Illustrator

Q. Describe the most common types of jobs you do for your clients.

A. Initially after three years creating the concept work for the videogame Gambys, where i did all the characters, world backgrounds, animations etc, i did a lot of almost anonimous magazine illustrations for all sorts of publications, (sci-fi short stories, etc), did my share of greeting card and poster work design, among generic graphic and webdesign for companies.

But now since i went completly fulltime into illustration, i´ve been doing my share of children book illustrations and board game design too.

Essentially i think my work is starting to be well known among the so called anonimous clients. Not the big companies (the market is totally saturated with fantastic artists), but among people that want to publish their own books, sometimes a firs children book novel and don´t know how to find an affordable artist.
As i also know a bit about the print on demand publishing process and i always help a client publish his book free of charges after he hires me to create the illustrations, many people that i have done illustration work recommend me to their friends and so that´s how it goes really.
Also like i told before, i really like to work for the common folks out there. Even if i end up loosing some money as i always try to fit my work around the tight budgets the regular person has. If there´s some meaning behind a project i usually take it.

Q. What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?

A. Search the web before looking to hire an illustrator and make sure you´re really comunicating with some one that takes the job seriously and really has time to fulfill the job. There´s thousands of people drawing on the web all over the world and posting on virtual galleries. Some are incredibly good but sometimes they are not professionals in the sense a customer needs them to be. Many people out there can call themselves professional illustrators and then the costumer learns that the artist doesn´t have time to actually do the work in the deadline needed.

Also, if you´re hiring an artist through an illustration company or agency, try to find out how much the actual artist is going to make out of the work he´s doing for you. I´m saying this because there´s some companies out there that exist mainly to take advantage of their artists and have a total secrecy policy regarding the comunication between costumer and artist. Be very suspicious of this behaviour.
Each time you hire a company wich provides an artist to do your work, and that company is not clear about all details and not very happy that you talk freely to the person which is actually doing the art for you, i can guarantee you that the real artist is probably being robbed out of his payment. That might be legal but it´s not fair or even ethic and so make sure you´re not supporting a company that´s out there only to steal the work from the artists they have.

I´ve had a real bad experience a few months ago for a company that accepted me as an illustrator. We agreed on a price per pic which suposedly would cover the regular agencie´s fee (between 20% to 35%) but then when i started creating the book for the client, i noticed that the company was censoring my comunications with the client regarding the value of the work. Lated i found out that they had charged the client for each spread page i did, about 400% more than what they end up wanting to pay me for the work. And i even did the whole book. Not only i did the illustrations, but i also created the graphic design and book layout. That company only had to collect the money from the client (overcharging him about 400%) more than what i was being paid + their reasonable and ethic commission as agents.
As a result i ended up creating a nice book for the client which loved the work, but he got totally robbed and overcharge for each pic. If he had come directly to me for the job i would have charged him about 60% less than what that company charged him for my (complete) work and i even had gained a lot more than what the company ended up paying me.

So, what i´m trying to say here, is please shop around, but make sure you´re not only dealing with honest artists, but also, with honest illustration companies if you end up going for one of those.
The only way to make sure this illustration market stays clean is not only that the artists keep their prices fair but above all that the market does not get saturated by some so called illustration companies that are there not just to overcharge costumers but mainly steal the work of artists like me which look for good opportunities out there to work on what we love.

Q. If you were a customer, what do you wish you knew about your trade? Any inside secrets to share?

A. I would like to understand more about the creative process the person i was searching to hire uses as that would allow me to better understand the real value of the job and see how fair would the rates be and all that.

Q. What questions should a consumer ask to hire the right service professional?

A. How reliable is the professional in keeping to deadlines, particulary over the web and when working from long distances. How acessible to respond to questions and all that could give trust to a buyer.

Q. What important information should buyers have thought through before seeking you out?

A. Well, if was one, i would try to make sure that the illustrator i was seeking really created his own material and didn´t copied any clipart already available on the web. Also i would seek for someone with a distinct line art style, and that is why it took years for me to develop my own.
Shop around compare prices but remember you can get for $15 a pic i´m doing maybe for $50, but sometimes you won´t be having your money´s worth, as you need to remember that an honest artist charges a rate for a reason. In my case, all my art is though out based on the amount of hours and fulltime dedication i apply to the work and particulary about the personality i can bring to a picture which is something that i´m sure you will not find out there from someoned that creates some drawings for you cheap, sometimes maybe copying them out of the web or from clipart already available as i´ve seen happen a lot of times before.

Q. Why does your work stand out from others who do what you do?

A. First of all i think i have a different style among the usual children´s book type art. It might feel generic at first look, but when a client looks deeper into my portfolio, people always tell me there´s something genuine about my work that they didn´t found on many other similar pics out there.
This is probably im not in this bussiness just to make money but mainly because i love to create pics like the ones i do and i even refuse good work when i feel i cannot have fun with a job. You see, if i don´t have fun with my children´s book illustration work, then i feel that i cannot do my best and so i preffer to refuse a client than delivering him crappy pages.

