Besides that, be ready to juggle day jobs for a while till you start making stable income from illustration.

1. Build a really good website; It doesn’t have to be highly designed, just make it user friendly, organized and show who you are as an artist.
2. Learn how to update your own site. Update the contents as often as you can. Website that does not get updated often is worse than not having a website especially in the early stage in your career.
3. Look like a pro, get a real e-mail address. Free e-mail address makes you look like an armature. Get @yourdmain.com, you can even forward that to your gmail. At least you look like a pro to them.  
4. Learn to write good e-mails. E-mails are often recipients's first impression of you. Don’t be a spam. Don’t be a stalker. Don't write like if you are text messaging your friend.
5. Do research on whom you want to work with. Make your own mailing list by visiting newsstands and writing down information one by one. Sending cards is good old fashioned way that stil works. 50 hand-picked names on the list works a lot better than 5000 random names on a list you buy.

Here is a list of the books you should read. Althgh I recommend them all, the first one is A MUST for all new illustrators.
+ How To Be An Illustrator by Darrel Rees
+ Inside The Business Of Illustration by Steven Heller and Marshall Arisman
+ How To Be A Graphic Designer, Without Losing Your Soul by Adrian Shaughnessy
+ It’s Not How Good You Are, It’s How Good You Want to Be by Paul Arden

A. It is a matter of preference. Some people like to just wake up, make a coffee and start working in their pajamas. Some people like to have clear separation between work and personal life. I am the latter.
I like to get dressed, take the subway and go to my office every morning. I like to relax and never have to worry about e-mail when I am home (I still don’t have internet there). Most of all, I like interaction with people at work, whether they are my studio-mates or neighbors who are in different design related industry.
Illustration is a lonely business. You can spend hours, or days and days just staring at your drawing table. Why not have a bit of stimulation and mild distraction from people who work around you? And to get advice, or to give advice?

If you are considering of getting a studio, here is my advice;
Find studio-mates who you really get along with, and who will never be your direct competitors, and whom you will be happy for their success and that they will feel the same for you.
Work can sometimes be stressful. The last thing you need is to make your studio into another cause of your headache.

A. I have never been asked to show my resume upon a client assigning me a job. We illustrators get work because of our portfolio and not because of our resume.
It doesn’t matter if you have PhD or you are a high school drop out. What matters are your work and your confidence in your own work.
A few years ago I was asked to judge Art Directors Club annual competition, one of the most prestigious in design industry. Chuck Anderson who judged with me that year was 19 with full of experience already. Does he ever need to go back to an art school? The answer is obvious.

Having said that, I went back to school and got formal art education. And I did that more than 10 years after finishing my business degree. It was because I didn’t have confidence in my work at the time. Whenever I met someone who went to art school I felt inferior. The only way for me to overcome my fear was to go back to art school. I learnt so much. I loved it. It is because of this experience now I can be working as a freelance illustrator. It was one of the best decisions I have ever made. 

Whether you think you need a formal art education or not; the answer is within you. 

1. If you are still in college, think of WHY you need to go straight to graduate school now. Chances are, you are scared of getting out of school, or feeling like extra two years in school would buy you time.
   If it is your first time getting out of school, trust me, the best education you can get is to get out to the real world.  If you start getting jobs and doing fine as an illustrator, do you really need to go back to school again?
   If you decide, after how many ever years you are out of school, that you can use that extra two years well, go back to school. You will appreciate the experience 10 times more.
2. Please consult your financial situation. Calculate how much student loan you have to take out, and how much debt you will be having out of school. Is it realistic? Please have your head leveled and make a right financial decision. The last thing I want to see is a young artist in a huge debt.
3. Please don’t think of the MFA as an instant passport to illustration success.
   SVA MFA Illustration has great reputation, thanks to many alumni who are working in different fields of illustration. I am extremely proud to be a part of its’ alumni.
   But we are still freelancers, and it is not the MFA that is making the alumni successful. It is each of their hard work during and after the two-year education. Unlike MBA from Harvard, it doesn’t guarantee you anything. You still have to cultivate your career yourself.
4. Please don’t expect for instructors to hold your hands and guide you like your BFA studies. Be ready for two years of open schedule that you can build your own projects where the instructors are there to help you. If you are ready for it, you will have an amazing time.

