From Hobby to Profession: The Inspiring Journey of a Successful Artist

Ever wondered what it takes to turn your artistic hobby into a full-time profession? Aaron Long, from Painted Dragon Studios, spins a tale of his journey from a Lord of the Rings-inspired amateur artist to a successful professional. Join us as Aaron highlights the importance of staying motivated and persistent in the face of obstacles, and how turning a passion into a living requires strategic planning and determination.

In our in-depth conversation, Aaron gives us a glimpse into his learning progression, his first painting sold for $60, and how he honed his craft through Youtube tutorials and the influence of his favorite characters from movies and games. The key, according to Aaron, is persistence, patience, and the courage to embrace failure. Moreover, he shares how a mentor can be a beacon guiding an artist through their journey. 

Finally, we dig into the transformation of Aaron's art from a hobby to a full-fledged business. He shares how he navigated the tricky path of leaving a secure job to plunge headfirst into his passion, refining skills, and leveraging platforms like Etsy to boost sales. Aaron's inspiring story is a testament to the importance of strategic thinking when turning a passion into a lucrative business. So, gear up for an inspiring episode filled with practical tips and advice for your own artistic journey.

You can follow Aaron on Instagram : https://instagram.com/painted_dragon_studios?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

You can buy art from Aaron here : https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/PaintedDragonShop

You can follow Kevin for tutorials on You Tube here : https://www.youtube.com/@KevinOilPainting

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hello everyone and welcome to the Curious Ulsterman
podcast, the podcast designedto equip you with the tools and
wisdom you need for as an adult.
I am your host, johnny aka theCurious Ulsterman, and today I
sit down with Aaron Long fromPainted Dragon Studios and we
discuss how to become afull-time artist.
We discuss Aaron's creativejourney and his transition from

(00:32):
full-time job to owning his ownbusiness and opening up his own
shop.
But, without further delay,here is today's chat on how to
become an artist.
Welcome to the show, aaron.
Glad to be here.
Yeah, man, I've been lookingforward to this one, because
it's not often I buy art, but Ido have one of your pieces I've

(00:53):
been following you on Instagramnow for some time and about, I
want to say, two or three monthsago, I bought your piece.
I think it's the Lord of theRings one.
It's like the little silhouettegoing into, I believe, the
heading for the Mines of Moriaand me being a big Lord of the
Rings fan, I was like, didn'teven hesitate.
I was like, yes, having it, andalso like, just impressive.

(01:18):
By the way, I love the factthat when I opened it up, you'd
already drawn it's almost like aSkyrim Dragon.
It must have only took you fiveminutes to do, but that just
made all the difference.
I was like, 100%, this is topquality.
Here we have you on today todiscuss how to become a

(01:38):
professional artist and thejourney you took to get there.
So I know you have quite alarge following on Instagram and
Twitch and all that kind ofthing, and I personally
thoroughly enjoy watching ablank canvas coming to life with
whatever your creativityinspires you to do.

(02:00):
But for the people who don'tknow you, can you just give a
quick background on yourself andwhere did it all start for you?
What was that spark that gotyou to pick up the PN brush for
the first time?

Speaker 2 (02:14):
So that's actually a really funny story.
So if you see most of my stufftoday, it's a lot of fan art.
It's all of my favorite movies,video games, tv shows, that
kind of thing.
The funny part about that isall growing up through childhood
I didn't really consider myselfthat much of an artist.

(02:35):
I grew up in a family of artistsand my sister was the one who
was really good at drawing allgrowing up, and so me and my
older sister would draw togetherand she was always the one that
would be like, you know, wetake the same reference picture
and we'd sit next to each otherand we draw it in our own styles
and hers would always look, youknow, so much better.
But we just be like oh, it'sfun because we're comparing our

(02:57):
styles.
And so I've been drawingforever.
But in my senior year of highschool I was about 17 or 18.
I was sitting in art class inhigh school and I kind of
considered it like the nap class, where I could just lay my head
down on my desk or play a gameon my phone.

(03:18):
And one particular day I wasplaying a game on my phone.
I was playing Flappy Bird.
It was really popular at thetime Everyone in school was
playing Flappy Bird for thislike month straight, I'm sure we
all remember it.
And my teacher, our teacher,walks over and goes you know,
this is art class, you should bedrawing something, you should

(03:40):
be painting something.
And I go I don't want to paintanything, that's, I don't like
painting, I don't like drawingthat much, it's just whatever.
And she's like well, I want youto draw something and like I
don't want to draw anything, Iwant to play my game.
And I went to a very like, verysmall, relaxed school where they

(04:00):
, you know, nobody really got introuble, that much for talking
back.
So I was kind of being a butt,but you know I was, I was just
being obnoxious.
And she goes you need to, youneed to draw something or paint
something.
I'm going to take your phoneaway and you'll get it back at
the end of class.
I'm like oh fine, and so I tooka screenshot of Flappy Bird and

(04:25):
I took some colored pencils andI drew a screenshot of Flappy
Bird.
So I drew this like reallydetailed colored pencil drawing
with, you know, little greenpipes and the little yellow bird
jumping through.
And after that I was like thatwas actually kind of fun.
I like I actually enjoyed that.
It wasn't just like a randomcelebrity portrait or a nice,

(04:50):
you know cabin by a lake, youknow like we see all these
classic paintings and whatpeople usually make paintings of
, and I was like fan, art iskind of fun, though, and so from
there I went and I found mymom's old set of acrylic paints
that she had deep in thebasement or in the garage or

(05:10):
somewhere, and I painted apicture of Mordor from Lord of
the Rings, and that was one ofmy first like actual paintings,
and, if you give me like 10seconds actually had it over
here, all right.

(05:33):
So this was one of my very firstpaintings that I ever did.
I think this was my thirdpainting, but yeah the last
incredible of Mordor with thelightning and the tower of our
door and do, and so that waskind of my like intro to
painting was was that pictureright there and I've held onto

(05:56):
it for you know, the last oh,that was 2013.
So what?
Nine years and?

Speaker 1 (06:03):
fair play.
Yeah, yeah, the YouTubeaudience got a nice treat there.
So if you're just listening,tune into the YouTube and see
that amazing painting, you knowI'm biased.
I love all things Lord of theRings, so that to me was that's
always class to see, but it's sointeresting.
I think that me and yourselfhave somewhat of a similar

(06:27):
experience with our.
I am not an artist by any meansof the imagination.
I am naturally quite creative.
You know the podcasting and thecontent creation.
I was quite good at drawingwhen I was younger.
However, when I went to highschool and was, you know, put in
our class, it was very you willdraw this or you will draw that

(06:49):
, and very much like yourself, Ijust wasn't interested.
You know, I'm a maritimeengineer by trade and I loved
drawing ships, you know,especially Titanic, and I
remember they I don't want tosay the day I stopped, ever,
they stopped drawing or but Iwant to say quashed my
creativity quite for quite along time was I was in art class
and I got told you have to drawthis apple with a pencil and I

(07:12):
thought I'll give it a good goand I spent four hours on it at
home, so in my own time, and Ibrought it in and the teacher
berated me saying, what do youspend 15 minutes on that?
And I was like, all right, nah,that's it.
Yeah, she was a horrendousteacher.
So from a drawing perspective, Ican totally relate the, you

(07:34):
know, I think, where everysingle person is a creative in
some way.
But it has to be fostered andmuch in the same way, you have
such an amazing talent forpainting.
It wasn't properly fostereduntil you find your little click
, your little you know whatsparked that little bit of
passion in you, which was fanart, which, by the community

(07:55):
that's, you know, revolvedaround you now and appreciates
your art.
It's obvious, then, that that'sthat's where your talents truly
lay, and a lot of, I think,that inspires a lot of people
like for me.
I would love to sit down andpaint someday and I think if I
was going to go with like thewhole Bob Ross kind of thing
which, by the way, I can say Iappreciate your t-shirt I

(08:16):
noticed that actually before westarted recording very good,
very good t-shirt.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'lldefinitely take up a Bob Ross
painting at some point when I'ma bit more how would you put it
settled?
Because I do travel a fair bit.
But you know, this all had to,you know, start somewhere and I
think a lot of people are quiteintimidated by painting.

