Illustrator & Artist Valerie A. Ryan

What does it mean to be a Freelance Illustrator?

My name is Valerie Ryan and I've been a freelance online cartoon & graphic artist for quite some time now. I am 29 years old and have been happily married to my husband Mathew Ryan for 9 years with whom I have the unimaginable "Perfect Life". We don't have children but we do have an adorable miniature schnauzer who goes by the name of "Kiko". I was born and raised in Montreal, QC but I now live in beautiful British Columbia (Canada).

My interests are drawing (of course!), swimming, biking, camping, hiking, tennis & reading. Although techno is my favorite musical genre, my favorite musical artist (Pink Floyd) isn't a techno musician. My favorite color is blue and my least favorite is red. In the past I was a huge MMORPG Video Game fan and played both Everquest and World of Warcraft. I also enjoy playing console games, mostly the Final Fantasy series.

As a youngin' in school I used to always get in trouble for having sketches all over my notes. My teachers would bust me for drawing instead of paying attention. I would create characters and stories and dream of one day seeing these characters in a comic book or an anime series. I have always been eager to draw. One of my first subjects of obsession was Ariel from The Little Mermaid. I've spent a lot my free time in my youth drawing Disney characters. When I first saw the anime show "Sailor Moon" I was instantly captured! Taking a huge interest in the anime style, I've been teaching myself through a lot of practice and since I started commissioning I feel that I have improved a great deal.

I am currently in art school. I am attending Vancouver College of Designs 'Graphic Design' course from July 2010 up until January 2012. After having worked as a freelance graphic artist for so many years, I decided it is time to have the proper schooling behind me to enforce it. I have enjoyed working freelance because the work is always different and I have met many people. I have had only good experiences in my years working as a freelance artist online and I believe I owe some thanks to all my great customers for that!

Personality & Tendancies

Being as self-analytical as possible, I would have to say that my personality is still hard to capture in words. I am overly friendly and many people tell me I have a knack for making people around me feel comfortable. I am organized and I have an obsession with efficiency & accuracy. I am honest to a fault and dislike dishonesty in others. I am also known for having a bit of a stubborn streak and I am extremely competitive!

As for spoken languages, I speak both English and French though English is my mother tongue. I have to admit my typing in French is less then average, and I haven't spoken it in years but I can still hold a full conversation.

So you see I have a fairly interesting life as everything I do is always changing. Every new person whom I work for is helping me sharpen my skills and learn new styles or showing me what others deem important in a piece of art. Its taken me a while to learn to use the tools I have (Adobe Software for example) to their fullest especially without training or schooling up until this point. But I think I am finally at a point where I can say that I am satisfied with my work. I still have a few things to learn about creating homepages, which I am planning to learn in the next year or so, but overall I am happy with the outcome of my dedication to perfecting my homepage, artwork and service. That's not to say that I won't continue to strive for more! I am excited to see where my art will evolve to in years to come.