Lotzi and his shiny horn

Lotzi and his shiny horn...which isn't supposed to light up like that...

I did this piece specifically for Illustration Friday.  The topic this week is 'shiny.'  I drew and colored it in Photoshop.

I changed the colors a little bit and softened the glowing so that the horn would stand out a bit more.  I also deepened the shadows.

microstock report for May 2012

Here's another exciting installment of our microstock report for May!

Shutterstock is terrific.  If it wasn't for them, I don't know if I'd be paying as much attention to the whole microstock business.  This May I ended up posting a lot more files - but apparently I'm terribly out of touch with what sells these days...so I'm going to have to keep stretching that creative muscle and see what I can do for the month of June.

Istockphoto made quite a lot of  money for quite some time...but they changed their licensing payment plan to favor exclusive contributors...and the downloads have slowed to a crawl.  One good thing about the company is that they approve the files in record time.  When I started three years ago it took almost a week to get approved, and now it's within hours.  Too bad none of the files get downloaded.

The rest of the sites had small boosts this month.  I'd like to think that'll continue...but the summer months are very slow...so we'll see how it goes.

Lotzi: GHOSTS!!!

I did this for Illustration Friday. There's a show on tv where a couple of fraidy guys walk into 'haunted' houses and then proceed to scare themselves silly.  I don't watch the show because it's ridiculous.  And if there really was a ghost (or in this case three) you'd high tail it out of there.

Hurry up and get out of there!

I did the illustration in Photoshop.  It was based on this quick sketch:

Lotzi is faded...

I drew this for Illustration Friday - this week the theme is 'faded'.  I was toying with the idea of a ghost...and then possibly dreams...but then my wife said that faded would be someone who drank too much...

That made more sense, so I went with it.  This is a character we're developing named Lotzi.  Let's say he's getting faded on too much rootbeer...

 He's a lightweight like me.  Two beers (rootbeer, remember?) and it's time to make best friends with the sidewalk in an alley somewhere.

One thing they've been doing in animation these days is steering the artists to use a cintiq to draw.  The best part is how easy it is to edit your drawings...one downside (and this is why I've been doing more drawings this way than by passing them through Illustrator like I usually do) is that drawing on the screen doesn't have the same feel as drawing on a piece of paper.  It's just a matter of getting used to (as sometimes there's a little bit of a delay...), so I just continue to work at it.

IF: Kernel three times

This week's Illustration Friday topic was Kernel.

It was a hard topic and it took me this long to finally decide that I wanted to attempt it.  And even though it's Thursday afternoon, and the week is almost at a close, I finally got my concept figured out and decided to post these drawings:

This is what gave me the most trouble - kernel conjures just one thing in my head...and that's a popcorn kernel.  It seemed like such a mundane thing to draw, so I held off.  But then I thought of a little word play and continued on with the next two drawings.

and that one led to this one:

Pixel Art Pets

I've switched gears a little bit in they style of stock illustrations I'm doing.  I've always enjoyed pixel art (or at least had an appreciation for it) since the time of the original Nintendo video games.  You have a very limited palette in which to convey your illustration.

I started with a page of fruit:

and then I moved on to pets.  First i drew a puppy:

And then drew this picture of a kitten based on Raimi, our little runt of a cat:

Microstock report for April 2012

This is our microstock report for April of 2012.  It was a bit of a downturn in all the stock sites, so towards the end I did one quick illustration...and I'll try to come up with some more this month to see if we can't turn those numbers around a bit.

Shutterstock still leads all the stock sites in how many sales we get each month - which translates into the highest earnings.

Istockphoto is really taking a turn for the terrible - as I can't remember the last time we made that little since we started.

 Dreamstime is slowly creeping up on Istock and could end up being our #2 lifetime earner soon enough.  It's still not too high, but it consistently makes between $20 and $40 a month.  And because of the image contest they do every month, I always want to create something for it, so we've ended up with a lot of exclusive files that sell at a higher price point on this site.

 This was the one new file I did for the stock sites...I'll try to do more spot illustration type drawings and we'll see if they sell or not.  It's feeling a little too much like clip art...

Adelia: Space

Illustration friday had the subject of "Space" this week...so I thought I'd revisit an old character to participate.

I did a quick rough in Adobe Photoshop:

and then decided to do the entire cleanup and color in photoshop as well (instead of importing it into Illustrator like I usually do).  And this is the final:

I always liked to use specific colors with Adelia (this character).  She's a little blue penguin and she loves the color purple...so it would make sense for her to hop around this low gravity moon.

