Hi everyone,

I am rebranding and moving accounts! This account will be NO LONGER ACTIVE.

Please find me over on  sorensystem

Thanks for everyone's support over the years!

I completed my (relatively) new barn owl suit in 2022, but I've only worn her a handful of times since then. I'd really like her to go to a home where she can go on all the adventures!

$1,750 plus shipping within the US. Not shipping internationally at this time; sorry!

Details on the FurForge listing here: https://furforge.com/listing/pre-ow.....moving-jaw/558

So.... how do all you artists manage to keep the same name for your entire career? 😝

I've had the same artist name online for about 13 years, and I feel like it's finally wearing out. I know for some folks, rebranding is tough, but if I decide to change my name, it doesn't seem like it would be too difficult? I'm not exactly super well-known, and while I've had this account the whole time, I feel like most of my followers are probably inactive at this point 😅

After a year and a half of appointments, phone calls and emails with various providers, my gender-affirming surgery is FINALLY scheduled. That means, my GoFundMe is live!

I'm also doing art commissions, of course. But for those who just want to donate, you can do that, too!

> > gofund.me/bbc35a01< <

Thanks to everyone who donates or shares <3

Between the new rules about selling in the EU (where a lot of my audience is, in spite of me being based in the US), and me having to move suddenly, I'll be getting rid of any merch that hasn't sold in the next couple of weeks. So this is the last chance to order from my Ko-Fi shop:
https://ko-fi.com/akirainart/shop

I'll only be shipping within the US at this time. Sorry for the inconvenience!

I'm active on Bluesky, for those who also are!

https://bsky.app/profile/akirainart.bsky.social

I'm not active on Twitter anymore, for... *wild gestures* so many reasons. (For those who aren't aware, the block button being functionally useless, generative AI training, all that jazz...)

I haven't had a WHOLE lot to post recently, because a lot of my brain space is currently taken up by burnout and my new hyperfixation (NieR:Automata)... but I have SOME stuff I'm working on that I'll be able to share soon!

And I've always been curious why. I'm located all the way over in the US, but a lot of the times if I'm shipping a piece or doing a commission, it seems like the client lives in Germany. It's a bit of a mystery to me because of the distance! Is it just because there's a very active furry community in Germany? Is it something to do with my specific art style? Or even the fact that I post early in the morning here (= evening in Germany) sometimes? Idk if anyone has an answer, just wondering out loud 😂

Just wanted to wish everyone a wonderful Pride month! (Since I finally completed my piece for this year. 😆)

Also wanted to share a small victory! I changed my drawing setup to be more accessible and efficient. Previously I had my Cintiq in a totally separate room from everything else, attached to a second computer, so even starting a drawing session was a task. (Especially with how slowly that old computer started up. x_x;) Then suddenly I realized that if I have a Cintiq, and I'm not using Photoshop (massive memory use), I don't even need the second computer--I can just hook the Cintiq up to my laptop. So now I can draw as easily as just turning the second monitor on, and even if the other room is being used! (Specifically, my bird sleeps in there starting at about 5:30 PM). It's already making me feel more motivated and opening up more drawing time in the evenings after work for me!

Which means if anyone wants a commission (nudge nudge, I'm doing special icons for June only for $20 USD), I can get it done pretty quick!

After considering it a little more, I cancelled my Artist Alley table at KuroNekoCon.

My last two shows went so poorly that I can hardly see myself making back booth fee for KNC, let alone the cost of the hotel. With my income from my day job limited and my surgery coming up, I can't afford to keep sinking money into Artist Alleys.

I'm switching my focus into clearing out all my unsold stock, which is... a lot. I've marked down prices in my shop and reduced it to $5 shipping on everything. I still have prints of some of my most popular works on here, like the recent striped hyena painting, and some currently relevant items (apparently capybaras are really popular on the Internet right now?). I encourage y'all to take a look!

It's definitely a sad goodbye, since I did my first Artist Alley back before I was old enough to legally do my own taxes, and I've never stopped wanting to do it since then. Sadly I'm not in a place in my life, and Artist Alleys aren't in a place in the grand scheme of things (what with how competitive they are these days!), that I can make it happen.

My Ko-Fi is still open for tips and my commissions are still open for badges if anyone would like to lend some financial support!

