Vineris

I now have a Storenvy store where you can buy my traditional art: lagomorphosis.storenvy.com/

Commission FAQ is still available here: vineris.deviantart.com/journal…

SO.  I have been de-jobbed.  This state of affairs may or may not be permanent, but in the meantime I gotta fill the fridge.  To this purpose, I am offering commissions.

All prices are in USD for high-res digital files, hard copies will have additional shipping, handling and/or printing costs.

PRICES:
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1-2 Characters, Full Body, Solid-Colour Background:

Simple pencil sketch, with or without shading: $20
Digital inks: $30
Cell-style shading: $40
Fully rendered: $60

Simple Background (stylized, cel shaded, etc.) +$30
Complex Background (fully rendered, detailed, etc.) +$50
Additional Characters +$10

ACEO (markers + pencil crayons on cardstock, 2.5"x3.5"): $15 + shipping
Con badges (same, 3"x4"): $20 + shipping

RULES & POLICIES
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- Please note me to request commissions

- Payment must be sent in full via Paypal to munkymu@gmail.com before any work begins

- The more information you supply about what you would like to see, the more likely it is that I will be able to give you the pic you want

- Check my gallery to see what kinds of things I do.  If you want something radically different from that, it may take more time, not look like you'd hoped, or just be downright impossible.

- All edits (except the most minor ones) must be done in the preliminary sketch phase.  I will do three edits for free, after that I will charge $5 for additional edits or, if the commission doesn't seem to be working for either person, you will get a refund according to my refund policy.  Same with initial colours -- once you approve of the colour and shading scheme, I will only make minor edits.

- I have no problems with furry or manga-style art.  I can do cheesecake and I'm willing to give artistic nudity a go.  Don't ask me for porn, I am terrible at it and neither one of us will be happy with the result.  Everything else will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

- I will try to keep you updated on progress as best I can, but I am often not a same-day message person.  Please let me know if you have any hard deadlines and I will do my best to meet them.  If you NEED updates twice a day, I am not the artist for you.

- I keep the copyrights to the work.  I will post commissions in my gallery and use them in my portfolio.  I will be happy to hold off on posting them until the deadline has passed if they are a surprise for someone.  I will identify you as the commissioner unless you ask me not to.

- I want this to be a pleasant experience for everyone involved.  I reserve the right to terminate the commission at any point for any reason with refunds issued as per my refund policy, and I recognize the commissioner's right to do the same.

REFUNDS
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- Full refunds will be issued during the sketch phase up to and including the 3 free edits if either person is not happy with how the commission is proceeding.

- Partial refunds will be issued after the sketch has been approved , based on how much work I have done.

You know the scenario: you have promised yourself that this year will be the year of making more art, but a few months in you have only posted one picture to your gallery and your sketchbook is covered in dust.  You don't seem to have any time to draw, when you sit down at the drawing board you suddenly get the urge to clean the cat's litterbox, and yet you also manage to spend three hours every day arguing with teenagers online and looking up recipes for chicken shawarmas.  What do you do to get back into the groove?

Note that I never refer to motivation problems as a "block".  When people say "I have an art block" it seems like they think that they are a pipe through which magic flows and now some ogre's gone and stuffed a cork in it.  I think it's unproductive to think that way because it's not an all-or-nothing thing and it's not external or beyond our control.  Ideas are everywhere.  Lots of them are terrible, or unexciting, or difficult, yes, but they're out there.  I think that the difference between people who get things done and people who don't is that the former will take something stupid and run with it while trying to think of less stupid things to do, while the latter wait for the exact correct right idea and as they get more picky they end up doing less and less.

Anyway, if you find yourself in need of inspiration, you can check out this article I wrote on finding ideas: news.deviantart.com/article/69… .  If you have a list of ideas you'd like to try out but somehow find yourself gravitating towards the game console, read on.

First off, you have to understand that creative work is *work*.  It's rewarding work, because otherwise we wouldn't do it, but it's still work.  It takes effort.  There will always be something out there that takes less effort and is just waiting to distract you if you hit a tough spot, whether it's the web or TV or hanging out with friends or even just physical effort when you're tired of thinking.  If you make it a habit to give in to distractions then not a whole lot of work is going to get done.  But the distractions are always there, lurking!  So what you do?

Keep an eye on the rewards.  If all you think about is the work aspect, how much effort you're going to need to put in to get the picture done, it's going to be tough to motivate yourself.  Concentrate on your goals instead and remind yourself WHY you are drawing in the first place.  Do you enjoy the feeling of finishing a piece and having a completed picture to hold in your hands or hang on the wall?  Do you like posting something and coming back the next morning to find some comments from your friends about the piece?  Is it an entry to a contest that you hope you'll win?  Have you promised yourself something nice if you manage to hit a sketchbook goal?  Think about how good those things are going to feel when they happen.  Block out all the negative thoughts like "this picture's going to suck", "I'm not getting anywhere", "I'm not going to win anyway" as much as you can.  There will be plenty of time to deal with those when you're done.

