Interview with Naniiebim

James: Do you have a job besides illustration?

Naniiebim: I used to wash dishes/ work in reception at a restaurant alongside illustration, but have worked freelance for a long time. I'd say I do half and half Illustration/ artist.

J: Do comic artist ever meet up for a drink during your cons? I’ve heard that for the San Diego comic con you have to burn the candle at both ends if you’re ever to see the editors.
N: I meet up with friends- mostly to chat, eat and hang, but have not bothered trying to get in with socializing purely to climb the social ladder.

J: A serious concern for me is that illustration isn’t seen as a respected profession. We live in a world where you hear terms like hipster and yuppie, very derogatory stuff. How do you maintain an environment that respects and supports your creativity?
N: It’s been much harder to work as an illustrator in the more recent years because the market is saturated with a lot of artists who are used to being paid much less than they ought to, it's a vicious cycle of people needing work, and having to take lower and lower pay because so many other artists will take the job if they don't. I have probably burned my bridges.  I only really work with clients now who I work well with.

J: Have you ever lowered the price of your comics at cons in response to seeing the prices of other’s work?  N: The books and going to cons have a certain overhead I have to cover which has been set in the price of the books to cover a number of selling possibilities- selling in the shops for example has a very high overhead to cover posting books to the shop, and to cover their commission charge for sales in store, which can be 30-50%.

I’ve lowered prices occasionally at a show when a customer has individually tried to haggle with me- usually this happens in exceptional circumstances- and I'll usually barter them a piece of their artwork for the cut price, or it has happened at the end of the day when they have expected us to lower prices- but don't know that as small publishers, if we lower the prices, we literally get nothing from selling them the book because of the costs involved involved.

J: It also seems very self-destructive that hobbyists and docile graduates are competing with proffesionals. Do you think the response to this is that many illustrators are now taking an entrepreneurial attitude to things? Making their own products and establishing an audience. To survive in the industry is it important for one to be independent and have that relationship with their audience at cons? Or is there another way for it to get better? E.g. in house studio jobs be it for games or cartoons etc.?

N: It’s a difficult and very complicated subject with a lot of factors. I can only really say that the development of my methods are individually decided over time and because of personal preferences.  The situation has become pretty bad for both Graduates, Hobbyists and Professionals alike because of the lack of respect for art and artists in the industry- and it's ended up with all artists and illustrators undercutting each other constantly- the only ones who gain from this are the industries that use artwork.

I made the choices to work as I do because they work and are supportable by me as an individual, and unfortunately, freelance work like my job is pretty unique to each person doing the job. I've only gotten where I am by trying a lot of things, making mistakes and avoiding them in my next step.

As for being independent or inhouse, it really depends on which sort of life you can cope with!

J: You stated one perk of self-publishing was getting away with not having a title on front of the ZERO art book cover, so what are the pros and cons of making an official book (with registered RSBN) as opposed to something you crafted?

N: ISBN's get you into libraries and large distribution chains. Library lending means you can apply for PLR funding for you book. The number is needed to be entered into catalogues so shops can order your books to sell. The trade off is: You sell you books for a really low cost wholesale- when you fund short run printing yourself- you may only profit in pence per book for work you will have spent a long time on. You'll have to spend a lot more time dealing with multiple outlets for distribution- you will no longer have a personal hand in customer service. You book will have a shelf life- the distributor will only increase orders if you sell well, sell badly- and they'll probably drop you.

I was interested in self-publishing without joining mainstream. The trade-off is control and freedom, but a small audience and more PR work. It's more personal, harder work, but I get to go out and meet people on my own terms for doing so.

J: What’s the plan for Mephistos book 6 and the rest of the series?

I usually update news on my Patreon about the state of work I'm in, I'm currently in the middle of a longer period of work with a client than I first thought, and this has severely delayed a number of HBD projects I was partway through last year. I have to work my comics around my client work.

J: Would you allow your fans to influence the direction of the series albeit with fan service or are you a bit more precious with your own stories?

N: I don't mind people drawing fan art based on my work, that's always lovely, but would prefer if they didn't sell it and compete with me with my own IP (intellectual property).

J: If someone doesn’t have the time or money to attend your conventions, then what best way would they be able to purchase your work?