Surprise! I got an email yesterday morning and was in the Chibi Chibi Con Artist Alley yesterday as a fill-in for a last-minute cancellation. I wish I had remembered to post here in the morning, but I was busy getting everything together for my booth last-minute!

I made back booth fee, so it was no Geek Craft Expo. But tbh, this whole Artist Alley development isn't going as I had hoped. Between how hard things have gotten since 2019, the number of rejections I've gotten even from "beginner-friendly" cons, and the amount of time I've spent improving my art vs. the low return I've gotten from it, I can't really see myself continuing to do Artist Alleys. It's discouraging, but even more so, it's a money-losing venture, and my family and I don't have the extra income to support it.

That said, I have one more AA acceptance for this year: KuroNekoCon in Spokane, WA! If anyone is in the area, I will be there. It has about the same number of attendance as Chibi Chibi Con did (~1,500 people). But I'm already committed, so the best I can hope to do is get rid of some of all the stock I have left over! And maybe make my $150 booth fee back?

I didn't get a lot of commissions when I did them, but every now and then a client would say how happy they were because this is the first time their character, or their own self, was visualized in this form, and they would be so appreciative of how it came out... It would always be such a magical moment. I miss that feeling :')

I would be lying if I tried to convince y'all that external validation wasn't a reason that I kept trying to take commissions, haha.

As mentioned in a previous journal, I FINALLY got into an artist alley this year: Geek Craft Expo in Seattle! The show happened this past weekend, and...

...It didn't go well.

I hardly sold a thing, and it was quite discouraging. But the plus side is, all of the merch stock that I'm now stuck with is available on my Ko-Fi shop for y'all to order!

> > https://ko-fi.com/akirainart/shop < <

I have prints of some of my digital pieces, bookmarks, and stickers! Regular anthro and animal stuff, as well as Pokemon, Genshin Impact, and a couple other series. Take a look--it's not too late to get yourself or someone else a gift!

Partially due to them needing more help, and partially due to my low (almost zero) income from art, I'm going back to working full time at my day job. For now the change is effective through the end of October; at that point, we'll be checking in to make sure my health is okay to stay full-time long-term.

Art is going to be slowing down a bit. Commissions will remain open for prospective clients, with turnaround time adjusted a little bit. I've updated my commission information to reflect the change.

So... thanks for y'all's continued support? ✌

Hey all,

I'm raising my commission prices back to what they were before on Monday, August 21st. I figure if I'm going to get so little work either way, I might as well charge a price that's fair to me 😅

So yeah, if you want to get something custom at the current deals ($50 bust/$100 fullbody/$250 scene), please submit your requests before Monday! Form is here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1.....5L-Ww/viewform

Colored pencil commissions will remain the same ($125 bust/$250 fullbody).

I'm noticing a trend (thinking back not just recently, but over years) that when I look for art advice, I'm simultaneously told to focus more and branch out more. Don't just do paintings--do merch and lower price point stuff that people can go for! Don't just do furry art, do less niche stuff! BUT ALSO, find one thing or a central theme you can be known for and focus on it! Do more of the stuff (i.e. full paintings) that will look the best in your gallery!

Legitimately, what am I supposed to do? 😭 I feel like the Spongebob meme where his eyes are going two different directions right now...

Sooo as some of you may know, I reduced my commission prices about 2 months ago. I was in a tough spot and needed more immediate income, and everything I had tried up until then hadn't worked. So I lowered them by anywhere from 25 to almost 50 percent, depending on the type, while keeping up my other advertising efforts in hopes it would bring in more traction.

Well... it still didn't work.

On one hand, it's kind of affirming that when people try to push you to lower your fees with the promise that you'll get more work that way, it's not actually true. So to anyone reading this: DON'T DO IT. Don't let random clients (who may not even pay for your work anyway) convince you to undervalue yourself.

On the other hand, the fact remains that I'm still in a tough spot financially. I'm completely out of ideas. I've taken out ads here on FA, in convention souvenir books, stretched myself to as many platforms as I can think of (and handle), started a Ko-Fi and merch shops for those who want something other than commissions... I even did a giveaway over on my Twitter, and I only got 4 entries. (At least that way I can make something for everyone, I guess?) I've done convention Artist Alleys and craft fairs, and for the first time in years, I finally have another one lined up this November. But I've sold almost nothing, and I'm lucky to get more than 1 commission a month, if that.

Luckily, I have a spouse who can help support me, and a day job that I enjoy to earn basic income. But I'm still frustrated and stressed.

