I wouldn't say that. Life happens, try not to stress so much about it. :)

Life's a bitch and it distracts you from the fun things D:<

This is true. The real trick is learning to get in fun when you can. :)

heck yeh

I don't think that makes you the worst artist ever. it just means your in a different part of your artistic journey right now. Being an artist doesn't mean you have to have art as your only means of financial support. There are a lot of us working other jobs along side of art or even full time jobs as our support so we can make the art we want to make.
Think of it this way, at the moment you have the freedom to experiment and make all the are YOU want to make, instead of having to make the art others want you to make and ignoring your own desires to keep the bills paid. Your only going to improve with every sketch, WIP and finished piece you make and even if it's not something that can support you right now, that doesn't mean it wont be something that can support you in the future, full time or not.
Being an artist just means you create art. Thats all you have to do to be the best artist ever and thats exactly what you are!

I miss you!!!!

I'm hopeful you'll get life back on the right track. Just believe in yourself and what you do. *^^*

You need to take a long view friend. Walt Disney was terrible at the business side of art. His early failures were many- until he got his brother involved.

Turns out Walt's brother was a business man. Walt relied on him until the day he died. Walt's brother made mistakes early on, but his mistakes were still better than Walt's best. And his brother learned from each and every mistake.

YOU are an artist, you love art, you are a good artist.

But you are only human. You need to focus on what you are good at and love. You need to leave the business side to someone else. Someone that can draw up a mental framework from which you then work to fulfill. Someone that can critically review where you are at, learn how you operate and advise you on business matters.

You need to start small- art won't pay the bills upfront. It might, eventually, but not yet. That takes time, reputation, happy customers.

You will have to work friend, for now. But what if you made a ten year plan?

A ten year plan that says, "At the end of ten years from now, I want to support myself with art."

Business is not natural to art friend. That does not mean they can't work hand in hand, but I have heard your story before- all too often.

You need an agent friend.

A fellow Fur or someone who is understanding of such things, who can asses where you are now and what it will take to get where you want to be. You need an agent, either someone that loves you enough to do this for free, or that you make a part of your art price to pay them a reasonable fee.

But where you might find such as this, I can't really say...

But if you are to ever prosper as an artist, financially speaking, you must do this. You MUST become either good at business or find someone that is.

In short, you need a "Walt's brother" to help you with this.

This

I heartily agree with this. I also am pretty sure I'm going to need to find my own 'Walt's brother' when I get finish my game project and try to sell it. I will admit readily enough I have no farking clue on how to run a business except that you better have more coming in then going out.

As a part time Inventor, I have a product that has real potential. Potential to be the next John Deere or Google kind of potential.

I assure you that while inventing does have a certain amount of, "Come on seven!" to it, this particular invention was planned.

The greatest Inventor in modern times, Edison, had one maxim that he lived by. "First, get the money." By that, Edison meant to say that inventing stuff that has no market was pointless- no matter how cool it was. He realized that even in a socialist society, there are market rewards and demands. Edison established demand first, invent second. After a couple of wins like that, people were throwing money at him due to the fact that his ideas would return 1,000 % On the investment.

So that should be the first business principal you live by. As anti art as it seems, you need to make art that people want to buy. Most likely, you have at least established there is a market for your art.

But, do you know what that market will pay?

"Everything is worth what its buyer will pay for it."

An ancient Roman wrote that- and Rome was more about economy than even war.

So that is your next step. You need to ask first, "What are my patrons willing to pay for a commision?"

Don't make the mistake of saying, "My art is worth X." As we just said, it is worth what your buyer will pay. This is called market price- and you don't set that. The market does. You likely have a rough idea of what your commissions are worth.

Now take that price and divide by the number of hours you would take to actually make that art. That's your hourly rate. If you find that the hourly rate makes you less than working at Burger King, you need to do some thinking.

I will add more later, but typing on the phone is a pain


But suffice it to say that these are the basics of a capital society. We don't teach these simple ideas anymore, which is why most are "wage slaves." Funny, almost like somebody planned that...

Regardless, you will start to see why a capital society is so amazing and raises the standard of living so high. Capitalism does the ideal thing. It finds people that are good at something and rewards them with more capital to do bigger and better things. It empowers everyone to create a market based upon the their needs and wants. Every other system concentrates capital in the hands of the "elite" who then dictate what your needs are and what you can buy and sell. And if you dare question your elites, they hang you.

It's one reason why so many people all over the world speak English, not Russian...

na uh IM worse