(08:38):
Like you know, the best theythink they can paint is maybe
throwing some paint at a wall or, you know badly, doing
something like putting somethingon the canvas.
But you know, you say you'refrom a family of artists, but
would you say the talent wasinnate or did you just have to
practice like everybody else,like did it just come naturally
to you, or?

Speaker 2 (08:59):
That's a really good question that I I wish more
people asked, because, as youknow, I like to live stream my
paintings.
I get people in there all thetime saying, oh, you're so
naturally talented, I'll neverbe as good as you, and my
response to that is always um, Ihad to work for this, for this
skill that I currently have, andwe all sucked at drawing or

(09:24):
painting when we first started.
Every one of us, even the mostprofessional artists out there
that can paint, you know photorealistic oil paintings or draw
you know a photo realisticcelebrity portrait or something
like that.
That's is just mind blowing tous now that I can't even imagine
painting or drawing somethingthat could.
Even that person starteddrawing stick figures.

(09:47):
You know, like we all, we allhad to start somewhere and I
think the only natural advantageI got growing up was having an
encouraging family, which a lotof people, you know, can't say
the same, and that's unfortunatethat a lot of people don't have
that.
But, like I think, I reallythink that's my only natural

(10:08):
advantage that I have, andbesides that, everything that
I've learned, I've had to workreally hard to learn that.
I've had to put in, you know,hundreds and hundreds of hours
of practice to to get like, tobe able to paint something like
this, like this was a couple ofweeks ago and I did this one in

(10:28):
you know, like 20 hours.
If I would have tried to paintsomething like that when I first
started painting, it would havetaken me 120 hours and it
wouldn't look half as good asthat.
And so I always tell peoplelike, oh, I'll never be as good
as you, that like.

(10:49):
Or they say I'm so bad atdrawing and I hope to someday be
as good as you are.
I'm so bad at drawing, I'llnever be as good as you.
I always say you're bad atdrawing.
Right now you have to put inthe hours of practice and you
will get as good as me.
If you put the amount of timeand practice that I've put into
honing my skills and you can getbetter than me.

(11:10):
You can find your own style,you can find what you're good at
, you can find what you reallywant to get good at and if you
put in the time and the effort,anyone can do it.
I firmly believe that and somepeople might learn faster.
Some people might have, you know, learning skills, and I don't

(11:33):
know if I particularly havelearning skills.
I think I just have patience anddetermination because I really
wanted to get good and I I foundsomething that I really enjoyed
, and so I spent the time, youknow, watching YouTube videos
for hours and hours every day,following tutorials online, and

(11:54):
that's that's really.
All I did was I, I just put theeffort in and I got to the point
where I am today, that mostpeople probably don't even think
of themselves getting tobecause they don't put the same
amount of effort into the, intotheir thing, and so I think for
anyone that's gotten really goodat something, most of us can

(12:17):
say, yes, we've put time andeffort into getting that good,
and I feel like most of us wouldsay that it's it's natural, and
you mean, some people are quiteoffended by that, by people
saying that they're naturallytalented, and I'm not going to
get offended, but I will saythat I've definitely put in the
time and the practice to getwhere I am 100%, and that was

(12:41):
such an amazing answer and thereis so much that I want to
unpack there that I hope I'mgoing to remember all the stuff
I want to ask you.

Speaker 1 (12:49):
But it's interesting I was having this chat with
another artist actuallyyesterday, a friend of mine.
He's a tattoo artist and hegrinded for years to get good at
his style and he now runs hisown tattoo business.
And we were talking about thisyesterday how people say, oh,

(13:10):
you're a natural.
And I totally see where you'recoming from there.
That people say, oh well,you're a natural, you didn't
have to work, you didn't have tomake the mistakes, you didn't
have to pay your dues to getwhere you are.
So I can totally understandthat.
A couple of people have remarkedto me oh, your podcast is
amazing, you're very good atthis.
It's like well, 55, 56 episodesin.

(13:32):
I hope it would be.
I have produced some cringeworthy episodes, not because of
guests but because of my owninterview style has evolved and
it doesn't feel so formal andit's just some bad habits with
my technique that I've managedto stamp out.
So I can totally relate to that.
And I love as well that youtouched on the fact of patience

(13:54):
and persistence, because thoseare skills now, especially in
the age of tech talk and AmazonPrime.
Everybody wants everything now.
They want to be that overnightsuccess and this was a quote as
well that I was chatting withthe tattoo artist yesterday.
A big shout out to ClintMcInnis and it was a quote from

(14:18):
the famous soccer player, lionelMessi.
He says, oh, it only took me 20years to become an overnight
success.
And people see these thingsthey want to be, whether that's
a professional painter, apodcaster, a footballer,
whatever and think, well, oh,it's easy for them, they got it
easy.
It's like, well, they have aneasy night because they grinded

(14:40):
for years and they made everymistake in the playbook to get
to where they are now.
So, yeah, I think what you saidthere was really powerful,
because another thing we weretalking about yesterday with my
friend Clint was that a lot oftimes we don't give ourselves
the permission to fail.
We want to tackle a new hobbyor a new skill and we instantly

(15:05):
want to have some sort ofcredibility with it or want to
be at least a decent skill levelat it.
And if we don't producesomething akin to the Mona Lisa
our first time, that's it.
Chuck the easel away, chuck thepaints away.
It's not happening.

(15:25):
So, in that regard, then youwould say that what you did to
build up your skills was justtime and persistence, but it was
painting things that youenjoyed.
Is that correct why you're here?
Yeah, and then the resourcesavailable to you.
As you say, you had a verysupportive family, which is

(15:46):
fantastic to hear.
There was YouTube First.
Out of curiosity, did you everhave apart from your sister,
perhaps, maybe a mentor or acoach or someone who perhaps
maybe you have your own style,but they guided you a little bit
along the way or encouraged you?

Speaker 2 (16:02):
Yeah, so I've never had like formal teaching or
anything like that.
But I mentioned YouTube.
There's a YouTube channel outthere called Kevin Oil Painting
and I cannot recommend himenough.
He's just a guy that's reallygood at what he does.
He paints landscapes and heputs out video tutorials of him

(16:23):
painting these landscapes andhe's really engaging with his
community.
And I've reached out to himthrough email a couple of times
and he's given me critiques andhe's given me feedback on the
tutorials or on the paintingsthat I've done from his
tutorials.
And so for my first probablylike two or three years all I
did was just watch his videosand copy him like brush stroke

(16:45):
for brush stroke, and I wouldtry to paint a picture that
looked exactly like an exactcopy of what he was painting in
the video.
And by doing that I learned allof his techniques.
And then, as the years haveprogressed, I still do a Kevin
Hill tutorial every now and then, just for fun, just for old

(17:07):
time's sake, but like, I'vetaken his techniques and I've
turned them into my owntechniques and I've evolved them
into what I do today.
And so, like the way that heloads his brushes, the way he,
you know, makes us his paint,the type of canvases he uses,
all these little tips and tricksthat I learned through, you
know, several years of followinghim.