Dreamstime contest: Pretty in Pink

This month Dreamstime has designated "Pretty in Pink" as their next contest topic.

I started with this rough that I did in Adobe Illustrator:

There were a couple of directions I thought I could take it...so I printed it out and revised it in red and then blue pencil (the red to figure out my lines, and then the blue to finalize them):

I ended up really liking the little girl thinking about flowers - Once I scanned it back into Illustrator and cleaned it up and colored it, I decided it didn't need the flowers to be pink.  So I submitted it as is:

Microstock Report for March 2012

Here's our microstock report for March of 2012:

We were busy working on other projects once again, so we didn't add any new files this last month.

Shutterstock is still the best at consistently selling our illustrations.  A couple of months ago I decided to start posting the lifetime earnings of each of the sites.  I feel like it's one thing to tell people you can make money creating stock images, and another thing to actually state the numbers.  I've uploaded my illustrations to have this be a passive income (meaning that I don't really actively create and upload new images on a consistent basis), so it's fantastic to make between 200 and 300 dollars a month on something I'm barely paying attention to. 

On the other hand, some of the sites are suffering because of it.  Istockphoto used to reach almost $100 (if not more) each month.  That's reflected in the lifetime total earnings, but also in the fact that it now makes less than Dreamstime each month.

Some of these sites continue to make money...others, such as Crestock, have yet to get off the ground and probably never will.  In March I signed up for a new site called DrawShop.  I've heard the sales aren't the best, but they have the possibility to do custom jobs, so I wanted to see how that would play out.  I've only uploaded 65 files...

Lil' Fincher

A quick drawing of our little cat Fincher.  He's a long hair nutball.  And he likes to sit in the sun.

A boy and his dog

I did this illustration for Dreamstime's latest contest:

Dreamstime is a microstock site - where they license photographs and illustrations.  And while i have every intention of winning this contest...it's usually the photographs that dominate.  There are a select group of artists that submit illustrations to the contest, but it's few and far between that any of us have won.

The payoff for just entering is still worth it - if this file is ever licensed (and my past entries have been a few times), they sell for more - on the low end the price can go from 36 cents to $1.26.  So it's a good incentive to participate.

The contest this month is "children with pets."  It's important to be one of the first entries (the contest started on friday) so you get more eyeballs on your piece.  I submitted it Friday night and as of Sunday, I'm still waiting to have the illustration approved...

This illustration was drawn in photoshop, but cleaned up and colored in adobe illustrator.  Microstocks like Shutterstock, Istockphoto, and Dreamstime sell more vector files than any other form of illustration.  So it pays to work in that media.

Microstock report for February 2012

Here's the fancy microstock report for February 2012!

I started last month by including the lifetime totals each site has brought me.  I've been selling my illustrations through microstock sites since February 2009 - so it's been 3 years and it's brought a total of $11,744.67 since the beginning.  It might sound like a big number - but it's just about $3900 a year of extra income.  What's nice about it is that I don't spend much if any time at all these days creating new illustrations.

In February I uploaded this image and two others compositions using the same laptop icons:

Shutterstock is the best site to upload files to.  Like all of the microstock sites, you have to sign up and upload several images that they'll evaluate to see if the work is good enough.  Shutterstock makes you upload 10 images for evaluation and you pass if 7 or more are approved.  Other sites vary as well as the time it takes to approve images.  Istockphoto has the hardest process to pass (even though they only evaluate three files), and I didn't get approved the first two times I tried (because of open paths).

Anyway - Stock Illustration sites are a good source of extra income - and it all depends on how much or little you put into creating new files and creating good files.  When we first joined, we aggressively uploaded and posted our biggest monthly numbers...since then we've uploaded about 1 or so files a month and average $250-$300 a month.

The line of "All Other Stock" refers to Stockfresh, Veer, and Thinkstock which are all sites that I signed up with later on and which don't sell too much between the three of them...I might just add Crestock to that mix as the income from that site is very minimal.  The lifetime earnings from "All Other Stock" are boosted by Stockxpert which was sold to Istockphoto and shut down (but not before I made $300 there).

more t-shirt designs!

My wife and I collaborated on these designs.  What that means are these were her ideas, her drawings, and I helped out a tiny bit (and she made me upload them to the site).

For the final t-shirt design we decided to lose the balloon as we wanted to make a clean and simple design that appealed to both men and women and felt the balloon 'babied' it up:

Please vote for this design by clicking this link to Deviant Art and then clicking "I'd wear this"

And then she drew this:

Which we turned into this design:

And this is what it looks like on the t-shirt:

And vote for this one too!  There's no limit to the amount of different t-shirts you can vote for...but I'd appreciate the votes for ours!  Make sure you use this link to Deviant Art and click "I'd wear this"

Thanks!

