What is your day job? (question for full-time and part-time creatives)
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I work full time as an admin, and thank goodness it pays the bills because nobody would pay me for my illustration work LOL! Someday...
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I work from home as the admin for my husbands construction business... Something I desperately want to quit. Haha! In the last few months I've also become a home school mom to my 5 kids. I've done it before, but its so much harder when I don't get to set the curriculum and schedules. I do art in the in between moments... hopefully those moments will increase to something more, or at least to something semi consistent.
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@charitymunoz I feel your pain. I'm in the same boat. Making progress and working when I can, but I'm on the slow boat for sure.
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@Pamela-Fraley Same story here, but with four kids, and I also used to homeschool. It is so different following someone else’s plans!
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@sarahlash oh my gosh! It was nothing like homeschool. I’m so glad we’re done. My sister in San Diego still has 2 weeks.
on a side note, there should be a support group for mom artists. My family loves my art and is encouraging in their way. But...they also don’t ever want me to go do it because that means I’m not paying attention to them anymore. I used to go to the library or my favorite coffee shop... but now I can’t hide anywhere. -
I work at a videogame studio as a VFX artist. It's a great place to be and I'm very fortunate - surrounded with artists and creators. Although the job is filled with amazing creative challenges, there's something special about designing and building a story and art in a picture book. I'm happy to spend my days solving problems with explosions and jump jets and my nights drawing goofy characters. I don't picture myself leaving anytime soon.
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I am a Physicist and was working in a laboratory till a few months ago. I found it impossible to work on art during those day. Since we had to always stay at work over-time. So, I quitted that job and gave myself a few months. After that I started to work as a teacher in high-school. This gave me so much more time to develope my art and start some personal projects. When my art improves to a better level, I would love to work as a full-time artist. I literally love to just draw the whole time. In my idea, full time doing art is great but it is hard to achieve to a level that it can work out. And as a side-job, the best would be something like a Graphic designer, or teaching is great. I love that I can spend time with children. Their energy gives me energy as well
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@Pamela-Fraley So glad to know I'm no the only one! Makes it feel better when there's more who share your "pain".
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@Pamela-Fraley @sarahlash We definitely need a mom's support group, homeschooled or otherwise. My older 2 just stopped being homeschooled this year, we just got my 3yo used to preschool . . . and then quarantine happened. Now, looks like we're going back to homeschooling for the fall. They both take up a ton of time and energy! Hang in there! We'll across the finish line one day!
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@charitymunoz @Pamela-Fraley It's so nice to come across others who are in a similar situation. I’m just trying to squeeze in these svs classes and illustration work where I can, usually after bedtime. It’s exhausting, and with the quarantine, everything has gotten even crazier. But I am grateful to have found something that I love doing, and trying to remain present in this season while it’s here.
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I've been working full time as artist for ten years now! Currently I am a full time illustrator. I work in house at a company that makes children's products, I mainly work on comics, books and educational magazine content. Before illustration I worked in games, I lucked out and was able to start directly after graduating art school.
As for how long it took though, I decided I wanted to be an artist when I was 9, my high school had a focus on fine art, so I took art classes there. Then I went after an animation/illustration degree which took me about 7 years to get through.
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@ArtofAleksey. Lol anytime
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I've had a lot of odd jobs over the past decade but what I ended up sticking with is my career in the maritime industry. I started about three years ago. I love the water and I get to travel to new places and ports. The ocean, marine life, and maritime culture are endless inspirations for my work. It's pretty easy to find time for projects, too. When my watch ends, I just find a place to park it - either in the common areas of the ship or my stateroom, and draw for a few hours before getting some sleep.
It was a ton of hard work and low pay in the beginning but I recently arrived at a point where I have more stability (one ship in one port) and that's allowed me to focus more on my illustration studies.
Before this I lived in NYC and worked in retail, delivery, print production, etc.. all of those jobs and my commute in and out of the city, drained me so much.. A very good friend of mine once said, you have to find a way of easing the pressure so you have time to create. I think it's different for everyone, but where I am now works well for me.
