Before starting this piece I had been practicing and playing around with coloured pencils while using Pre-raphaelite as my subject. I found myself specifically drawn to a painting by John William Waterhouse called Hylas and Nymphs because of the colours used for the water and the way you see the Nymphs bodies through it. I tried to capture the same look as in the painting by layering the coloured pencil. After looking at more paintings and saw that a lot of Pre-raphaelite artists had women in beautiful scenery as their subject, so decided to do the same thing with my drawing.

As this project is the final one before the end of the semester and Christmas fast approaching, I thought it would be a good idea to make cards that I could sell. These cards will be given out to friends and family this year, and could possibly sold on a website such as Etsy. 

I started by looking at Illustrated Christmas cards and noticed a lot of the ones I was drawn too had cats or dogs in them. These kind of cards are usually popular with many people as they themselves have a furry friend at home, so I decided to go with this idea and use my dog as my reference.

The subject of my work is my dog in his Christmas pudding costume by a Christmas tree. I found inspiration for the colour and the Christmas tree from a photo of my own Christmas tree. I used the photos below. 

After finishing the illustration for the Christmas card I searched for a website to were I could send off my design to get it printed as a card. After searching and looking through reviews, I came across vista print. 

- 100 A5 prints on unicorn white costs £33.84 
- Price increases depending on paper type and weight 
- Price can reach up to £75
​- No option for a finish 
- Sustainable 

- 100 A5 Prints without a finish cost £12.50
- Price varies from £12.50  - £15.50 depending on finish options 
- Only does one design of print at a time 
- Wide range of print size
- Multiple choices for finishes including foil

Etsy is the biggest and well known platform available for artists to easily sell their work. In the pictures below it shows how straightforward Etsy makes it for users to set up their own shop, with a step by step set up after registering with the sight. The site also has a section called the sellers handbook which is filled with articles that gives advise or guides on how to set up, run, and manage a shop.

In this project you will consider the potential of the illustrator as author. You will explore the practicalities of this pathway and you will demonstrate examples of your own work within these contexts.

In this short project you will create a collection of work for direct sale whilst considering a number of industry factors.

Steps:

1. Research the world of 'illustrator as author' or illustrators who sell 'personal' work online. What sort of work are they selling? What formats are they selling the work in? Is the process as simple as making some images and slapping them on 'stuff' or is it more considered?

2.Explore ideas for a subject that satisfies both your own personality and which may realistically find a home amongst an existing community.

3. Develop a collection of illustrator authored work, part of your development is to focus on the outcome, not just the illustrations. e.g. my initial plan might be to produce a hardback book - thus I will have to consider page size and type content. In other words, in this example illustrations are only a part of what I'm doing, I'm also designing a book and all its content.

4. Your outcomes should be presented in such a way as to make your intentions clear and believable.

Don't ask your audience to 'imagine' what your intentions are - show them.

You will need to create promotion for the work. This could be in the form of social media posts which give information and get the word out, better still, it could be a video of you creating or talking about the work.

REMEMBER taking the path of least resistance will never provide you with the greatest rewards, whether in terms of project grades or in terms of success as an illustrator author