Also, while you're thinking about carrots, don't forget about the occasional stick.  Set yourself deadlines and treat them seriously.  Do the sorts of projects that come with deadlines, whether it's work for art shows, contests, gifts or just online jams.  Become responsible for updates to friends and readers.  Take a class.  A little stress can be a good motivator.  You do have to be careful about this, though, because overbooking yourself will lead to procrastination and burnout, and disappointing other people is not good.  If you're not sure you can finish and someone else has something riding on your work, don't take it on.

Next up, try to form good habits and get rid of bad ones.  Have your workspace as far away from distractions as possible.  Put your drawing table in a room with no TV and no net access.  If you have to do digital art unplug the network cable.  Put your sketchbook on top of your keyboard.  Go someplace boring and leave the toys at home.  Make it harder to do non-art while making it easier to do art.  Have everything for your project ready to go, or stored close at hand.  Write or sketch quick ideas when you're not in your art space so that you never have to sit there in front of a blank sheet wondering what to do.

If you can't do anything with your space then try to form good habits regarding time.  Set aside a regular time to do art.  If you are having trouble getting motivated, set your art time to be fairly short -- between 30 minutes to an hour.  Set a timer.  If you feel an overwhelming need to check your e-mail it's easier to tell yourself "I'll just draw for 30 minutes and then I can check all the e-mail I want" than "I have work, WORRKKK!".  Quite often the hardest part of work is starting and once you get that out of the way you might be good for a couple hours.  But sometimes that 30 minutes is all you can manage, and then at least you did 30 minutes which is better than nothing.

If the distractions are too much, go somewhere else.  Leave the iPhone and toys at home and go somewhere where drawing or writing is the most exciting thing you can do.  Ever wonder why we seem to get so much art done in class or in waiting rooms or other inconvenient places?  It's because we're stuck somewhere for an hour or two and the alternative to drawing is staring at the wall.  Instead of trying to get rid of boredom, take advantage of it.  It's a powerful tool.  We are never so productive on a project as when we're trying to avoid working on something even less fun.

You also have to strike a good balance between new projects and old.  We've all had days when inspiration strikes and we can't wait to get home to get started on that brilliant idea.  Some people, though, end up starting project after project and abandoning each one when the honeymoon period is over and the next brilliant idea strikes.  The problem with this, of course, is that they work a lot but have nothing finished to show for it.  Other people seem obsessed with rehashing the same idea over and over or overworking their picture to death (whether from perfectionism or from a reluctance to try new things) and they don't really have a lot of finished work to show either (or they do but it's all the same).  Now, if you're happy with this state of things than all the power to you.  But if you're not, then it may be worthwhile to set aside some time to try new things and some time to finish things that are already in progress.

Personally, I like to work on finishing things when I'm tired and cranky.  If you've had a hard day at work it may be refreshing to get started on a new idea, but when I don't want to think I like to put on some music, shut my brain off and get all that tedious inking and hatching out of the way.

Figure out what your own work habits are and take advantage of them.  If you never seem to get to work early in the morning or can't seem to stay up all night, don't schedule things in that time frame.  I always promise myself I'm going to get up early and jog, but the only time I have ever *actually* gone jogging is in the early afternoon or evening.  It makes no sense for me to put a morning jog on my schedule.  It's never going to happen and I'm only going to feel guilty about it.  If you find yourself consistently drawing at a certain time or in a certain place, go with it.  It's better if you can do it anywhere at any time, but if you really need that habit then set it up.  It's better than nothing.

You should also try keeping track of your time.  It's easy to forget just how many days it's been since something new went into the sketchbook.  Put up a wall calendar where you can clearly see it every day and mark every day that you worked on your art (or set up an online calendar like the Google calendar).  This way it will be easy to tell just how many days you've been slacking now (or working!).  Set yourself some goals (like "I will draw for half an hour every day for a month") and give yourself some rewards for a job accomplished (even if it's only a gold star sticker -- it's cheesy but it's surprising how often cheesy things work).

If none of this is working, especially if you have a lot of other things going on in your life, you may need a break.  You may not be interested in the same things you used to do and need to explore other subjects or media or interests.  My guy stopped playing the classical guitar for a while and couldn't get back into it because he just wasn't into the same kind of music any more.  When he finally accepted this and bought an electric guitar, his motivation to practice returned.  Maybe the manga art isn't as exciting as it used to be, maybe urban photography seems boring now, maybe it's not Art you dislike but the kind of art you're doing.

Or maybe you have new girl/boyfriend and five papers due next month and a soul-sucking job.  Maybe you just need to step back, take a breath, regroup and not do a whole lot for a while.  That's okay too.  It's a lot more difficult to start something up again after you've stopped, though, so be prepared for the possibility that after a few weeks weeks you just might not get into it again.

