What?! Where?! When?! Why?! HOW?!
THESE ARE THE QUESTIONS THAT MUST BE ASKED!
SO! I hope you all have been safe and healthy, with all the crazy stuff going on in the world right now.
It has indeed been a while since I’ve updated or posted anything. It’s been partially because of lost motivation, and other things that have been happening. I’m gonna summarize as best I can, since I have a habit of explaining things too much. <_<
First thing! It’s been very tough trying to get a job in my chosen field, especially with how much the world has been effected right now. All the internships I’ve applied for has either been canceled or postponed indefinitely, and I haven’t been able to get a job anywhere yet. ;-;
I’m not giving up hope though, I’m still applying for whatever job I can get (while working safely) and I’ve been doing commissions at the same time.
Second thing! I’m gonna update my commissions list real quick so things are more organized (and I’m gonna get rid of the forms since they’re confusing and intimidating). Alongside commissions, I’ve been working on making clay charms and enamel pins to sell! I only have a couple designs ready to go, but I’ll need to make some advertisements for them first before they’re ready to be sold.
Third thing! Since I have had rotten luck being hired by anyone, I’m going to continue education just a bit so my chances of getting hired as an artist will be much better. Starting the last week of this month (September) I’m going to be working towards a Concept Art major through online school with Vancouver Animation School. It's only a year long program, and I will definitely share what I make during that class.
That’s all the major things I needed to say right now. Not being able to get a job did dampen my spirits a bit, which left me feeling unmotivated to do much art. Thankfully, I’ve been finding ways to keep myself productive by doing projects I’ve always wanted to do, and take the right steps to get started.
Some of those projects I am working on are currently on hold because of all the other things I’m balancing right now. Once work resumes on those, I’lll share bits and pieces of them as I go. The ones I’m ready to share I will share soon. Once I’ve edited my commission info and create advertising for the charms and pins I have ready to go.
Thank you for taking the time to read this! Please stay safe and healthy out there!
Commissions (OPEN)
Welcome to my commissions! Feel free to ask me any questions!
If you'd like to commission me, contact me via messages/notes here on DA, private messages on Twitter, private messages via Discord, or through my email at daxaolin26@gmail.com
My Discord server: discord.gg/Er5krYV
Twitter: twitter.com/xaolin26
These are my current commissions menus. At the moment, they include illustrations, clay creations, and customizable birds.
Commissions menu>
Season Special>
This is my current waitlist (will continue to be updated as commissions circulate through):
In Progress:
1) Giant Tooth Sculpture for my uncle
2) 3 sculptures for raiikuii
3)
Wait List:
1)
2)
3)
Looking forward
Last year was quite a doozy. From my previous journals, so many things happened last year that drained me mentally and emotionally (from my bag getting stolen to irl problems at home). Things were rough for quite a while, but I think things are finally starting to get better. Thanks to everyone's prayers, everyone's support here, support from my friends and family, support from the community of the Lazypurple Servers, and just going forward with my classes, I feel like I've finally been able to pull out of my burnout. There's a lot I've been able to sketch in my new sketchbook, and I've had fun experimenting with ink markers thanks to Inktober. And throughout this month/year, I'll slowly be uploading mostly everything I've been working on (from personal projects, to commissions, to class assignments).
There's a couple of things I want to accomplish this year that I've been putting off for far too long.
- Upload more often.
I want to be able to become more active here and perhaps just more active online. It's important for independent artists to make connections with other fellow artist, and perhaps to build up a community/following of their own. A lot of independent creators I've looked up to have been able to do this, and it's something I'd like to pursue further. Although, I might have to branch out to other websites in order to accomplish this. I've thought about potentially making Youtube animated stories, but I'm not too sure yet.
- Build up my current portfolio
This will benefit me for applying for art positions, internships, and potentially allow me to create prints/stickers/etc. to sell at conventions. For years I've been wanting to get a table in an artists alley at conventions, and in order to do that I need to make more things to sell.
- Start establishing my original short stories and fan comics
I've always wanted to make comics and stories of my own creation, it's just that I've always been afraid of how any of my stories will turn out. I want to be able to make stories that have a lasting impact, or at least be memorable. Thankfully, the classes I've taken at my University and research into a variety of different styles have helped me build up my storytelling skills. Transformative theater has been especially helpful in regards to that.
and finally
- Open up commissions
This just kept getting put on the back burner because of all the life events that have kept happening to me. Plus in the back of my head I always have this fear that whatever I make won't match the expectations of whoever commissions me. But as long as there's constant communication between me and the commissioner, the finished product should turn out to be satisfactory for both sides.
Throughout everything I've experienced this year, I've learned and been reminded time and time again that I shouldn't let past negative events weigh me down. A lot of bad things can happen in life, but a lot of good things can happen too. I've been incredibly blessed in my life to be surrounded by such compassionate and supportive individuals, and I want to be able to stay strong and dependent for everyone.
Thank you all for taking the time to read this, and thank you for helping build me up as a person and as an artist.
Burnout
First that whole computer fiasco happened (with the previous journals) and now something else has prevented me from uploading.
There was a smash and grab that happened to my dad’s car a bit more than a month ago. We were visiting my sister, so I had brought a lot of my art supplies with me. I shouldn’t have left my bag in the car, but I did, and someone smashed the window and stole my bag. All my art supplies, including my computer, pencils, sketchbook, iPod, headphones, the bag itself, and a lot of pins I collected over the years were stolen. At the time, those large commissions I was working on were on my computer too, and I didn’t have time to save them to a backup before the smash and grab. So all those weeks of hard work were lost, and a lot of sketches I wanted to upload here were lost (including some story concepts and convention montage sketches). The good news is, through insurance I was able to replace most of the items stolen, though the only thing that can’t be replaced is my artwork.
Having that happen to me, and all the negative situations at home, had left me emotionally, mentally, and physically drained for a long time. For a while I felt burnt out creatively. A part of me is still recovering from that , and with school starting up for me again it’ll suck away a lot of time and energy from making anything bigger than just sketches.
I’m sorry again for staying unusually quiet here again. I don’t want that to keep happening though. I’ve been able to make sketches here and there to help cheer me up, and I want to share those sketches with y’all. So I’ll try to make a small sketch dump or upload sometime soon. I’m unsure of how often I’ll be uploading here for now, since I have gotten busy again with school, and life might throw another curve ball at meh, so eh. ;-;
Again, thank you all so much for praying for me and my folks in the past. Prayer has helped us a lot through these trying times. And thank you for taking the time to read this.
Computer Fixed!
Almost all my previous data was able to be saved, and I have about fully restored my computer back to it's original state. It'll probably run even better now since my computer has been updated to the newest operating system.
Thank you all for supporting and praying for me. It helped a lot!
So now I can get back to uploading one thing each day, though not quite yet. Some last minute things popped up that I need to take care of first, and I'll need to double check just to make sure all the pictures I plan to upload are still in good condition.
Again, thank you for taking the time to reading this, and thank you for staying patient with me!
