Am I overcharging for Art Assets: Freelance Question
high dynamic range
Can I email anyone who's freelanced before about whether I am crunching my numbers incorrectly and overcharging people for assets?
I've been on hourly since Uni ended a year ago, so I have no context for what is reasonable.
I've been on hourly since Uni ended a year ago, so I have no context for what is reasonable.
Replies
I know it might be a bit taboo, so if you guys got an answer but don't want to discuss it publicly it'd be nice if you could drop me a PM as well. Cheers!
I think what scares me personally, both as a very nubile industry professional and a younger man, that people don't say to me that "That price is unreasonable for us. Can you do X?" and instead just say "No" avoiding additional emails (which I totall understand, time is of the essence.)
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Freelance#Freelance_Rates
Id also factor in how strong your work is and if you have experience working in a company.
I wonder what my value is then, because off the cuff, been making games for almost 5 years, interned at Blizzard, Reverge Labs, worked at TapZen and on Disney projects, but I'm only 22 and it's been a year since uni ended for me.
That's just one of the risks you take. If I have a lot of people I'm asking to quote for a job, I'm probably not gonna negotiate with all of them. If I'm just talking to the one person, then I might try and get something lower.
All you can do is try ask for enough money that you'd be happy doing the job for that amount.
I also adjust my rates based on how much I need the work. When I'm really busy I charge high.
I'm assuming month to month burn is "easily" calculated with a personal budget, but what about personal wealth?
but really do the math, we can't do it for you. how much do you need? how much do you want to put aside or invest or whatever. thats your rate.
unless you straight up ask them. and then you`re usually presented with "calculate". I do understand that prices vary from person to person and their cost of living but if you dont have any kind of average to go off by you could easily undercharge because of the risk of a company not wanting to go with you because you ask too much or overcharge and actually have the company say no thanks.
you also cant ask the company what they usually spend on freelancers because then they`ll see that as a sign of you not knowing what to charge and lowball you.
and this is how you get into this situation were professionals are cursing students for driving prices down but wont really give any clear figures of what are the minimum and maximum prices to go by
edit: nvm just saw this link http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Freelance#Freelance_Rates
It also helps a lot to find out what their budget is before you quote. I ask them how much do you have to spend on this job? What is your budget? Some will give the info, some won't.
Also some people are more comfortable with a day rate rather than hourly. And others just want a total cost to work with.
But yeah, it's very different from one freelancer to the next, just like every art job has different specs. I learn as much as I can about the job before writing up a quote, so I can judge what they're willing to buy.
Serious games, architecture, construction, biotech, legal, military... CG for these fields is less saturated with young kids bidding low, and the budgets are generally higher, so the companies are more willing to pay decent rates.
There's also an opportunity to impress some people who have worked with the low-cost foreign providers, but been burned for one reason or another. Lack of experience, constant changes needed, difficulty communicating, poor quality of the initial work, or inconsistent quality... all these things have happened to some of my clients, and they were fed up when I caught up with them, so they were then very willing to pay my rate for a solid experience.
YMMV of course, there are some good foreign art firms out there.
it's also sounds much more boring but it has always been like that in my experience at least - the most boring and unispiring job pays the best. and it's true not for art only but for most other fields.
But I have to say that if you are doing arch-viz, product visualization, ads, CG for movies you'll have the same situation with rates - young freelancers are charging low rates because how can you expect to gain experience and pay bills at the same time when you have almost nothing to show? Of course it's better to start when you're in high school but not everyone did this.
Nobody has it easy.
It's when they ask your rate, you respond, and never get back to you that went over their budget.
character art typically bills higher than enviro/prop/hard surface, anyway.
Edit:
I do what racer does in that I say "X is my day rate" but I don't lead off with anything about being flexible or open to negotiation.
To find new clients I stick myself out there, making myself visible at industry events, talking to people.