(17:27):
I would say that, like he's theclosest thing I had to a mentor
, even though, like we've nevermet in person, we've never
talked more than a couple ofsentences through email.
I've learned so much from thatguy and I like, for anyone out
there that wants to learn how topaint landscapes, I cannot
recommend Kevin Hill enough.
He goes by Kevin oil paintingon YouTube and he is just a

(17:48):
fantastic teacher.
I've learned so much from him.
But even from a very early,early stage of me learning from
him, I started just like puttingcharacters or items from
different like movies and gamesthat I like.
So like a couple of landscapeshave, like Skyrim, standing
stones sitting in them.
So what I would do is I wouldtake a Kevin Hill painting,

(18:12):
which he's very similar to BobRoss.
He just stands up by his easel,he talks through what he's
doing, he does his paintings ina few hours, but he chops his
videos up into smaller, smaller,more cohesive bits that you can
follow a bit faster.
So I'd follow these like thesepainting tutorials and then I'd

(18:32):
put my own stuff in there tomake it personal to me and make
it more fun for me.
So that's just going back tomaking whatever you're painting
enjoyable, even if it's notsomething like you know I like.
I like painting landscapes, butI love painting fan art and so
I would.
I would take this landscape andmake it something you know,

(18:53):
special to me, and that's that'sreally how I learned I was.
That was my mentorship was wasjust watching YouTube tutorials
and there's a couple artists avideo tutorial out there that I
also followed, but he was.
He was my main one that Ireally learned a lot from.

Speaker 1 (19:12):
Yeah, that's fantastic and I really like what
you said there, that you know Iwould class you as an
exceptionally talented artistbecause of the hard work you've
put in.
But even you are saying I stillgo back to the tutorial, I'm
still learning, I'm still youknow.
You know they always say, oh,you become a master of your
craft.

(19:32):
But I think really you neverquite stop learning, do you?
There's always a new technique,or perhaps a new spur of
creativity.
So that's.
That is something I reallyenjoyed hearing there, because a
lot of people, I think, perhapssometimes box themselves in
creativity out creatively bysaying, oh, I've got nothing
more to learn or I've masteredthis, but you know the fact that

(19:54):
you yourself, a successfulartist, are still going hey guys
, I'm, I'm still learning here,and that's great, you know.
And, on a side note, theStanding Stones, that's Skyrim,
one Incredible.
I think that was actually thefirst painting I ever seen from
you, so I think it came up withmy like suggested feed because
obviously, skyrim, whatever andit was like oh, my subscribe,

(20:17):
follow this.
I want to see this, more ofthis, but I never sent them.
Man, it's the pain things Skyrim.
I I totally transparency.
Haven't played it in years, butit still holds a soft spot in
my heart.
Just the amount of hours I'vesunk into that game and the rain
is obviously special to the sky.
Skyrim as well, very good.

(20:39):
So for a lot of people who arepotentially wanting to pick up
the paintbrush for the firsttime, you know what, in your
opinion, is like a good startingkit.
Like you don't, I'm assumingyou don't need to blow out your
wallet or your bank account onsomething expensive.

(21:01):
What's a?
What's a good starting kit foran aspiring artist or painter,
just to master the basics?

Speaker 2 (21:11):
So depends on really what you're going for.
If you are interested inpainting landscapes, I
definitely recommend oil paints.
Just because they flow a bitbetter.
The consistency of the paint isa little different.
You can get these really cool.
Sorry for the audio only peoplebut this painting right here

(21:32):
has a very blended sky.
It's very smooth.
It looks all foggy and misty.
This is very difficult toachieve in acrylic paint.
People can do it, but Ipersonally like painting with
oils for a sky or something softthat needs to look more blended

(21:54):
, versus acrylic paint, which Iwish I had If I'm doing a
character portrait or somethingthat needs a lot of really sharp
details.
I painted a picture of MasterChief a few weeks ago from Halo.
Oh yes, yes, yes.
He has all these really sharpedges and details that would

(22:15):
have been really difficult forme to do in oils.
I did that one with acrylicpaint.
The acrylic paint is more oflike rubber, latex based when it
dries.
It dries very fast and it driesreally heavy.
You can just layer upon, layerdifferent colors and textures of
the paint on top of it, whereasoils can take several days to a

(22:38):
week to dry if you layer onreally thick.
As for a kit, it depends onwhere you're listening or
watching from.
If you're in America, there's areally good craft store, hobby
lobby that I get most of mypaints from.
They have these 50% off sales.

(22:59):
I know there's a few otherstores Michaels, joanns Just
these hobby craft stores thatyou can go in there and watch
their sales.
If I were to buy all my paintsfull price, I'd be spending so
much money on my art supplies.
I get most of mine from HobbyLobby personally because they

(23:21):
have a 50% off sale almostconsistently every two weeks
where you can get all of acertain type of brand of paint
for 50% off every time.
Same with my canvases, mybrushes, my paint thinner, all
that stuff.
I never spend full price on it.

(23:41):
There's sets there.
You can get a box set, a reallynice box set.
You can spend $30 on it and geta whole set of oil paints.
Comes with brushes, a palette,a little easel and a nice 30 box
to carry it all in.
For $5, you can get a littleset of oil paints that has all

(24:03):
the colors you need.
You can get a set of brushesfor $3 during those sales.
You just need to be cleverabout it and not just buy the
first thing.
You see.
If you want to save some moneyon your first set of paints,
there's plenty of sales outthere that really make it easy

(24:27):
to pick up a new hobby thatcould potentially become
something even more than a hobbylater, for just a few dollars.
I wish I'd known that when Istarted because my first set of
oil paints I think I spent like$60 on it I bought every tube of
paint individually for $7 or $8and I bought a whole set of

(24:52):
paint.
I bought a bunch of brushes andover the course of several
months of buying my firstsupplies, I probably spent $200
in my first couple of months ofjust buying art supplies.
I wish I'd known earlier thatyou don't have to break your
budget to get supplies even justto start, because most of us

(25:14):
aren't going to notice thedifference of the quality of
paint until you get really intoit.
I still today use only thecheapest of supplies, usually
because I still don't notice thequality of final product.
Because a lot of people say, oh, you need only the best quality

(25:34):
paints, only the best qualitybrushes.
My brushes usually don't costme more than like $0.50 each
because I get really cheapclassroom set brushes that I can
get a whole box of them forlike $10 and those will last me

(25:54):
months, whereas I could spend$10 on one brush.
That if I end up ruining thatbrush because I forget to wash
it afterwards or I let it dry, Ilet paint dry on it that brush
is just ruined and that's anexpensive brush down the drain,
whereas I can just get thesecheap brushes.
They do the same thing for methe majority of the time and

(26:15):
they work great for me and I canstill produce quality work
because it's, I think, my mainpoint is.
The quality of materials doesn'talways equal quality of work
and if you want to make qualitywork, it's more about the time
and practice that you put intothat than the materials

(26:35):
themselves.
I've even done a couple oftutorials online where I'll
paint a whole picture and I'lltry to paint something pretty
high quality using only theabsolute bare bones, minimum,
cheapest supplies that I canpossibly get, just to show that
you don't need the $60 tube ofpaint, because you can spend $60

(27:00):
on one tube of paint.
You don't need that $60 tube ofpaint to produce something
quality.
Now, if you're selling a$10,000 painting, yeah, I demand
investing in some good paints,because that client's going to
be really disappointed if youused a Walmart canvas versus a
nice stressed canvas.
But even, especially if you'relearning, just get what you need

(27:23):
to put color on the canvas,because color is what you really
need to paint, and you can dothat with acrylics, with oil
oils, with watercolors.
You can get colored pencils.
Anything that can create coloris what you need to begin with.

