Okay so it is Saturday it is half 12:00 and last week was a year exactly since I
quit my job in order to pursue a career in art full time. It was the biggest leap
of faith of my life so far and a decision that has come with a lot of
lessons to learn along the way. So now that I'm here, I wanted to share with you
how I came to that decision how it's been working out for me, you know, how I
knew I was ready, how I fared financially and also just sort of how I structure my
life, my day-to-day, my budget now that I'm self-employed. So it's gonna be a
long one; grab your snacks get a drink ready- I don't have any Capri-Sun
today but I do have an Innocent Smoothie just for kids- grab your sketchbook
or anything else you're working on and let's talk art together.
So if you're new to this series, The Underpainting is a little segment where we chat about
different art issues while we hang out together just kind of peel back the
layers of work and mystery that go into crafting a creative life and make sense
of everything that goes on behind the scenes. I am today drawing a couple of
drawings in my sketchbook; I am drawing the house that I grew up- in I thought I
would draw this house but then I don't want anyone finding me- and I'm also, if
we have time, gonna draw and watercolour a house that I found just having a wander
through Google Maps Street View. Just had a little wander through the East Sussex
countryside looking for a nice little cottage to draw so if we have time I'll
do that as well. I'm gonna be using one of my Pitt artist pens in the size
small and if I get around to using the watercolours I'll be using my WH Smith
watercolours in my portable painter palette but you'll see that once we get
to it. And as always all the tools will be listed below in case you want to
check those out. The reason I'm doing this is actually; I've decided to open up
my commissions for the first time in probably like two years, purely doing
drawings of buildings. So like if someone wants their house to be drawn or like what I'm
doing the house they grew up in stuff like that I have set that up now on my
shop so you can check it out. I will have that linked below if you want a custom
drawing of a building of your choice and they'll be in either
just ink like I'll be doing on this one or in watercolour. Different size options.
Have a look below, see if it's something you'd be interested in.
Right so today's topic is something that I get asked about a lot. I get a lot of
emails from like high school students or people just finishing uni, people who are
interested in pursuing a career in art but don't really know where to begin
with that. What are their next steps might be and you know how you get to be
earning money from making art. So my journey to where I am now has not been a
straightforward one, it's not the kind of thing I feel I can give like a
step-by-step guide of how to get there but what I can do is at least just share
my experience, my story and you know if it helps anyone then that would be great.
So last year, 13th of September, was my last day at work. I had spent the last
like three and a half years working at a supermarket. And like sometimes I stocked
the shelves, sometimes I worked on the tills
but my main job was actually to check the dates on every single short-life
item in the shop. So things like sausages, cartons of milk, profiteroles... I would
have to go up and down every single aisle, up and down every single shelf,
going through individual items checking the dates on them. And obviously it was
in the fridge section so it was freezing. Very repetitive as well. I'd be doing
that for like four to eight hours a day and then the next day I would come in
and check the exact same items I had checked the day before. It sounds pretty
awful. It sounds quite grim but the thing about me is I do quite enjoy repetitive
actions. I like- I don't know- I quite like the monotony of things like that. I like
being able to come into a job, come into work every day and know what I
have to do that day I don't really have to talk to anyone I can just sort of
grab my tools and get on with it. I'm kind of a paradox of a creative
person I think just because like if I wasn't an artist I would love to either
work on like a factory assembly line doing the same thing over and over and
over or I've always always always wanted to work in like a sorting office in a
post office. Like if I wasn't an artist that's like my dream job. But
I did, you know, grow up with the idea that I wanted to be an artist from a very very young
age. I loved drawing and I was always kind of told that I was good at it so I
thought that that would be something I could just do as a job forever. My main
dream as a child was to write and illustrate children's books and because
I loved drawing and I loved reading it just seemed like the ideal combo for me
to put those two together and write little stories and be able to draw
along. I really loved people like Quentin Blake who did the illustrations for
Roald Dahl's books also I can't remember who did the Jacqueline Wilson
illustrations but those were quite a staple of my childhood. I think anyone
that read Jacqueline Wilson books will remember the illustrations that went
along with them. But as I got older that idea, that dream, kind of faded. Not for