N: In general, I usually tell people that the conventions are the places to pick up the books, ideal for me and for readers. The second would be Etsy; although I feel very bad about the extra postage cost and the fees added due to maintaining the listing- this is a problem mainly affecting overseas sales though. The last would be in the shops- the postage cost, the large commission cost is entirely incurred by me- I can't really say what state the books get to the customer, I can't add freebies or

check they can get the full available range unless I spend a lot of time contacting the shops personally to check. I use Travelling man as they've been the only ones of a very small range of small press accepting shops who have looked after my stock and made efforts to sell them though- Astral Gypsy in Coventry are my other comic shop stocker I usually see them at cons and drop my stock of when I see them. They're a lovely little independent shop- and I thoroughly encourage you to buy from there is you can visit it!

[This interview took place on January 2016]

Naniiebim's twitter:

https://twitter.com/naniiebim

Naniiebim's Etsy:

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/naniiebim

Portfolio Meeting: The Opinion of Practitioners

In a previous post I mentioned how I was able to have my portfolio reviewed by the illustrator Natalie Wood. Recently when I was in London I got the chance to meet the Day Job Collective. A band of Illustrators who make a cohesive team, juggling projects and contacting clients as a group, which in essence allows steady jobs and productivity, basically they got a better chance of keeping the illustrator life as a day job through their collective (which isn't just specifically illustration but as a whole they have a multitude of skills). They have their own tumblr page and it's beautiful!

The Opinions I gathered from them was very similar to what agents mentioned but because they know what its like to be on the creative end they were very much interested in the development process. I learned from them that practical and traditional printmaking is still valued but also that it is very standard to use digital procedures to clean up and tweak the work. Their advice to me was to just keep being computer savvy, understand printing and file formats. And be considerate of colour modes and file compression. They also told me that a good website is just as good and all that is needed instead of using a PDF portfolio (although the PDF is there since not everyone has a net connection).

Portfolio Meeting: Opinions in retrospect

Because of the bad luck of not finding any potential clients to speak to within the past month. It got me thinking about any time where there was a potential client I spoke to in the past. So this post is a retrospective of the time I visited the Futureworks in Manchester,, at that time I was interested in a career in video game design (and still am considering what being an illustrator can get you involved in). I spoke to the people at SmashMouth Games, which in itself is a studio that acts as neighbour to their videogame design course at Futureworks, a practice most studios could do with.

My portfolio was very different from the one I had now (it had still life pieces which I wouldn't be caught dead with having in my portfolio now). The opinions I took from that meeting, especially from speaking to a man named Zuby Ahmed, was that for a career in video game design clients want to see characters in many different angles and poses because of the fact that they need to be animated and may involve being in full 3D, what's more better for them is to see characters interacting with others and their own environment. Another thing to note is on environment, the fact is that games as an interactive experiences need concept art that creates a specific mood and sense of place. This is something that I want to involve in my final major project.

Tackling Folk Tales (My Final Major Project)

Red riding hood was chosen since it was already has a familiar story that would save me from having to work on an original plot and instead give entire focus on just the imagery. Also the familiarity adds to the experience. Anticipation is there and it’s as if a gauntlet has been set.  The real challenge that people expect to be delivered is to witness my own personal vision and take on the characters. You see my designs and they are supposed to be distinctive enough to make you wonder how they would look like in the next page. If Red looks cute now will she look cute when she is eaten by the wolf? And will the wolf eat her? How does the wolf eat her? These questions are all about verisimilitude. There will be logic to my take on the story.

Bettelheim’s psychological analysis of the folktale showed me an interpretation where Red subconsciously wants the wolf to kill off her Grandmother. It gives my Red a dark motive to why she reveals the Grandmother’s location to the wolf. It’s a crucial moment in the story since how she behaves towards it directly gives consequence to the plot. The moral comes from how Red reacts to the wolf.

Catherine Orenstein explores the permutations of Red within pop culture and much more.  Reading her book helped me contextualise the folktale itself. It gave me an awareness of who tackled telling this story. I need that sort of road map because you can’t expect to play with characters that have been in better told stories and yet not even know about them.

In the early days of the project I went to visit a nature reserve, this was done for basic primary research but it was also effective in understanding the mind of the characters as they travel through a forest setting. Specific feelings and keywords were listed. This helps me develop a mood and sense of place for my illustrations.

Portfolio Meetings: The Opinion of Agents

During the past months I’ve been trying to get my portfolio reviewed and it proved far more difficult then I imagined. I discovered the hard way that agencies don’t like to meet you face to face unless they know enough about you in interest of hiring you.  I also discovered that undeniably the capitol was the best place for business contacts and job opportunities, that’s not to say there isn’t elsewhere but it is difficult. A successful illustrator may have to get use to travelling to unknown cities for clients if they want a secure and steady income, having said that this is an industry that deserves a “whatever works” mentality.