Speaker 1 (27:43):
Yeah, so there's no need to break the bank.
So just be savvy about it, getthe basics and get very good at
mastering the basics, and thenyou can start concerning
yourself with that individual$60 brush or that individual
tube of paint.
Yeah, okay, yeah.

Speaker 2 (28:01):
So as you come across new techniques you want to try
that you can't do with the $1Walmart brush, then go out and
invest in a brush that's moresuited for what you're wanting
to do, and you'll accumulatetons of art supplies after a
while, but at least to beginwith, just get the basics and

(28:25):
you'll learn what you reallyneed, based off of something
that a basic brush can'taccomplish.
You'll learn what you reallyneed to get and you'll try
different brushes.
You'll try different techniquesand you'll get there.

Speaker 1 (28:38):
Yeah, yeah, and then, before you know it, you're
running your own art studio.
Yeah, so something you touchedupon there about hobbies
transferring into something moreFrom your own perspective, how
did you know that it was time togo from a hobby to a business?

(29:03):
What was that moment?
How did you know?

Speaker 2 (29:06):
It's a bit of a more drawn out story, so we've got a
couple of minutes to spend onthat one.
Yeah, so I painted as a hobbyfor, I'd say, good seven or
eight years, just honing myskills, painting for fun.
I did start selling mypaintings very early on, just to

(29:30):
anyone who really wanted themis usually friends and family.
At that point, for the firstseveral years and during the
time of following the YouTubetutorials, I started posting my
Skyrim paintings in differentFacebook groups and so I got

(29:51):
this little client base ofpeople that really liked my
Skyrim painting.
So I started an art page onFacebook and for the first
several years it had a couplehundred to like 1500 followers
by the time I went full time.
But, like I had 1500 followersfor the majority of that time
and that was mostly just fromthe Facebook groups of people

(30:13):
who were like big Skyrim nerds,and so the few paintings that I
sold were usually commissions.
Someone would send me areference picture of their
character or of a screenshotthey took from in game, or they
just describe what they wanted,and then I would usually make
that happen and I sold my firstpainting for $60, I believe, and

(30:38):
after I sold that painting for$60,.
That particular client wasn'tthe most pleasant person and he
made me realize I probablyshould have sold it for more
because he didn't appreciatewhat he was getting and he ended
up not wanting any more art forme because I didn't know how to

(30:59):
run a business at that point.
I didn't know about agreeing ona price beforehand.
I figured, oh, we'll figurethat out after the painting's
done.
That was a big mistake.
By the way, I'll never paintsomething without agreeing on a
price beforehand if you're doingcommission work and also get
deposit beforehand, because ifsomething goes south later, then

(31:23):
you still have that deposit andyou still made money off of
your work.
But I sold my first paintingfor $60, and I realized I should
have probably asked more for itbased upon the amount of time I
spent on that piece, which was60 hours, and so after that I
kind of stuck around $100 to$200 for most of my paintings,

(31:46):
which that's a decent amount ofmoney, but it's not livable.
You can't really pay your rentoff of $100 painting every three
or four months.
So I did that for many yearsjust doing the occasional
commission, and it was usually.
I would just post a painting onFacebook and someone would

(32:07):
message me and say, hey, I wantyou to paint this for me, I'll
pay you X amount of money.
And so that's what I did.
For the longest time.
I did a lot of soul searching,of deciding what I wanted to do
with my life.
I got married.
My wife and I moved overseasfor about six months.
We worked in the orphanage inGuatemala for a while and over

(32:32):
there I realized that my wholelife pretty much, I haven't
really had a lot of really knownexactly what I wanted to do.
I wanted to do something and,for anyone who doesn't know, I
go to church.
I believe in God.
I believe that that's what'simportant to me is to teach
people about God and about theBible, and that's my personal

(32:55):
beliefs.
And anyway, I went to Guatemalawith the intent of being a
missionary and with the intentof that being my main passion,
my main thing to focus all of myattention to.
And while I was down there Irealized I'm kind of bad at this
.
I'm not a good public speaker,I'm not good at teaching things

(33:17):
very well, but I am good atteaching art.
And while I was down there, Imet this little boy who enjoyed
painting, and he was pretty goodfor a 13-year-old and by the
time I left he was very good fora 14-year-old Like me and him

(33:37):
just really connected and wewould spend hours together just
painting and we would followKevin Hill videos on YouTube and
I would just sit there and I'dpaint my thing and he would copy
me and I'd give him little tipsand pointers along the way and
I was like, ok, maybe this iswhat I'm good at and maybe I

(33:59):
need to to actually like thinkmore about this, of why I'm
doing what I'm doing and whatI'm really good at and what I
need to focus my times on andhow to use this to still Do what
I believe is important.
And so the the orphanage overthere we didn't.
We end up, you know, movingover there full-time or anything
that.
That Didn't work out.

(34:21):
But we came back to the Statesand I was like, well, I don't
know what we're gonna do.
I guess I'm just gonna go get afull-time job and I'm gonna I
Don't know make money andsupport my wife and what she
wants to do, because she alsowants to do stuff like that and
she wants to take care ofchildren.
And so I went, I got afull-time job, working 60 hours

(34:43):
a week.
I was making Plenty of moneyand I was like, okay, this is
great money, but I kind of hatemy life.

Speaker 1 (34:50):
Yeah, so yeah.

Speaker 2 (34:51):
I quit the job.
I got another 60-hour job whereI was making even more money.
I was like, all right, this isawesome, I'm gonna support my
wife and I'm gonna send her apaycheck and it is, and she'll
get to do what she wants to doand this is great.
That lasted a whole two monthsmaybe, before I realized that I
just don't like workingfull-time jobs.

(35:11):
It's I don't like manual labor.
I it's.
It sucks for me, is it drainsme, it makes me Just a very
unpleasant person to be around.
And so and that was like heavymanual labor I was driving a UPS
truck Delivering packages like300 packages a day.
Sometimes it was awful.

Speaker 1 (35:33):
Yeah, yeah, I could imagine that be quite a
hard-born sometimes Especiallyduring the holiday season.

