Michael Fleishman - Starting Your Career as a Freelance Illustrator or Graphic Designer: Revised Edition

STARTING YOUR CAREER
AS A FREELANCE
ILLUSTRATOR OR
GRAPHIC DESIGNER

BY MICHAEL FLEISHMAN

2001 Michael Fleishman

All rights reserved. Copyright under Berne Copyright Convention, Universal Copyright Convention, and Pan-American Copyright Convention. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior permission of the publisher.

05 04 03 02 015 4 3 2 1

Published by Allworth Press
An imprint of Allworth Communications
10 East 23rd Street, New York, NY 10010

Copublished with the Graphic Artists Guild

Cover and interior design by Jennifer Moore, James Victore Inc, New York, NY
Cover and interior illustrations 2001 Michael Fleishman
Page composition/typography by Sharp Des!gns, Inc., Lansing, MI

ISBN: 1-58115-199-3

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Fleishman, Michael, 1951
Starting your career as a freelance illustrator or graphic designer /
by Michael Fleishman p. cm.
ISBN 1-58115-199-3
1. Commercial artVocational guidance. 2. Graphic artsVocational guidance. I. Title
NC1001 .F58 2001
741.6'023'73dc21
2001005296

Printed in Canada

For Joanne, for our boys, for me

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Organizations

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thanks to all the folks who added their unique insights and seasoned comentaryyour valuable input was most appreciated. I am indebted to the following friends, family, and colleagues for their generous help, expert advice, and words of wisdom: Roger Brucker, Norton Gusky, Larissa Kisielewska, Robert Saunders, Randy Glasbergen, Matt McElligott, Marti McGinnis, Mark Monlux, Jay Montgomery, Ilene Winn-Lederer, Todd M. Williams and Kevin R. Horner, Peter Zale, Robert Zimmerman, Dan Johnson, Ryan Osborne, MaryAnn Nichols and Juda Kallus, Ward Schumaker, Elwood Smith.

Heres to Stephanie Norris, Julie Robinson, and all the Keystroke Kops: Amanda Allmandinger, Ty Cooper, Bridget Crimeans, Valerie Lawson, Jason McCauley, Corina St. Martin, Micah Sitzman, Casey Telger, Mark Wells.

My great thanks to Tad Crawford and Nicole Potter at Allworth Press, to Jennifer Moore, to Susan Conner and all the folks who contributed to the first editions of this book.

If this book had a bibliography, at the top of the list would be Starting an Online Business for Dummies (IDG Books Worldwide Inc.) by Greg Holden. This was a great resource and cross reference for chapter 19, and I highly recommend it.

And finally, to my wife Joanne Caputo, and my sons Cooper and Max; because family is what counts when you absolutely, positively have to get your book written overnight.

INTRODUCTION

There have been many changes in the profession since this book first appeared as two separate volumes for another publisher. There have also been big changes for me personally, but youll have to wait for my epic masterpiece Starting Your Career As a Full-Time Husband and Parent to hear these tales.

Professionally, the biggest shockwaves have been ushered in by the computer and the Internet: digital illustration and design, the advent of online portfolio sites, the proliferation of stock art and royalty-free image banks. We have not developed the vaccine to successfully beat spec work, all-rights contracts, and work-for-hire yet, but the fight continues. Another point of note: Lets not forget sophisticated, efficientand reliablecommunications and delivery systems that have dumped the global market right in your own backyard.

So a brave new world is here, but I remember my first professional efforts very clearly. Not long out of grad school, it occurred to me that freelance illustration would be a fun way to put my art to work. I bought the biggest portfolio I could find and loaded it with the best of my graduate material. Setting my sights high, I traveled halfway across the country, and dropped my book off at a most prestigious greeting card company (which shall remain nameless, but call me and Ill spill the beans). At the time, my pen-and-ink drawings were hardly greetingcard friendly, but I figuredhey, theyll be able to see I can draw, right?

Not only was my portfolio rejected, but it was returned with bits of somebodys lunch and manicure statically charged to the acetate. Talk about dejection! Nevertheless, I believed in that portfolio. With some evaluation and a bit of regrouping, my next stop brought me two immediate assignments for a local newspaper. It was a great kick, opening the Sunday edition at the laundromat and seeing my illustrations in print. I was freelancing, and I was hooked.

Im still hooked. And if youre reading this, you must be fishing, at least. Starting Your Career As a Freelance Illustrator or Graphic Designer addresses the common problems facing those who want to open up their own shop. You may be a beginning illustratorlong on talent but short on experienceor perhaps youre a designer just getting out of school. You could be on staff and interested in branching off or you just might be a gallery artist wanting to explore a new arena.

Wherever you are on the ladder, I wanted to keep the new Starting Your Career realistic, honest, relevant, and up-to-date. There have been the sea of changes mentioned above, but as illustrator Ward Schumaker commented in a recent correspondence, Those who have moved with the changes are doing quite well.

Schumaker went on to remark that there is no such thing as thinking locally, and I agree. I live in a lovely village of 4,000 people in rural Ohio but I work nationally, even internationally. The technology that has made this possible was only hinted at in the first editions of this book.

What else have I learned over the years

It matters more than ever who you know and where you stand, and in our current business climate, networking and activism just make sense. To deal with that reality, I took a bigger role in the Graphic Artists Guild (initially as a chapter rep and serving on our grievance committee; I next co-chaired the Guilds Campaign for Illustration and am now President of the At-Large chapter). For, as Schumaker says, We must use each other to compare techniques, talk business and finances, join in solidarity, fight unfair contracts, and devise new marketing paradigms. And, of course, we must be there for our colleagueswho but a fellow illustrator (or designer) could ever understand?

Another lesson, as designer (and master marketer) Roger Brucker will tell you: diversify, diversify, diversify. My illustration career opened the gates to a variety of new arenas for me. I work both digitally and traditionally and relish both disciplines. As you can see, I am also a writer about illustration and the arts with numerous book and magazine credits on my rsum Since 1995, Ive been teaching illustration, and administered a degree program at a local design school. I also have a regular roster of private students and teach group classes in cartooning, drawing, and computer illustration.

Illustrator Elwood Smith puts it another way. Changes in the industry, says Smith, Have marked the beginning of a whole new opportunity for creative growth. In fact, he says, The Creative Muse is already guiding me into areas I never dreamed of. Ive been inspired to move into other areas of commercial creativity that Ive been meaning to investigate (but was previously too busy to do).