7. What advice can you give wannabe illustrators?

"Never give up, never surrender!" Seriously, though, it can be tough. And although it's a cliché, it is also sadly quite often true that "it's not what you know, but who". But don't be discouraged.

First off, join an artist or illustrator association. I am a Fellow of the International Association of Astronomical Artists (www.iaaa.org), and they are great if you want to get into space art. Then, you need to get to know your potential clients, learn which magazines, publishers, whatnot, will actually want to publish your work. No sense sending a beautifully rendered painting of a spiral galaxy to a magazine called, I don't know, Horse and Countryside. Okay, extreme example, but you get the picture. Once you know what sort of art you want to do and who will want to print it, get in touch with them. You can find out how to contact them in publications such as Writers' and Artists' Yearbook (in the UK, but no doubt other countries have similar tomes). Send your target clients some samples of your work and then wait. And then wait a bit more. Then perhaps send a chasing letter. And just keep at it. Eventually, if you have a degree of talent, somebody will spot it and you'll get in print.

But don't stop there! It is a misconception that once you have made it in print, it gets easier. Okay, perhaps it's not entirely false, but it's not that simple. I am constantly sending out samples to people who already know me, or I email them just to stay in touch. Otherwise they forget about me and they use somebody else's art and I have to live on bread and water. Most of the samples I send out to new potential clients just vanish into some black hole somewhere. It's tiring, but you have to know how to network as well as how to draw. And you need patience.

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