Speaker 2 (35:38):
Yes, which is exactly what I was doing, that.
And so I I just quit that jobon the spot.
I was like, sorry guys, I can'thandle this job.
This isn't for me.
I Hope you guys find someoneelse to fill this position.
And I dipped on out of thereand so I had this.
I was like, well, I hated themanual labor part, but I enjoyed

(36:00):
the driving part.
Driving is chill I just get to,you know, chill on the highway.
So I was like, well, maybe I'llgo be a truck driver and I'll
drive like big semi trucks.
And so I spent the next 30 days.
I was like, all right, I'mgonna spend a month unemployed
and I'm just gonna try to getthis Commercial driver's license
.
And so I spent the next month,you know, working on getting

(36:21):
this commercial driver's license.
I had a job lined up throughsomeone else that I knew that
they said they would hire me asa rookie driver to go and drive
so my trucks.
It's like, all right, well,this, this will be better than
that last job because at leasthere it's not so physically
taxing.
During that month, to make upthe money I wasn't making
Working, I decided to do somemore art commissions because I

(36:43):
couldn't work on the CDL stuffevery day, I couldn't work on
getting the driver's licenseevery day.
So I painted a lot during thatone month and during that one
month of posting, mostly in theSkyrim groups again, I made
almost as much money as I didwhen I was driving for UPS and I

(37:03):
was like Hold up, what, what amI even doing?
Like, why, how did that justhappen?
How did I just make so muchmoney just painting?
And my Facebook page got up tolike 2000 followers.
At that point, I think I I mademy Instagram page, I started
posting on there a lot.

(37:24):
I Got that up to, I think, athousand followers.
I Made a YouTube channel whereI I uploaded like time-lapse
videos of my paintings and I waslike I really enjoy this.
This is actually kind of funlike Doing, actually putting
effort into, into what Iactually know I enjoy.
But I've never really, you know, pushed that hard.

(37:46):
It was really just painting ahobby.
You know, that was what I didfor the longest time.
And so during that one month wedecided by the end of it like
let's not, let's not get the CDLjob, let's, let's actually, you
know, call that, call thatemployer and say, hey, sorry for
getting your your bills, turnin for hiring me on, I'm not

(38:09):
actually gonna take the job.
And so instead I went and Iworked in a warehouse overnight
for 20 to 30 hours a week, andso I would get up at 2 am, I'd
work till 7 or 8 am and I andthen I'd focus on getting my art
business going During thedaytime, which ended up being
like from 2 in the afternoon tolike 7 in the evening, because I

(38:32):
was sleeping All the other time, because I was working
overnight.
And so I I spent the next threemonths just working that that
overnight job and Again, justtrying to make money through the
job and make money throughselling my art and getting my.
That's when I started an Etsyshop.
I started selling my paintingsthrough Etsy my original

(38:56):
paintings and then I startedselling prints of my artwork
through Etsy, and that's that'swhat's really Worked for me and
that's what really startedgetting my sales up was selling
those prints, because noteverybody can afford a, you know
, a couple hundred dollaroriginal painting, but most
people can afford a $20 to $35print if they really want to own
some my artwork.

(39:16):
And so I got my Etsy shoprunning.
I really focused on honing myskills more and and improving on
my art.
I started doing like dailypractice of either painting a
picture or drawing, just tryingto hone my skills as well as I
can.
Within three months of workingthere, I realized I was still

(39:39):
losing money by going to apart-time job.
I Was, I was sleeping all dayand I was like this this,
sleeping till 2 in the afternoon.
This is negative for my artbusiness and so I decided all
right, now is the time, now'sthe time to make that jump, and
so I quit that overnight job andI currently am working a very,

(40:04):
very part-time job that I Found,that I happen to get insurance
through and so I work maybeeight to ten hours a week every
morning, from like 4 am To 6 30am In the morning, and that that
job has allowed me to Take myart completely full-time at this
point.
Like I go home and I sleep fora couple hours in the morning, I

(40:27):
get up at you know nine or tenin the morning and then I have
all day to focus on my art, toHang out with my wife, to hang
out with my friends and familyactually like enjoying my life
for once, and and that's all.
That's all due to just reallylike going deep into into Trying

(40:48):
to turn my hobby into abusiness, and so I hope that can
like be inspiring for somepeople.
That like it doesn't happenovernight, it doesn't happen.
It's not just like you decideone day I'm gonna quit my
full-time job and go art.
I worked my way in to Having myart be a full-time business and

(41:11):
that was through putting a lotof hours extra into what I was
doing, and it wasn't reallyuntil I quit my full-time job
and went part-time that I wasable to devote that time.
But I had, at least as a skillat that point that I was decent
at, and then I turned that skillinto even more of a profession

(41:35):
later by by putting that timethat I wasn't working into into
honing my skill.
But I still worked into that.
I made sure to Not be dumbabout it, because a lot of
people, when they try to start abusiness, they'll jump right
into it, they'll they'll quittheir 60 a week job and They'll

(41:55):
go from making a full income tomaking to hopefully making all
their income off of theirbusiness, and that's
unfortunately Very rare thatthat actually succeeds.

Speaker 1 (42:06):
So yeah, that's that.
That's an incredible story andI like what you said and how
transparent you are, that thiswas not a walk in the park, like
, yes, you have reaped thebenefits now, because you took a
very logical and Strategicapproach.
Like, as you said, you didn'tgo from a 60 or fully paid job

(42:28):
paying your rent, food bills,all that kind of thing to jump
immediately in the art.
You did it in a very logical,slow transition to your art
business.
What's your opinion on peoplewho who have ambitions that they
, they, all they want to do isart and it's gonna be.

(42:48):
It's very hard to persuade themotherwise that they probably
need to get a normal job beforethey become a full-time artist.
And I'm not.
I don't want to.
You know what's the words I'mlooking for here.
I don't want to discredit them.
I you know especially verytalented artists.
They're right there.
All they want to do is exactlywhat you do, like you've

(43:10):
inspired them.
But, yes, I want to do whatAaron's done and I have my
full-time business.
I've no interest in workingcorporate America or anywhere
else.
But, like, from an artist'sperspective, and a successful
artist perspective, do you thinkthat realistically, for 99% of
people, you, the facts are,you're gonna have to get a

(43:31):
normal job and, yeah, build yourbusiness on the side, or you
know what's your opinion on that?

Speaker 2 (43:38):
There's.
I mean there's ways if youstart early enough, before
you're completely independent,like for my young friends who
are maybe graduating high schoolor graduating college, who they
aren't completely independent,they aren't paying all their own
bills yet.
Maybe they're young there maybe living with their parents.

(43:58):
In that case, while you, whileyou're still in that position,
go as, go as hard as you can atmaking your art.
You know as good as you can getit, get those social medias up,
post your stuff everywhere,make your Etsy shop or whatever
platform you decide to sell on.
Get that going now, before youmove out and you start.

(44:22):
You know having to pay your ownbills and you know get your
full-time job and all that.
Because if you, if you startworking on these skills now,
those skills don't really goaway.
Like you, you can pick themback up at any point and I Lost
my train of thought.
So Once, once you graduate highschool or graduate college, you

(44:46):
move out.
You have to get your full-timejob.
You know that's pretty commonfor most people.
You have to.
You have to get your life going.
But keep Going with your art,at least on the side.
Don't let it go completely.
I see so many people and it'sit's really sad because they'll
they'll be so into art, they'llbe so into what they're doing,

(45:07):
they'll be so in touch with whatthey're, you know, they're
enjoying with their hobbies orwhatever they're good at, and
then they'll, they'll Begintheir adult life and it'll
completely go away.
And it happens a lot.
But I just want to encourageeverybody that you know, once,

(45:28):
if you're already an adult or ifyou're starting as an adult,
like, don't let that go, latchonto it and you know, keep, keep
practicing on the side, keeppracticing when you have time.
Most of us have, you know, anhour of the day where we, you
know, sit and we scroll throughtick tock or we watch YouTube
videos or we watch TV.

