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scarycave posted:I don't know if this is art but... Aaron Diaz (creator of Dresden Codak) offers amazing advice every now and then in his design related blog posts: http://dresdencodak.tumblr.com/tagged/design
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Feb 25, 2013 14:40
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Kelmo: Your art is boss and you could absolutely sell it for more. Charging hourly makes a ton of sense. Think of it this way, if every piece is the same price, you're basically presenting your art as a commodity. This image, that image, doesn't matter. As if you just printed them all and they took equal (low) effort. Obviously that's not the case. It might make sense for a bulk order of similar images, but that's it. Here's a secret. People have no idea how much stuff is supposed to cost. All they can do is compare it to other things they pay for. Unless your quality is obviously poor (it isn't), people have been conditioned to accept that higher price = higher quality. Think of Starbucks. Or any designer brand. You pay for the privilege of paying more, and the status that goes with. People do it gladly. You already have experienced this: you raised your prices a bit and didn't notice a drop off in sales. Look at the rest of your market. Which would be other smallish custom illustrations. What do other people charge? I go to Etsy, and see that pen/ink illustrations illustrations $50 - $100 (your current range) have uneven quality. Some stuff is ok, some looks like junk. Switch to $100 and up and the quality goes way up. $200 and up (you can do this via the url) and now we're talking consistently good material. That's where you should be. Basically you don't ever want to compete on price. If you do you're signaling that you're a commodity. You're right next to stuff that looks like it came straight from some weirdo's DeviantArt. If your stuff costs $200+ then there's no chance of that. Try out vastly higher pricing for a month or two. If you don't sell anything, you've missed out on, what, the equivelant of $150-300? If you sell one piece you validate the model (and break even). Two and you're raking it in compared to before. There's almost nothing to lose. I struggle with this myself. I freelance tutor math on the side. When I first started my friends all suggested that I price myself "reasonably" (commodity prices) - $15 an hour. Like every other random tutor. I followed the advice of entrepreneurs and freelancers and started off at $30 an hour. People pay it. But even that isn't really out of the "commodity" price range. Sooner or later I'll move to $60 an hour. That's a premium rate. And when the people paying me have no marker of how good I am (besides the testimonials that every other tutor also has), and no feel for how good other tutors are (in the $15-30 an hour range), they'll pick me because of my higher price, not in spite of it. They want the best for their kid and they'll pay for it. And I'll deliver, but that's assumed. The other tutors probably could too. Remember, people don't just want an image on their wall. They want to tell friends how it cost $350 and was a custom job from the UK (or Australia). They want to feel like they did something significant with their money and got something significant for it. Your work is good enough to deliver on the satisfaction end, but your prices are too low for people to feel like they really bought something serious. Jack up the price (and charge by the hour) for a month or two. See what happens.
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Feb 26, 2013 03:16
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I really need a shortcut to switch between layers in Photoshop, but I can't find the command in the Edit Shortcuts-list. Google tells me the keyboard shortcut is Alt+[ and Alt+], but I use a QWERTZ-keyboard, and I'd rather change my shortcut to something I can reach with my left hand easier. Am I missing the command, or is it just not editable?
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Feb 28, 2013 18:24
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horriblePencilist posted:I really need a shortcut to switch between layers in Photoshop, but I can't find the command in the Edit Shortcuts-list. Google tells me the keyboard shortcut is Alt+[ and Alt+], but I use a QWERTZ-keyboard, and I'd rather change my shortcut to something I can reach with my left hand easier. Am I missing the command, or is it just not editable? It's not editable. If you're on Windows, your best bet is Autohotkey or some other key-combo rebinding program.
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Feb 28, 2013 18:40
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neonnoodle posted:It's not editable. If you're on Windows, your best bet is Autohotkey or some other key-combo rebinding program. Mac, sadly. Does anyone here know the shortcut for QWERTZ-keyboards?
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Feb 28, 2013 22:55
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I have invented (as far as I know) a number of origami flowers, and I was wondering how do I go about getting an origami book published?
