Selling Exclusive Single Customer 3D assets?
polycounter lvl 3
Hello all,
Has anyone tried selling 3D assets to a single customer for a higher price so that studio/ customer gets an exclusive asset...Instead of spending a work week on an asset, only to get $20 a month for a grand total of $300 ...a year later...for 45 hrs of work...you can say sell it for $899 or something, market it to studios, they're the ONLY ONES with that asset, vs. a public one. They can save the hassle of interacting/hiring a stranger or contractor online and save their in house workforce 40 some hours with the click of a button etc.
I was thinking of trying it but wanted to know if anyone had experience doing this or had insight.
Has anyone tried selling 3D assets to a single customer for a higher price so that studio/ customer gets an exclusive asset...Instead of spending a work week on an asset, only to get $20 a month for a grand total of $300 ...a year later...for 45 hrs of work...you can say sell it for $899 or something, market it to studios, they're the ONLY ONES with that asset, vs. a public one. They can save the hassle of interacting/hiring a stranger or contractor online and save their in house workforce 40 some hours with the click of a button etc.
I was thinking of trying it but wanted to know if anyone had experience doing this or had insight.
Replies
I'd say it looks pretty much like freelance work, just that in the latter case the client can get exactly what they need, matching their exact specifications. While there are situations that studios need assets "right this minute" it's still not as common as the opposite. So just like with other pre-produced assets, it's pretty much a gamble on your part and while the reward would be bigger, the chances of finding that one customer are slimmer. Since your avatar is a camera, you might be aware that offering exclusive licences is pretty common with stock photography and I think I've seen that for 3D scanning services as well, but producing an asset for a week seems risky, as you can't easily take multiple shots or variations to sell separately as that would undermine the exclusive part in case of a 3D asset that's easily modified by the customer as well.
Now with a single asset this sounds like a very odd strategy. The freelancer will typically ask for a price to cover his expenses and some gain - while you will do what exactly? Your costs will be the same as his. He/she will be doing exactly what the studio needs and be reachable through out the process. In the meantime you will be gambling that someone needs your asset with no financial advantage since you will have the same costs? Why should anyone come to you and pay the same as for a freelancer? Just because your asset is already done and unique? How will this so unique piece fit into your potential clients project? And if its a regular realistic item, why pay the price for a unique asset, when there are significantly cheaper options from regular asset sellers? Is you quality going to be that much higher?
As long as you can't add more value to it than saying its an 'unique' 3d asset, you will have a very hard time justifying the same price as a freelancer and anything less will probably result with you taking a loss. To me it sounds like you would lose the advantage that mass production has on the price side as well as the flexibility a freelancer offers, with the only real potential gain being that your asset would already be finished. The exclusiveness is probably rather a problem than an advantage.
1. Downtime work
2. Free reign work
3. I don't have to worry about NDA / portfolio display restrictions
While interacting with a freelancer may seem like a benefit, I'm sure other studios may feel otherwise. If they see a monster pre-made, that fits their universe, and don't have to worry about another game with the same asset...then what's the downside for them. They get to inspect the model before paying as well via Marmoset Viewer etc.
I feel it could be an icebreaker for studios that gets tons of resumes. Even if a studio THINKS that the asset may be of use and asks a few questions, but doesn't bite, at least you're on their radar for future freelance work. Going through the process of resume sorting, portfolio watching, and hours and weeks of interacting with briefs is a big barrier to people.
Maybe it's just me, but selling pre made models doesn't seem lucrative to me as a public/bulk sale and it seems very hard to get into that. (Tools and tutorials are much better IMO for public sales).
Thing that strikes me is you’d have to work like a maniac to keep your “stock” topped up, and that means creating a load of stuff which might never sell. I guess over time though, you get a feel for what types of asset people want, which ‘lines’ sell well, but even then you’re still obliged to keep each one unique or it defeats the purpose. So, oddly, you need to walk a line between niche and popular.
Especially the part about pre-made monster. There is some much to consider with characters and creatures - starting with rigs, design, optimization...
I would expect hero assets are probably the least sought after on the market because they have to fit the game in every imaginable way and are subjected to change. You typically go and get the most generic assets from market place to fill up the game without taking time from your artists. Also complex assets like characters or other rigged stuff is probably surrounded by a pipeline with a lot of things to consider. Why should someone buy a random expensive pre-made item to have his artists re-work it to fit into the game? As said before you can't cut the costs of a freelancer enough to make up for his/her flexibility.
The only problem with assets is that if you want to target different engines you need to re-optimized everyting for that engine like re-exporting textures in Unity or UE compressed format, re-compose the scene and so on.
Those have higher value given their rarity and sell to a selective market of consumers.
If all artists valued themselves individually we'd likely charge studios a lot more than they'd pay us.
But its a competitive market so a lot of people undercut themselves just to get a job and will sell their talents for way less than its value
once your skillset and experience is high, you can come from the seller frame, not the buyer. Look at most industry's there are experienced people selling their courses for 5-10k and people are happy to pay them for it. There are similar courses you can find for probably 200 bucks but the person doesnt have the leverage of a proven track record, large audience or years of experience.
Sure there might be lots of undercutting and racing to the bottom for entry level positions in every industry, but focus on getting really good and soon you will be the one setting the price.
back on topic, I would either freelance or work in a salary position if you want exclusive work at a decent rate. remote work is becoming more common too, working from home on a larger production, even if you are employed by a studio.
I just meant that undercutting does happen in the industry from both sides.
In many cases it might be unintentional, really depends on the standards people set for themselves.
And of course I've always believed that if you have the skills there are many studios that would pay well for that and you may need to relocate to avail of that opportunity.
Montreal is certainly faring a lot better than Toronto, so for the time being there is a lot more undercutting here in Toronto given the saturated market and fewer studios that can afford to pay well, rather very few studios compared to the number of schools pumping out game dev graduates.
Given the high cost of living its pretty challenging. But it does compel me to better myself so that's a plus.
As I add to my portfolio, I've found freelancing for overseas clients to work better for me for the time being to support myself.