I work full time, and freelance, and I've had a similar situation to yours skylebones, where an old, regular client contacted me for work, I've got 3 projects at works on the guy, and 3 freelance projects on the go.
@skylebones:
So for this existing client that has contacted me for a new project, I've done a number of jobs for him, some big, a lot of smaller update type of work on existing work, which is quick. But this new job is bigger, and I couldn't take it on right now as my schedule is full, so i told him that my schedule would be open in 2 months. He said he's happy to wait that period, and the briefing process has started in the mean time, but actual work will begin in 2 months - which is a great way to work.
@Justin Meisse:
So for me, I schedule all of my freelance, so I don't have deadlines that all occur close to each other, all my projects are staggered and don't overlap too much. I'm still getting a full nights sleep, not pulling all nighters, maybe a few late ones, and early mornings, but i'm not exhausted.
It's all in scheduling the projects, and agreeing on timelines and deadlines with clients - good comms will always help. Sometimes a client needs a job urgently (normally new clients, not regular clients) - I don't like rush jobs, so I just put a rush fee on top of my normal fee to discourage rush jobs - doing that, I often find if the client is desperate, they'll pay it, I'll basically need to pull an all nighter to pull a rush job deadline, The client usually asks at the end of the project, "how can I avoid the rush fee" - to which i reply I need a good lead time (2 weeks etc). Sometimes the client turns my quote down and finds someone else, which is perfectly fine, it's an open market, and my rate is my rate, I'm not desperate for work, and rush fees help me get a full nights sleep(usually).
Also, I charge a bit higher for my freelance, as I have a full time job, the freelance is extra work, and my higher rate discourages a lot of the lower end clients, who expect a lot for very little (they're often the noisiest, with the most revisions, or don't know what they want when they come to you - which result in longer hours than you anticipate, which results in less take home at the end of the day). A higher rate also places more value on my time and the work that I do, and the clients that recognize my time has value, and are willing to pay that rate, are the clients i want to work with. If someone says my quote is too high, they're welcome to find another designer.
What about free time? I could head straight home from work and get about 5 hours of work in, so that's 25 hours on weekdays with 15 to spread out over the weekend. I would be pretty miserable and would crash and burn after 2 weeks of that.
I could swing 20 extra hours a week, is it possible to find clients that are ok with a task taking twice the time but not twice the cost?
That's part of the scheduling, and it's something I bring up from the beginning, what is their deadline, and discuss when I can get it to them, I only really work about 2 hours a night, some nights I'll work 5, and none the night before/after.
My job is 9-5:30, I spend 1 hour driving a day, and at least 1 hour with the gf having dinner and an hour relaxing, so I only get home at 9, sometimes 10. I then work for 2-3 hours, then go to sleep, wake up at 6/7 and maybe work for an hour before breakfast then head off to work.
I also have social nights, and the following/preceding night I'll put in a solid 5-7 hours work. I try not to work weekends, not even check my email, but if a deadline requires it, I'll put in some morning work, 5 hours a Saturday morning, leaves most of the afternoon and all of the evening to myself, same with Sunday. (its not a regular occurrence for me to work weekends thankfully)
I strongly believe one shouldn't work themselves into the ground if they don't have to.
Sometimes a client is paying for your work in terms of time instead of money, the higher fee / rush free is if they want it sooner, which requires me to work longer nights, but at the same time, I'm not discounting my work because of the hours, I'm charging a normal/average hourly rate.
It can get complex, all quotes are tailored to the project. I use my hourly rate to calculate how much it'll cost the client, then I factor in communication time into the quote, those emails and phone calls eat into your actual work time, so I add time for that, the other expenses are factored into my hourly which I'm using to build the quote.
So the client isn't paying for your longer work deadlines. If they want me to do it faster, they can pay me more, as I make it clear the hours that I will be available to them. And if they need it done quicker, then I refer them to another designer - which hasn't happened often - but has happened, so you still have that relationship with the client, you haven't turned them away and let them figure it out themselves, you've given them someone you trust to do the work.
I find a lot of my clients are happy with work taking the time it does, because they know exactly what they're getting, and most importantly, we've both agreed on a deadline, which is something I don't miss, and so far, it's always a deadline I can meet without turning into a zombie or recluse.
Working a full time job and freelance at the same time isn't easy, and I wouldn't recommend it to everyone, sometimes clients will ask if I can get them the work quicker, at which point I explain I have other deadlines, which prevents that, but I could do overtime on it, and that overtime costs x.
I've just found if I communicated these things up front, deadline, cost deliverables etc, before I quote, clients have never had issues.
Sorry if what I've said is a bit disjointed, it's midnight, and I've just finished my 5 hour work session, and it's sleep time, tomorrow night is a social night
There is lots of freelance tech art. I mostly work with smaller indie studios that don't have a tech artist. I think Paul Neale (http://paulneale.com/) is a great example of a freelance tech artist.
Would be interesting to hear about your experience. Most of what I have heard about are rigger consultations and freelance rigging. Not much on the tool development/pipeline side.