If anyone has ANY suggestions that aren't "lower your prices" or "draw NSFW/fetish/fanservice/like (other artist)'s style", I'm all ears. Words of encouragement would be appreciated, too. I've been on this site for almost 11 years and I don't understand why it's still this difficult.

The first artist alley/craft show I've been able to do in years, Geek Craft Expo in Seattle, is this November 24th-26th!

Obviously since it's a few months out, I'm still getting things ready, but I'm hoping to have prints, bookmarks and stickers available. My table setup will be simple, but I'm excited about it anyway.

Not sure if anyone here is around the Seattle area, or if anything is actually going to sell, but hey, at least I finally got into something!

My colored pencil work seems to be gathering more attention than my digital work, so... time to open for those!

> > > COMMISSION REQUEST FORM < < <

$125 for a bust badge and $250 for a fullbody like my most recent submissions. (+$50 on fullbodies for complicated characters who have 5 or more base colors). All prices include having the original artwork shipped to you!

These take me between 1-3 full days of work to complete, and I still have two art work days per week, so overall turnaround is a bit longer than my digital pieces. If you're looking for a fully painted scene, digital is still going to be the way to go. Doing them traditionally takes extremely long, and I still have to be gentle on my wrist injury. People seem to like the colored pencil stuff though, so I'm happy to offer traditional badges and fullbodies as a returning commission type!

Hey all! This isn't really an announcement I wanted to have to make, but at least y'all can benefit from it!

Long story short, I've had some changes in my financial situation, and unfortunately my focus is gonna have to shift from ensuring long-term success to gathering more immediate income. So, to hopefully make that happen even though it's not ideal for the long term, I'm significantly lowering prices on all my commissions until things are a little more stable.

New prices, examples, and request form can be found here: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/50962570/

I should also mention here that I'm in the process of moving into a new apartment, so any commission requests put in now will be started on Friday, July 7th, when my workstation will be put back together.

I apologize to anyone who has bought commissions earlier this year and might feel blindsided by the price change. Sadly my options are very limited right now.

---

If anyone's interested in the long story (as if I don't complain enough in my journals here haha), basically one of my roommates brought to my attention that my lack of ability to work full-time and my resulting lower income has been a major stressor for a long time to them, and has expressed that some immediate changes need to happen. Obviously this is stressful for me, as I've been focusing more on long-term goals for my art while avoiding strategies that might work in the short-term but aren't the best in the grand scheme of things... like lowering my commission prices. Previously, they were structured so that I could focus primarily on prints, merchandise and making conventions work, while ensuring that any commission I did take was worth my time spent away from those endeavors and wouldn't lead to me feeling burnt out, or like I might as well just pick up more hours at my day job.

Sadly, I've failed to sell a single print or get accepted into a single convention this year. I was waitlisted for a couple, but continuing to pursue them would require me to drop stuff at my day job, make hotel reservations, pay extra for faster shipping on merch, etc. on short notice. I last did conventions years ago, so I don't have any current merch stock just sitting at home... and I was hoping that online sales would help me gauge demand for stuff, and that I could know that I'd actually have a show lined up before I could invest money I really don't have into keeping stock on hand. So... none of that has really worked out.

I might also be a liiiittle frustrated/dealing with an inferiority complex from seeing other artists out there who have been drawing and putting themselves out there for the same amount of time as me or less, who have been able to gather such large audiences and get consistent requests for their work... meanwhile I've only gotten a handful of commissions, mostly from IRL friends and my spouse--very rarely from someone actually finding my art and being interested enough to pay for it. And I've been on FA for over a decade and haven't even managed 1,000 followers. I know I'm not like other artists. I can't do NSFW without feeling like I'm sacrificing part of my soul, and I don't like fetish stuff. So maybe I'm a bit out of place here on FA. I love the natural world and drawing what I see, and I guess that just doesn't resonate with a lot of people. (At least not the way I do it... I can think of artists off the top of my head who DO gather an audience on this, not gonna name any names in particular... but for some reason it just hasn't worked for me.)

The best I can do right now is lower my commission prices in the hopes of generating more immediate interest and income, and deal with it being a little more work for the sake of being able to stay in my current living situation. >~< It pains me that I have to ignore all the advice I've heard from fellow artists to not lower your prices just for the sake of getting work, and bend to the requests of clients potentially outside my ideal clients and try to make things more "affordable." I just don't see any other option right now. OTL

Is gonna be... I don't know, honestly.