any particular reason, just just kind of moved on from it. Like when I was about
13 I started watching CSI and I suddenly wanted to be a forensic scientist and I
was properly obsessed. That went on for quite a while. I don't think I genuinely
wanted to be a forensic scientist I was more interested in like living a really
snazzy life in Miami with hot co-stars. And then after that, my next
thing was that I wanted to be an interpreter. I really loved learning
languages I really love listening to languages and I thought that would be a
great great career path. I was about 16 at that time and that
is a time- I don't know how it works like around the world- but that's a time like
here in the UK where we start doing our GCSEs. So we choose our GCSE topics, GCSE
subjects, in order to move on to our A-level subjects in order to go to
university and then obviously to get a degree and get a job. So it was a time
where people were starting to think about what path they were going to take
and being an interpreter was something that I was quite happy with as an idea. I
genuinely do enjoy languages and learning them. So I did well. I got A's in
my A-levels for English, Spanish and art and a B in French just because
that was the one time in my life that I decided to spoil my hundred percent
attendance rate and start skipping classes. So could have done better but
overall I did really well in school got the grades that I needed to get into my
first choice of University which was King's College London. And there I
started to study english and spanish for my degree. So i was on track in life. Like
the whole sort of ideal plan that you have when you're going through school
and stuff, I was definitely on track to get to where I wanted to be. And I was
also still kind of drawing here and there. I guess like once you start drawing at
school you know for coursework and stuff, it kind of takes away the fun of things.
So not drawing as much as usual but still doing a lot for coursework and
also had quite an interest in like deviantART at the time. So I would go on
there and sort of get inspired out of nowhere and want to draw.
It's the kind of thing where you see something great, you see people doing these really cool
drawings and things and you just want to do something similar. You want to do
something just as cool and put that out there and have other people see that. So
that was sort of the extent of the art that I was doing at the time. So yeah, I
got into Kings, it was a great uni, met a lot of nice people. But...
overall, yeah, I like I hated it. I genuinely hated it. If I have to think
of like a rock bottom in my life that would definitely be it. Because all of a
sudden, all the things that I had been working for, all the plans that I had
made every step of the way; doing well in these exams to do well in these exams to
get into this uni to get my degree and get my job... it all kind of fell apart and
I was stuck there thinking like 'I don't want this, I'm not interested in
this, I don't want to be here'. And it was a very kind of 'who am I?'
time. And like 'what do I want, what am I gonna do'. I felt very lost.
Very uncomfortable in my own life and just kind of started having my lowest
days. I think at the same time my anxiety was probably at its worst but at the
time I didn't really know what anxiety was. So it was all just a bit of a mess.
Also at the same time I had been working at a train station a little coffee kiosk
on the platform. If you've ever been to Brockley Station platform 2 on the
overground there is a coffee kiosk on the platform and I used to work there.
6:00 a.m. every day making coffee for the grumpy- so grumpy- rush-hour commuters.
Lots of free coffee though so it was kind of worth it. But yeah because at the
time they were working on changing the East London line to the overground
there was a lot of engineering works which meant that the station was closed
a lot of the time which eventually led to me having to be let go from that job.
Which was a shame but also not that deep. Like it really wasn't a position that I
saw myself staying in for very long anyway.
I also around that time had got my license and bought my first car and
realised that I hated driving. Driving filled me with so much dread. I would get
behind the steering wheel of my car. I'd be shaking and I'd feel
sick and I wouldn't want to drive anywhere. So my car was just sitting
outside my house most of the time while I was paying insurance and road tax and
all that kind of nonsense that goes with owning a car. So I was at a stage where
all these things that I had been building towards; getting into uni, having
a job, having a car... I felt like a proper person and it all just kind of flatlined.
Kind of all at once. And I found myself just kind of drifting and floating in
this... not liking where I was but not knowing where I wanted to be. And so
still not really knowing what my next step was and not knowing what I was
going to like move on to I decided that whatever happened I didn't want to be
where I was at. So without a plan or anything, without like a plan B, I just
dropped out of uni. Stopped going. And that was hard.
And my parents understandably were a bit, you know, I think we were all shocked.