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Feb 28, 2013 23:34
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I got accepted to two gallery shows that are running at the same time. This is my first time actually showing in a place that isn't attached to my school. First and foremost, I told one gallery I would be submitting work's number 1, 2, and 3, but the other gallery wants work number 3, if that makes any sense. Should I alert the gallery before dropping off my work that I'll be one piece short? Secondly, is it a huge faux pas to miss the opening reception? For one of the shows I'll be out of town and wont be able to make the reception. I was also curious about things like business cards, artist statements, etc. The galleries would have asked me for those things, right? Should I just carry my business cards with me during the opening? Do I even need them? I'm so overwhelmed. It feels so weird showing with real artists.
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Mar 1, 2013 04:03
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Yes, you should tell them as soon as possible. It's not a problem not to show up. Once you've been to enough it's all pretty routine and boring. You get free drinks though if its that kind of gallery. And yes, carry cards.
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Mar 1, 2013 05:51
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SynthOrange posted:Yes, you should tell them as soon as possible. Thanks, I dropped them a quick line. I didn't expect to get accepted to both shows at once, to be honest. In college they also said to make postcards for shows. Should I do this too or are business cards just fine? I need to update my business cards...
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Mar 1, 2013 15:42
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So, after being inspired by a friend of mine that supplements his D&D campaigns with sweet-rear end drawings, I bought a cheap, crappy tablet in an attempt to learn how to draw. I have a ton of freetime at work and at home to practice, which I know is the most important part. However, I know exactly dick about actually drawing anything. Is there some kind of, like, Couch-to-Not-Completely-Awful set of tutorials? I looked over at the creative resources thread and there's a ton of good tutorials (that I bookmarked), but they all seem to assume you know which end of the pen to hold.
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Mar 2, 2013 03:39
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Shnooks posted:Thanks, I dropped them a quick line. I didn't expect to get accepted to both shows at once, to be honest. Postcards and other publicity material for shows are usually handled by the show organizers. Just have your own cards, and maybe hand some to the gallery to give out to interested parties.
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Mar 2, 2013 03:56
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Doomsayer posted:So, after being inspired by a friend of mine that supplements his D&D campaigns with sweet-rear end drawings, I bought a cheap, crappy tablet in an attempt to learn how to draw. I have a ton of freetime at work and at home to practice, which I know is the most important part. However, I know exactly dick about actually drawing anything. Is there some kind of, like, Couch-to-Not-Completely-Awful set of tutorials? I looked over at the creative resources thread and there's a ton of good tutorials (that I bookmarked), but they all seem to assume you know which end of the pen to hold. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned but I think you made a mistake by jumping straight to digital. You could learn a lot by just carrying a small sketchbook around and drawing from life.
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Mar 2, 2013 13:35
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Can someone recommend a DSLR camera for someone who intends to use it a lot for HD video projects?
