The Quitters Curse

The hardest undertaking in my art career so far and it isn't even artistic.

Quitting smoking is hard, now don't let me underplay it, it is incredibly damned hard. Even now as I sit here 2 months after quitting, I pause now and then as if to stop and reach for my cigarettes. I don't have any, and There is nothing to reach for, but the act of sitting here at my computer, is setting off triggers to old and terrible habits.

I realize this even more when I sit down at the easel. Every little pre-work action (which previously had been done while smoking) is another trigger trying to pull you back in. As soon as I enter my studio I am immediately hit with that feeling, which obviously means I need to back off. I am getting better and I have implemented a set of steps to conquer in order to get back to it, but that is taking just as long as quitting is.

Last week I went into the studio and just sat there for an hour. I didn't do anything. I didn't think about painting, I didn't think about setting anything up to record... I just sat there, and even that was difficult.

This week I am going through the motions of setting things up and then just taking it all back down. Just trying to make these things as second nature as the reaching for a smoke was. These are the steps I am having to take if I want to continue making art and doing a decent job at doing it.

What once was normal is now equivalent to discomfort and anxiety. (I just did the pause and reach thing again... see what I mean.)

I am hoping that sometime this week or next week I will be able to actually attempt to put something on canvas or paper, but I also think it still might be to soon. It is very frustrating and I hope that with time, I can learn to art again without these impulses.

So I would like to put it out there to you guys... Have any of you quit something you did while doing something else that has negatively impacted the something else? Would love to know if I am alone in this or not. (I know I'm not, but confirmation is pleasing... lol)

AntiSocial Media

Is social media  becoming antisocial?

More and more it is becoming apparent that social media platforms are trying to think for us. They are constantly updating algorithms that take your interests away from you. You can see it happening all over the place, on many different platforms and if you ask me it is beginning to get out of control.

The first time I had realized this was on Facebook. When you have a page (not just a profile) on Facebook, it is your job to promote that page as best you can, but do you have the power to even do that anymore? The answer is no. Facebook has taken your power away from you and more and more they continue to make your page less visible to the people that like your page because they want to see your stuff. They limit who sees your work and only let it out to a choice few of your followers. If they randomly pick the few followers that are only lookyloo’s who do not like or comment, than your post is stuck in limbo waiting for another random follower to either come to your page and look for themselves, or maybe it gets dropped into their timeline at a later date… but the chances of that are slim.

Then Instagram started to do the same and people eventually started to notice they were not seeing everything, but only what Instagram wanted you to see. They followed the same example as Facebook, but without the monetary incentive Facebook uses to try and make you purchase views.

Well, now YouTube appears to be jumping on this bandwagon and is now slowly starting to limit views. I have started noticing that channels I follow are not getting put into my “subscription” feed. So I started checking around with other people I know and asked them if they were seeing this as well… and lo and behold, they are. How far will YouTube take it? Are they just limiting views or are they going to take it to the Facebook level?

One of the main reasons people use YouTube is the possibility that you can make some money down the road, (don’t even get me started on the 10,000 view thing) but what happens if YouTube eventually decides that it is you that should be paying them to let people that have subscribed to your channel get notifications from your channel?

Am I being an alarmist here? Maybe I am, but with the increasing amount of sites that are getting into the limiting business, shouldn’t I be worried about it? Are you?

Would love to hear your opinions on this, if you have something to say, feel free to leave a comment below.

For the record: YouTube actually started to do this back in 2012, but has recently made some changes that is making it far more active in its subscription hiding.

No longer FREElance

Freelance isn't free anymore as New York City by a vote of 51-49 becomes the first city in the US to attempt to seal the deal for freelance workers.

The Freelance Isn't Free Act is the first bill passed in the US that will actually give freelance workers a legal right to uphold their contracts and I hope the rest of the US will follow suit. This is a great thing for artists as the client can not just worm their way out of paying for work done, as long as a contract was signed.

"The Freelance Isn't Free Act will make sure all workers can get paid for their work, on-time and in full," said Council Member and lead sponsor Brad Lander.