For example, I went to a neat local VR developer event a couple weeks ago, through Meetup.com. I made the effort to introduce myself and chat with various people. I do a quick informal elevator pitch (explain what I do in 15 seconds), and let them know I am interested in applying my skills to VR (or whatever the event is about, the week before I went to a medical tech Meetup). I ask what they do, and listen attentively, asking a few questions about their work. People love sharing what they do, especially if you seem genuinely interested in learning about it.
Sometimes there's a match, most times there isn't. I did get one new potential client out of the VR meetup, and it could be really lucrative if it pans out. The medical one, not so much, though that could pan out in time.
I never been on any expo to ask for jobs, have a super outdated portfolio, no businesscards, not even a studio website. I hope we have time to change that, just for having some sort of a central hub but really I never put any energy into that.
At least not directly to get jobs, but i get to know people and some spread the word, one thing leads to another and from there further, artists leaving one client going to another, they want to outsource and we have a foot in the door before we even know it.
I don't know i am a shitty marketing person, i am also pretty honest on what i feel like being good at and what i am not, still, somehow, it always worked out.
So after 5 years of working on the same game I had the decision to either pick another slightly better paid fulltime job on Spec Ops the Line, which would last long (this was 2007)but would probably be pretty stressfull.
Or working part time freelance but secure for that company, on glorious titles such as "my boyfriend 2" or "my beautyhotel for pets".
I picked the money and the less stress, and the not so good games. On the side I was freelancing then, the message was out, german studios or rather their artists knew me, so I was booked for settlers 5 to do some work i barely did before, handpainted assets. I was by no means as good as some of the guys doing it for years for them inhouse. But it was a start and I think overall i did a decent job, which was partly because the first stuff was basically upressing existing assets, from very lowpoly characters with 256 or 512 texturey to a higher res animatable portrait with a 1024 texture just for the portrait region of the body.
From there really one thing let to another, I showed my work I did on that project publically and got in contact again with some guys who happened to work for one company when I was still in my first job, they got fired as well and formed their own studio by now looking for support on that disney game, Hell yeah, Balu the bear, king louie, mulan, lionking, lilo and stitch, what an opportunity.
Turned out to be the disney channel edition of dance dance revolution. So instead of my beloved toon characters, i did hannah montana, highschool musical cast and other real life disney channel crap, tho i worked on Lilo and Stitch and Kim Possible. I got my next job and then the next, now we are 10 people inhouse, 10-20 more over the internet, juggling about 13 games productions a year and not all of them as small as those i mentioned.
I think you should stick to what you do best, keep learning and keep showing, once you do quality, people will notice. For a start maybe, know your locals but don't run after everyone, a shitty but better paid job will give you more time to work on personal stuff, show it, be public.
Oh and I had my times when I panicked, will I ever get a job again?! I need to stop freelancing asap, this will never work, fuck it i have this offer lets do the arttest and FAILED not on the artside but onsite in the interview, partly for underselling me and being too honest, stating what I like to do and stating what I should not be doing. But i failed on selling them, that I would certainly work on cars or weapons, but there are people more skilled than me in those areas so i still think it would be better to get those guys for those tasks.
Now, years later, this company is my client and I work on assets I said i will not do, or rather should not do, but i failed at bringing this over back then.
And I love it, but thanks to our studio I can get help by better artists than me in that field, and we make it work.
Actually, if you are good enough and the client feels he can't do without you, he will pay over the standards.
This was one such illustration.
From my experience, the best thing to do when freelancing, is to start saving up.
When you land on a good project, start living smart and stack up some dosh.
Then, the stress levels drop immenesly, and you can just relax and focus on the work.
Always keep that in mind when calculating your fees, and run some Xnormal padding on your estimated cost of living, so you'll have savings keeping you calm and sharp.
Are people willing to pay for your services/products?
If yes: then you're not charging too much, raise your prices incrementally after this job.
... That's deep.
Having a small part-time job is even better IMO. That way when there is no freelance work you can focus on personal projects with no stress at all. I once worked 15 hours a week at a supermarket and that covered my rent and food.