Con Report (read: Art Rant)
Hmmm. So… I came out of this weekend with a few things.
1) A decent little profit. Not as much as I made at momo-con, or even as much as I made at AWA last year, but enough to make me feel decent. The niggling little demon known as Artist Self Doubt wants to convince me that it was only by luck that I profited - a friend I know from DDR bought $30 worth of prints and a group of girls all wanted body art commissions, so that got me back into the green. Still… only my small cheap things sold really well for the most part, which made me pretty grumpy.
2) Look at the program schedule. Apparently the voice actors (or something) from Full Metal Alchemist were doing a signing - literally EVERYONE wanted FMA fanart. I would have tried my hand at that rather than the KH stuff if I had known. So yeah, research good.
3) Along the same lines, Run with the OS-girls. They were the most popular this year… again… in spite of being one and a half years old and not as polished (at least in my mind).
4) And as a corollary to that, good god do I need to work on my compositions/backgrounds. Last year I would have said my art was at or slightly above average compared to the rest of the alley. This year I would say that I was below average, if only because I had so few robust… “complete” feeling pieces.
5) Cool ideas don’t necessarily sell. With Evan’s inspiration a couple of nights before the con, I got the idea to make arm-length body-art stockings. I entertained myself decorating them the whole convention - and literally every other person who went past stopped to gush about “how incredibly cool” and “what an amazing idea” it was. …And then I only sold two, even after I dropped the price from $8 to $5, which is barely enough to make a profit. Any ideas on what makes things transition from “so cool” to “I’m going to buy one”?
6) And finally, I came out with the knowledge that I NEVER EVER EVER AGAIN want to try and do that by myself. I’m literally having shoulder spasms from carrying my art bag - and that’s the last of the bad. Friday was okay because I had company for most of the afternoon, but Saturday? Talk about hellacious. I was lonely and grumpy and in need of pain killer. When I needed to pee I had to freaking call people and beg for them to watch my table for 5 minutes. Did I mention the lonely and down bit? Basically it all added up such that by 4:30 on satuday I was fucking Done. There was still a huge crowd in the alley - and I had at least 6 people who were planning on coming back at the end of the day - but I just couldn’t sit there alone and down and uncomfortable anymore. I packed up and hit the game room for some ASC IIDX Action so that I could say I actually did something fun, then went come and collapsed.
Soooo… yeah. All in all it was okay, but not fantastic. I guess I’m glad I went - though Sunday I felt all funky and guilty because I had been working so hard for the last two weeks and then all the sudden I had nothing to do. I suppose the bottom line really boils down to: “…sigh”
1) A decent little profit. Not as much as I made at momo-con, or even as much as I made at AWA last year, but enough to make me feel decent. The niggling little demon known as Artist Self Doubt wants to convince me that it was only by luck that I profited - a friend I know from DDR bought $30 worth of prints and a group of girls all wanted body art commissions, so that got me back into the green. Still… only my small cheap things sold really well for the most part, which made me pretty grumpy.
2) Look at the program schedule. Apparently the voice actors (or something) from Full Metal Alchemist were doing a signing - literally EVERYONE wanted FMA fanart. I would have tried my hand at that rather than the KH stuff if I had known. So yeah, research good.
3) Along the same lines, Run with the OS-girls. They were the most popular this year… again… in spite of being one and a half years old and not as polished (at least in my mind).
4) And as a corollary to that, good god do I need to work on my compositions/backgrounds. Last year I would have said my art was at or slightly above average compared to the rest of the alley. This year I would say that I was below average, if only because I had so few robust… “complete” feeling pieces.
5) Cool ideas don’t necessarily sell. With Evan’s inspiration a couple of nights before the con, I got the idea to make arm-length body-art stockings. I entertained myself decorating them the whole convention - and literally every other person who went past stopped to gush about “how incredibly cool” and “what an amazing idea” it was. …And then I only sold two, even after I dropped the price from $8 to $5, which is barely enough to make a profit. Any ideas on what makes things transition from “so cool” to “I’m going to buy one”?
6) And finally, I came out with the knowledge that I NEVER EVER EVER AGAIN want to try and do that by myself. I’m literally having shoulder spasms from carrying my art bag - and that’s the last of the bad. Friday was okay because I had company for most of the afternoon, but Saturday? Talk about hellacious. I was lonely and grumpy and in need of pain killer. When I needed to pee I had to freaking call people and beg for them to watch my table for 5 minutes. Did I mention the lonely and down bit? Basically it all added up such that by 4:30 on satuday I was fucking Done. There was still a huge crowd in the alley - and I had at least 6 people who were planning on coming back at the end of the day - but I just couldn’t sit there alone and down and uncomfortable anymore. I packed up and hit the game room for some ASC IIDX Action so that I could say I actually did something fun, then went come and collapsed.
Soooo… yeah. All in all it was okay, but not fantastic. I guess I’m glad I went - though Sunday I felt all funky and guilty because I had been working so hard for the last two weeks and then all the sudden I had nothing to do. I suppose the bottom line really boils down to: “…sigh”