Because I had always been very good and very reliable and I just always had it
together and did well. So I think, you know, I was kind of shocked and confused
about what was going on obviously my parents were as well and I understand
now that had I said you know 'okay I'm not working anymore, I'm selling my car
and dropping out of uni but I have a plan', I guarantee they would have been
behind me 100% especially if I had said I want to be an artist, I want
to do art. Because they probably would have said like 'oh great, yeah finally,
we've been saying that you should do that like your whole life'. But
obviously because I didn't do that and they could just sort of see me drifting
and floundering it was a hard time, very tense time. But at the same time there
was a lot of there was a lot of support and understanding. You know, they put up
with quite a lot of crap from me in that time where I was lost and confused. So
for the next few months- maybe up to a year- I lived off my student loan which
was still coming in. I spent a lot of that on a trip to Greece and a laptop
and a DSLR camera because that was a time where everyone was kind of into
'photography'. And buying that DSLR camera when I had that money was one of the
best things I could have done for myself. It's one of those things that really
helped for things to fall into place without me realising it at the
time. So I also spent a lot of time and money- a lot of money- on nights out at
that time. So I was 18 or 19, and had no job, I had a lot of free time and I was
just kind of drifting. So that was kind of one of like the worst times in my
life but also weirdly one of the best times. Like I felt like absolute garbage,
I felt like completely worthless and completely lost, but at the same time it
was nice to finally have a moment- the first time ever- where there was no
structure and no commitments. I was just completely free. And somewhere along the
way, I started drawing again just for fun. I was surrounded at that time by a lot
of creative people. A lot of my nights out were spent at lots of local live music
events, lock-ins in pubs, open mic nights and jam sessions and stuff like that.
Being around those people just kind of reminded me that that kind of life
exists there are people out there who are creative and who do that as their
thing and they share it with other people. So I desperately wanted to be a
part of that again because I remembered that I used to be that kind of person.
So I was drawing again and, in the time that I hadn't been focused on drawing,
things like Instagram and Pinterest had popped up. So there was
this huge new bank of inspiration for me just just waiting to be discovered. And
so, like with deviantART, I was seeing all these things. I loved seeing like an
artist's full body of work, the things that you don't normally see, that
behind-the-scenes. Seeing real people living life as artists and you know
creating these amazing pieces and putting them out there. And, as I said,
like with deviantART I loved seeing that and I wanted to be part of it, so I
started posting art on my own personal Instagram and then eventually I moved on
to a separate one- I think mainly because I find sharing my art with my friends
quite cringe and I don't really-... I mean I'm still really bad at showing them
things I draw. And I just wanted to keep it private, I kind of wanted to build up
a following before I shared it with anyone, because it was weirdly
embarrassing for me. And the more I got into it the more I realised that these
other people that I'm seeing and admiring are really making a living out
of this especially using their online presence so I quite naturally got into
looking at like branding and marketing. I watched a lot of YouTube videos on like
search engine optimization things like that- mainly out of curiosity but then I
would end up applying that to everything I did afterwards. And the timeline of
things is kind of unclear for me but at some point I decided to set up a YouTube
channel, again because it was something that I was consuming so heavily that I
just wanted to be part of it, I wanted to be even more deeply into it and there's
no better way than making your own channel. Now obviously at that point none
of it was making money. I obviously had hoped that it would make money but when
you're first starting out I think that's-... it just takes a long long time to start
seeing any real return on it. So eventually my student loan money finally
ran out. I sold my car that money ran out as well, so
I ended up getting a job at a local supermarket; just the Sainsbury's
down the road from me. And on the day of my induction it was me,
a guy called Sam and a girl called Sonya. Sonya left pretty soon after we all
started but me and Sam became really good friends because we were kind of in
a similar position where we just needed this job as a temporary thing. We were
both trying to work on our own passions in the background so he-... so obviously I
was working on trying to build a career as an artist, he was trying to work on
setting himself up as a personal trainer. So his dream was to, you know, open a
studio or have his own space have a sort of portfolio of clients that he could be
training here and there and earn his money from that, so we connected on that
level and ended up working there for quite some time. I was kind of working on
building my art career but I really didn't fully commit to it. I think it's very
much in my nature to be lazy and not put 100% into anything so it took me a lot
longer than it should have done for me to start seeing any sort of progress of
things in that aspect.
