Evaluation

All in all, I think this unit has expanded my knowledge of online self-promotion. I was worried at the start, thinking I’d have to adopt a new style of illustration so I could plaster my work on coasters or phone covers, but with a deeper look there was definitely much more I could do. 

An online presence is a must have in today’s career climate, and this unit definitely helped me understand how to go about establishing myself online and how using social media is a great way for your work to be shared amongst the public.

Business cards

After talking with a tutor about my business cards (which had yet to be printed), I was directed to Solopress (http://www.solopress.com/) as a good source of business cards. In the end I left the printing so late I was practically forced to use a 24 hour printing service. However the results were great, with great printing quality and high quality card being used for just over £15, with next day delivery.

Aside from the comic and business cards, I also settled on doing some postcards. They seemed like a great avenue to promote my work as it is, instead of having to resort to creating more decorative illustrations. Here’s some new artwork I created for one of the postcards:

Here they are printed. I put them together using an Adobe inDesign template:

Zine collaboration

I collaborated on a zine with two other classmates (Josh Flinn and Josh Wiltshire). I pretty much just drew my contributions for it on the day, but it I feel like that sort of added to the ‘ironic’ nature of the whole thing.

Digital Comic

I was still struggling to think of some more promotional items, especially as my work seemed to exist more in the digital space than the physical one. After some discussion with tutors however, it was suggested I make a short comic to be distributed digitally.

This ties into my previous discussion of tumblr really well, in that short comics tend to do quite well on that platform.

Website

I've been constructing my website, and I've settled on using tumblr as the main hub of my web presence. It’s easy to post to both on mobile and pc, has plenty of users and a great share function so my work can be quickly spread about amongst the public. It also has a wide selection of page themes so choosing one that was both professional looking and easy to navigate wasn’t too hard. Plus it allows for custom domain names which is incredibly helpful.

The domain name I've currently settled on is tdj-illustration.co.uk (Bought from 123-reg.co.uk), however it takes a few days for the new domain name to take effect, in which case the website is also found at tdj-illustration.tumblr.com.

Within the first few days of starting it I already have around five followers, and one image was shared around forty times. I plan to regularly try and increase my following by updating it weekly with new work. I feel certain subjects sync with the tumblr mentality better, and as little humorous comics are some of the most shared things on tumblr I’ll probably try and produce something along those lines every now and again to keep up interest. 

Thankfully by using tumblr I can simply tag my work which then makes it easy to find by other users, which then means it could be potentially shared among other users and so on, giving me publicity.

I submitted the following to the Crow Press’ (http://thecrowpress.tumblr.com/) Zine:

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I think it turned out quite well, and I can certainly add it to my portfolio