Also, although i do mostly children´s books nowadays, from what you can see from my portfolio if you chack my official webpage luisperes.net, you´ll see that i can do a lot of different themes, mainly school book illustration, science-fiction or fantasty. So let me know what you need and let me see what i can do within my own style of illustration.

Also, if you hire me, you´ll not be only getting the final raster illustration in jpg, bmp, whatever, but i´ll also send you the original psd editable files, in case you want to take each original illustration apart some day in photoshop and create another variation of the pics for future use on other projects. For free. You pay me for the pics, but you´ll get much more.
And usually, if you hire me to create a book, i always do the covers for free too. ;)

All my art is created hand drawn and colored in watercolor with a touch of digital wherever i need to apply it. I like to keep it simple and having my art feel traditional as there is plenty of fully digital art out there and so i try to stand out in this way which is the way i have fun.

Q. What do you like most about your job?

A. The fun i have with most projects but mainly i love when a client tells me that a book that i created for him really made a diference on his life and this happens more frequently than you may think.

I already did a lot of stuff for companies over the years, but in truth what i love the most is illustrate for anonimous people like you and me out there.

I loose a lot of money on that process actually as the regular person out there usually is always very tigh on budget but , really i don´t mind giving people special discounts and special prices for my work when i find out that a project has some real human sentimental value behind. Either, a person is looking to create a book in memory of someone, design a set of personal greeting cards to comemorate a relationship or simply to surprise the family with his own book.

So it´s nice to be well paid for a job when working for a company, but it´s a lot more satisfying to know that a direct client of mine loved the way my art made a diference on his life, even if i have to loose a bit of money in the process.

That´s why i don´t have a generic rating for my services. To me each project is a project and if there´s a real person behind that´s great.

Q. What questions do customers most commonly ask you? What's your answer?

A. Most people besides asking for my rates of course, when they see the finished work, usually ask me where do i get my inspiration to create all these images.
Well, it´s a bit difficult to explain, but i do a lot of hiking and i´m always taking photos, landscape photos and so nature and big open landscapes are my main inspiration, along with cinema (particulary oriental cinema actually which i love).

The ocean is another of my inspiration sources. I´m lucky to live in a fantastic coastal area with tons of little secret beach spots and so i make the most out of those hidden world whenever i can and i´m always gettin tons of ideas from the isolation feel i can get when i´m in one of those places with a sketch pad which i always carry with me around all the time.

One thing that most of my costumers don´t know about my work process is that i do at least 60% of my art when im not at home. I do a lot of drawings when i´m taking a break lost somewhere in my hiking trips, or by the river, or at the beach. Then i get home and in my studio i color the images in watercolor and turn on my photoshop to edit all the separate elements that i did before into a complete pic.

Q. What do you wish customers knew about you or your profession?

A. About me: I can say three things. I never overcharge a client, i stick to deadlines and if i think i cannot get the best end result delivered i preffer to refuse a job no matter what a client offers me. I preffer to keep a good reputation out there than delivering a crappy job just for the money.

About my profession: Beware some children book so called agencies out there. Many have artists that do the work for you but those artists can get scammed as much as a client that gets overcharged.
If you choose an illustration agency instead of an individual artist like me, get suspicious if the agency starts censoring the communications between you and the people which is actually doing the pics for you.
I sugest you try to comment about your budget and if an agency starts deleting your posts from a workboard so that he artist does not grasp the real amount you´re paying for the job, i sugest you get suspicious that you, yourself might be being overcharged and the only people profiting out of your project is the so called - illustration agency.

Q. How did you decide to get in your line of work?

A. I´ve always been drawing since i was a kid. When i was 4 years of age, one night in 1974 i remember my father picking me up on his lap at the kitchen table one night and show me how i could draw wells, (you know water wells, rural farm wells, wishing wells), using color pencils.
And he tought me to draw them not just in 2d but also with volume. That and little houses.
Most kids draw little houses as shapes or 2d lines. Because of what my father tried to taught me back then i always tried to create them with volume in 3d and i was always very aware of space and volume from earlier one, which helped me to develop my drawing skills over the years that went by.

Then the series SPACE 1999 came on tv back in 1976 here in Portugal, and from that moment on i was totally captivated to what could be created using drawings. I spent years designing "Eagle" spaceships and moonbases.
Then came Star Wars and all that. But what made me really want to work in illustration, was the movie "The Neverending Story" directed by Wolfgang Petersen back in 1983. The first time the fantasy landscape showing the "Ivory Tower" appeared on the screen i knew i had to learn how to create that and since that moment i never stopped trying to learn all about creating landscapes , particulary imaginary ones which today is still my favorite thing to draw.

