Join multi award-winning artist, and 2018 Illustrators of the Future winner Bruce Brenneise for our next Ask Me Anything event on the Writers & Illustrators of the Future Forum. The topic for the AMA is Resources For Illustrators. As a professional in the industry, Bruce has a wealth of information on the subject.
Join us on Saturday, Oct. 11, at 5:00 PM PT.
The way this will work is any questions are typed into this thread and Bruce will answer each one in sequence.
Hello, Bruce!
Could you talk about what inspired you to pursue this career and any words of wisdom for someone who feels intimidated by the wealth of talent in Illustration markets?
I get asked questions frequently about how to properly price art. A beginning artist is happy to sell a piece of art, regardless how many hours they spent creating it...even it works out to $1.00 per hour! What is a good rule of thumb? And how do you increase your rates?
@breanda-petsch Sure! It probably helps that my grandfather was also an illustrator. I also came across the art books of Michael Whelan and Keith Parkinson when I was a tween. It showed me a really exciting career as a fantasy illustrator was possible.
One of the hard truths of this profession is that right out of the gate you're in competition with an incredible plethora of skilled illustrators. But even Donato and Dan Dos Santos were newbie illustrators at one point. We're all on that journey together. Yes, in competition to some degree too, but that's why it's important to develop one's unique interests and voice, so that more and more often the clients are coming for what you specifically provide. It really helps to realize that what non-artists call 'talent' is not a gate or fence that separates you from those intimidating pro illustrators. It's the passion that propels you to grow and bit by bit develop the skills that can make you their equal. It's a marathon, not a sprint.
What are some good resources that you would point an aspiring artist towards who wants to grow their skills but doesn't want to spend thousands of dollars an art school?
@johngoodwin Sure, pricing is complicated. When I was starting out, I was mostly aiming to make about $25-$30/hr, based on what I estimated a piece would take me. Sometimes the piece takes longer than that, and your hourly rate drops as a result, but that's part of the learning curve that can be expected if you're trying to also maintain a high (and rising) quality standard necessary to continue raising your rates. I think it is important to at least start planning in concrete terms about amounts that the artist feels is sustainable for themselves, though, otherwise they'll set themselves on a path to burnout. There are certainly would-be clients who won't value you appropriately, who won't be concerned with the cost to the artist of underpayment, so there's a boundary that's hard to establish at the outset of a career, but very important to develop as you go along.
Currently I'm charging somewhere in the range of $60-$100/hr, which is in the realm of AAA game art and the like. It depends on the piece and the client, on what feels reasonable for a plethora of reasons in terms of the value of the art I'm providing (e.g. cover art is a more valuable asset, so the result and price need to be better to achieve that). I'm also in a position to do so because I've reached a level of demand for my work where if I'm charging less, there's an opportunity cost to that due to other better paid work I could be doing.
To increase your rates, I suggest letting existing clients know that you'll be raising your rates, but if they book now they're either getting the current rates or something between the two rates. It's clear communication and an incentive for them to take action and keep working with you now. It's important to keep in mind that rates are not the only, or even always the most important, concern that clients have when working with an artist. If you can obtain and keep the kind of clients that are more concerned with effectiveness, quality, good communication/business practices, etc, you won't have too much trouble raising rates when you need to.
How do you make a living doing this?
How do I gain traction - turn that passion into a career? Do you focus on freelancing, selling prints, starting a Patreon, or pitching your work to publishers? I know you also attend conventions and work with some major studios — could you explain this a bit, please, to offer some insights on how to get started and make it a paying journey, the way you did?
@brucebrenneise Thanks Bruce, and that makes sense. I can use this to help answer these questions when they come at me.
@breanda-petsch Good question! You can definitely get better value-for-money from other resources than art schools these days.
I'm going to copy/paste from a blog post I wrote on my patreon about a few online schools (typically much cheaper than brick and mortar art school):
I built a DIY MFA out of online courses taught by working professionals who actually know what they're talking about in the commercial arts because they're currently 'doing the thing'.
I'm sure there are other great options, but I'll highlight three options that I can speak from personal experience on:
Schoolism: https://schoolism.com/
Affordable and very flexible options for both pre-recorded audits and a version with instructor feedback taught by giants of the field from concept art and animation. I particularly enjoyed Nathan Fowkes' classes, but some might find him a little overly loquacious; if so, you can cheaply switch between classes to find the perfect instructor for you.
