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Heather Castles loves to paint. Designing greeting cards gives her the opportunity to break out her watercolors. She specializes in "old-school illustration styles" such as watercolor, pencil and acrylic.

"Basically I do a fresh take on traditional illustration mediums, as there's always a need for that warm painted look," she says.

"I think the most rewarding thing about my work is seeing the final cards in shops. Then flipping it over and seeing your name on the back is the icing on the cake," says Castles.

Castles was hired at a greeting card and stationery wholesaler after she finished her diploma in illustration and design at college. She gained experience designing and illustrating cards. She became an art director at another card publisher. Now she works as a freelance illustrator and designer.

"I continue to find employment by researching card companies online, and sending samples of my work to them," she explains.

Designing greeting cards is fun. But if you want to make ends meet, you'll need an additional source of income. Castles says that it's rare to be only a greeting card illustrator. She also does illustration for children's books, banners, brochures, video game packaging and online game concept development. The Internet is a big benefit to her for advertising.

She occasionally sells e-cards online. But she doesn't think that e-cards will threaten traditional paper cards. "Giving a paper card shows the recipient that they're worth you taking the time to go out and purchase a card for them. E-cards can be sent in a matter of minutes without a lot of forethought. How many mothers do you know who would be happy getting an e-mail greeting on Mother's Day from their kids?"

Since she does traditional illustrations, she doesn't compete directly with digital artists. She's found her niche. Castles still does her sketches and painting by hand. Then she scans the artwork and does color-correction and touching-up to prepare the artwork for the printer. She says digital art works well for juvenile and funky cards.

"Traditional illustration, because of the warmth of the paint, can fill niches for the card recipient that digital can't always fill, such as sympathy, anniversary, birthday and wedding," says Castles. She says you have to think about the recipient of the card. Grandmothers might like to receive a softer, watercolor card instead of a funky card with a digital image. But she admits that the shift to digital is looming.

"Give it another 50 years and we'll likely see a big shift to more digital styles for those traditional cards because that's what we've grown up seeing and will feel traditional to us," she says.

Kimberly Schwede does almost all her work on the computer. "Occasionally I will hand draw an image, scan it, open it in Photoshop and place it as a bitmap image in Illustrator where I apply color to it. I really like the hand-drawn, rough-sketch look," says Schwede. "Sometimes people tell me what they want to see while others give me creative freedom."

Schwede is an illustrator and graphic designer based in California. She has a bachelor's degree in communication arts. After graduation, she worked for a design firm. Then she did marketing materials for a real estate office. She began to do freelance work and realized she could work for herself. Now she's her own boss and she loves it.

Greeting card design is a small percentage of her freelance income. "People can make a living from it, but it's competitive. I think something to consider is the cost of living where you live. I'm sure it's easier to live off it in a small town versus a big city," she says. She also illustrates children's books, textile graphics, magazine illustrations and logos.

Ian Challis has embraced digital artwork. He met his business partner David Roos in architecture school. They use their design and fine art skills to create home decor, gifts, textiles and paper products such as greeting cards. "Pretty much everything we do is created in Photoshop. Even the things that look natural are done in Photoshop," he says.

Digital media is convenient and flexible. Clients often request changes to the artwork. With digital art, he can make those changes in half an hour. It might take a full day to redo a drawing by hand.

"Digital media makes an artist more inclined to be flexible," he says. Sending images digitally is also convenient. Challis doesn't have a lot of equipment in his office. He uses a computer, printer and scanner. He says the low barrier to manufacturing cards means that anyone could make cards at home.

He recommends trying your hand by producing your own greeting cards. Design the cards on your computer. Print the design on high-end stationery. Then embellish them with glitter, ribbons or anything you can imagine. Challis says to try making and selling your own cards as a summer job. Either sell them directly at a craft market or have a local gift shop sell them for you.

"Doing this is a great chance to see if your cards sell. You can test the market."