The dark side of freelancing is — unstable income. I like being an independent artist and programmer. I wouldn’t want to work in someone else’s firm. But there’s one thing that people new to freelancing have a hard time dealing with. It’s the fact that income is so unstable that some months you might not…
[Continue Reading]Artist Life
Don’t Panic
I see a lot of artists worried about low sales these past few weeks. Don’t panic! That’s completely normal this time of year. I’ve been a designer since 2012, and it has always been like that. February and March are just very, very slow months. Maybe this year is a bit slower than the previous…
[Continue Reading]I hired a law firm (Update #2)
One thing that’s been on my mind recently is this whole situation with illegal sellers. In December, I hired a lawyer and we sent requests to 19 people to stop selling my designs and pay me compensation. Recently, we’ve sent requests to 17 more people. But I’ve already found more. The most stolen one is:…
[Continue Reading]February is the worst month and that’s okay
If you are a freelancer, your income is often unstable. When I was starting there have been months when I didn’t earn anything, and when I did earn something, it was less than $5 a month. Now, that I have a lot of designs in my online stores, I get regular royalty payments each month,…
[Continue Reading]Space Botanica
You probably heard that you should choose a niche for your store and that all your designs in that store should be thematically consistent. If you want to make designs with a completely different topic or style, then you should create a new store for them. When customers visit your store or see your logo,…
[Continue Reading]How to protect your art
If you create designs and submit them to online stores like Redbubble or Teepublic, you will soon find out that there are a lot of thieves. They will steal your designs and try to sell them in their own stores. Luckily, there’s an easy way to deal with them. You have to send a Notice…
[Continue Reading]I hired a law firm (Update #1)
Two weeks ago, I wrote that I had hired a law firm to help me fight illegal sellers of my design “Not Today”. Time for an update. For a start, we sent requests to 19 sellers to stop selling my design and to pay me a small compensation. Of those 19 sellers: 18 sellers removed…
[Continue Reading]I hired a law firm
I never thought I would need a lawyer. I wrote previously about my most popular design. Unfortunately, a lot of people steal it and sell it in their stores. Reporting all those places where it’s for sale takes a lot of time, and it never brings me any compensation. This time is going to be…
[Continue Reading]Advice for aspiring artists
It’s an advice for aspiring actors, not for artists, but it applies anyway. Bryan Cranston is an actor, he played the main character in Breaking Bad. What he says is that you should do your job, as you can, and everything else is out of your control, so you should not even think about it….
[Continue Reading]What if no one likes my art?
I subscribe to the Farnam Street newsletter and recently there was a quote that I am going to share here: Recognizing that people’s reactions don’t belong to you is the only sane way to create. If people enjoy what you’ve created, terrific. If people ignore what you’ve created, too bad. If people misunderstand what you’ve…
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