The great thing about things like YouTube is that they
do sort of generate their own growth so things were growing for me quite
steadily, quite slowly. I remember the first sort of hundred subscribers was such a
struggle. And then the first thousand. Those sorts of milestones really
took a long time but there was a steady kind of growth in the background. I think
within maybe a year year and a half, I started to see money from it. The
threshold to get a paycheck from Youtube is sixty pounds, so I started
earning like sixty pounds a month from YouTube which obviously wasn't enough
for me to be full-time but in the meantime I had been enjoying my work at
Sainsbury's. I liked being out of the house it was
something to sort of help me build up more people skills I guess, and just gave
me a much thicker skin. Because when you're working in retail you definitely
need that. People do not treat you like a human being. But I met a lot of great
people, I made a lot of friends there and it was definitely a nice chapter of my
life. But eventually I did kind of get to a point where I had had enough. I'd been
there for like two and a half years, I hadn't anticipated on being there for
that long, and I just thought 'okay it's time to kick my butt into gear and start
working on a plan to get me out of here'. So that's when I sat down and sort of
wrote out a quite detailed financial plan, a sort of guide to what I need to,
do how much money I need to be making, how I can make that money through my art
in order to be able to leave. I've always- I'd say since I was about 18- I've
had to pay rent for living at home and by that point, because I was probably 20
20ish, it was... while it was reasonable, it was something that I
needed to have a job to be able to pay. I needed to be earning a substantial
amount of money. So my main goal was to be able to be earning that much money to
where I could pay my bills; my phone bills stuff like that, and the rent to
be living in my house. And then anything else, I didn't really need. Like I just
needed to be able to survive. So I wrote down that number and thought about what
parts-... how much my making now from my art and how can I make that more in order to
add up to what I need. So I thought about you know how much I'm making from
YouTube, how can I make more... I could put out more videos stuff like that. Just
literally wrote down this whole plan and had the amount of money at the top that
I needed to be earning and sort of broke that down into, you
know, ideal goals of where those funds could be coming from purely from art. But
obviously it isn't as easy as that. You can't just write a plan and then it
falls into place. So things did kind of stall after that. I
again didn't put in as much work as I should have done. I had written out this
plan but didn't really follow it. And also it was a very idealised plan you
know like in the best circumstances that's how much I would be making. One
piece of advice I will give, if you are planning on leaving your job in order to
pursue self-employment, try to save at least three months worth of essential
money; so rent money anything you need to pay and can't sort of live without, food
money... save three months worth of that and then you're in a better position to
leave. I wouldn't just leave having had like a month savings or anything like
that. Just just because you never know what unforeseen circumstances might pop
up and what you might need that money for and you don't want to be just stuck
without any funds whatsoever. So I was saving in the background which
definitely helped me a bit later on. It just didn't really click fully for me
and then another year passed really quickly and I had been there for three
plus years. And Sam, my friend, left. He handed in his resignation. He had built
up his personal training business enough to a point where he could leave. He had
made it. And I was stupidly proud of him and I still am. So a week after he left, I
handed in my resignation- I handed in my notice to leave within a month- and I
wasn't ready but I think that at that point I needed to do that, because I was
too comfortable in that job and I was never gonna push myself. I just know with
me, I was never going to push myself until things got kind of desperate. So I
put myself in the position where I was gonna have to work harder on my art
because I wasn't gonna be earning money elsewhere.
So obviously thankfully I had been saving. I don't think I would have left
if I didn't have the savings that I built up for a few months of survival. I
actually had quite an eventful summer that year. That was the year I went to
Spain and we had a great holiday but it was quite a disastrous holiday. A lot of
things went wrong and there were a lot of unforeseen expenses so a lot of that
money that I had saved to survive off comfortably had to be spent on all sorts
that I won't really go into because it's a long story.