My first portfolio review was by Fig Taylor, a genuine authority since she is an illustration agent and a. Her opinion was that my digital painting style seemed to be my strongest work which is very time consuming for me to do. Such work from me is rare and would deserve a client and subject that I would have to be in love with. Her advice was “to take out work that others can do better”, which is another way of saying be true to yourself; the main problem with my portfolio was that it was having an identity crisis and I think the reason behind this is that in my past projects I was obsessed with what the client would want that I actually forgot about my own taste, and that really confuses clients.

 

 

My second review was by the guys at Illustration Ltd. and they were very kind and gracious. Again they took a liking to my digital work but they did however explain that in today’s age it is important to use a combination of traditional and digital for best results. The main advice was that I should always have work within context, clients love to see work in its final phase, be it a printed or screen captured so it’s not just the original concept and sketch that people will see. It shows a level of professionalism but an exception to this rule is not to have photographed work framed and on display. A footnote of the exhibition is more than enough for your portfolio.  Alice Ball gave me encouraging advice in respect to what Fig Taylor said. A portfolio can still have a variety of styles and experimentation, the key towards it being any good is to have a high and consistent ratio of one particular style.

Hopes and Fears (Part 3) Printing a book and the Convention Scene

I would love to publish fiction some day, especially comics. I see a lot of people who probably wanted to go into film making go into other forms of media, making a comic, graphic novel, Picture book is just one way for getting an idea towards a broad audience; one of many. I see this most in terms of independent publishing. There is a whole indie scene that devotes themselves towards web comics and indie publishing, making a web comic is considered a cheap way of gaining recognition since it avoid making a print run and thus having that being sold. It can be seen as a stepping stone towards self-publishing.

 I  went to the Huddersfield Manga con so to get in contact with some indie comic artist. The environment was very much dedicated towards a generation of kids into the Japanese moe culture. There were some artists there who were fans of such a culture and relatively new to setting up a stall but experienced with the convention scene. It’s a niche market in all honesty, because there are so many great Japanese and American artists it makes me wonder if the moe aesthetic  is having a negative effect on the comic world. To me the aesthetic was good for teenagers because you could evoke sensitive and dark narratives whilst drawing things in a very cute manner, big bug eyed characters are made to appeal to your sympathy. The problem is when that visual language becomes an entire genre. My main complaint and fear that I’m on about is that when I go to a manga convention I expect comics but instead I found it to be saturated with artists and illustrators who do not even make comics but instead create prints that were in a “manga” style. Is this really saying something important as good art does or is this really just cutesy commodity fetishism?  I think in spite of such a case there are still some amazingly talented people found in these places who get the opportunity to meet fans face to face.

 

 

So I digress; the truth is there were some comic artists at the convention. Lou Ho, better known as Naniiebim gave me some insight into printing her comic books, the Mephistos series. Since she uses a lot of services from the internet she told me that the international sizes of a5 and a4 are the cheapest, so anything straying from those international measurements would take more effort to set up.  There are also two types of printing that are known as digital and lithographic. With a print run below 500 books Lou recommends just digital printing. There are plenty of articles on the net that describe the differences (such as this one in this link: https://www.print4london.com/digital-vs-litho-print-production) some good printers involve the guys at Printbar, which Naniiebim (Lou) really recommends along with Inky Little Fingers and Caric Press. A fellow classmate has gone to Lithaprint for her children’s book, which is a bit closer to home for me but I’m going to have to talk to her later in order to review that printers. I found out from Lou that she herself would have never been able to make comics if it were not for the internet, she completely believes that her independence in this industry is down to the freedom of communication that the internet grants us. 

Huzzah! A Website is Birthed!

I was finally able to create a website for myself, solely dedicated to my illustration work. So far it's a bit of a Frankenstein's monster of illustrator's sites that I kind of like. I used Wix due to my inexperience of using HTML and coding. So this is really the beta prototype of my site. Apparently Wix demand you subscribe to their premium service in order to have no advertisements on your custom made site, on top of this your private DNS needs to be 60 days active before you can use a pointing or transferring procedure (If you bought your domain name from another service then this would be relevant to you). Some day the whole website will end up looking far more streamlined, cleaner and cohesive for users but for now, it's a start.

You can view my website here.