CG Master Academy: (NB: I no longer recommend this one, see post further down). From their former instructors, I particularly recommend Ron Lemen (anatomy), and Tyler Edlin, but they had a lot of great options previously.
Smarter Art School: https://www.smarterartschool.com/
Possibly the priciest option, but for good reason. I used this as a capper for my impromptu MFA. Organized as small-group (ten or less) classes with some of the best of the best from the world of illustration, I can't think of any other program in the world that has a better track record of placing artists specifically with jobs at Wizards of the Coast (Magic: the Gathering, Dungeons and Dragons). One of the reasons is that they always have a guest art director who shows up at the end of term for each class, and usually they're ADs from WotC. They also have a very active discord for getting help with all sorts of things, and a biannual portfolio update contest for alumni, judged by an AD from AAA game or publishing companies. Getting your work seen by the people who could hire you is a big part of the battle. Getting your work seen by peers who could end up in those positions can be just as valuable in the longer run.
In addition, I found blogs like Muddy Colors, Gurney Journey, and Stapleton Kearns invaluable. There are a wealth of great books one can learn from. Some of my favorites in no particular order are: 'Creative Illustration', Andrew Loomis; "Color and Light" and "Imaginative Realism", James Gurney; "Alla Prima II", Richard Schmid; "Carlson's Guide to Landscape Painting", John F Carlson; "Framed Ink", Marcos Mateu-Mestre.
I highly recommend finding a local live figure study session you can attend. Often atelier-style programs will have ones you can drop in and pay as you attend.
You can read a great article from Bruce with a number of additional resources for illustrators at his Patreon. https://www.patreon.com/posts/resources-for-134934626
Be sure to subscribe!
@jeanclaude Sure! First I should note that the exact composition of each artist's business plan is going to look a bit different. But I think one important philosophy I've had was to never just rely on one income source. It's much better for you to sit on a stool that has 3 or 4 legs than just one. Any number of things can come along and destroy your one income source, whether that's industry-wide downsizing, globalization, AI, a pandemic, etc. I do a lot of conventions (probably 43% of my income), have an online store (maybe 23%), freelance (33%), and patreon (less than 1%). Part of the patreon is even doing a few paid mentorships. I'm always looking around at the wider playing field and seeing what things would fit my interests and my business well, and which things wouldn't. Honestly at this point there's more options to pursue than I have time to pursue, but it certainly didn't start out that way. I think most illustrators find it's the case that they enter the market to crickets. It can be rough. It was for me.
So to answer the heart of your question, it's a marathon not a sprint, the proverbial snowball gathering size as it heads down hill. My breakthrough realization was about the importance of networking. By which I mean, making friends in my industry and other areas (that can use art) that I was interested in. I was living in Seattle at the time which was fantastic for this. I met some of my first breakthrough clients by attending shows like Norwescon (lots of writers and tabletop game industry people), a local monthly hangout/drawing group, a fans of classic computer games FB group, and indie game dev meetups (where I met the guys who founded MegaCrit when they were just getting started working on their first game, Slay the Spire). All those things paid off with paying jobs, great advice, and emotional support. I also met other artists at all these things, some of whom were able to pass work on to me when they didn't have time or bandwidth to do it. Invest energy and thoughtfulness in your own cohort of artists who are coming up at the same time as you. You never know what jobs they'll end up with. Some of them will eventually be art directors. Who are they likely to like or trust more than the folks they bonded with in the pain of starting a career?
Thank you so much, Bruce!!! Can you drop in your website and socials?
Thank you very much Bruce. I'm certain that your responses will be of immense help to artists wanting to make a viable career!
Thank you for this great answers.
@emilygoodwin My pleasure to pay it forward!
https://www.brucebrenneise.com/
https://bsky.app/profile/brucedraws.bsky.social
https://cara.app/brucebrenneise
https://www.instagram.com/brucebrenneise/
And I'm on a variety of other places, my name is unique so I'm not too difficult to hunt down.
I should note that since I wrote the patreon post, CGMA was bought out by a company (Domestika) that pretty much imploded the service by, among other things, not paying their instructors. No longer recommended. Do try and find some of the artists who used to teach there, though, on other platforms.