By this point I was however earning a few hundred a month from YouTube so
again that was just enough really to pay my rent. Anything else would come out of
my savings so just you know things like food and shampoo and travel that
was all slowly eating away at my savings. But all in all I was staying afloat at
that point because I had I would say... about 50 to 80 thousand subscribers I
was getting more sponsorship deals and those are a godsend just in terms of
getting a cheque. Essentially just getting a proper sum of money for still
doing what you love, still doing your usual thing but you're getting a little
boost, a little financial boost from it. So those very few sponsorships I did
made it possible for me to keep going with things, would really bring me back
from the edge of complete like financial ruin. I also spent a lot of time in my
overdraft so essentially spending money that I didn't
have, pretty much building a small debt. I think it got to the limit eventually but
in the back of my mind I did know that if it got to the point where I was
completely broke and I had nothing left there was still going to be a job
waiting for me at my old workplace. When I left
Sainsbury's the manager told me that if I wanted to come back then I could, so
that was always there as a backup but at the same time I knew whatever
happened I wasn't going back there. There's no way. But there was always the
back-up plan of 'if it doesn't work out I'm just gonna have to get another job'.
You know I'm not gonna get myself into a position that I can't come back from, I'm
not gonna build up a huge amount of debt. Also that's why it's taken me this long
to sort of announce on this channel even that I quit my job, because as far as you
guys knew I was working. I think quite a few people here are new so they might
not even know that but the people that have been with me for a while will
remembered me talking about my job at the old supermarket and I didn't sort of
announce that I had left, that I've become full-time, because it really
wasn't like 'this is it now, I'm ready, were doing it'. It was like 'I'm gonna try
this and see if it works and it might not work so I'm not going to tell anyone
yet'. So my next challenge was sort of becoming a good boss. Being my own boss
and you know making sure that I got work done. Being consistent and motivated and...
within the first couple of months after I left my job, that was around September
October time, I think I spent at least a month not doing anything. I completely
lost all focus all motivation and I could tell myself I really need to do
stuff because I am hemorrhaging money right now and I'm in control of earning
the money... but it just didn't materialise in that way. So that is when I actually
started my '30 ways to fill a sketchbook' series. I again had to sit myself down
with a notepad- that's the only way for me to sort of sort things out in my
head- and I wrote out different ways that I could challenge myself to be more
consistent. It was a way that I could get myself into a rhythm of filming, of
editing, of drawing regularly. And even though I had a few hiccups along the way
in terms of recording as often as I wanted to it ended up being just what I
needed to get me back into a swing of things. Really challenged me to get some
solid content out there and sort of figure out who I was as an artist and
also as a youtuber. I forgot to mention as well; way, way back I did start selling
my original artwork and prints, maybe within like the first year of starting
to take art seriously. However I did value things quite low just because well,
A- because I was working at the time I didn't really need that money and also I
didn't value my work very highly at that time. But if you are someone that you see
yourself as an artist and you see your work being worth a lot then I definitely
think you should charge a lot. I think it says a lot more about you as an
artist, it gives you more credibility. So I was making like 10 pounds a month from
my actual art, a lot of my money came from YouTube back then. At this point I
was making a lot more money from prints and selling original pieces of artwork, I
had a lot more confidence in my work and therefore I felt happier charging more.
And the more I do develop as an artist, the more confident I feel about you know
charging people for the time that it took and the materials that went into it
and also the whole thought process behind it and also after the '30 ways
to fill a sketchbook' series, I gained a lot of subscribers , which
gained a lot of more traffic to my youtube channel, which in turn meant more
earnings from Adsense and stuff. It also led to a lot more of a following in
general, so a lot more people that were willing to
check out my work and buy my work so they all kind of grew and grew and grew
Very slowly. But it all fed into each other and I eventually got to a point
where financially I was doing better than I had been doing at my job- my 'job'
job- and that was probably just a few months ago. And doing better financially
meant that I was now in a position to save. Which is so so important when you
are self-employed because you don't get things like holiday pay so if you need a
week off you're not getting paid for that. You don't get any sick leave which
means you know if you're in bed for a week or even a month with something
that's all time that you will be essentially losing money because you're
not able to create the things that you put out in order to sell them.
So having money saved is very, very important. So as soon as you can start
saving I would definitely recommend it. I now have two separate bank accounts, so
one where I get paid for everything like YouTube and prints and originals things
like that; that all goes into one place and from that I pay myself a wage so
that that money goes on our supplies and anything else, postage and packaging
things like that, and then the rest of that is- and whatever I make in a month
depends on how well I do as a company- that obviously is money that I'll
spend on food and you know personal things.