Ultimately, though, you have to be getting something out of art in order to be doing it.  You have to WANT to accomplish something more than you want to sit in front of the TV or play games or chat with your friends.  If something is important to you, you will find a way to make time for it.  Any given art session may be frustrating but you have to feel that on the whole the effort put in is worthwhile.  If you don't feel it's a fair exchange, if it seems like you're just putting in a bunch of work and getting little out of it and have no hope of getting anything out of it anytime in the future then do something else!  Life is too short to spend on things you don't truly enjoy and your real interests may still be waiting for you.

And remember: if it's stupid but it works for you, it's not really stupid.  The above has worked for me, but if you can only get art done with the TV set on in the background while small children are jumping up and down on your back, then congratulations on finding something that works for you!  Good job and keep working!

Drawing from Your Head, or "Hey -- Why Doesn't This Look Like I Imagined It?"

So you're a newer artist and you're pretty good, as long as you've got a picture in front of you to copy from.  And you have this COOL idea for a monster deer with stars shining through its hide and coral branches sprouting from its head instead of antlers.  Unfortunately, you don't have a photo of one of those in front of you -- but you see the picture in your head SO CLEARLY and you're sure you can draw it!  You get to scribbling away and the inevitable happens -- you draw something that doesn't look anything like you imagined it.  You toss the picture into your wastebasket in disappointment and question your abilities.  What's going on?  All those other artists just sit there and knock out picture after perfect picture.  Why not you?

First off, your brain is not a photo album.  It's good at all sorts of clever tricks, including giving you the impression that you're imagining something solid while actually glossing over all sorts of details.  Like, say you're dreaming that you just told the funniest joke in the world, and in your dream you're laughing like crazy.  Then you wake up and you try to remember the joke and it's not all that funny.  In fact, it's not funny at all.  That's because your brain didn't produce a funny joke, it produced the feeling of something being funny.  So when you look at that deer picture in your head, your brain might be producing the impression of "deer" and "coral", but it's not actually giving you anything real to work with.

So how do all those other artists do it?

Most of them don't go around telling you "this isn't like I imagined it".  And if they do, half the time you're not paying attention anyway.  "This picture looks so good!" you think.  "Who cares if it's not exactly how the artist imagined it?"  The important thing here is to realize that drawing from imagination and having it look like what you imagined is not automatic or natural for anyone.  Even if the result looks really good at the end.

Next, your brain is going to fail you unless you have a photographic memory.  In order to draw something well, you need to know all the details.  When you imagine that deer's pose you need to know what shape its head is, how its legs attach to the body, how wide the coral branches are and how tall.  You need to know how you're going to get that glow around its body.  If you've developed an artist's eye for noticing and remembering details, you might be able to observe many of the things you need to in your mental image before it changes or fades away.  If not, you're going to have to figure out all those details before you do the finished piece.

Of course, most of the time we don't actually know all the details and never did.  If you've never spent much time looking at deer and your brain isn't going to magically remember that a deer's head has such and such dimensions and such and such a shape.  You can't remember something you never knew.  Just because you can imagine something doesn't mean you know anything about it.  Imagine page 33 from the last novel you read.  I bet you can see a page in your mind.  Unless you happen to have a photographic memory or happened to memorize that book, you're not going to be able to read the words off that exact page merely because you can imagine it.

There is no shame in getting reference and looking things up.  Newer artists hate to do this because they don't think they have to.  Experienced artists know that if you don't put serious time into figuring out what things look like, you're likely to end up with dogs that look like goats.  Newer artists think that means they don't have talent.  Experienced artists know that they don't want dogs that look like goats, and if they have to look at photos to achieve that then by God they're going to look at photos.  They're going to study dogs until they feel like a dog themselves.  Nobody knows whether you looked at a photo or not, unless you tell them.  They only know whether your dog looks like a dog or not.

So: when you have a mental image, try to figure out what the important bits are (deer in a certain pose, stars, coral, night sky, etc.)  Then plan your drawing out.  Do some studies of deer.  Instead of trying to use that mental image as a photo to copy from, use it as inspiration.  Think about the basics of art.  Is there a background behind the deer?  Rather than trying to copy it out of your head, use your knowledge of perspective to set it up.  Draw out a few different, simple versions of the image.  Would it be better if you were looking up at the deer from below or straight on?  Should it be framed by trees?  After you've decided on the basic composition, look for reference.  Do some studies of deer and coral.  Work out some colour schemes.  When you feel ready, do up a composite and if you like how it looks then do a finished image.

It sounds like a lot more work than just closing your eyes and scribbling, but this is the way most artists work.  Just like most people will write better essays if they research the topic and write an outline first, so most people will draw a better picture if they plan it out first.  And when you're done it might not look *exactly* what it looked like in your head, but you will have done everything you can in order to make the best picture you can.  A good artist might actually make a *better* picture by planning it out first.  They might decide that their mental image of a pose was good but the lighting and colours were boring.  In planning things out, they might hit on a colour combination they like much better, or decide that giraffes are cooler than deer, or whatever.