What about free time? I could head straight home from work and get about 5 hours of work in, so that's 25 hours on weekdays with 15 to spread out over the weekend. I would be pretty miserable and would crash and burn after 2 weeks of that.
I could swing 20 extra hours a week, is it possible to find clients that are ok with a task taking twice the time but not twice the cost?
I'm sure it's possible to find but as someone who hires freelancers all the time it's a big red flag.
Otherwise incredibly talented people can come off as unprofessional when they consistently miss deadlines, deliver sub par work and lag with communication because they're "at work".
There are probably exceptions but I haven't found them.
Otherwise incredibly talented people can come off as unprofessional when they consistently miss deadlines, deliver sub par work and lag with communication because they're "at work".
But how is that different from communication lag because they're in a time zone that's 8+ hours ahead of you? Like I mentioned before, I don't have to worry about overtime and crunch and I wouldn't quote time as if I had full 8 hour days to work on it. Kaptainkernals seems to be able to pull it off and I guess I have a good reputation, It sometimes feel like I have a better rep than I deserve :P
I have the joy of having a relaxed work environment, where its not frowned on if i step out for 5 minutes to make a phone call, or to send an email off my phone. So thankfully my communication doesn't lag due to being "at work".
Okkum is right though, if you cant communicate, and you miss deadlines that will reflect negatively on you. And the chance of that happening is compounded by working a full time job an freelance on the top.
Okkum, these designers that have missed deadlines and miscommunicated, out of curiosity, how did they handle the briefing and the deadline discussion?
Because in my experiences an artist my have a lot of talent, but little business sense, they just look at the cash, over promise and under deliver and probably neglected to look at how the hours they allocated to the project, would be distributed into the actual time they had available for freelance work. So basically promising a deadline they couldn't meet, and not communicating their availability adequately.
There's not a single experience that could sum it up other than it usually doesn't end well.
When commute, work, sleep and everything else an average person does is done you're probably left with 4 hours to work for your client. I'm guessing it's probably hard to stay motivated when you're working 12 hour days and have no room for other activities.
Less than 4 hours a day means that you take more than twice as long to deliver work as someone who works full time so you would probably have a hard time keeping clients interested if it's bulk asset work.
For me I just recently left the comforts of UbiTO to work for myself, it was a very tough decision but my reasoning was personal as I wanted to be closer to my family and spend more time with them. Seeing my kids reach 8 and 4 and asking myself "When did that happen?" made me take pause.
This is my first week going Freelance for "real", meaning I now live and die by my decisions and work ethics. It's nothing like my pass attempts and I'm definitely no longer burning the candles at both ends like okkun mentioned.
Even though 1 week in, the pros/cons are very apparent but I'm honestly digging my new flexibility. Now it's time to focus and balance my work/life a bit more freely.
For me I just recently left the comforts of UbiTO to work for myself, it was a very tough decision but my reasoning was personal as I wanted to be closer to my family and spend more time with them. Seeing my kids reach 8 and 4 and asking myself "When did that happen?" made me take pause.
This is my first week going Freelance for "real", meaning I now live and die by my decisions and work ethics. It's nothing like my pass attempts and I'm definitely no longer burning the candles at both ends like okkun mentioned.
Even though 1 week in, the pros/cons are very apparent but I'm honestly digging my new flexibility. Now it's time to focus and balance my work/life a bit more freely.
Years after, if you read this, what would you say to someone tempted by such decision ? @lildragn (with, or without the current crisis being..) thanks I'm also trying hard to be able to cumulate studio contract + freelance gigs.
Replies
@skylebones:
So for this existing client that has contacted me for a new project, I've done a number of jobs for him, some big, a lot of smaller update type of work on existing work, which is quick. But this new job is bigger, and I couldn't take it on right now as my schedule is full, so i told him that my schedule would be open in 2 months. He said he's happy to wait that period, and the briefing process has started in the mean time, but actual work will begin in 2 months - which is a great way to work.
@Justin Meisse:
So for me, I schedule all of my freelance, so I don't have deadlines that all occur close to each other, all my projects are staggered and don't overlap too much. I'm still getting a full nights sleep, not pulling all nighters, maybe a few late ones, and early mornings, but i'm not exhausted.
It's all in scheduling the projects, and agreeing on timelines and deadlines with clients - good comms will always help. Sometimes a client needs a job urgently (normally new clients, not regular clients) - I don't like rush jobs, so I just put a rush fee on top of my normal fee to discourage rush jobs - doing that, I often find if the client is desperate, they'll pay it, I'll basically need to pull an all nighter to pull a rush job deadline, The client usually asks at the end of the project, "how can I avoid the rush fee" - to which i reply I need a good lead time (2 weeks etc). Sometimes the client turns my quote down and finds someone else, which is perfectly fine, it's an open market, and my rate is my rate, I'm not desperate for work, and rush fees help me get a full nights sleep(usually).