[slurps]
So it's been a very slow and steady process but it's been almost a snowball
It's been- the growth has been kind of exponential. So the longer you do it, the
bigger things will grow, the more money will come in and the easier it kind of
becomes to be able to see yourself as an artist. I think now looking ahead at what
I want to make of this career, you know as a future, I've been thinking a lot
more about that recently for the same reason that I made this video; that I'm
feeling a lot more confident in my art and my career as an artist. So looking
ahead I love - I love the idea of doing things like this, I love breaking down my
experiences and the lessons that I've learned and being able to share that as
almost a guide for people who were in a position like me of you know self-doubt
or just being unsure. So moving forward I would love to be able to do that in all
sorts of ways. To finish off with some advice I would first say if you are in
school and you know that you want to be an artist, it's still important to focus
on your studies for now. That's one of the things I get emailed about the most,
where someone is saying that you know their parents are telling them to focus
on their maths homework and they just want to draw. Focus on your studies now
because you have all the time in the world to work on your art. It's really
important to build up that strong work ethic that comes from being at school
and doing things you don't necessarily want to do. It's really important to just
build the skills that you can at that time so you're not looking back and
thinking I wish I could work out percentages because now I need to do my
taxes. You never know how those things that you learn then, when you have the
chance, are going to translate into your life in the future. You never know what
position that might put you in above other people as an artist.
So build as much knowledge as you can. Do your best. It's not about doing well
necessarily. It's about doing your best, putting in your all, and committing to
the things that you have to at those times. You can do art in your free time.
You know I remember being at school and there was always time for it, as stressed
as I was, you know I could either go on myspace after school- because that was a
thing back then not YouTube- or I could do some drawing. So there is always at
least a little bit of time for it. Another piece of advice kind of
following on from that is to create as much as you can. And do it for you.
We- especially when were younger- I think it's important to express yourself the
best you can because there's so much outside influence. Do the things that you
want to do, draw what you want to draw, create as much as possible and really
explore different ideas and explore your style and see who you are as an artist
and be open to trying new things and changing and just letting it flow.
There's no pressure to be a certain type of artist, there's no pressure to do
things in a certain style. Do you and just enjoy it. Another thing I would say
is, if you know that being an artist is what you want to do in your life and
this applies to anyone any age, start taking the steps to figure out how you
can make that a possibility. So look into different professions that artists
can go into whether that's design or animation, think about what you want to
do as an artist and then look at people that have done it what they - what steps
they took to get there, what schools did they go to, what did they study.
Things like that. Just be take a very sensible and clinical look at the path
you want to take and just really consider all your options. And if you're
not sure if you want to be an artist, if you do art as a hobby and you don't know
if it's something that you do want to make a career out of, that's absolutely
fine. Just you know - keep your options open. You can become an artist at age 14,
you can become an artist at age 84. It really doesn't matter. Just create art.. If
you want to create art and if you want to make money from it then follow that
path but if not and then continue to just enjoy it as a hobby.
Right and my final piece of advice would be; don't wait until you're ready, because
you will never be ready and jumping in at the deep end is the thing that made
the biggest difference for me. Obviously you want to be in a position where you
have a safety net but you don't need to build a fort around you where nothing
can go wrong and you've got all bases covered. You need to dive in and make
mistakes in order to learn and see what works and what doesn't. Right so that's
all I have to say on this for today but I would love to hear about your
experiences or your goals in the comments below.
Big thanks to all of you for watching and for staying tuned to the end. As I've
said before, without you, this show would not be possible; the time it, takes the
equipment I use, the tools I use- it would all be non-existent. Special thanks to my
Patrons whose support makes all the difference. If you are interested in
supporting me on Patreon I'll have that linked below.
There you can see high-resolution images of each and every sketchbook page that I
do as and when they happen, as well as behind the scenes pictures of what I'm
up to I also do a weekly real-time sketchbook
Q&A so you can have your question answered while you watch me draw in real
time, and the occasional bonus video in there as well. I'm also going to have the
time-lapse of this and this page as well for you to see the full process
altogether. So it's patreon.com/semiskimmedmin
We would love to have you over there.
For now this Under-Painting is over. Thank you so much for joining me
and I will see you in the next one. Bye!
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