January 14, 2015 - Robert's Creative Habit

Today, I spent an hour or so adding in the sun to finish up my Japanese style wavey scene. I’m super happy with how it all turned out. I decided to go ahead and recreate the entire picture in Photoshop and that also turned out really well! I’m noticing that I missed a few details, like some of the blue shading at the bottom, and the picture totally needs a surfing Pikachu but I was pretty distracted when I was finishing it up. Even so it was a fun little project.

I’m going back and forth on how exactly I should sell my artwork online. I mean, on one hand you have websites like Society6, RedBubble, Inprnt, and DesignByHumans. Then on the other hand you have Etsy, or an online store that I build myself directing from my website. With the former options, the vast majority of the profits go to them, but they handle most of the work and take care of the expenses of printing and mailing. With the latter options, especially with my own store, I get most of the profits, but there’s a lot more work to be done as I have to get the prints done myself, and send them out, etc. However, then I know exactly what kind of print quality my fans are getting. They deal through me, and when people ask, “Hey, where did you get that picture on your wall?” they’ll respond with, “Oh, this guy Robert Chapman.” rather than, “Oh, from some website called Society6.” I’m honestly considering using both options, and it’s probably easier for me to get started with the first four websites I mentioned, as I’m not quite set to do all of the work yet. That will come in time as I gain knowledge and experience. I just won’t give them my highest quality stuff. I’ll stick to a certain marketable style with those sites where they get almost all of the profit. I don’t know, not sure what to do.

That all being said, there’s no reason I can’t do all of it. Have a whole whack of fun characters and designs up on those mass market websites and hopefully make a few dollars here and there. Then for my big projects that I’m really proud of, sell my own prints (or even one of a kind stuff maybe) through my website and get them printed and mailed myself. Any suggestions?