gamerprinter
Mapper/Publisher
So you're asking what am I doing now? I seem to be a lot older than many of you - I'm 52, though I don't feel necessarily much different than when I was 30. A little rougher shape physically and bit gray in the hair, but in my head I'm not really different.
Seeing my parents struggle now with major medical issues (mother suffered a stroke several years ago and requires care, dad recently suffered a heart attack and triple bypass surgery), issues about taking care of them, their home and their future are a concern. Despite the economy, my dad's finances are secure so paying for them is not an issue. Which gives me pause, in that I've only ever run my own businesses, and while have some retirement plans in place, it's nothing like my parents - so I wonder about my future when I get to their age.
Right now, I'm doing my game cartography as a full-time freelance occupation, and though at least the video game strategy guide side pays well, its nothing like working for a corporation with more retirement incentives than what I can offer myself. Still with over 20 years of self employment "being my own boss" I doubt I'd fare well in a corporate environment, let alone having someone as my boss. I'm having more luck with experience in receiving commission work - I still seem to have desired skills. Really I've gotten more freelance opportunities in the last 10 months than the previous 8 years, I seem to be in good shape with keeping myself cash flow positive, though I'm not getting rich.
Also working on some side income streams. I have well over 100 non-published personal maps (perhaps more than 200), many of them posted in my map emporeum thread, and I'm going to spend much of my summer monetizing them. Throwing grids on them, insuring the scale and resolution is correct then preparing them as both whole map, and letter-sized sliced maps PDF files with accompanying virtual tabletop ready JPG files (without grids). RPG sales of maps don't make but a few sales a month each, but I've learned that the secret with RPG product sales is having a huge line of products. So I want to try and get 50 or more of my maps and map symbols sets available for sales. Again if you're only selling a half dozen of each product a month, only by having many products doing that at the same time is capable of generating any more serious income. I've already released 5 products over the past 3 weeks - an undersea domed city map (for sci-fi games), a hand-drawn swamp map, a dwarven mine, and mostly recently an 1880's train set (floorplans) from locomotive to caboose and a train station as a destinations. Strangely (to me) the railroad cars are selling pretty well, I never thought that would be a "best seller".
I'm guessing I'll still be creating maps, map symbols, writing RPG content even far in the future - I see myself making maps in the nursing home if and when it comes to that.
I'm trying to make my finances more secure, and am hopeful.
Seeing my parents struggle now with major medical issues (mother suffered a stroke several years ago and requires care, dad recently suffered a heart attack and triple bypass surgery), issues about taking care of them, their home and their future are a concern. Despite the economy, my dad's finances are secure so paying for them is not an issue. Which gives me pause, in that I've only ever run my own businesses, and while have some retirement plans in place, it's nothing like my parents - so I wonder about my future when I get to their age.
Right now, I'm doing my game cartography as a full-time freelance occupation, and though at least the video game strategy guide side pays well, its nothing like working for a corporation with more retirement incentives than what I can offer myself. Still with over 20 years of self employment "being my own boss" I doubt I'd fare well in a corporate environment, let alone having someone as my boss. I'm having more luck with experience in receiving commission work - I still seem to have desired skills. Really I've gotten more freelance opportunities in the last 10 months than the previous 8 years, I seem to be in good shape with keeping myself cash flow positive, though I'm not getting rich.
Also working on some side income streams. I have well over 100 non-published personal maps (perhaps more than 200), many of them posted in my map emporeum thread, and I'm going to spend much of my summer monetizing them. Throwing grids on them, insuring the scale and resolution is correct then preparing them as both whole map, and letter-sized sliced maps PDF files with accompanying virtual tabletop ready JPG files (without grids). RPG sales of maps don't make but a few sales a month each, but I've learned that the secret with RPG product sales is having a huge line of products. So I want to try and get 50 or more of my maps and map symbols sets available for sales. Again if you're only selling a half dozen of each product a month, only by having many products doing that at the same time is capable of generating any more serious income. I've already released 5 products over the past 3 weeks - an undersea domed city map (for sci-fi games), a hand-drawn swamp map, a dwarven mine, and mostly recently an 1880's train set (floorplans) from locomotive to caboose and a train station as a destinations. Strangely (to me) the railroad cars are selling pretty well, I never thought that would be a "best seller".
I'm guessing I'll still be creating maps, map symbols, writing RPG content even far in the future - I see myself making maps in the nursing home if and when it comes to that.
I'm trying to make my finances more secure, and am hopeful.
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