(45:49):
Most of us have, at some time,most of us don't work, you know,
80 hour work weeks.
It's.
It's very rare that we do, andAll I'm trying to encourage you
in is most of us have time thatwe can set apart, but that we
usually are, you know.
We say, oh, I'm too tired, oroh, I'd rather play video games

(46:09):
or I'd rather watch TV orWhatever it is.
And I fully understand that.
I do that myself all the time.
I'll just sit and I'll, youknow, scroll through Facebook
for an hour and be like crap.
I could have, you know, drawn awhole picture in that time.
Just hold on to those skills,even as you're an adult and if
you have kids, and if you have ajob and a Family and all this,

(46:32):
like, there's usually some timeduring the day to keep going.
And it only takes 20 seconds tomake a Facebook post.
It only takes a minute to makea tick tock.
It only, it only takes a minuteto post something on Instagram
and that's, that's all it is tomake to get those socials out
there.
That's all I do.

(46:53):
I didn't, I didn't pay formarketing, I never went to
business school.
I I've built up my socialmedias to what they are just
from posting and postingconsistently and sharing my
stuff everywhere I possibly can.
I literally share my arteverywhere that is Allowed to
share art, and I think that'sthe only reason that I've built

(47:13):
up the following I have my percontext.
I have about 25,000 followerson Facebook at this point.
I have about Wow, six thousandfive hundred followers on
Instagram and I have ninetyeight thousand followers on tick
tock.

Speaker 1 (47:36):
Yeah that's yeah, I'll play to you.

Speaker 2 (47:39):
Yeah, and like people say, oh well, you must have
gotten lucky.
You must have, you know,especially for tick tock.
Yes, I did get lucky a littlebit.
I had one video go viral andget over a million views and
that got me about 70,000 of myfollowers in the course of a
week.
So I did get lucky in that inthat instance.

(48:00):
But besides that, my Facebookfollowers I've.
I've built up every single oneof those Facebook followers
Through just posting and showingoff my art.
I I didn't have a single post,you know, go crazy viral
Instagram.
I haven't had a.
I haven't had one singular postgo Insanely viral and get me

(48:21):
all of my 6,500 followers.
I've built that up over timeand it it takes time and it
takes consistency of posting andlearning how the social media
is work and all that.
You can, you know, go into thatand learn all that is as you go
.
I'm not an expert on it, but Ifound ways that make my posts do
better and get seen more.
And and yeah, another site thatI've done really well on is

(48:45):
reddit.
I've posted my artwork in likethe skyrim subreddit and I've
had posts skip I think.
I think I got like 65,000 ofvotes on a post on on reddit,
wow.
And so, like you, just got tofind these platforms that enjoy
your work and you got to findthe groups of people that want

(49:07):
to see your work and share itwith them as much as possible
and latch on to those groups andkeep trying.
If one group doesn't work,there's the the reddit slash
pics, so it's just a generalpictures subreddit.
People post, kind of whateverthey want there.
I have some posts that get like20 upvotes there and then I've
had others get 50,000 upvotesthere, and so you just got to

(49:32):
keep trying.
You got to keep posting.
You got to be persistent withit, because if you just post
once and you say, oh, my postgot three likes, okay, that's
probably gonna happen your firstseveral posts until you get
followers, and you just got tobe consistent with it.
You got to be happy with those.
You know when, once you get 10likes on your posts consistently

(49:52):
, that's exciting because that's10, that's 10 fans that you
have that are coming back andliking your work.
Once you get Start getting tolike 50 likes on your post,
that's exciting because that's50 people.
Imagine, like 50 peoplestanding in front of you and
you're holding your painting and50 people going.
I like that.
You know that's insane.

Speaker 1 (50:11):
That's a powerful perspective.

Speaker 2 (50:13):
Yeah, yeah.
And I've gotten to the pointwhere when I post something on
Facebook, it usually gets atleast a thousand likes.
And that's insane to me becauseI'm imagining myself Standing
up on a stage, I'm seeing guyslook at what I made and that's a
thousand people that are going,you know, and I like that and

(50:34):
Like it.
Enough I can get, I can get,you know, 500 comments on a
painting.
Like that's 500 people thathave walked up to me afterwards
and said, hey, I really likethat.
I just want you know Iappreciate you sharing your art
with me.
Like that's a good feeling.

Speaker 1 (50:49):
I really, I really like that perspective, like it
gives a.
You know, social media can be abit horrendous at times, but
that's a really wholesome way oflooking at it.
I really enjoyed that you gotto take that you forward, or
take that forward yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:05):
Mm-hmm.
And so I just want to encourageyou, like you got to just be
persistent.
You got it.
You got to be, you know,resilient against hateful people
online, because they'reeverywhere.
You got it, you just got it.
Oh yeah, you got to go at it,can't give up.

Speaker 1 (51:21):
Yeah, yeah, exactly, it's interesting.
I I thankfully, have got quitea few five-star reviews, but I
was listening to a podcast,thank you very much.
I was listening to a podcastand this dude is a mega
successful podcaster and he saidthe you know, somebody asks him

(51:42):
to come on to their podcast,you'll instantly look at the
reviews.
And he says if it hasn't got atleast one Bad review, like a
one or two star review, hedoesn't take it as a credible
podcast.
I'm like I'm at the point.
I am like I'm almost wishing forone bad review, just officially
incredible, because it's likeyou're, you're not.

(52:03):
If you're not getting, ifyou're not getting, you know,
one bad review or you're notgetting some pushback, then
you're not really in yourelement, you're not really
broadening the horizons, if youknow what I mean.
So, yeah, I really like whatyou say, that even though you're
generating really wholesomecontent that in any sane
person's mind you would go, howcould you not like this?
Like it's maybe not yourproperty, but you can at least

(52:24):
appreciate the talent and thetime and the craftsmanship
that's went into generating thisnice picture and you're still
gonna get some troll online'sgoing oh, it's awful.
What?
Why?

Speaker 2 (52:33):
would you say?

Speaker 1 (52:34):
that but, I'm sorry, no no, no go on, so I
interrupted you.

Speaker 2 (52:42):
Well, one thing that I've done over the last couple
years to kind of like Grab thetension is I'm sure you've seen
it is I wear this like goofycostume.
Well, I well.
I love that, I love that andsome people either love it or
they absolutely hate it, and Iwore it as like a joke one day.
Just just trying to be funny, Ijust put the.