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Mar 2, 2013 15:59
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Doomsayer posted:So, after being inspired by a friend of mine that supplements his D&D campaigns with sweet-rear end drawings, I bought a cheap, crappy tablet in an attempt to learn how to draw. I have a ton of freetime at work and at home to practice, which I know is the most important part. However, I know exactly dick about actually drawing anything. Is there some kind of, like, Couch-to-Not-Completely-Awful set of tutorials? I looked over at the creative resources thread and there's a ton of good tutorials (that I bookmarked), but they all seem to assume you know which end of the pen to hold. Ctrl+Paint is a great site for digital artists, and its "Digital Painting 101"-series is a good row of videos that cover the absolute fundamentals of digital drawing - I'm talking "How to open Photoshop" here. The utmost important step to learning how to draw is knowing what to learn. It's critical to know what to work on when practicing art, which is why it's a good idea to have a teacher. I definitely agree with slowdave to not focus solely on digital art, though, you should try to be as open as possible when it comes to drawing. I've been drawing for 6 years now, but I learnt a whole slew of vital information since I got into drawing portraits with graphite a couple days ago. You should also probably accept that it can take a good while until you come up with anything you're satisfied with. Patience and tenacity are two extremely important factors when drawing. When drawing, painting, whatever: Keep the basic elements in mind. Think of the object you're drawing, break it into the elements, then draw it. Once you develop "the painters eye", the rest is just technique and lots of practice. Oh, and start out by drawing from real life, like still life. When you have an actual object in front of you – rather than something you've made up – you can always check for differences between your drawing and reality, giving you solid feedback. Begin every drawing session with some warmups – draw circles, draw two dots and a straight line between them, squares, squiggly lines,... basic shapes and lines. Make sure you draw in one continuous motion, not a broken mess of lines. You'll develop muscle memory for this stuff, helping you greatly down the road. Next, things get a little more open, but I'd recommend picking up an object and drawing it - make sure you construct it out of basic three-dimensional bodies, such as spheres, cylinders and cubes. Don't worry about too many details, just make sure your lines are confident and the drawing actually looks like the object. When you're not drawing, read up on as much theory as you can find. There's a lot of good tumblrs around that collect some great tutorials focussing on all sorts of stuff, like wings, fabric, grass, color and so on. Also, there's plenty of YouTube-channels around with great tutorials and such which I watch all the time. Sometimes it's good to just draw whatever you want, so draw it! Then analyze it. Find what bothers you about the drawing, keep it in mind and work on it. Also, save your drawings, even when they're gonna look like crap. I'm guilty of dumping a lot of old stuff, but it's interesting for you and others to see how you improved. Lastly, there's the comfort zone. Over time, you're gonna like some things about drawing more than others, and you'll try to avoid those inconvenient parts, be they backgrounds, color, shading, faces or something completely different. Eventually, you'll need to tackle these things head-on, there really isn't a way around them. Obviously, working on your weaknesses is the best way to improve, as there's little point in working on your strengths. Know those weaknesses, keep them in mind, and get rid of them; but don't push yourself too much, or you'll get frustrated. Save those exercises for a good day. Here's a great tutorial/analysis/whatever on getting past your comfort zone, by the way.
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Mar 2, 2013 16:10
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slowdave posted:Maybe I'm just old-fashioned but I think you made a mistake by jumping straight to digital. You could learn a lot by just carrying a small sketchbook around and drawing from life. Oh I totally get that, and I have a notebook I already carry around with me (well, in my car), but Photoshop is the one vaguely art-y thing I'm actually familiar with, been using it for years, so it seemed a good place to start with all the online tutorials available. I don't want to Tim Buckley my own art education by just thinking it's good enough to just wing everything. The other reason is that I only ever intend for the drawings to be used in online D&D campaigns as vague representations of what's happening. horriblePencilist posted:Ctrl+Paint is a great site for digital artists, and its "Digital Painting 101"-series is a good row of videos that cover the absolute fundamentals of digital drawing - I'm talking "How to open Photoshop" here. These are all amazing resources, thank you! And I totally didn't mean to imply I expected to get any better immediately, or really ever, I know art takes a lifetime of dedication to get good at, I'm just shooting for, like, 7th-grade trapper keeper levels here. I'm just hoping that after a couple months I can get to the point where my drawing of a cat can be identified as "possibly some kind of four-legged animal". I used to be a model for an intro to figure drawing class, and I'd see someone do that circle-with-two-lines thing for doing proportions of the face and go "Whoa whoa whoa, what the gently caress kind of wizardry is this?" So these resources are incredible, thank you.
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Mar 2, 2013 21:12
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I have a script for a sci-fi audio play. I got some feedback here on the opening scene, but the thread where I linked the whole thing on Google Docs has two replies, both mine, after a month, so I'm not expecting to hear much more on that. I'd like to produce it or get it produced somehow but it's tough to know where to start on something like that. What would you say my best options are? Should I try to pimp it harder here and get more interest, or would that come off desperate, or should I try to present it differently? Are there other good places to circulate something like this? I'm trying not to come off all E/N about this, I can think of a couple of things I did wrong putting it up, and the answer may well be let it lie fallow for a while. I've got other things on the burner but this is a project I'm passionate about and I need to get better at self promotion. So advice is welcome.