Many years later, after i left the army at 22, i took my portfolio into a software company that at the time back in late 1992 wanted to created the first Portuguese PC Videogame, called "Gambys" and i was hired as a conceptual designer for the whole game which i did for about three years or so, creating the Gamby world, characters, animations, sprites , design you name it.
Check my luisperes.net to download the game for free.

After that i never stopped creating illustrations for clients wherever i could get them.

I worked a lot in software design for more than 15 years or so but i always did illustration in between and now i´ve been doing it fulltime for a couple of years.

Q. Tell us about a recent job you did that you are particularly proud of.

A. I loved to work on the book "Adventures of the Quiet Warrior" for the author Matt Blair from the United States. It´s a good example of the type of work that sometimes comes my way tottaly unexpected and that i love to do because it has an emotional tone behind it.
Intially being done as a Pod project for a individual person, it will soon take off into more meaningfull routes and so it´s also a good example that if you have your own book project stashed away inside a drawer because you don´t really believe much in it, maybe what you need is to put it out there and of course you can start by finding an illustrator to work on it. Mainly me. ;)

Q. Do you do any sort of continuing education to stay up on the latest developments in your field?

A. I try to keep learning new technics and stay up to date with new materials or ways of creating pics.
Although i work mainly in traditional mediums like watercolors and hand drawn art done in paper, i plan to also start working in digital illustration, mainly doing some pics in Ipad as that plattform has some great free and almost free illustration software, so i plan to take advantage of that and do some work there.
Although i´m not thinking of abandoning my watercolors as i still think traditional medium is a great way of adding character and personality to an illustration and distiguish it from among thousands of digital works floding the market right now.
Besides I love watercolor.

Q. What are the latest developments in your field? Are there any exciting things coming in the next few years or decade that will change your line of business?

A. The Ipad with its mega cheap incredible art packages to me is a revolution. I was saving to buy an ultra expensive wacon art tablet a few years back but now im glad i´ve waited because the current cheapest ipad illustration software can do about all that a wacom tablet can and it´s much less expensive. It might not fully compare techically regarding illustration features, but really, who cares. For what i need i think right now the best thing out there are the new illustration softwares for ipad and i want to get one of those as soon as possible.
I don´t think we should always go for the ultra expensive stuff to get good results and from what i´ve been experimenting regarding children´s books illustrations the ipad is the greatest thing since the invention of the watercolors.

Q. If you were advising someone who wanted to get into your profession, what would you suggest?

A. RUN !
Just kidding.
More or less...

Essentially i think it´s a matter of persistence and don´t be discouraged by the competition.
Do the best you can do to learn to do what you love, and then start showing your work around the web.
Remember, there´s thousands of artists that are much, much better than you out there so don´t let that scare you, as there´s also thousands of artists worse than you out there.
It´s not a question of who´s the best, but a question which art fits best what a client wants for a project.
Sometimes there might be a hundred artists better skilled than you out there, but a client picks you because he sees that you have a specific thing he likes for his project. It´s not about technic, it´s about providing for what the client needs and sometimes its a feel not a displaying of technical skills that gets you the job.

Q. What is your greatest strength?

A. I think it´s my ability to create fantasy worlds with a lot of details in it. Sometimes you might not even noticed them at first look, but when you give it a second look you´ll find out that i´m always trying to tell a story within a story with my pics.
For example, with my fantasy landscapes, i always want for a reader to feel like if he´s inside a real geographic location within the world i´m trying to create looking around into all the details as if he was standing on top of a mountain or something.
I think my scenery has a personality of it´s own and contributes a lot for the good end result i always try to achieve.
Many people do children books out there, but most people concentrate on the characters rather than the world they´re living in. In my case i try to create the world first and then place the characters there as i feel good characters without a world to live in are half the job done and so that´s why i love to create scenery so much.
I also love to create cute characters too. And humor.
A big characteristic of my illustrations is humor for sure.

Q. What are you currently working on improving?

A. Actually i want to get into digital a lot more but it´s been hard to find the time to really start creating something within that style of art.

I also want to improve a lot on my display of the human figure. Not that i want to start creating realistic illustrations as that never interested me much, but we need a good real knowledge about how to acomplish realistic art particulary when dealing with the human body to be able to extrapolate those technics and create really good cartoon versions or children´s book depictions of human characters in a professional way.

People tend to not give many value to cartoon or children´s book art when compared to realistic drawing, but what most people don´t get is that to be able to create cartoon versions of characters or world landscapes, you need to use the same technical knowledge about propotions and perspective as if you would be doing a realistic painting.

The end result is all about the cover and not about the base of an illustration as you pretty much need to be aware of the drawing foundations to create any type of illustration art, being either comic art or realistic stuff.