in this program because I don’t use it often enough to remember them. Still, it gets the job done, and it’s easy to adjust the points to feel things out until you get them ‘right’. Then you just copy and paste the grid back into your art program and you’ve got that information to use as need be on its own layer.

Of course, using Carapace isn’t a replacement for actually knowing how perspective works– you still have to have a sense of how far apart the vanishing points should be placed to keep things feeling believable. But it sure does save you a lot of trouble once you do have that knowledge.

So, there are my big three recommendations for programs to help your art workflow. I hope people find them useful– if you do, please share so that they climb a little higher out of their unwarranted obscurity! And if you’ve got a favorite tool like this that I didn’t cover, feel free to share it in the comments. I know I’m curious to see what else is out there, too. Also, if Mac users have any suggestions for programs that fill similar functions, feel free to share there as well!

straighten your back

go pee goddAMN IT STOP HOLDING IT

go take your meds if you need to

drink some water

go get a snack if you havent eaten in a while

maybe wander around the house/stretch a little if you’ve been sat at the computer a while (artists especially: sTRETCH THOSE WRISTS)

reply to that text/message from earlier you’d forgotten about

the hoh rainforest in washington’s olympic national park receives around fourteen feet of rain throughout the winter season, resulting in the lush, green canopy of both coniferous and deciduous trees seen here. 

and because of the abundance of water and nutrients in the soil, many of the trees have short roots that are unable to hold onto the wet soil and topple over. mosses and ferns cover the surfaces of both living and fallen trees, adding an otherworldly feel of this temperate rainforest. 

Enter here: http://www1.flightrising.com/forums/skin/1704185

For non-artists, let’s give you a little perspective.

For me, an illustration takes a bare minimum of 6 hours. Mind you, that’s JUST the drawing part. Not the research, or the communications, or gathering information. Just drawing.

That’s if it’s a simple illustration.

My art deco or more detailed stuff can take 20+ hours each.

Even simple, cartoony things still take at least 3 hours.

Let’s go with the second one. 2 illustrations for $25. Figuring 6 hours each. 12 hours total, for JUST the drawings. That’s approximately $2.08/hour. 

Asking these prices is an insult. But what’s even more hurtful is there are people out there that will take these jobs. Which only encourages rates like this to be acceptable. And there are people who will try to say these are just what you have to do to get started.

I believed that. So my first coloring gigs were just $10/page. The day someone offered me $25/page for just flatting work, I realized just how wrong I’d been. I’m still not making the rates I’d like, but now I refuse anything below $25/page. Because there is value in my time.

In any standardized industry, even ones that pay piece rate over hourly, these numbers are criminal.

    If you are an artist who wants to make money off their art, I highly suggest you buy The Graphic Artist’s Guild Handbook. It goes in depth about copyright issues and even contains contract and model release templates. The 2013 book *I believe* states the average professional charges $72 an hour. This article calculated that to make a 40k annual salary you would need to charge about $60 per hour.

  After graduating from Art Center in 2012, I think I asked for somewhere between $35-45 an hour and got laughed at by multiple big name clients, which was infuriating, sadly expected, and terrifying with over $100K worth of student loans staring me in the face. If they tell you it will be “great exposure” that’s a red flag. Ask yourself how their exposure can compare to your Tumblr, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Flickr and Facebook pages combined? 

And when you do get a decent paying gig, PROTECT YOURSELF. You have the right to negotiate and revise a contract. Do not start a job until you have a contract signed. If they don’t provide you with one, MAKE ONE. And make sure you have your bases covered. You can specify in a contract that maybe two revisions are included in your cost, and if they ask you to revise the piece more than twice, they will have to pay extra. In terms of payment schedule, I usually do the 50/50 Method (50% before, 50% after) or the 3/3/3 Method (1/3 before, 1/3 in the middle, 1/3 after all work has been received). Both of those are pretty standard in the industry, as they guarantee you will get compensated for your time, even if the job goes bad.

Remember you have a skill, and you have spent time honing that skill and you deserve to be adequately paid for that time and effort. You will have clients dismiss you because, honest to God they think, “Well, I could do that if I wanted. Hell, my five year old does it now.” No they can’t, because they didn’t, they don’t, they won’t and they probably never will. And good luck hiring a five year old. They can’t keep a fucking deadline.

But at the same time, please read this, maybe check out the book, and be aware of what professional artists can make! The world doesn’t always understand the value of art. Sometimes it falls on the artists to remind them.

Another reason for posting - you guys are all super talented! Look at the prices professionals charge and know that you can make a living off your art! It may be tough but it is totally a thing that can happen!

I’ve been posting some video tutorials to teach aspiring artists my drawing techniques, but I think it’s very important to learn from my mistakes as well.

I’m 25 right now, and I’ve been drawing all my life. I started drawing a lot more and professionally when I was about 19-20. I drew all the time and didn’t think much about it. I would draw until I’m in pain, from sitting too long, from not eating because I was in the flow and didn’t want to stop. I would get terrible back pains and even heart palpitations from sitting in the same position drawing for so long.

That’s when the nails on my right hand started to get weird and lumpy. At first I thought it was a dietary thing, so I took vitamins, went to the doctors, exercised, changed things up but it was too late. It’s been years now and 3 doctors later they couldn’t fix it.

If it were just ugly nails, I wouldn’t really care, but the nails are just the tip of how bad I’ve been treating my body. One time during a particularly hardcore drawing marathon, my right hand swelled up for a week. Nowadays I try to take it easy and take long breaks in between but the damage that has already been done can’t be undone. I can only draw for so many hours in a day before I have to stop or I will get pains from my entire hand, arm, and shoulder.