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Mar 3, 2013 04:03
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Maxwell Lord posted:I have a script for a sci-fi audio play. I got some feedback here on the opening scene, but the thread where I linked the whole thing on Google Docs has two replies, both mine, after a month, so I'm not expecting to hear much more on that. I'd like to produce it or get it produced somehow but it's tough to know where to start on something like that. Hey Maxwell. I'll have a look at it. I would be happy to read a part for you too, see here for what my voice sounds like to see if that would be helpful.
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Mar 3, 2013 04:58
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I'm starting to look over how many actors I'd need but there's still organization in terms of having an engineer and sourcing the sound and music and so on. The Solicitation thread seems to be mostly for full pitches ("I need X amount of money, here's what I'll do with it") and I'm not quite at that stage yet. That's partly what I'm searching around for, any help actually doing the logistics of an audio production.
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Mar 3, 2013 05:06
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Maxwell Lord posted:I'm starting to look over how many actors I'd need but there's still organization in terms of having an engineer and sourcing the sound and music and so on. The Solicitation thread seems to be mostly for full pitches ("I need X amount of money, here's what I'll do with it") and I'm not quite at that stage yet. That's partly what I'm searching around for, any help actually doing the logistics of an audio production. I'm not quite clear what you're wanting - people to help with sound/music? Or someone to talk to about how to find people to help with sound/music/recording?
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Mar 4, 2013 01:02
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sebmojo posted:I'm not quite clear what you're wanting - people to help with sound/music? Or someone to talk to about how to find people to help with sound/music/recording? The basic needs would be voice cast, engineer (I can work Audacity but there's no substitute for someone who has a trained ear), sound and music. Any people I get involved will probably want compensation of some kind, so what I should be offering for that is a question I don't know the answer to. I need to know what kind of budget I will need. THEN it's a question of where and how to solicit that help. (Sound and music can probably be stock. It'd be great if they weren't but that's at least one thing I know I can get.)
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Mar 4, 2013 02:17
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Hey guys. Not sure if this is the right forum to post this on, but I've just bought an Iron Man 3 hero mask, and I want to fill the lacking eyeholes with shiny iridescent plastic. Where can I get the same type of materials that shiny sunglasses and ski goggles are made of? Again, I want plastic, not glass. Thanks....
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Mar 4, 2013 10:09
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Neowyrm posted:Hey guys. Not sure if this is the right forum to post this on, but I've just bought an Iron Man 3 hero mask, and I want to fill the lacking eyeholes with shiny iridescent plastic. Where can I get the same type of materials that shiny sunglasses and ski goggles are made of? Again, I want plastic, not glass. Thanks.... Google tells me you want Window Film. Get some window film, get some clear plastic, apply the film and cut to the approriate size. At least, that's what I'm guessing is what you're supposed to do – I never tried crafting.
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Mar 4, 2013 14:58
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I'm trying to find an application (for Windows or Android) that would work with a headset mic as a sound monitor. Does such a thing exist? It seems easier to have live feedback than recording yourself and listening back.
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Mar 6, 2013 04:47
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So, one of the galleries wants "not more than two pages with a concise biography, artist's statement and list of your major exhibitions". What the hell does a "concise biography" entail? What do they want from me? I'm confused 
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Mar 7, 2013 16:07
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Most artists are gigantic narcissists who'll dump pages and pages of masturbatory drivel at the drop of the hat. They're just saying, "Tell us briefly and concisely who you are, what you do, and where you've done it, in places that are worth mentioning."
