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Since I was last here I've taken my istock portfolio into a new direction. Actually it started around December of last year, but that was after I left so most of you probably haven't seen it.
When I first started submitting to iStock, I was coming off a year long stint as a freelance painter for a local shop. Much of my work was primitive folk art styles and I had even developed a top secret formula for antiquing my pieces.
While a few of my primitive style pieces did manage to get uploaded as raster illustrations, I got seriously burnt out from all the painting and set aside this style for a long while. Last Christmas season as I was pulling out all my decorations, I started feeling the urge to pick it up again, so I started a little holiday series... and it just took off from there.
I've been on a steady uploading kick since the first part of September when my friend Diane and I decided to challenge each other to keep ourselves motivated to upload. I went from an average upload rate of one every other month to an increase in my portfolio from 153 files on August 28 to 180 files as of yesterday, with two still in the queue (look for more kitty cats!). This has been a lot of fun for me. She has over three times as many files in her portfolio, and therefore gets about triple my downloads per day... so I'm not under any delusions that I'll beat her to gold, but I'm enjoying seeing the growth of my portfolio and my rising stats
The best thing about it is that my stuff hasn't been copied yet. And I stress the YET part. Maybe I've just managed to stay under the radar somehow. Or maybe my stuff just really sucks. Who knows.
Here's a link to my whole folk art lightbox on istock:
Wow! I've been away for a bit. I was seriously neglecting all kinds of things and fostering a new addiction for Vox (to go along with my well-established addiction to istockphoto), so I took a small much-needed break to put some things back into perspective. What little leisure time I've spent on the computer lately was devoted to following the growing pains of istock and the never-ending drama attached to them. So, after getting an email from Team Vox regarding my banner contest entries, I came back... and what a refreshing discovery to find a boatload of cool (and fully functional!! *gasp*) features like private messaging and enhanced comment handling... and now I have tons of fun posts from all of my cool friends to read still.
Bring on the caffeine!
What are your personal memories of September 11th?
I remember putting my kids on the bus that morning and hopping in the shower. As I got out, I heard the phone ringing. I ran to answer it and stood there dripping wet in a towel while my husband told me to turn on the news, that a plane had just hit the World Trade Center. While we were discussing what could possibly have gone wrong, I watched the second plane hit and could almost hear the collective gasp of thousands. I remember not being able to speak for what seemed like a long time. It was surreal.
When the meaning became clear, I remember going to pick up my kids from school. We live on the I-95 corridor between Washington DC and Philadelphia, near two nuclear power plants, and nobody knew how many targets there were going to be... I remember sitting in the lobby at school, choking back tears and waiting for them to come from class...looking around at all the red puffy eyes and worried faces of the other parents waiting for their children. I remember trying to decide what I would tell my girls when they asked why they were being picked up early... why so many children were being picked up early...
How many places have you lived in your life?
I have no idea. Let's see...
Gulfport, Mississippi, twice, and four different places
Ocean Springs, Mississippi
Mobile, Alabama, twice, and four different places
Starkville, Mississippi, two different places
Omaha, Nebraska, three different places
Bellevue, Nebraska
Oxford, Pennsylvania
North East, Maryland
what a weird list. :)
Yay! I just got home from a hellish experience at the MVA (is there any other kind?) and found a mailbox full of comment notices from my Vox buddies. (I'm exaggerating; but there were a few more than usual.) It seems that of the bazillion entries I prepared for the banner contest, all I really needed to do was pull out an old watercolor and crop it a couple of times. Well, there was a little more work to it than that, but basically yep, two crops of my Back Bay watercolor were chosen as Top 50 entries in the contest.
Two other istocker vector artists (there could be more using some obscure name whom I don't recognize) also were picked: Haze McElhenny and Kenn Wislander! Yay us! :)
This has been a pretty awful week--too evil to even bother going into here... but it was nice to find a little moment of giddiness amongst it all.
Thanks, Vox team! :)
Yay! I just uploaded my entry for the September Vector Challenge on iStock. The theme is PHOBIAS, and I was so phobic that someone was going to do the same one before I had a chance to complete mine, that I just took the whole morning to finish it. At least this way I know I won't be the last entry...again.
I may do another one, but I need to think on it. I don't have any brilliant ideas rattling around up there right now, so I think I'll try to focus on paying work again for a while. That means NO more banners, either! ;)
I realized last night that I haven't been excited about drawing for a while. Well, it wasn't really some sort of startling discovery. I knew it, but tried not to think about it. I had started to look at it as a job, I guess. Something else I needed to find time for. Yet another demanding part of my life. I've been turning down painting work because I didn't have time and because it doesn't pay near as well as design work, so my paints and brushes sit over there in the corner collecting dust, my easel folding into its little box alongside.
Something about the vector challenges, and the silly banner contest have awakened something in me. In spite of the fact that I still have as much work to do, I find myself zipping efficiently through it... so that I can have time to draw. *GASP* Me. the procrastinator.
Now, I must leave you. I'm about to hyperventilate at the thought someone might submit the same phobia before I get mine uploaded! :)
What are your plans for the holiday weekend?
Sure. Give us a contest and then ask what our plans are.
That's sick. just sick.
Okay, all my whining and hysterics about the vector challenge has come to a close (at least until I start up again for this month). It is now time to voice your opinion by voting for your faves.
All the details about the competion, along with suggestions for judging criteria can be found here.
All the entries can be viewed in this lightbox.
You need to pick your top 3 and rank them, and then send a sitemail to this tabulating genius that includes the image numbers and their rank of 1, 2, or 3. There are many amazing illustrations. Check it out for inspiration, even if you aren't going to vote!
What? You can't vote because you're not a member of istockphoto? What the heck are you waiting for?
It's totally free! Go ahead. Try it. You'll like it! Just click on the link in the middle of the page that says "Click here to get started!"... and you're all set!
Have Fun!
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