Good morning Reader ☀️

I hope your week is going fantastic so far!

I've been very busy with work (my gf jokes that I say this every week haha), but I have some great art to show you! And great news too 😊 Yes, despite the title! I will explain.

All the books have been shipped! 🚢

I was sharing some of my progress last week, but I’m now happy to announce that all the people who participated in Susie & The Blue Roof Witch book launch giveaway have their orders on the way!

For those of you who don’t know, I organized a giveaway to celebrate the release of the children’s book I’ve been working on over the past 7 months; the catch was that everyone who joined would get the book for free!

I’m sure some of you might be asking why I did that; but before I explain, I want to share some stats with you!

Where are you guys coming from? :)

Fifteen people in total joined the giveaway!

And the most magical thing for me was to see where every one of you is located:

12 are in Europe, of which 4 are from France (salut!), 4 from Germany and Austria (hallo!), 2 from the UK (hi!), and 2 from Poland (siema!). And last but not least, the 3 remaining are from Canada and India :)

It just made me so happy to send those packages all over the world!

Sending anything is a struggle for me—I sometimes work late and miss the opening hours of the post office, and the language barrier can be an obstacle, especially when sending things internationally.

But giving away my art (prints and books) has been a huge help to improve my confidence and process; I have a lot to learn, but I’m at least way more organized now!

How did the book sell? And the reason I gave it away

Now, I know some of you have been wondering how the sales have been: after all this work, how many books did you sell?

The answer: None!

Now don’t feel bad for me, this was expected!
Let me explain: Very few people know about my art, and even fewer have heard about my book. But on top of this, I happily gave it away to the people who were the most interested (you, if you joined the book giveaway!).

So I very much expected to not sell any copies at this stage.

But why did I give it away?​
First of all, to thank you for following my journey every week. This is something I really wanted to celebrate 😊

Second, because I clearly saw that despite the book being pricey for a paperback this size ($12 + Shipping on Amazon US, for example), I also would get very little royalties on each sale—about $2 per copy.

If I were to compensate myself just for the work I put into it over the past months, I would need to sell thousands of them.

Art is my passion, and I’m happy to put money into it without expecting any returns right away; I thankfully have a full-time job to support me while I explore my creativity freely.

So the last thing I want is to squeeze a few bucks from the people who support me the most! Because I don’t even need it.

I could obviously work on making the book cheaper by ordering in bulk or changing my printer (and I might do it at some point!), but this is not the problem I need to solve: rather, I need to show my art to more people!

And this is why I’ll be bringing the book to Krakowski Festiwal Komiksu (Krakow’s Comics Festival) on the 28th and 29th of June :)

The book will be shown there, making its official debut! I hope to meet a lot of people there and apply what I learned from my last convention!​

Some sketches I made for friends! 🌿

Last Friday evening, I went to an event organized by art students. The goal was simple: exchange each other’s sketchbooks and draw in them.

It was very fun, and a nice change of pace :)

I didn’t manage to take a picture of everything I drew (nor what people made in my sketchbook!), but here are some of the pictures I took!

Ironically, I think this evening I learned that it’s okay to not always go out of your comfort zone, especially when you want to relax and have fun with your peers.

I was putting a lot of pressure on myself at the beginning, but I did my best work later in the evening when I was more relaxed and focused on what I love to draw the most. It was very fun; I hope to join again next year!

Speaking of collaborating with other artists, I’m working on a small community project I’m excited to share with the world, something that would mix art and my day job as a programmer. Here is a screenshot for now:

I’m excited to share the details with you soon!

Would you like to color my art? 🎨

Someone made a comment on one of my posts, and I couldn’t wait to ask you: Would you be interested in some coloring book pages with my art?

I’ve been thinking about making a coloring book for some time, but I realized we could start with something simpler: what about some printable pages to download?

I could make one for you each time I finish an illustration :)

I’m not used to coloring myself, so this is why I need your feedback: is this something that interests you? If so, please reply to this email or send me a DM!

I’m very curious about what you think.

And that's all for this week! I actually had more planned to share with you, but I need to respect your time and stop myself sometimes 😌

More seriously, I hope you're enjoying receiving these issues every week! Have a great rest of your day now!

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And as always,

Take care,
- Nighten

This email is part of my art Newsletter. Invite a friend to join the club: https://club.nighten.fr​