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Mar 7, 2013 17:01
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Hello! I'm really new to Adobe Illustrator. I have 5 independent shapes that I want to "connect" so that they are one, and I can fill the interior like so: (A mockup in photoshop of what I want to do.) Object>path>join doesn't work, but you experts probably know that. EDIT: Nevermind, I got it. Rubber Slug fucked around with this message at 08:08 on Mar 8, 2013 |
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Mar 8, 2013 07:48
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fart.com
curse of flubber fucked around with this message at 00:52 on Sep 2, 2015 |
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Mar 11, 2013 23:32
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I've been searching and looking around but couldn't find a thread dedicated to Special Makeup Effects. Does such a thread exist or am I the only person around here who likes to get their hands dirty with liquid latex, grease paint and gallons of stage blood?
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Mar 14, 2013 18:04
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Caryna posted:I've been searching and looking around but couldn't find a thread dedicated to Special Makeup Effects. Does such a thread exist or am I the only person around here who likes to get their hands dirty with liquid latex, grease paint and gallons of stage blood? What comes immediately to mind is the cosplay thread; if nothing else, someone there will probably be able to point you in the right direction.
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Mar 15, 2013 02:24
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I've been getting back into papercutting lately, and working on more detailed projects (like these by Julene Harrison or this traditional Chinese style.) Can someone recommend a better knife for this kind of work? I've been using an X-Acto with #11 blades, but the tips tend to break, especially if I need to cut tight curves. I have one of these swivel knives but I find it very difficult to control. Is a surgical scalpel my best bet?
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Mar 17, 2013 03:12
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Carbon Thief posted:I've been getting back into papercutting lately, and working on more detailed projects (like these by Julene Harrison or this traditional Chinese style.) Can someone recommend a better knife for this kind of work? I've been using an X-Acto with #11 blades, but the tips tend to break, especially if I need to cut tight curves. I have one of these swivel knives but I find it very difficult to control. Is a surgical scalpel my best bet? You might actually want to consider a wheel-bladed knife, like a glass cutter. I've borrowed my mother's when I was visiting (she works in stained glass) and it produced quite satisfactory results for the project I had in mind. I'm not sure how difficult they are to keep sharp, though.
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Mar 17, 2013 05:13
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Hiya, I think I'm going to have a bit of trouble getting the question out there but try to stick with me for a second. I've been going through the Comic-Strip mega-thread and I noticed that a few comics use really simplified forms for their characters, but said characters are still recognizable as to what their supposed to be. I guess what I mean is that there pretty much caricature's. I tried giving it a shot but I just can't do it...my mind seems to be hard-wired to try to keep the image as close to the original as possible. If it gets to out of line or exaggerated, I'll just erase it without thinking. I don't think that its a really healthy drawing habit. I should be able to draw what I want, and what I need to. Does anybody have a similar problem or know a way I can overcome this? Or maybe just a way I can practice caricature without triggering the reflex?
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Mar 18, 2013 21:18
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scarycave posted:Hiya, I think I'm going to have a bit of trouble getting the question out there but try to stick with me for a second. Ah, my dear friend, you have asked a good question. Many people train themselves into human Xerox machines, when there's a whole other world out there: caricature and design. Our brains are special: when we look at things our brains are trained to see all the extremely subtle differences between similar things and remember those and essentially forget everything else. This is so we don't waste brain space on unimportant details and therefore recognise things based on a small amount of information. If you can identify the important differences and exaggerate them and simplify away everything else, you can draw something that is more identifiable to the human brain then the thing itself. It's honestly so cool its practically magic. You have to train yourself to do it though. Tips: - When you look at a thing ask yourself what makes this thing identifiable to me as what it is? Try to make those things stand out, and eliminate as much unnecessary detail as possible. - Compare two similar things and exaggerate them away from each other. Do this with two people, try a donkey vs a horse, you can even do this with cars, tea pots, cats, etc. - Look for trending towards a basic shape. For instance some peoples heads are almost rectangles and others are almost round, some still are triangles almost. Rather then drawing a slightly triangular head shape, draw a slightly head shaped triangle. - Observe things until you have committed as much of it to memory as possible. Then draw it entirely from memory. Your memory auto simplifies and exaggerates. Make sure you aren't just making stuff up that you didn't commit to memory though... If it is too much for you to remember all in one go: try to break it down into manageable chunks but try still to observe longer and draw as much as possible before you go to observe again. Sometimes its easier to force it into your brain by drawing it. So try to redraw form memory after you have already drawn it once. - Look for shapes that are created by features lining up in odd ways. Some peoples nose continue at the exact angle of their forehead. Some peoples smile oddly mirrors the curve of their eyebrows. In some cases the bridge of a persons nose is as wide as the bottom of their nose. - Don't forget to exaggerate big empty spaces and make them bigger empty spaces. Its easy to forget to exaggerate a feature like the cheeks or the forehead that is only defined by the placement of surrounding features rather then drawing the feature itself.