(53:05):
It's a costume of Chewbacca andyeah it's a onesie and so I put
this little hood up and it's gotlike a little face on the hood
and it's got his little no sashfrom across the holes as bullets
.
It's.
It's goofy and I thought it washilarious because I got that
was like one of my first redditposts.
They went really viral.
Was all these people just going, wow, that's some cool art, but

(53:25):
what are you wearing?
And my first, my first severalposts of that was it was like
split 50 50 people either lovedit or they absolutely hated it,
and I got some terrible commentsin in those people just being
awful and just straight upbullying me.
And you know, if you're doingsomething like that I don't

(53:46):
recommend everybody try to begoofy with their but they're
sharing.
But like that was, what workedfor me Was being really goofy
with my posts and trying to justgrab attention and I thought it
was fun, I thought it was funnyand so I've done that for like
the last year of just like itkind of became iconic there for
a while oh, there's the wookieguy, there's the wookie artist,

(54:09):
it's.
I think it was funny becauseit's attention grabbing and it's
, you know, gets people to stopand comment on the post, which
makes the post do better andyeah, so like yeah man.
Half those comments were justlike just calling me really mean
names and saying horriblethings about me.
And I had people like DMing mejust like paragraphs of hate

(54:29):
messages, like actual hatemessages, like what, why?
But yeah, it's like if you dosomething that's in any way
controversial which I don't knowhow wearing a onesie is
controversial people some peopleeither love it or they they
hate it.
But that it really helped myfollower base because it got me

(54:53):
people to follow me thatappreciated my goofy side and it
kept people that I don't wantfollowing me away.
And so it it was reallyattention grabbing, got a lot of
people going to my pages.
But yeah, you got it.
You got to be prepared for forhaters and you know people will
comment, say, oh, the art isOkay, but this could be better.

(55:14):
I still have people commentingon my posts all the time that
they're like, oh, I went to artschool, I know all these like
terms and I know all these likedifferent things, and they'll
sit there and critique my artand They'll like point out every
little mistake that I made inthis art.
And I'm like you.
You know, if I wanted critiqueI would have said please give me

(55:38):
critique.
Or if I wanted constructivecriticism, I would have said
please give me constructivecriticism.
And I just I only say thatbecause I wish more people
understood that even as fellowartists sometimes we like to do
that.
Please only give critique ifit's asked for, because it can
be very discouraging to theartist and for my artist friends

(55:59):
out there.
Just push through that, don'ttake it to heart.
I know people are trying to behelpful, even if it kind of
hurts sometimes and you makesomething you're really proud of
and you you just want to showit off and say, guys, look what
I made.
And then someone goes okay,this is wrong with it, this is
wrong with it, this is wrongwith it and this is wrong with
it.
Don't take that, don't takethat personally, like that's,
that's just someone that'strying to make themselves sound

(56:22):
smart or trying to be helpful.
In most cases it doesn't seemvery helpful in the moment but
just push, push through thatkind of like you know, internet
haters or internet helpfulcritiquers that comes across as
people being negative.
You got to push through thatnegativity and just keep going.
And once people realize thatyou're not going to stop

(56:43):
especially for the haters thatsay mean things once people
realize that you're not stoppingand that you're still posting
your stuff, even though they're,you know, commenting on it time
after time, they will stopcommenting on it.
I get like I used to get like50, 50 of haters versus people
that actually enjoyed seeing mepost my work.
It's now like 95% positive andI firmly believe that's only

(57:10):
because I've built up that, thatreputation for myself of one
being a good artist and for two,not responding to the haters
and not not, you know, lashingback at them through the
comments and just keepingposting anyway.
And I think they've juststopped because they know I'm
not going anywhere.

Speaker 1 (57:29):
Yeah, exactly, and please do not go anywhere.
I want to see this art for thelong term.
But what I love about you knowhow you responded to that was
the fact that I think I did seea post age at months ago and you
were in your wookie costume andyou unveiled an absolutely
outstanding painting and Iremember even you just put this

(57:53):
little cheeky comment as thecaptions of the hopeful was like
so here's this painting.
Oh, by the way, here's thewookie costume again for all you
haters, and I was just like yes, love it, like I don't care, I
like this onesie, I like thestate it's here to stay and
you're right.
It didn't stand out for you from.
You know everyone else on theinternet.

(58:15):
You know, when everybody'sscreaming for air time, there's
just you not saying a word.
But look at my look at myreally nice painting and my
wookie costume and it's like asyou say.
You know you've got yourlegions of fans now and quite a
wholesome fan base, as I imagine, as well.
It's as you say, you're going toget that one or two.
You know 5% who are just likethere to be negative.

(58:38):
Some people's default isnegative and it just comes with
the territory.
So some really solid advice.
And you know exactly what yousaid about you know getting
quote unquote lucky on TikTok,you know there's a famous quote,
I heard that you know luck iswhat happens when preparation
meets opportunity.
So you know, going back to whatyou said at the very start of

(59:02):
the episode, where people arelike, oh well, you're lucky,
you're naturally talented, andit's like, well, I'd argue
almost that it wasn't luck, Iwould say you've put in the work
, you've done, you've paid yourdues and then the opportunity
presented itself and you seizedit and, lo and behold, you've
reaped the benefits.
So I am a big fan of yetsometimes, you know, lady luck
does.
It does show kindness tocertain folk, but at the same

(59:25):
time you've got to be have thepreparation beforehand to fully
seize that opportunity, whichyou've clearly done.
Yeah, and that's the only otherbook on that.

Speaker 2 (59:36):
That's that specific painting that did go viral.
I got 1.5 million views.
It was a pretty good painting,it was probably one of my better
ones, and I used a sound thatwas really viral at the time,
because with TikTok you can kindof copy paste sounds that do
well in the algorithm and try tolike, boost your videos and you
try to just utilize every soundyou can, so like.

(59:58):
The reason that I think I wentviral at that time was because I
was using a.
I was just being veryconsistent and persistent with
trying everything I could onTikTok and especially for you
guys out there that are, youknow, trying on TikTok or
interest on trying on TikTok,the first thousand followers is
a sludge.
It takes so long to get yourfirst thousand followers, but

(01:00:22):
once you get that, your videosare going to do better and
they're going to latch onto thealgorithm faster.
And I think that's probablylike you're saying was I did the
right thing at the right time.
I did a really good painting andthen I used a sound that was
working really well at that timeand so it was the sound mixed
with the really good art, and Iwas wearing my Chewbacca onesie,

(01:00:44):
of course, so I got people'sattention and I think I really
did just like be reallypersistent, because some people
say, oh, you blew up overnightbecause you had one random fluke
video, okay, so maybe or maybeit was just a good video that
people really liked, and I dowant to encourage you guys on
that.
But, like you know, just keepputting out your good work and

(01:01:07):
it's not always going to getseen.
I still post videos that getless than a hundred views
sometimes, and then other videosI'll post and they'll get
150,000 views and so like.
With stuff like that, youreally just got to be persistent
and you got to just keepposting as often as you can,
trying everything you can,because if you don't try
everything, that's a.
That's a you know opportunitythat you didn't take and you're

(01:01:31):
not going to reap the benefitsfrom that.
So I think, just touching onthat, that point real, real
quick is just be persistent andkeep trying and eventually you
might have one that just reallyblows up, like mine did.

Speaker 1 (01:01:45):
So yeah, 100%.
And we're coming up to the endof the episode and just a couple
of final thoughts I want to getfrom yourself.
Is you know there's some totalof your journey to become an
artist?
What do you think is the mostimportant lesson or lessons that

(01:02:05):
you can impart on inspiringartists or aspiring artists?

Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
Yeah, I'd say my.
My biggest piece of advice andI give this to everybody is just
, you know, if you're, if you're, a painter and you want to get
a painting, paint as often asyou can.
Paint at every opportunity youfeel a tiny bit of inspiration.
Latch onto that inspiration anduse it.

