I am approached regularly by artists, both amateur and semi professional, asking specific questions about being a pet portrait artist. They ask for instance, how can they get more commissions? What's the best way to package portraits? Which paints are the best to use? I am also asked general questions about how to set up in business. How should they set their prices? Are they charging too much? Should they give up their day job and can they making a living from art.....??? And that's a big question, i always had trouble answering that one as i was giving advise to someone who was clearly willing to give up their job.
Over the years i spent a lot of time each day emailing individuals and it came to the point that i just couldn't handle all the emails that were coming in. With painting portraits, doing admin for the business, tutoring for my pet portrait course and keeping both mine and my husbands websites up to date, there wasn't a lot of time left for emailing artists let alone trying to live and sleep! So i decided to make a section on my website what would be useful to all artists who are thinking of starting up in pet portraits, or for those who are already doing it and need a little guidance.
When i first started my business 12 years ago with my husband we had no one to turn to if we needed to ask a question. We don't have any family members who are artists and there was no Internet in peoples homes like there is today to read, learn and ask advise. So we had to make our own way and made many many mistakes in the process. I wasted money on awful cold calling advertisers and have now learnt my lesson with advertising. After probably thousands of commissions under my belt I have learnt lesson after lesson on how to deal with customers and what to do - or what not to do. From years of experimenting and having portraits bent in the post I have finally cracked how to post portraits. Having taught myself how to use web authoring software, make and update my own websites i now know what people want when they surf. From studying thousands of sites over the years I now know what surfers like and don't like, know how a surfer thinks and why they might stay on your site for only a few minutes and leave without commissioning you. These are just a few of the major lessons i have leant along the way.
The problem is i cant tell you all the answers just like that. You have to do some of the work yourself otherwise you will never learn from your mistakes and progress and grow, but i can give you a nudge in the right direction.
So how can you help me i hear you cry!
Pet Portrait and Wildlife Art Forum!
Your first port of call is my Pet Portrait Forum. This forum was set up about 3 years ago and is the only prolific pet portrait forum on the internet that i know of. I have over 900 pet portrait artist members who dip in and out on a regular basis to answer questions, put up their artwork for critique, show their latest portraits, give demos, discuss materials and mediums, recommend books and dvds, we have monthly pet portrait challenge and the most popular section has to be the reference library. Artists can use photos in the library for free which have very kindly been put up by some of our members.
The forum takes up quite a bit of my time, i have some wonderful moderators and admin staff and we all give our time up for free, it is a non profit making forum and the small amount of advertising revinue goes to pay hosting fees and updates which are quite costly. It is a spam free environment and myself and my administrator hand activate all new members so that it is safe and secure for everyone. Our members range from 'teens to silver surfers' and so we have a wonderful large age range who all get on wonderfully. I pride myself on the fact that this forum is friendly and has a lovely atmosphere, so you are all welcome.
Pet Portrait Diploma Course
If you are just starting out drawing animals or you feel you need to brush up your skills with some professional advice then why not join my pet portrait diploma course. I have all the answers you need here, it is in acociation with the london art college and i wrote and now tutor the pet portrait course, the coloured pencil course (which is tutored by Laura Hardy) and the young artists courses tutored by myself. You can read more about the course here - pet portrait diploma course.
General Advice from Melanie
This section gives some geneal guidance and advice if you are trying to start up your own pet portrait buisiness. Click to read my top tips and advice!
General Art Information
To accompany the forum I have added in the 'For Artists' section, with information about materials, techniques, mediums and old masters. This is an ongoing collation of information, and if you would like to help me gather this information, do let me know. Email me if you feel you would be able to write some reviews (as i need reviewers for mediums and materials) and you will of course be credited and i can show your work too!
Finally If you are sitting at your computer, your head full of questions about pet portraits and being an artist ,its more then likely someone has already asked it or solved it on the pet portrait forum. That's your first stop - don't be shy! Join today its free and i only wish i had the opportunity of reading such information when i started out! Lucky you!