Art blocks?

Yes… sometimes I think, “AUGH I don’t want to do art today!” Art as a career is a lot different than art as a hobby. I wake up and know I have to do art for at least 10 hours that day (be it doing Windstones, or other freelance work I do, etc). I fall asleep planning what I’ll be doing the next day. A lot of my time is eaten up doing business-end stuff too, like answering client emails, researching subject matter for my work to make it accurate, doing my taxes (that’s an entirely different kind of headache), researching art supplies, trying to keep my site up to date… etc. That eats up time I could be working and painting, so I often don’t get a day off during the week and work right through the ‘weekend’. I also have to work more than what would just get me by, because I am self-employed I don’t get things like benefits and have to afford my own insurance, have to pay extra taxes, etc. No sick time or paid time off. 😉

So yes, I often think, ‘blech I don’t want to do art today, I want to do something else!’.

I also have off days where I get easily frustrated when things aren’t turning out well. I have to force my way through them though or I can’t make ends meet.

This dragon I’m painting has actually been giving me a bear of a time! I’ve wanted to throw him out the window on several occasions. It’d be really easy to say “Yuck, let’s do something else”. But then last night somehow I salvaged him… so things tend to work out in the end!

If I get really frustrated and art blocked I’ll break out my sketchbook, throw some headphones on and just sketch really random nonsense stuff. That usually helps!

you get a pretty steady set of commissions that keep you drawing? I heard that you accepted to do Chibi for Shinerai.(Shin’s poor pet leopard gecko)

I haven’t been doing private commissions as much as I used to. My pro freelance stuff keeps me really busy! I did a huge painting for Nickelodeon Magazine for December for example.

But yes I took the Chibii commission, because I know how hard it is to lose a pet. 🙁