(01:02:32):
If you're, you know, a pencilartist, every second you get to
draw and you feel anyinspiration to draw, even if you
don't feel any inspiration todraw, take that opportunity to
draw.
Like, keep a sketchbook withyou, keep a keep a little pad
with you.
I keep a sketchbook in mypocket all the time, just in

(01:02:52):
case I have an idea that I wantto get out.
Just take, take, latch ontothat one thing you want to get
good at and do it a lot, becausethe, the people that have only
put, you know, 10, 15 hours intotheir practice are going to be
miles and miles behind someonewho's put 150 hours into their
practice or someone like mewho's put probably over a

(01:03:14):
thousand hours into theirpractice over the last year or
two.
Like you, got to put that timein.
If you don't put the time in,you're not going to improve, and
that's like the biggest pieceof advice I can give anyone is
put those hours in, put everyounce of energy like and don't
wear yourself out, don't burnyourself out.
If you feel yourself burningout, just lower that time a

(01:03:36):
little bit.
But I had someone comment onone of my videos the other day
saying they were they weretrying daily drawing practice
and that's that's a really goodpractice to do is to to practice
daily.
But they said they were gettingdiscouraged and burnt out.
So my advice was um, if you're,if you're in one of those like

(01:03:56):
weeks or a month where you'rejust really struggling and
you're getting burnt out, takefive minutes every day and limit
yourself to five minutes, causeif you set, if you go in the
goal of practicing every day andyou're spending an hour or two
hours I did a daily, a dailychallenge in October.
I did Inktober it was extremelydifficult to do two hours every

(01:04:20):
day Limit yourself to fiveminutes.
If you can just get up out ofbed and sit down at your drawing
table or in front of the easeland you can put five minutes in,
it will become easier andeasier to make that time longer,
because the hardest thing aboutany sort of practice and any

(01:04:40):
sort of putting time intogetting better or something is
just showing up.
If you just show up, you willimprove, because even just that
five minutes of practice willget you better than you were the
day before.
And if daily isn't going welland you still can't do that five
minutes daily, do it everyother day.
And if that's, if that's likeyour goal to do something

(01:05:03):
consistent practicing to getbetter, do five minutes every
other day.
As you do that five minutes ofevery other day, it'll get
easier and easier and you'llfind yourself sitting there for
10 minutes the next time.
You'll find yourself sittingthere for an hour randomly, like
it's.
It will get easier and it'llit'll just make it much more
manageable If you just just showup, just start, because

(01:05:27):
starting something is thehardest part of anything is just
getting the willpower to oh, Iwant to lay in bed for this
extra hour today that I have onthe weekend, and then you have,
you know, a meeting later.
Well, that was an hour you couldhave spent, you know, being
productive or honing your skills, and so I think just that, just

(01:05:48):
that five minutes.
Just limit yourself to the fiveminutes to start with, and if
you can make that five minuteshappen.
You can make you know what youwant to happen later.
Happen If that's an hour, ifthat's 30 minutes, whatever.
Just just beginning is thehardest part.
So I'd say that's my biggestpiece of advice is to just just
practice, and if you can getthat practice and you will

(01:06:12):
improve.

Speaker 1 (01:06:14):
No, excuse me, a hundred percent, that's.
It's the same, I think, withany creative endeavor, isn't it
Just summoning the willpower tostart?
And then, once you've started,it's, it's so easy.
And one thing I would recommendis I did an entire episode on
the seven different types ofrest.
And, funny, you mentioned thatcreative rest is one of the.
If you're naturally quitecreative, you can get burnt out

(01:06:36):
creatively.
And you, you know, rest is sucha generic term that you need to
decide are you creatively burntout or you you've been using
too much digital.
Have you, you know, physicallyexhausted?
You know?
I think it's very key toidentify that rather than just
saying generically, I'm tired,you know, and you can, you can

(01:06:57):
rest adequately in that way, butI really like that.
It's like even getting 1%better a day, five minutes a
year, five minutes every otherday or, you know, even weekly,
it's better than doingabsolutely nothing.
And to wrap it all up, what'sthe question you've never been
asked.

Speaker 2 (01:07:19):
I tried, I tried so hard to think of one beforehand.

Speaker 1 (01:07:23):
It's.
Do you know what I was thinkingabout About a quarter of the
way through this episode.
I think you may haveaccidentally answered it in the
you were saying nobody ever asksyou about how much hard work
you had to put in.
Yeah, it's just, people justassumed you were naturally
talented, if you can think ofone or if you do think of one.
But I find a question thereperhaps is you know what is the

(01:07:49):
most inspiring piece of art youthink you've ever created?
Like what was?
What was that when you finallylaid the brush down and you had
to take a step back and justappreciate it for a moment?

Speaker 2 (01:08:04):
So maybe my favorite piece that I've created Well, I
always say it's the piece I justfinished, most recently.
You know, I always oh.

Speaker 1 (01:08:17):
I like that.

Speaker 2 (01:08:19):
It's just like my artwork is like a part of me.
You know, like I put in allthis effort, I put in all this
time to make this piece and ifI'm really proud of it, like
it's because I've gotten to thepoint where like this is now my
favorite piece and it's becauseI've worked up to the point of
all my previous paintings arenow like I had the skills that

(01:08:42):
I've picked up and thesetechniques I've picked up from
all my previous paintings andI've created this using all
these skills.
So I have a piece that I justfinished two days ago sitting on
my easel right now and it'sposted on my Instagram and my
Facebook and my oh yes.

(01:09:02):
It's a character portrait of acharacter from Elden Ring and
people on YouTube you can seethis and people not on YouTube.
You can find these at mysocials.
But this is a piece of Ronniethe Witch and I am so proud of
it, I'm just so happy with howit turned out.

(01:09:22):
I think she turned outbeautiful and I love her giant
hat and the moon and the starsbehind her.
Yeah, I think that's theeasiest or most accurate answer.
For me is just the piece Ifinished last, because I'm just
so proud of it and it's I justlove how it turned out.

Speaker 1 (01:09:44):
Yeah, that's a really nice answer.
I like that because it's alwaysthe next bit that You're not
like.
Oh well, I've never painted apiece that I like as much as
that one.
It's just generated an entirelynew piece of art.
It's a total original.
It's never been done before.
Many people have painted thesame person or idea, but this is

(01:10:07):
truly yours.
It's a one of a kind, so Ireally like that answer.
Yeah, it's been an absolutepleasure to have you on the show
, aaron, and I'm sure everybodyelse would love to stay in touch
with yourself and your content.
So where can people find you?

Speaker 2 (01:10:22):
At Painted Dragon Studios is my handle for all my
socials On Instagram.
There's little underscores inbetween Painted Dragon Studios
and on Twitter it is alsounderscores, I believe.
But if you just Google PaintedDragon Studios, you'll come up

(01:10:43):
with all of my socials.
You can buy my work at PaintedDragon Shop.
I sell all of my prints andoriginals on my Etsy shop.
But, yeah, I can provide somelinks as well.
All my socials are PaintedDragon Studios.

Speaker 1 (01:11:05):
Happy days.
Yeah, and I will use them linksand put them in the show notes
and people can go in and viewyour art and stay up to date
with all your content as youproduce it.
But once again, Aaron, thankyou so much for coming on the
show.

Speaker 2 (01:11:20):
Thanks for inviting me.
It's been a pleasure.

Speaker 1 (01:11:23):
There you go, folks.
That concludes today's episode.
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(01:12:06):
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(01:12:26):
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