I was hoping to have something to work toward, and I had also tried to follow some of my friends' advice to sell at conventions to improve my art's reach and find some new audiences. Sadly I just heard back from the last outstanding Artist Alley I was waiting on--I didn't make it into any of the events I applied for in 2023. (Not counting ANW--I applied but wasn't able to attend due to their more lax COVID safety measures).

It's life, especially right now where there are apparently so many new artists wanting to sell at conventions... but it's still a letdown. I've been struggling to get commissions and still haven't sold any prints, so at this point I'm wondering if there's anyone out there other than my IRL friends who would really even want my art. I've had a good time doing a lot of self-directed things, and I feel like my art shows it and is more cohesive for it, but I also felt like a sort of outcast throughout art school and I still feel like I don't really fit in anywhere.

So yeah, not sure where I'm going to be going from here. Cross your fingers with me for 2024, I guess?

So... idk how many of you have heard about the new tiered artists fees that Redbubble is introducing? :'D

Needless to say, it takes an even bigger cut of the already meager income that artists get from sales there, with small artists (me!) being hit the hardest. I've been made aware by other artists of alternatives that don't take such a severe cut, AND have better quality--the latter was my main hesitation about Redbubble, as I was hoping to use it as a way to gauge interest in merch, but I don't feel that the lower quality does my more painterly style justice. So this week I'm gonna be working on closing down my Redbubble storefront and most likely transitioning to another website.

Someday, maybe I'll be able to produce and stock my own merch! But, since I'm just starting out, today is not that day.

Well... I'm back from Sakura-Con! (As an attendee, not an artist this year). It took a lot of my time and energy, which is one reason I've been quiet here!

I'm going to have to spend a couple weeks catching up on admin work, household stuff, and things like that that I wasn't able to do while getting ready for/at the convention. In addition, we're getting ready to move in a couple months. So it's probably going to be a few weeks before I can get back to focusing on drawing.

I've also been trying to apply to convention artist alleys to give everything a little boost. Sadly, I've applied to three "beginner-friendly" ones and have been rejected from two of them so far. The third one I'm waiting to hear back from is an anime convention, so until I hear back, I'm going to be focusing on making anime merch and prints. I don't know if that's of as much interest here, so I might be quiet again for a little bit until I can focus again on furry stuff. Commissions, of course, will remain open; just most of the non-paid stuff I'm working on will be (hopefully) stuff that can go into my next convention.

It's coming up on a full year since I first opened my print shop!

https://www.inprnt.com/gallery/akirainart/

For those who haven't checked it out yet, I add new designs all the time, so if you see art that you'd like on a card or on your wall, be sure to check back frequently!

If I can be vulnerable for a second, I've actually only sold ONE print in the entire time it's been up... so here's to a better year ahead, maybe? 😂

For those who might be interested, the site where I host my print shop is having a 15% off sale this entire week~
And these are REALLY nice prints. I've bought some from other artists on the same site before and I can definitely vouch for the quality!

Check out what I have available here: https://www.inprnt.com/gallery/akirainart/

So, I've learned that I don't like opening up about my struggles here, because people seem to take it as an opportunity to be rude and comment on how my prices or too high or my art isn't in the right style or whatever... but I'm really in a bad state right now.

In a few months, I'm turning 26, and I'm going to have to pick between not being able to afford monthly health insurance premiums, or not being able to afford the hospital bill if life decides to take a turn of cruel irony and make something major happen to me. For those not based in the US, here dependents are able to stay on their parents' health insurance until they turn 26 (or sometimes 25, or 22) years old, at which point we have to either buy our own private health insurance, or elect to get our own insurance through our employer... but you can only do the latter if you work at least 40 hours a week. Which it turns out I'm not as able to do as I'd like to be.

A year ago I worked up a list of goals to dedicate myself to to try to make some income from art part-time, but... nothing's really working. I've made 35 cents in the last month, and I'm admittedly freaking out at this point. I might have a couple possible conventions later this year, but everything's only a "maybe" at this point and it's all going to depend on how the COVID situation here in the US (which--guess what--is also awful!) is looking.

I'm sorry to get personal here on FA, but if anyone is looking to buy some merch from my shop or is considering a commission, now would be a really good time.