Just listed “Afterall” in my etsy shop. This is a limited addition print of 50. Printed on archival paper with archival pigment inks.
Archive for the 'design' Category
More Than You Know, Digital Illustration, © Leoa Design Studio 2008
Digital Illustration © Leoa Design Studio 2008
The way I look at it, I have three major areas of my business to keep up with. Wedding album design, fine art, and graphic design. The most important is wedding album design. I am hoping that once my website is up, this part of my business will take off. I know that with more and more wedding photographers outsourcing their album design needs, there is quite a bit of competition out there. I feel pretty confident in my abilities to deliver consistent quality album design. I may not have a huge number of clients right now, but it doesn’t worry me.
Etsy however, is one place I feel myself struggling. To be successful at etsy, you have to post new items all the time and I think it’s best if your shop has a really strong theme. The majority of the work in my etsy store is older work and I don’t feel like it is the best representation of what I do as a fine artist. I have a good idea about how I would like my shop to be and what I would like to put up there but it is hard to find time to make new work. My mind is constantly overflowing with ideas of new paintings. I just feel like I haven’t quite found my rhythm in the art making department.
I haven’t really found any solutions yet. Maybe I need to set goals for myself. Finish one painting a week? How hard can that be. Make Sunday (or any one day) my painting day? I suppose when you run your own business you really have to be consistent with your time and have clear cut goals.
Another thing is that I would really love to have a show of my work this year. It’s been a LONG time since I have been in an art show and I think it would be wonderful. So far, this year has been pretty good to me. How awesome would it be if I could finish it out with an art show, a few more album design clients, and a successful etsy shop?
The next few days are going to be busy, work-wise. I have three sample wedding albums I am working on for a client. Plus, revisions to another wedding album. I also have to get six sample albums uploaded to my server for my website that is in the works. I have three ready to go, the other three I am tweaking a bit. Plus, I’ve decided to take a trip to Ikea this Saturday to purchase a new desk for my office, along with some additional stuff for my kitchen. On top of that, I have my one year old tornado of a baby to keep entertained and fed. Busy, busy, busy!
I am not complaining, mind you. It really is feast or famine when you are working for yourself.
Well, since I mentioned wedding album design and I have yet to show off anything in regards to that- here is one of the sample albums that are on my website - EliosoDesign.com:
© Leoa Design Studio 2008, Photos: © Scott Patrick Photography
Please click on the photo to open up my wedding album design website and see several sample albums.
I have been working so hard lately to come up with my business identity and to have all things business related run smoothly. The fruits of my labors are beginning to show themselves and I am very excited about what this year will bring. I know that blogging can be an important part of running a business, especially one that is run primarily online. So here I am and I hope to blog at the very least a few times a week.
A little bit about me:
I grew up in Rockford, IL and moved to Milwaukee, WI to attend art school. Now, aside from running my art and design business I also stay at home with my one year old son. My educational background includes painting, printmaking, and graphic design. Going into art school, I was pretty much a hardcore fine artist. But since graduation, I have extended my education to include graphic design and I am finding I have quite a passion for that too. The main core of my business is designing wedding albums for professional photographers (I am also available to the general public for albums as well).
This weekend I hope to put up a few samples of what I have been up to lately. Aside from that, my website is in progress and should be up very soon. I am really excited about that- I completely designed all of the graphics for my website and I think it turned out great. I can’t wait to see it as a fully functional site!