Now I have a standing desk, ergonomic mouse, hand brace, and all that. I wish I had done these things sooner so I can keep drawing without restraint. I used to update my comics more frequently, but I can’t realistically sustain that speed without hurting myself. (Hence I plan on doing a Patreon in the future so I can hire helpers to do some of the comic’s background drawings)

In those speed paint tutorials where I paint within 1-2 hours, it may seem like I have it made, dishing out art in hours, but after those hours I have to massage my hand and arm. I can’t draw for more than a few hours a day now without hurting.

When I was in college all I could think about is how to improve my skills, practice endlessly, and all that hard work has paid off in some ways but not in others. So please take care of your hands, and your general health. It seems obvious in retrospect but I never thought about it when I was younger that, hey maybe, just maybe, if you overwork and break your body, you won’t be able to draw and create all you want anymore.

Exercises your wrist!!! My god. Please.

$1 = 100 gems = 66 000 treasure

$5 = 500 gems = 330 000 treasure

$10 = 1050 gems = 693 000 treasure

$20 = 2150 gems = 1 419 000 treasure

$50 = 5500 gems = 3 630 000 treasure

(current 8/11/2015) Items for Sale forum’s gem to treasure ratio 1:660

gem values are from here

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US minimum per hour = $7.25 source

2 hours of work = $14.5 = 1450 gems = 957 000 treasure

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Feel insecure about your art? Still try, let the cheapskates judge, you can always lower the price, but don’t sell yourself cheap from the get-go. 

If your demand exceeds the supply, meaning you have 4 people in queue already and no end in sight, it’s a sign to raise the price! It’s not a dick move, you have worked yourself hard for your skills, take pride in them and don’t sell them cheap. Customized art is a luxury product everyone’s neighbor and their dog aren’t supposed to afford in excess. 

Undercutting yourself also damages other artists around you, people take the prices as the norm and get away with bullshit offers. 

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For averagely skilled digital art there seems to be this pricing trend: 

Bust = 1-3 hours of work (average) = $5 - $15

I don’t know about you, but my full-body images can take 3-6 HOURS, 8 if I’m obsessed, there’s no shame in chasing quality over quantity or being slow. Don’t lie to yourself or to others about the time to feel good, it’s not worth it. Or if you actually can do professional work under an hour, then whoa, great job, you have perfected your skills to insane levels, I’m jealous, but please add the time you won still to the fee, your insane skills are worth something too!

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Some points to remember as an artist who is getting harassed over content:

The Harasser probably isn’t an artist, otherwise they would just make the content they wanted to see, and would understand art and artists enough to know that content controlling is bullshit.

The button that silences this person has more power than this person will ever have. Use it. Blocking people who upset or offend you is A-okay. And the only way you can see them getting their diapers in a twist is if you go looking, which is on you. You control what you see and do, no one else.

These people wouldn’t do this in person, so remember they’re cowards behind a computer thinking they can just get what they want. They can’t. They’re not allowed. 

I can’t stress enough the importance of stretching your hands, and forearms every morning and every evening, spend 5-10 minutes going through a stretching routine. These are very easy to do, takes little time to do them. It’s VERY common in all animation studios. Conditions can slowly develop, the most typical one is Repetitive Strain Injury, it’s a prevalent condition resulting from overusing the hands to perform a repetitive task, such as typing, clicking a mouse, writing, and of course drawing. In simple medical terms, repetitive strain injury (RSI) stems from prolonged repetitive, forceful, or awkward hand movements. The result is minor damage to muscles, tendons, and nerves of the neck, shoulder, forearm, and most commonly hand and wrist, which can cause pain, weakness, or numbness. If you’re feeling some pains, tingles, weakness, or numbness in the wrist/forearm; one of the best ways to heal quickly are ‘Contrasting Baths’. What crazy voodoo am I speaking of? A couple different physiotherapists and massage therapists had recommended this technique to me several years ago, and for anyone I knew that tried it, they all say the results are fast and effective. Commonly used by carpal tunnel suffers, it’s a method of treating muscle soreness, swelling and inflammation, it’s also known as Hot/Cold Immersion Therapy. You can use the double sink in your kitchen at home, if you don’t have one, then get your hands on two very large identical bowls, it needs to be big enough to submerge your entire forearms from wrist to elbow. Fill one up with ice cold water (with a couple dozen ice cubes floating in there). The other with very warm water, not tea-kettle boiling hot water, just hot tap water, or as warm as you can handle, no sense in burning yourself of course. Have a stop watch or clock ready, and submerge your arms for 30 seconds in the hot, then switch to doing 30 sec. in the cold, and repeat a few times back and forth, 30 sec. a piece. After only a few times you’ll notice the hot water getting cooler and the cold water getting warmer, so then the technique grows to be less effective, but by then, the job is done. The idea is that the extreme heat and cold contracts and expands your blood vessels, promoting greater blood flow to circulate and flush through your arms, and increased blood flow is what aids in healing faster! Enjoy!

[Source]

For artists and animators. Take care of your body and your body will take care of you.

Okay, so looking over Tumblr’s guidelines for contests, sweepstakes, and giveaways, these are some important points to follow in order to “legally” maintain an event:

Disclose all rules for your event, including entry methods, prizes, etc,

Formally release Tumblr of any association/accountability/liability when it comes to your event,

Entrants must be 18+,

Participants must reside in the event’s country of origin.

MOST IMPORTANT since most tumblr art giveaways tend operate this way, and are most likely what gets Tumblr officials’ attention: 

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