Deviant Art: Cute Monster T-shirt Contest

Click here to vote for my t-shirt design!  Click on "I'd Wear This" to vote.  My design will only be capable of winning if you vote!  You have to be a member of Deviant Art to vote - but it's well worth it!  So come on...what do you say?

A friend of mine told me about this contest that Deviant Art was holding (the deadline to enter ends tonight at midnight).  I did a bunch of quick roughs:

But I didn't like how any of them turned out so I kept trying and did a series of really terrible drawings that I won't post here...but then I drew this one...and while it's still kind of wonky...it demanded that I finish it:

and that led to finishing it in Adobe Illustrator.  I did the drawing as I wanted to finish it (the one on the left) and then because the rules of the contest strongly suggested that the illustrations be confined to 7 colors (which is easier for them to print) I changed my color palette to comply.

The color swatches at the top are all the colors in the drawing...my original finished piece had 13 colors, so I had to really pare it back to get it to seven.

And this is how it looks if it was on a t-shirt:

My friend, Leonard Dill,  also entered the contest - His illustration is almost as good as mine (and some would say it's better) - Click on his name and also vote for him!  Do your good deed for the day...or two good deeds...don't be lazy, it's totally worth it!  Here's his t-shirt design:

Random Background drawing

I was working on some layouts and came out with this...I liked enough to post here:

It's pretty rough - but I like how the colors came out.

resting on a tree

How can he be capable of sleeping in the middle of such a good book!?!?

I created this in Photoshop.  I might attempt an acrylic painting, but we'll see...

Originally I just drew the tree as I'm trying out a variety of styles to figure out what things in this world will look like.  I liked it enough to add the little panda napping after a good read.

Squaremania - evening lanterns

I was doodling this out a bit - and decided to finish it up a bit more...I started out with the dark blue background color - and played everything else off of that so it could, hopefully, have a nighttime feel.

it's still in rough form, but I thought it was kind of a cute idea.  I have to give credit to my wife as she's the one who suggested that I draw something like this.  "How about those square characters holding lanterns walking across the roof of a house".  So there you go.

IF: Suspense

I always liked the idea of a character thinking that the glasses and mustache would be a believable disguise.

This is part of a suspenseful scene as our little disguised hero builds up the courage to round the corner and face the room beyond.  Nobody would recognize him...or would they...!?!?

Microstock report for January 2012

Here's my latest microstock report:

This month I've decided to include lifetime totals for each of these stock sites.

I thought it would be informative to see what each of these sites has actually made.  It might help anyone looking to submit photos or illustrations to microstock to pick the right ones - or at least focus on the ones that pay the most.


Shutterstock leads the way this month and every month.  They've been the top money maker with licensing my illustrations from the beginning.  They were the easiest company to get approved on (you have to submit 10 images).  My wife and I have been submitting images for about 2 years now (we got our first sale/download on January 31st of 2009) and there have only been a handful of days (less than 5) where we didn't make at least one sale.  In the Spring of 2009, when we were at our freshest and we devoted hours a week to uploading, we were making almost $300 a month.  But now, sitting on a big portfolio of illustrations, and not uploading anything new - we still make at least $100.  And that's why I got into stock illustration in the first place.  I had drawings that were just sitting around on my computer collecting dust - so I brushed them off (colored some of them) and uploaded them and now they're making money.  Some make more than others...but it's nice that they all have a chance.  And by uploading to several sites we increase our chance of having that file make more money.  And our ultimate goal with Shutterstock is to reach the lifetime total goal of $10k because we get our final raise from 36 cents per download to 39 cents.  It's a small raise, but it adds up - and, as you can see, 2 years (or 24 months) of those small downloads have made about $5,500.

Dreamstime and www.istockphoto.com are the next two big companies.  Istock used to be my second best performer and, at one time, threatened to overtake Shutterstock - but last year they changed their royalty structure and they slipped below Dreamstime in the amount of money they bring in.  I hope it comes back around, but it doesn't look likely...Dreamstime is probably the company I upload to and focus on the most - but only because they have a monthly contest that I like to participate in.  I have yet to win, but all the images accepted into the contest sell for a higher price point which still makes it worth it.

The rest of the companies are hit and miss from month to month.  I still upload to them because the money adds up eventually.  And ya never know when a big sale could come.

Anyway - that's all I have this month.  Hopefully I'll never be this long winded in another microstock report...