New Blog

I have began a new blog on Tumblr. It is less wordy than my blogger and easier to navigate for me and other people. I am using it to mainly blog my work, however it is really good for keeping following and bookmarking work and artists that I like. It feels fresher and looks more professional.

www.emilyteareid.tumblr.com

I have also put a link to my Tumblr on my Cargo Collective site. Its sort of an online sketchbook.

Online Shop

I have tried to set up my Folksy but I had some issues verifying that it was me at the final stages before setting up shop. I have set up paypal but as I couldn't get onto making the shop on Folksy, I have put my work on BigCartel. Unlike Folksy, who charge for each item you put in your shop, BigCartel do not charge when you use the basic package. The basic package includes 5 items, 1 photo per item, url.

Etsy seems to be a popular online shop used by a lot of people I have been looking at. They also charge per item you put in your shop.

http://emilyteareid.bigcartel.com

Memo

Memo were at the International Book Fair and at Handmade in Bradford as well. They use etsy to sell their work and this is a new zine of theirs, selling for £4.00. The cover is screen printed, with 24 pages printed onto recycled paper. If I want to produce more books/zines I need to think about where I sell them and how they are made. I like the fact that they have used recycled paper. Screen printing books covers is something I really wanted to do.

http://www.etsy.com/listing/99863358/endangered-species-zine

Garnets Website

My friends band Garnets have used the Grizzly Bears on their website, which has just gone live. They seemed to really like them and said they fitted in perfectly for the beginning and end of the website, the text I drew is also similar to the text used throughout the site.

http://www.garnetshome.com/

In Search of Moths

I have finished the bear zine/story, finally! I am pleased with the way it has turned out although I think the illustrations could be developed more and it would benefit with more hand painted type accompanying the images. I am pleased with the aesthetic of the book, the thread stitching looks really cool and was really quick and easy to do.

Cargo Collective

I am finally getting my head around creating an online portfolio/website using Cargo Collective. It is actually not as difficult as it seemed before, I just need to be patient and experiment with the layout and learn how to use it. I am pleased with the way it looks so far, I am in the process of selecting work to put up.

I have chosen a really clean and simple layout which looks quite professional and is easy to navigate. I don't want it to be too cluttered and I want projects and work to be easy to find and clearly labelled.

I'm still not sure about all of the folders/projects I have created yet, I may change or rename some of them and a few don't have anything in them yet as you can tell! I keep changing the order and experimenting with what goes where. 

How it looks at the moment...

I discovered how to add an image to the top of the page, I want it to say 'Good Day' so I put this together to see how it looks. I may do some drawings and refine the type and things but this is the sort of thing I want at the top.

Photocopying Mission

I decided to try photocopying the pages of the Bear zine in black and week so I could figure out pagination etc. It took a lot of upside down and wrong attempts to get it in the right order. I photocopied 10 copies of it in black and white, I really like the imperfections in the photocopies, although it would be good if the type was darker as its a little hard to read. The water colour illustrations loose a little of their effect as well in black and white. Some pages work, and some don't. I was also talking to Abi about photocopying and she informs me that you can actually play around with the contrast and things on it so the type could be copied darker. I'll give it a go!

The type is readable but very faded. 

The water colour back ground are completely lost on these images.

Pricing my work

For the RAG week Village Fete I made and sold handbound books with ink illustrations on them. As I didn't end up selling that many as it wasn't very busy in college, I am going to set up a folksy to see what response I get from the online creative community.


At the fete I priced the books at...

• A4 Sketchbboks- £3.00
• A5 Sketchbooks- £1.50/£2.00
• A6 Sketchbooks/Notebooks- £1.00
• Grizzly Bear poster- £0.80
• Postcards- £0.60
• Notecards- £0.20
• Grizzly Bear Zine- £0.50

For the online shop I am pricing the books slightly higher as it is a different audience and context I am selling them in. I need to make sure I earn money for materials, time and make a profit. I am pretty clueless about pricing my work so I talked to Marianne about it in my tutorial and we decided on some prices...

• A4 Sketchbboks- £7-50
• A5 Sketchbooks- £5-00
• A6 Sketchbooks/Notebooks- £3-50

I haven't put my name or a link to my blog anywhere on the books so I need to make a bussiness card or possibly turn the postcards into a alternative bussiness card with my details on it. 

I need to find out about postage costs too, how much it will cost to send each book and buy envelopes/stamps etc. 

First step though, set up Paypal and then get my Folksy page and everything up!

Leeds Love Affair

I got really excited as Leeds Love Affair tweeted that they had bought one of my Edith Piaf prints from the People You Should Know exhibition! They posted a photograph on twitter about the exhibition and my work, its really exciting as I have never had anyone buy my work before. It is a confidence booster, and plus lots of people follow this blog so will see it. They are now following me on twitter too which is really cool as they post about all kinds of things happening in Leeds. Having a twitter does have its benefits! I am happy.

They also wrote a full blog about the exhibition, its really good to see the exhibition, all Emma's work and our work being talked about and appreciated after all the work and preparation that went into creating the exhibition. It advertises it more as well so more people may come visit during the week!

Link to the full article-
http://leedsloveaffair.blogspot.co.uk/

Side by Side

I'm trying to improve my photoshop skills have been quite limited so throughout this project I have been trying to learn more about it and ways to use it. I feel myself and my work would benefit from this. I have been playing around with this illustration, adding colour and experimenting with layers, possibly turning into an image ready to screenprint.

I also know how to prepare an image for screen printing now, separating each colour into a separate layer and printing each layer in black and white. This is very useful as I am really enjoying the screen printing process and feel I am learning and improving my skills in this area. The experience of screen printing my Edith Piaf piece for the People You Should Know exhibition was a learning process as my first attempts were not so good so I had to re print them.

I have been wanting to get stuck into printing all year as I have never had the opportunity to develop skills thoroughly in this area so I am pleased, I feel much more confident to go to the print room and prepare images to screen print on my own without being guided all the way through as previously.

Ante Bookfair 05/05/12

Yesterday I went and helped out Loosely Bound at the Ante Bookfair in Shipley. They run a zine workshop for kids so I went along to help out and it was very fun indeed! The kids got really into and had the best imaginations. Working with them to create stories, adventures of aliens, creatures, drawings of everything and anything, they came up with some crazy and amazing stories.

I drew the name Freddy and I asked a girl called Izzy, who is 7 years old, what does Freddy look like? And she said he has really long hair and a tiny body. So, here is Freddy!

Some of the drawings and zines the kids were making.

A pink monster who is really good at Karate, by 7 year old Izzy.

A Muck Monster called Katie, by Izzy.

Adding more to the Pink Karate Monster.

I drew a character called Mr Stripey, Izzy came up with the rest of the story for Mr Stripey Adventures!

Marriane's son Jake's drawings in his zine. He was really interested in space and we talked a lot about the sun and moon and galaxies. 

Jake and Robbie making and drawing.

Izzy's brother called Bill, who is 6 years old, came up with this story about a knight in his castle. The little yellow door is the entrance and inside is his castle full of dragons. He also drew a lot of super heros with special powers, called Super and Hero. We also debated about whether Batman can fly, it was 50/50.

I was a bit nervous about today but I had a really fun day and the kids seemed to really enjoy the workshop! They were so creative and imaginative, the stories they came up with were brilliant. I would love to do workshops like this again and more often.