Also, I charge a bit higher for my freelance, as I have a full time job, the freelance is extra work, and my higher rate discourages a lot of the lower end clients, who expect a lot for very little (they're often the noisiest, with the most revisions, or don't know what they want when they come to you - which result in longer hours than you anticipate, which results in less take home at the end of the day). A higher rate also places more value on my time and the work that I do, and the clients that recognize my time has value, and are willing to pay that rate, are the clients i want to work with. If someone says my quote is too high, they're welcome to find another designer.
I could swing 20 extra hours a week, is it possible to find clients that are ok with a task taking twice the time but not twice the cost?
My job is 9-5:30, I spend 1 hour driving a day, and at least 1 hour with the gf having dinner and an hour relaxing, so I only get home at 9, sometimes 10. I then work for 2-3 hours, then go to sleep, wake up at 6/7 and maybe work for an hour before breakfast then head off to work.
I also have social nights, and the following/preceding night I'll put in a solid 5-7 hours work. I try not to work weekends, not even check my email, but if a deadline requires it, I'll put in some morning work, 5 hours a Saturday morning, leaves most of the afternoon and all of the evening to myself, same with Sunday. (its not a regular occurrence for me to work weekends thankfully)
I strongly believe one shouldn't work themselves into the ground if they don't have to.
Sometimes a client is paying for your work in terms of time instead of money, the higher fee / rush free is if they want it sooner, which requires me to work longer nights, but at the same time, I'm not discounting my work because of the hours, I'm charging a normal/average hourly rate.
It can get complex, all quotes are tailored to the project. I use my hourly rate to calculate how much it'll cost the client, then I factor in communication time into the quote, those emails and phone calls eat into your actual work time, so I add time for that, the other expenses are factored into my hourly which I'm using to build the quote.
So the client isn't paying for your longer work deadlines. If they want me to do it faster, they can pay me more, as I make it clear the hours that I will be available to them. And if they need it done quicker, then I refer them to another designer - which hasn't happened often - but has happened, so you still have that relationship with the client, you haven't turned them away and let them figure it out themselves, you've given them someone you trust to do the work.
I find a lot of my clients are happy with work taking the time it does, because they know exactly what they're getting, and most importantly, we've both agreed on a deadline, which is something I don't miss, and so far, it's always a deadline I can meet without turning into a zombie or recluse.
Working a full time job and freelance at the same time isn't easy, and I wouldn't recommend it to everyone, sometimes clients will ask if I can get them the work quicker, at which point I explain I have other deadlines, which prevents that, but I could do overtime on it, and that overtime costs x.
I've just found if I communicated these things up front, deadline, cost deliverables etc, before I quote, clients have never had issues.
Sorry if what I've said is a bit disjointed, it's midnight, and I've just finished my 5 hour work session, and it's sleep time, tomorrow night is a social night
I left college and needed a job to live. That's when i felt i was ready. Other than that, it's just about knowing what you can do and what you worth.
Would be interesting to hear about your experience. Most of what I have heard about are rigger consultations and freelance rigging. Not much on the tool development/pipeline side.
I'm sure it's possible to find but as someone who hires freelancers all the time it's a big red flag.
Otherwise incredibly talented people can come off as unprofessional when they consistently miss deadlines, deliver sub par work and lag with communication because they're "at work".
There are probably exceptions but I haven't found them.
But how is that different from communication lag because they're in a time zone that's 8+ hours ahead of you? Like I mentioned before, I don't have to worry about overtime and crunch and I wouldn't quote time as if I had full 8 hour days to work on it. Kaptainkernals seems to be able to pull it off and I guess I have a good reputation, It sometimes feel like I have a better rep than I deserve :P
Okkum is right though, if you cant communicate, and you miss deadlines that will reflect negatively on you. And the chance of that happening is compounded by working a full time job an freelance on the top.
Okkum, these designers that have missed deadlines and miscommunicated, out of curiosity, how did they handle the briefing and the deadline discussion?
Because in my experiences an artist my have a lot of talent, but little business sense, they just look at the cash, over promise and under deliver and probably neglected to look at how the hours they allocated to the project, would be distributed into the actual time they had available for freelance work. So basically promising a deadline they couldn't meet, and not communicating their availability adequately.
When commute, work, sleep and everything else an average person does is done you're probably left with 4 hours to work for your client. I'm guessing it's probably hard to stay motivated when you're working 12 hour days and have no room for other activities.
Less than 4 hours a day means that you take more than twice as long to deliver work as someone who works full time so you would probably have a hard time keeping clients interested if it's bulk asset work.
This is my first week going Freelance for "real", meaning I now live and die by my decisions and work ethics. It's nothing like my pass attempts and I'm definitely no longer burning the candles at both ends like okkun mentioned.
Even though 1 week in, the pros/cons are very apparent but I'm honestly digging my new flexibility. Now it's time to focus and balance my work/life a bit more freely.
Years after, if you read this, what would you say to someone tempted by such decision ? @lildragn
(with, or without the current crisis being..)
thanks
I'm also trying hard to be able to cumulate studio contract + freelance gigs.