The bill also establishes a formal mechanism for the director of the Department of Consumer Affairs to enforce the labor rights of freelancers who are stiffed by employers.

While it still needs final signing by Mayor Bill De Blasio, but his staff has said that he is indeed in favor of passing the Bill.

This is long overdue in the US and I hope it gets its final approval as soon as possible.

The Thinking Behind Thanking

Thank You GIF by Joseph Finchum

        I see a lot of artists on Facebook that post their artwork for others to see and comment on. They do this a lot, and they should, but what I don’t see is artist’s thanking those people who interact for the like or the comment or even for the view… if you know who it is.

     Now the reason to do this is not just to be polite, but to further your reach, being polite is just a side effect of this action. We all know or at least we should all know by now, that Facebook puts some limits on the reach of our posts. If you have 100 followers, Facebook will show that post to about 10 people. If only 1 person out of those 10 interacts with that post, it isn’t going to get out to that many more people after that, if it goes out to any more at all.

     But if you thank that person for their action… you have created another action, one that also reaches out. Friends of that person or rather, people that are not actively following you will see your post with that additional message of “Your Name” was mentioned in a comment or on a post. Now if those friends see your post and act on it in any way… you get a little more action on your post. It is a way of reaching back through your follower to their followers, which in turn can lead to new followers for you and if you are using Facebook for your art… you should.


So send out a thank you now and then and make sure you are tagging the person you are thanking, it can only work in your best interest… In my honest opinion. 

Work In Progress

"Rolling" with the failed background.

This is a "Work in Progress" post. I had started this painting almost three years ago and was never quite satisfied with the way the daylight side’s background was coming out. As I started painting the rolling hills in the foreground, it just (to me) made the background look far worse and it wasn't coming together quite right.

I eventually put it aside and moved on to another project, always with the hope that someday I would eventually come back to it and get the painting I wanted out of this attempt. That didn't happen... until now.

"Rolling" with the reworked backgrounds first layer.

I finally decided what I wanted to do with it and have started to rework the failed background. I have decided to go with a much brighter and warmer background and this is the first layer of color that will go over this old background, one more should cover all the old background and really add some more dimension and overall appeal to the entire thing.

Keep an eye out for further WIP images of this one. I think it is going to be a beauty.

Social Media Interaction

How do you interact with other artists on social networking sites?

I have some basic guidelines that I set up for myself. These guidelines are set up in a way that allows me to interact, ask questions, and give critiques to any number of artists and either gather new information or just shoot the breeze from time to time. Both can be just as rewarding if your goal is simple interaction or learning something new. I use these guidelines to not only gain exposure for myself and my artworks to others but to make it simpler to interact with more real people and artists. Because that is what people do, we interact with others, even online. We are social creatures at our core.



My guidelines:

• Never add a +1 or a Like to something that is not by the artist themselves or a promoting service helping the artist get more exposure.
        The reason for this is time management and concentrated efforts. If someone posts a picture of another artists work and doesn't include a link or even their name, then that  person is getting and more likely taking the credit.
  
• Only engage with artists that are willing to engage you back.
        If someone doesn't take the time to interact back, then they might not be worth the effort. This does not count against the occasional poster. Only those who are very active but don't take time to engage with their audience. Why have the social networking account, if you aren't being social.
  
• Never +1, Like, or Share something that is asking or begging to have it made so. If someone is asking me to do these things I immediately get that feeling that that is all they are really interested in... their personal numbers. Facebook can be an exception since they limit your views and numbers so that you will pay them to increase it. Ask away on Facebook.
        I get that numbers can be important and that the rate they go up can be thrilling, but this should not be your main focus. I also, will not add one of these requests to anything I post, mostly because it comes off as needy. Yes I want my numbers to go up, who doesn't, but let's not lose control and become lost.

These are my guidelines, not yours, and yours may vary greatly. Do you have any personal guidelines for promoting yourself and your artwork on social networking sites? What sites are you on and or using? Anything you do or don't do? Any tips or tricks?  Whatever you want to talk about is always open for a good discussion.

Hope to hear from many of you.
Joseph

Edit to add this video: Check it out if you have any questions about Facebook ads.