Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Steve Condon. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Steve thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

My wife cajoled me into learning to paint based on my other interests and hobbies, though I disliked it at first. She got me started on the path with a couple of well thought out Christmas gifts. I would have tried to be more consistent early on, but my interest ramped up over time. Being more consistent now has accelerated my learning, even if it can still be a challenge.
The most essential skills were and always will be the fundamentals of paint itself, and concepts like color and light. Specifically for me, learning to airbrush, how to make stencils, and how to paint in a comic/manga style accelerated my business.
The biggest obstacle has always been time. I’ve split my time between this and my career in IT. My painting and streaming really came to a head as a way to destress. Now I also run my own IT business and have a young child.

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’m 39 and have been painting miniatures for the last 13 years. I began with gaming miniatures for Warhammer 40k and have expanded into other games and art pieces over the years. I got started as a content creator by streaming on Twitch as a bit of a dare from my wife, who is my business partner as a fiber artist. My content and persona resonated with viewers and I became known for my bright paintjobs and deep dive discussions on anime, manga and music. I have not been a commission artist traditionally, but have taken on work for various clients including providing studio art pieces for the game, Judgement. Currently, I have slowed my content creation to focus on live paint instruction, but can still be found on Twitch, YouTube, and TikTok. I currently regularly teach at Cardboard Corner Cafe in Overland Park and will be travelling the states in 2023 for various conventions.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

In early 2021, my mother was diagnosed with COVID and my wife and I had to relocate and take care of my father. During this, I had been releasing weekly videos in lieu of streaming as consistently due to work and family. I managed to release one a week for an entire year. In June 2021, the week after my 52nd video, my mother passed. I will always miss her and her encouragement as she watched my streams and what I had built out of my passions, In the time since, I have refocused on the teaching aspect of my business and look back to my mom’s focus on education for inspiration.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I had to unlearn turning down money. Early on in streaming, I didn’t feel right taking “donations” or “tips” during my streams. It felt like some weird form of charity and I wasn’t looking to make money streaming, just having some social time while I practiced painting. I turned off the ability to do so and immediately got a few concerned messages from viewers asking where it went because they wanted to support me. I asked my wife and she explained that they found value in the content I was creating, it wasn’t any more complicated than that. I was being silly.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://linktr.ee/reiner72
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/reiner72paints/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/reiner72/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/steven-condon-794a74a/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/reiner72paints
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/reiner72
• Other: https://www.twitch.tv/reiner72 https://www.patreon.com/reiner72 https://www.tiktok.com/@reiner72paints

Image Credits
Table with game: ImpendingDuff, Draxx01, SuzieQQ