Schoolism.com: Jeckyll and Hyde

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As I mentioned yesterday, I’m taking a character design class from Stephen Silver at Schoolism.com. Our assignment for Lesson 3 had two parts. Yesterday I described part 1. Today is part 2.

Last week we were told to choose one of two stories (Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde, or Oliver Twist), and start thinking about designs for the main characters. Our first step was to fill up at least one page with thumbnail silhouettes of possible designs, thinking about what we could say about the character with just the overall shape. Stephen then critiqued our thumbnails and told us which ones were the strongest. As the course progresses, we will continue to develop our character(s).

I chose Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. Part 2 of this week’s assignment was to take our best silhouettes and develop an actual design for Stephen to critique. This is what I came up with. I’m fairly happy with how Mr. Hyde is coming along (the big guy on the right), but Dr. Jeckyll….not so much. I like the overall face shape, it’s a strong silhouette, and both characters look like they could be the same person. But Jeckyll’s face feels “tacked on” to a generic body. The silhouette of the body doesn’t really echo the shape of the head. Also, I wanted him to have an anxious look, as if he knows he must give in to his internal monster and drink the potion, even though part of him doesn’t want to. But I don’t think it was successful. I’m not sure why, but it doesn’t communicate deep anxiety and angst. Instead, the pose just feels noodly and awkward. Maybe I’ll see it more clearly after a good night’s sleep.

It’s frustrating because these assignments are so much fun, I’d love to spend days on each one. But I’ve been swamped with freelance work lately, so I’m lucky if I can spend half a day noodling around. But I’m still learning a lot, and the good news is I can continue to do these exercises on my own even after the class is over. As long as I take what I learn and put it into practice with future projects, in the long run I know I’ll reap the reward of being a better character designer.

Schoolism.com: Portrait Study

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As I’ve written before, I’m taking a character design class from Stephen Silver on Schoolism.com. I just finished my assignment for Lesson 3, which was actually two parts. Here’s what I did for part 1 (part 2 will be posted tomorrow):

For part 1, we were given photos of four different men. First, we had to do a straight-forward sketch of the person, not really pushing the shapes or getting too cartoony. Just do a standard portrait. Then, after finishing the portrait sketch, immediately put it away and get rid of the photo. From memory, draw the person again using three different shapes: a circle, a square, and a triangle.

The goal was not to do a dead-on likeness and squeeze it into the shape, because that would be almost impossible. Rather, we were to take the features that defined that person (i.e. eyes wide apart, big chin, small pointy nose, whatever) and play with those features within the shapes to create three new characters.

There are several benefits to this exercise. First, it forces you to really focus and study while drawing the portrait, becuase you know you will have to do the rest by memory.

Second, it forces you to think about the placement of your facial features within each shape. You can say very different things about your character’s personality based on how high the forehead is, or how wide the nose is, for example. Keep in mind that every feature effects every other feature (for example, as the nose gets bigger the eyes, in contrast, should get smaller and pull closer together). Its amazing how much of a difference it makes to simply play with the size of the facial features and their relationship to one another.

Third, it forces you to simplify. When you know you will be drawing by memory, there’s no point in trying to memorize every little line and shape on the person’s face. Instead, you train yourself to study the overall essence of the person and figure out how the individual features interact to make that person who he is.

It was a really fun exercise and I was pretty amazed at the results. Not that these are my best designs ever, but I was surprised with how much variety I got out of the characters simply by starting with a different shape and then making a conscious effort to really think about how the different parts of the face interact. I encourage every aspiring character designer to try this exercise.

Make The Most of Your Website

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For a freelancer, a website is an essential marketing tool. It proudly displays your work to potential clients 24/7. It trumpets your accomplishments to art directors all over the world. Most will not even consider hiring you if you don’t have a website.

But not all websites are created equal.

There are some little extra touches that can go a long way in making sure your website pushes you to the top of the hiring list. Some of these tips I’ve just recently learned. In fact, I’m planning to completely redo my website this fall to take better advantage of them.

Put your contact info at the top.
Make sure your email and phone number appear on your header, so that they are readily visible on every page. It’s not that uncommon for an art director to print out samples from two or three artists to show to the boss and/or the hiring committee for a project. If they are having a tough time deciding which artist to call, having your contact info at the top of the page might push you over the edge, especially if the art director is busy and doesn’t want to take time to look up the contact info for the other artists.

Don’t use Flash.
I know many artists use Flash on their websites. It looks cool, and can make it difficult for others to copy and use your artwork. But while it may help you protect your work, but it won’t help you get hired.

According to The Thriving Artist, an excellent resource by Mark Simon, there are two ways Flash can work against you:

First, you can’t print a Flash webpage unless print functionality has been purposely built in (and most of the time it hasn’t). If a busy art director can’t print out your work, your samples won’t make it into the hiring meeting.

Second, Flash sites are not user-friendly. One nice advantage of non-Flash websites is that each page has a unique URL. If you want a potential client to view your character design portfolio, for example, just send them a direct link to that page and they can go right to it. With a Flash website, the potential client will have to start on the home page and poke around for the correct page. To a busy art director at a big agency that could be a turn-off.

