We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Steve Myers a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Steve, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

I think there are a couple, but mainly anytime I can work on making someone’s story come to life in a comic. I’ve been approached by a few writers now to work on their dream projects and seeing the end result has always been amazing. Its a lot of hard work, but once you get the book in print and you’re holding it and see how excited that writer is to see their baby out in the world it makes it all worthwhile.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’ve been doing art ever since I was a kid. I would even play sick to stay home and make my comics. The ideas have always been there, the skill, not as much haha. But its been a long journey to just get better and better.

Around 2014 is when I got my first job as a paid comic artist. I was able to quit one of my regular jobs to pursue it and a few years later was able to grow my freelance business to finally be able to quit all my side jobs and be a full time artist. It’s been a lot of ups and downs but the support from fans friends and family has been amazing.

I’m most proud of being able to work on commissions that mean something to people. I’ve done quite a few dealing with loss of a loved one. Memorializing them into a picture or story, or as fantasy characters they had loved. This always hits the hardest that someone trusts me on those projects, but always feels the best.

I’m hoping to push further into working on my own projects in the next couple years however and becoming my own boss. With avenues like live streaming and monetization of social media, I think there are more possibilities than ever for creatives to be able to fund the dream projects of their own, and thats the current goal!

Alright – so here’s a fun one. What do you think about NFTs?

I hope NFTs can iron out all the issues they currently are experiencing. Its a tricky medium and I know there is a lot of blowback currently. I think once things slow down and artists and curators on that end can come together to meet whatever ethical demands society has of the platforms, it can certainly be a good thing to our industry. I have a lot of hope that all the issues get solved and artists can really start benefiting from creating on a much larger level and fans can feel a more personal involvement in the projects that are being done digitally these days.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative?

That it isnt always fun hahaha. Its a lot of work. A lot. Clients dont always understand why they’re paying so much for work you can sometimes do incredibly fast. But there is years of study that went into that skillset. You’re paying for a skillset, long hours, lost social life, etc etc, that made that artist get so good. And I hope non-artist clients come to understand that most of us arent living in luxury. A lot of that money is lost to taxes, home expenses, and all the other things a normal employer would be taking care of. As a small business owner and freelancer, we’re responsible for all of those things ourselves so we need to bill for that. As well as certain online shopping sites taking sometimes more than 10 percent of our sales money and payment sites taking another 5-7 percent at times, the cost of a single commission can really add up just for us to cover all these fees. Its not something artist enjoy either, I would say about 80 percent of artists despise raising prices and will even lose their business because they refuse to do it. But its they way of the world now and we hope that those of you that buy from us and commission us understand those things and dont take anything personally.

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