Twelve years ago, on February 17th, 2009, I started this blog to chronicle my journey as a monster artist. Today's post makes my 1729th post on the blog, and to be honest, I am not sure how I managed to get to this point. Twelve years ago, I was rebuilding my career after it crashed following four years of reliable and consistent work. A couple of things happened all at once. First, most of the art directors I worked with were fired, quit, or moved to other endeavors. Second, the projects I had been working on came to an end, changed their production structure, or were outright canceled. Third, my skillset was not where it needed to be to work on the projects still avialable.
I considered calling it a day and moving onto other work opportunities. The four years of work were terrific, I had never expected to do as much as I had done, and I still was surprised to find myself working in the tabletop gaming industry. Instead of abandoning what I had grown to love, I decided to double down, focus on my skillsets, look for new and varied work opportunities within the industry. What acquired from that point until now has all been documented here on the blog. All the ups, the downs, the successes, and most of the failures - there are a couple of those still to share, but NDAs stand in the way.
In these twelve years, I went from a desperately eager artist that would take any and all jobs at horrifyingly low pay rates to some guy that says 'no' way more than 'yes,' has worked on all the projects he had dreamed of of working on. I somehow wrote, illustrated, funded, and published a book that was over twenty years in the making, and I have started on the next two books.
It's all here, more or less in these 1729 posts, all my secrets, processes, and mistakes. For what it's worth. I would like to think there is content here that can help others and help those making their way in the art industries, but there is a lot to dig through, and it is all through my personal lens. I know that a lot of this is a way for me to process the journey and a form of self-promotion, but one can hope that even a single piece of my yammering could be helpful.
I realized I never posted one of these past few years, which is fitting for 2020. The past few years were rough on the blog. I had little time and even less work to share here as I focused on completing my book and then the pandemic, but I made an effort to get things going again here. I do not know what the future holds for the blog. Maybe I say this every year, but as client work slows and I focus on my books, there are fewer and fewer immediate events to share. Perhaps I will use the blog as a way to share things beyond myslef and as a way to encourage myself to make sure I have new work, or at least process posts, to share regularly.
Who knows where we will be in Feburary 2022, but if this blog is still chugging along, I will see you here.
That's all for another exciting Wednesday on the blog. See you back here on Friday! Until then...
You know I have been reading it thoughout the years. I may not have time to respond, but I am listening. Especially now that I am trying my own hand at illustration and making a living out of it. Keep up the good work
ReplyDeleteHey there. Thanks so much for the support and interest. Really appreciated!
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