Looking to do book illustrations.

[Elliotanimated]

Nice.
I had a very peculiar and related experience this morning.

A bunch of us unemployed animationy types went for breakfast in the city today.

As we were leaving the besuited fellow at the table next to us asked if we were all in independent film production.
It turns out he was one of the producers of Sita Sings the Blues, the great big NYC animated independent film.
He has an interest in animation and asked us to send him some stuff.
Nice, huh?

[J_Turner]

So, as a suggestion, I should have something on hand, just in case.

[Lowman_X]

From reading those anecdotes, I'd take that as a resounding "God yes!", J_Turner. LOL

[ben c]

YES.

in fact, i regretted that most of what
i had on me was more skewed towards
superhero-type art (i wasn't expecting
to do any reviews), luckily i had a printed
sketchbook on hand with some harry
potter junk in it, and a few cheap printouts
of art from another story that i was just
carrying around for my own amusement.

i used to have a tiny 8"x8" portfolio book,
i think i'm going to dig it up and load it with
a nice mix of stuff for the future.

also, ALWAY HAVE HANDOUTS. even
a business card with some art on it will
do. even a few home-printed, oversized
postcards with a collage of your best art
on one side and contact info/bio/past work
on the other. you can have those in your
bag or pocket. not only can you show them
to people, but they can keep them, show
them to coworkers etc.
i'd say over 80% of my work has come
from some editor or AD seeing my work
sitting on the desk of some other editor
or AD. seriously. and it might just one take
ONE contact! i've probably mentioned this
before, because it still weirds me out, but
consider the following chain of events:

1-showed art to DC editor, hired to do "manga DC" designs
2-passed to DC licensing, hired to do licensing art
3-passed to another licensing editor, hired for 6
wonder woman kids' books
4-ww editor introduced me to AD, who set me up
to meet bruce timm on a trip west
5-timm passed my art to WB, hired to do "LoS" and
"lost boys" dev
6-timm or someone at WB showed my art to glen
murakami, who showed it to james tucker, hired to do
"batman:b&b" dev

the point is not that i'm fabulous -- you'll
notice that in most cases, although i was
paid, my art did not make it to the final stage --
but that i would never have imagined being
able to do all that. and it all came from one
meeting at SDCC 2002.
there are some people who are like machines,
they know how to set up contact lists and send
out tons of promo etc. i'm not like that. that's
why it's been so important for me to ALWAYS
have something to show. and also, i'm a very
shy person, i hate to be rude... but both in
2002 and last weekend i just said "screw it"
and harassed people anyway. you can't
always make opportunities, but you should
always be ready and willing to jump on them!

anyway, on a more prosaic note...

high-quality postcards (i used them for my "dare"
and "cartooning " postcards, very happy), now
it's only $86 for 250 cards:
http://www.modernpostcard.com/products_ ... /standard/

and for my last sketchbooks, i used vixen
printing, good quality and reasonable prices,
although there is a 100 copy minimum for
initial orders. can't find their site (which might
be a red flag), but you can email bethane ditto
bethanek@mac.com
for quotes.

before that, i used dreamweaver press, which
was pretty good quality and price. a little more
expensive per book than vixen, but i think you
can order much smaller batches, which is great
for promotional sketchbooks:
http://www.egoworks.com/dreamweaverpress/

you might also consider burning CDs with a
sample of work, you can also include a resume
or whatever, and you can easily (and cheaply)
print your own CD labels (with art on them , natch)
and covers (more surface to put your art!). i
learned this trick the hard way last year, when
i was sending tons of portfolios around the country.
you can also easily customize CDs for different
recipients. here is a sample of what i did. as
you can see, with minimal cost and medium effort
(printing and folding the one-sided insert cover,
laying out/printing a CD label) i made a cheap and
fairly sharp looking portfolio to hand out. once
you've done the layout, the assembly is super-
easy, and it's small enough to carry around, with
enough art on the cover/label for people to see
right away, and more inside to see later. feel free
to copy this layout -- i'd post the actual template
i made, but my illustrator is messed up. it is at
the actual size.

i hope i'm not being too overbearing, i just know
how easy it is to get intimidated. while there aren't
any easy solutions, there are so many little things
you CAN do to improve your chances, and i think
everyone should be judged on their work... not their
self-promotion skills!

[Scruffy]

Just to chime in that this is one of my favorite threads ever. Great advice and experience from everyone. I think this is a subject that doesn't get talked about nearly enough anywhere.

[J_Turner]

Thanks for all your advice. I know, I will use the information that you have given me. I am sure everyone will be using it to.

[GEORGE]

What a great thread...Thanks for all these posts.

[maria-mar]

I'm bookmarking this thread

May i throw another question in here?
When visiting in person is just not possible, what's better:
- Mailing a printed copy of the portfolio?
- Mailing a cd copy of the portfolio?
- Both?
or
- E-mailing with a link to an online portfolio?
- E-mailing with a pdf version of the portfolio?
- Both?

Other thing?

[J_Turner]

I have been trying to find a way to create a slide show on cd. I have been trying to put stuff on those business card sized cd. (that is an idea I have.)

[maria-mar]

You can easily create a slideshow usigng PowerPoint, although there are other programs able to do that, like Key-Note (for mac).

[Wibo81]

Fantastic information here!