art

Fannish Skills On The Job Search – Art

by

I write a lot about using your fannish and hobby skills on the job.  It's sort of a big thing, what with this whole "Fan To Pro" title putting pressure on me.  But there's more to using the skills from your recreation in your profession – you can use them in other "professional areas", which I'm going to talk about in the weeks to come.

Namely, I'll be writing about how your fannish, geeky, and otaku skills can also be used in your job search.  It's even possible you have some skills you don't want to or can't use in your chosen career that are great to use on your job search.  You probably have a lot of unappreciated talents anyway (or at least ones that you may not be great at but you can leverage)

Read more

An Interview With Artist Cheng (Lily) Li

by

I met Cheng (Lily) Li in one of my many rounds of conventions.  She's a
fascinating example of how people can share an combine their loves –
she's both an artist and a Life Sciences Research Assistant at
Stanford.  Not only does she do fannish work, she does detailed
scientific illustration – you can find much more at her website, http://www.lilycli.com/.

A person who combines fandom, art, and science sounds like someone
with quite a story to tell, and Lily was nice enough to let me interview
her.

Read more

The Changing Role Model

by

I'm big on advising people to find role models to learn what to do (and what not to do).  However I've been darkly speculating that some role models as of late may not be as good as they once were because of changing economic and technological conditions.

Specifically, be careful of your role models in fiction writing, manga, and comics.  Those media who are experiencing rapid industry and distribution change.

I'm not saying you can't learn from your favorite artists and authors, but these are areas of the geekonomy that are underground rapid change.  Publishing is having issues, web distribution is up, serial fiction is poking around a potential comeback.  Written and graphic media is changing rapidly.

This means that even your best role model may have less to teach you as they became famous and respected in a different environment than you are.  Even someone who hit the big time as  a writer or artist or mangaka a few years ago was in a far different world than you are now.

So when you go looking for lessons from your favorite role models, keep in mind what is relevant today and what isn't.  You may even need to seek new role models to learn from.  Your comic idol from ten years ago may have less to teach you than you can learn from Penny Arcade or Girl Genius today.  There may be no new J.K. Rowling or Stephanie Meyer ever – their success stories may be no longer relevant.

What made success even a few years ago is not the same as today in some media markets..  It's a hard lesson, and it makes learning from others harder, but it's something we have to face.

As for what is coming next?  We'll, I've been speculating and may try that in another column . . .

– Steven Savage