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Mar 19, 2013 03:14
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Duck Party posted:Ah, my dear friend, you have asked a good question. Many people train themselves into human Xerox machines, when there's a whole other world out there: caricature and design. Thanks for the awesome tips. I actually gave it a shot this morning, but it didn't come out to well though. I definitely need a bit more practice. I'm going to try to get at least three caricatures a day starting tomorrow.
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Mar 19, 2013 22:22
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I've been trying to figure out how you find or start a writers group if you don't already know other writers in your area. My wife and I seem to be the only people we know, and that our friends know, who actively write. Does anyone have any advice?
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Mar 22, 2013 04:20
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I'm looking to get a microphone for my organization. We've recently started recording a lot of our events for eventual publication on YouTube. We have a nice camera that takes really high quality video, but it doesn't do that great of a job with the audio. We have a lot of older speakers, so we need something that can pick up that kind of thing reliably. I don't know the first thing about this. Our budget is tight, but not that tight. Is there anything we can get for between $100 and $300?
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Mar 24, 2013 23:42
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Red Crown posted:I'm looking to get a microphone for my organization. We've recently started recording a lot of our events for eventual publication on YouTube. We have a nice camera that takes really high quality video, but it doesn't do that great of a job with the audio. We have a lot of older speakers, so we need something that can pick up that kind of thing reliably. I don't know the first thing about this. Our budget is tight, but not that tight. Is there anything we can get for between $100 and $300? There is a recording thread in Musician's Lounge that might be able to help you: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=2292898 It moves a lot slower than normal threads but the advice is pretty good in my opinion.
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Mar 26, 2013 02:54
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Not 100% sure where a good place to ask this is, so I'm trying here! Help would be super ultra appreciated! I used to use this really handy Photoshop plug in called KillWhite. This was great because ti deleted out all the white in a picture, so all transparency is retained... so you could take a picture of a drinking glass on a white background, delete out the white and effortlessly fake any other kind of background and it would realistically show through the glass. Unfortunately I'm using CS6 now and have long since upgraded out of a version of Photoshop where this plug in actually works, and I can't find anything as a comparable replacement. Possibly I'm just not googling hard enough but I've tried every now and then and I just can't find it... I've made do with using crappy workarounds like selecting Color Range and deleting out white that way but it's not nearly as effective. Anyone know a suitable replacement that would still work? I'm also using Mac machines so anything Windows only is out, unfortunately... but I'd love it if there was something out there I could use.
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Mar 28, 2013 20:31
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redjenova posted:Not 100% sure where a good place to ask this is, so I'm trying here! Help would be super ultra appreciated! The sample images seem similar to using the Blend If blending option and Alt-dragging the "This Layer" max value slider over to the left. I've never used the plugin so I may be missing something though.
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Mar 28, 2013 21:00
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I know there is a 'color to alpha' tool in gimp that does what you are describing. I beleive photoshop your options are either masking out the white (select white, mask, invert mask) or change the blending mode of the layer to multiply.
Duck Party fucked around with this message at 02:28 on Mar 29, 2013 |
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Mar 29, 2013 02:22
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