Autumn Barn

Well, autumn is right around the corner, so in honor of that great season, I've painted a country barn scene.  This painting kind of reminds me of East Texas where I grew up, and where I return every chance I get.

Fantasy Art: Fairy Pond

Whew!  It took me two days, but I finally finished my latest illustration: Fairy Pond.

I'm not sure if I'll add this one to my website portfolio or not.  Sometimes I create art just for the fun of it.  By the way, you can check out my new site here:  www.bradwsimpson.com.

Why I Love Goosebumps, by R.L. Stine!!

I've really come to love the work of Tim Jacobus and Brandon Dorman, both illustrators who did the covers for the Goosebumps series by RL. Stine.  Here is my version of Tim Jacobus's cover for "The Werewolf of Fever Swamp."  I realize my version is not on scale with the original cover art. 

My version started off as just me playing around on my new Bamboo Pad in ArtRage and Gimp.  I just wanted to work with blending colors digitally for the fun of it, and since I've always loved the Goosebumps covers, I thought I'd give "The Werewolf" a try.  I had so much fun I decided to go ahead and do the entire picture, wolf and all. 

Below is the original art by Tim Jacobus.

The Haunted Barn

Lately, I've had a hankering to do a barn scene.  So here we have it.  I call this The Haunted Barn.  This is a first for me, as this painting was done completely digitally, using Gimp 2.6 and my Bamboo pad.  I probably still prefer watercolors, oils or acrylics, but I have to admit, doing it all digitally was a lot of fun.  And there is a lot to be said for digital painting.  No messy clean-up afterwards, for one thing. 

Colored Pencil Art

Here is one of the first paintings I ever did using colored pencils.  I call it a "painting" since it's more than just a drawing.  I suppose technically, it should be called a "coloring."

     I like how vivid your colors can get with colored pencils.  I use Prisma Color, with a colorless blender marker.  The blender marker really makes the colors come together, almost like watercolor paints.

My Version of Jack and the Beanstalk

     My mother-in-law recently told me that my illustrations are "dark."  And while it's true that I do enjoy drawing ghosts, monsters, and other spooks and spirits--the things that excited me as a kid-- not all my stuff is so macabre.  Above, for example, is my rendering of the classic English Fairy Tale "Jack and the Beanstalk."  I did this illustration using colored pencils.  This picture was a lot of fun to do.

Publishing Ebooks vs. Traditional Publishing

     If you're a writer, or a writer-illustrator like me, and you've never had any of your work published, then you may wonder which is better: traditional publishing, or self-publishing through Ebooks.  Allow me to share my personal thoughts here.

 

There are advantages to both, and disadvantages.  First, a simple, cruel truth.  It's hard to get published through traditional publishing.  By traditional, I mean submitting your manuscript to publishing houses and having a team of editors read your work, give it the stamp of approval, and send you a publishing contract.  Your book would be in bookstores across the nation in about a year, maybe two.  With traditional publishing, most companies would give you an advance against royalties.  The advantages to traditional publishing is the up-front advance with the potential of royalties to come, and most publishing houses have the resources to promote your book and market it, print thousands of copies, and get your book in actual stores like Barnes and Noble, Wal-Mart and Target.

 

The downside to traditional publishing is:  it's hard to accomplish.  Editors are some of the most cantankerous people on the planet.  Ever read through any of the Writer's Market Books?  If you haven't, then you really should.  Just read what editors have to say when it comes to submitting your work to them.  From what I've read, editors seem like some of the grumpiest, hardest, unfriendliest, and rudest people in business today.  In fact, you're lucky if you can even get one to read your query letter. 

 

The bottom line:  Finding an editor who is currently accepting query letters for the type of book you have written is hard.  If any given editor accepts your query and agrees to read your manuscript, then chances are, she will reject said manuscript.  If she doesn't reject it, and she passes it along to her team of editors to review, then chances are one of them will reject it.  See?  It's hard.  Hard, but definitely doable.  Writers get published all the time.

 

Another downside to traditional publishing is the long time it takes for your book to actually be released to stores.  As I said before, from the time your book is published to the time it actually hits store shelves, two years could have passed.  Really.

 

But what about the resources that these mega-publishing companies have? Just their power to promote your book alone, doesn't that make up for the difficulty it takes to publish through them?  Maybe.  But consider this:  more and more these days, publishing companies are relying on YOU, the author, to promote your own book.  In fact, as a condition of publishing your book, publishers want to know what you can realistically do to promote your own book. 

 

Now, let's look at Ebook publishing.  With the advent of Barnes and Noble's Nook, and the Amazon Kindle, MANY, MANY writers are turning to self-publishing ebooks.  I'm one of them.  Here are some advantages to self-publishing your Ebooks.

 

First, it's free.  It costs nada to upload your book to the Kindle and Nook.  Second, your book is ready for public viewing (and purchase) within hours of your uploading it.  You don't have to wait up to two years.  Thirdly, your book can be released simultaneously all over the world.  My novel, for instance, is available in the US, Canada, UK, Italy, India, and other parts of Europe.  In fact, a large chunk of my sales come from overseas!

 

Also, you set your own price for your books, and you get royalties on sales. Furthermore, you can easily track your sales, your earnings, and see how well your book is selling in different places. 

 

And best of all, ANYONE can publish a book.  You don't have to deal with those cantankerous editors.  But that, my friends, is a double-edged sword, and it leads me to the disadvantages of Ebook publishing.

 

Like I said, anyone can publish an Ebook.  And many, many people DO!  And that's not always a good thing.  As anyone who has ever purchased a book from Kindle or Nook can tell you, there are a LOT of bad books out there.  Not everyone can write, but that doesn't stop untalented wanna-bes from unleashing their undeserving wares upon the unsuspecting public.  Here's my prediction:  Eventually, the Ebook market will become so inundated with awful, unreadable books, that sales for everyone will begin to suffer.  Remember the Ebay craze?  For a while in the mid-90s, people were getting extremely rich selling all kinds of stuff on Ebay.  Several people became millionaires and then began publicizing their success stories for the world.  It wasn't long before EVERYONE jumped on the bandwagon, wanting to get rich.  As a result, today, there are millions and millions of items uploaded on Ebay every single day. Since the market is so saturated with products, supply far outweighs demand. As a result, sales for everyone suffer.

 

This is exactly what I believe will happen with the Ebook market.  Eventually, there will be so many millions of crappy, bad-written books by amateurs out there, that sales will sharply decline.  Ebook buyers will simply search out and buy Ebooks from their favorite established authors, and will ignore the Ebooks by novices.

 

So, what will happen then?  Writers will give up the Ebook dream, and will once again return to seeking traditional publishing deals.  That will be their only option if they want to get their books noticed.  After all, their Ebooks will be like needles in a massive haystack amongst the other millions of Ebooks out there. 

 

So my advice?  Ride it out and see.  You don't have much to lose, do you?