Have I been discouraging? I hope not.
Again, It was the best education I have ever gotten. I can recommend it to anyone. I just want you to apply exactly at the right moment when you are ready to really appreciate the unique two-year education you will be getting.
Good luck!

Q. How did you come up with a distinctive style in your work? I am trying to figure out my own style.

I often meet young illustrators who are struggling to try to “find” their style.  My advice is: style is not something you can force yourself to  “look for” or “find”. You are you, different from everyone else, and your personal voice should already be within you. Learn to let that come out in your work.

I grew up in Japan in the 1960s and 70s with comic books and TV cartoons. I naturally started drawing by imitating them. I stopped reading comics or watching anime by the early 80s, but by then I wasn’t able to get rid of my early influences and actually hating it.
After I moved to New York and started art school, my initial goal was to learn to draw and paint “like an American”. It didn’t take long to realize that didn’t work. I just don’t think, paint, or use colors like Americans among other things. My instructors helped me realize it is OK to being a Japanese person who’s work had early influences of my own popular culture. 
Of course, the process was not easy as it sounds here. It took me a long time, starting from learning not to hate my own work.

So, what would be more useful than coming up with superficial gimmicky style is that you go out for a soul search, although I am not to try to sound new age here.

A. Absolutely not! Don’t get caught up in the trend and what’s new. Be true to yourself and who you are as an artist. If you hate painting and love computer, welcome to the world of digital art. But if you love painting and traditional medium, why quit?

Legendary designer Paul Rand once said,  “What’s new has nothing to do with what’s good. What is good is timeless”.  If you are a good traditional artist and love it, there is no reason for you to switch to what you really don’t love.
Because you feel like it is old fashioned? You live in 21st century, reflect your time in your own way. Learn from people like Sam Weber, James Jean, Hellovon or James Blagden.
Because it takes too long? You need to get faster. Shawn Barber paints in oil and finish up a portrait in less than a day. Chris Buzelli knows every single trick to make his paintings dry fast from years of experience. Look at Tim O’Brien’s detailed realistic work, and see how many illustration he puts out a year.

I use what I use, because I cannot think of any other way. I tried to be a painter (I still paint quite OK), and soon realized I think in lines and flat colors, not in forms. I can draw lines and patterns forever and feel meditative. Painting frustrates me and I keep thinking of how many more hours I have to sit in front of an easel. It was just not for me.
People often think I have a comic influence and Japanese edge which are considered trendy. but I grew up in Japan and started drawing imitating comics I read . This is jut me being me. You cannot expect me to draw and paint like Americans, or anyone else.

Just need to stick to what you love. Trends just come and go. You don’t come and go. So, be you.

Rapidohgrap, nib pens, watercolors and other paint medium, pastel, etc are hard to use and take a long time to learn to be good at. But when you master them, it allows you to do 100X more than the cheap fake mediums do.
When you are in school, you can make mistakes. You learn by making mistakes and become a better artist. In the real world, you cannot make mistakes or you will loose a client forever.

I am not trying to be mean or hard on them. My job as a teacher is to let my students make mistakes and learn while they can.
If they learn the real medium and at the end come to a conclusion that a ballpoint pen is the only medium that works for them, then I would be happy for them, really. (And, I do love Hope Gangloff's work.)

1. All the request e-mails go into my “reply to” folder. Whenever I have extra time (which is not often) I write back to some in the folder. Sometimes writing back takes me months.  (I have to admit there are e-mails I haven’t replied in more than a year.) Please don’t expect me to reply quickly.
2. I am an art college instructor myself, and I take learning very seriously.  Please write me only if you are looking for a constructive criticism.
   If you are looking simply for praise, I am not the person you want to write to.
3. (I hope this does not apply to you.) You will be surprised how and what people write us illustrators, and how many people actually write us back to say "thank you".
   After all these years I now only write back to those who know how to write a stranger for a favor. It may be easy to shoot an e-mail, but it takes time and effort to write back with comments.

A. There used to be a cool wallet, notebook and greeting card manufactured by NookArt of Australia, but they are all sold out as far as I know.

Currently (October 2008) there is no product available for purchase, but a few are in works including t-shirts and cell phone packaging, which may take a while till they come out. Any new product release will be announced in NEWS SECTION.