Studios from the Start (BTS of a WFH Artist)
I’ve lived in 4 homes over the past 5 years (exhausting!) - and although all the upping and moving has began to catch up to me, I’m seeing the benefits in the way my studio is evolving with my work.
When I first started out, I had nothing more than a laptray, a north-facing window in a block of studio flats and some pencils I’d kept from my high-school days.
It just goes to show that you don’t need to be perfect to get started!
One of the first things I upgraded in the studio were my tools - the quality of pencils that I used greatly incresed the quality of my work, and as I drew more I discovered the benefits of using various brands to achieve textures and colours.
This was the first space I used when starting out my pet portraits - the lightest space in the flat, I got decent lighting on good sunny days!
The important part was having good natural lighting to work under…
As the pet portraits picked up, I moved to a bigger flat and the studio got a whole room rather than just a corner! (Well, half a room as it was a shared computer space with the other half!)
Having more space naturally meant filling it with more stuff… I bought a desk top and two cabinets from Ikea and set up my desktop pc there for admin. The space around the flat meant that I could use my easel, my university drawing board and the table to draw at - but most days I simply worked in my lap, curled over a drawing secured to some mdf. (Definitely don’t recommend doing over long periods… this was absolutely not good for my back long-term!)
Around this time, I realised to could take pet portraits full-time and make as much from my day job in the additional hours I’d have - so I took the plunge and handed in my notice!
Suddenly, my entire income relied on me being able to continue to produce work on my own - this can be one of the scariest things about being a self-employed artist, but I learnt very quickly to prioritise tasks that would help bring in an income or impact me negatively if I didn’t do, and leave all the ‘buy more stuff’ ideas til later when they were a bit more necessary!
Faber castell Polychromos pencils were and still are, a solid favourite to work with. I’m a sucker for dropping pencils on the floor (an artist’s WORST nightmare) but 99% of the time these sturdy pencils withstand a fall or two and last me many many drawings.
Caran d’Ache Luminance were the next type I tried out; they’re more expensive than other coloured pencils and definitely worth the price tag. I’ve never been one to buy entire sets of pencils, I simply bought colours as and when I needed them and now have a solid collection of colours I use all the time.
My other favourite tools that I use all the time include my trusty pencil sharpener - after running through many other brands I just found that this little machine can’t be beaten. My Swordfish Ikon sharpener creates the pointiest of points and rarely ever breaks a nib. with daily repeatative use the blade I bought it with has lasted me 2 whole years, and it’s only recently that I’ve replaced the blade (although it might have benefitted from me doing it a little bit sooner, I guess I was just a bit lazy).
Let’s talk erasers - never ever (okay, maybe a few times) have I used an eraser to ‘get rid of mistakes’. I’ve always grown up attempting to make use of lines I didn’t want places and only use the eraser if I really, really had to. Now, I’ve learnt that there’s so many more uses for them than rubbing out a mistake. The Derwent electric eraser is a fantastic tool that’s perfect for creating tiny highlights in fur textures or eyes if I’ve saturated the paper a little bit too much. But most often, I use the Faber Castell putty eraser and this is awesome at lifting extra pigment off the paper to allow me to keep the drawing clean and to layer more colour on top. Both are great at keeping the white space around my drawings clean, too!
Perhaps the best upgrade of all… our collie!
This is how she looks at me on a daily basis in the studio…!