Post your resume.
I’ve been freelancing for ten years without a resume, going on the strength of only my portfolio and client list. Recently, I’ve been advised that not having a resume could be limiting the jobs I can get.

Often, I’m told, the hiring decisions at an agency or corporation can take place outside the art director’s office in a more corporate setting. The final decision is not always made by the art director alone, but by businessmen and other non-creative types. In such a setting, the lack of a resume can make you look less professional and keep you from making the final cut.

Taking that advice, I’ve just posted my resume online here. For now there’s a link on my home page, but when I redo my website this fall I’ll make the link more accessible site-wide.

Post a PDF of your portfolio.
Why should the art director have to go online to see your work? Wouldn’t it be great if he/she could easily print out samples to keep on file, or better yet, to bring to the hiring meeting? Take a few of your best samples, assemble them in a PDF, and post them as a mini-portfolio for download.

If you own a Mac, making a PDF is easy. In almost any application, click Print. In the print dialogue box, you should see a little button that says “PDF” or “Save as PDF”. Click it and your file will be converted into a PDF. It’s that simple.

If you don’t have a Mac, you can upload your file to PDFonline.com and they will convert it to a PDF for free.

My mini-portfolio can be downloaded here.

Track your visitors.
Having a website is great, but how do you know if anyone is visiting? Track ’em. Big Brother issues aside, its amazing how much information you can find about your visitors. I use a free service called StatCounter.com. By pasting some code on my website, I can track not only how many people visit my site, but when they visit, which pages they visit, how long they visit, what city/country they are located in, even which web browser and operating system they are using.

I can’t learn anything too personal like name, address, e-mail or phone number, so in my mind its not a privacy issue. There’s nothing to get paranoid about. All it really tells me is how many people are visiting my website, and which pages they are viewing most often. Using that information, I can see if there’s a link that no one is clicking. Or if the number of visitors drops down for a while, I know its time to step up my self-promotion efforts. The knowledge is used for good, not evil.

If you want to get more specific info from your visitors, here’s a legitimate way to do it….

Create a Sign-Up Page
You obviously have a mailing list, right? But adding the right names to the list can be a challenge. The good news is, chances are there are people visiting your site who like your work and wouldn’t mind being contacted with updates. These people could turn out to be your best leads for future work, you just need to find out who they are. With a little website magic, you can create a sign-up page on your website. That way you can get some names on your mailing list from people who actually want you to advertise to them.

Just make sure the sign-up process is short and simple. Quick and easy is the rule. Make all fields optional, and don’t ask for anything more than some basic information. You can view my sign-up page here.

With a little extra work, your website can go from being a simple marketing tool to a promotional machine.

“Hi, I’m a Marvel”…”I’m a DC”

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I was playing around on my iPhone the other night and came across these YouTube videos. They gave me a good chuckle. The first one is a spoof of the “I’m a Mac”, “I’m a PC” commercials. From there they evolve into a series called “After Hours” where various heroes and villains hang out and talk about whatever.

To view them all, click here.

Clip Art

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One of my first clients as a freelancer was a company that specializes in clip art for Churches (i.e. bulletins, newsletters, etc.) I worked for them for a couple of years. It was reassuring to have a client who gave me steady work every month.

Then I started reading about how clip art is bad for freelancers. Because clip art is inexpensive it encourages clients to use cheap pre-existing art instead of hiring up a professional for a fresh illustration. In addition, the artist who creates the clip art usually signs away all rights for a low fee and never sees any profit. So, as my business began to pick up steam I dropped them as a client. I was grateful for the experience, but it wasn’t a good fit anymore.

Things hummed along for a few years, and then I hit a really bad stretch. For several months I could only land a few freelance jobs, none of which paid very well. In desperation I humbled myself and went back to the clip art client. They graciously signed me back on. I still believe clip art is not a good thing for freelancers in general, but I also know most churches don’t have the budget to hire freelancers for their monthly newsletters. So it wasn’t like I was taking work away from clients who would otherwise call up a professional artist.

After the dry spell finally ended, I stayed on with the clip art company “just in case” things got slow again. It’s been a couple of years now and I’m busier than ever. So busy that I don’t feel like I can give them my best work anymore. Besides, graphic design was never my strong suit, and frankly the pay is still low–in fact, they are still paying the same rate they paid ten years ago. Each month it gets harder and harder for me to justify the late nights I spend for them producing less-than-my-best work for below-market rates.

So, this month I turned in my last clip art assignment.

Unless I hit another slow spot. A really slow spot. They were great people to work with, but its just not a good fit for me right now.

I’ve posted three of the better samples I did for them over the last couple of years, just for fun. If you see any of these popping up in a Sunday bulletin or newsletter, you can say, “Hey, I read this guy’s blog!”

Illustration Friday: “Captain”

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Today’s word over at IllustrationFriday.com is “Captain”. It’s been a long time since I was able to take part, so I’m going to throw this against the wall and see if it sticks.

Here’s some early concept sketches I did for a publisher a while back. The project eventually evolved into something else and the character changed, so these sketches disappeared into my files. The superhero rabbit never got a name, so let’s call him Captain Carrot. There, now I’ve got something for Illustration Friday.