Illustrator (me) - Shock and amazement from potential clients at a quote that works out substantially less than both those rates.
Either I'm in the wrong business or too many people think that illustrators are less skilled than those two professions. Or that too many illustrators sell themselves too cheaply.
You need to get an overall, put all your drawing implements on a tool belt, go round the client's house and make noises by sucking air through your teeth. Sometimes I think that's the only way that an art-based profession will be taken as "serious" compared to manual labour.
To be perfectly honest, a lot of artists have no business sense and they easily accept commissions that pay at too-low rate. I really made way more money as a PC repairman than a comic artist.
Yian 2012
I think you are probably right, Yian. It's very difficult balancing a good, appropriate fee against one that will be accepted. I spent four years at art school and business practice was not mentioned once. I hope things are different today. What bugs me is the number of people who are willing to part with £200 for a new ballcock fitted in an hour yet sneer at an illustrator daring to ask for the same amount for what may be two days work.
Maybe one problem is also that many clients don't know good art from bad and if they can buy bad art cheap, why pay more for some (the good) art? (I mean, if they don't see the difference anyway...)
Maybe if you mumbled the calculations just loud enough for them to hear... If you come up with fancy enough sounding words for things like equipment and work hours and all the stages from idea to finsihed piece, they'll think "oooh that sounds complicated, I'd better just pay anything he asks"
Maybe one problem is also that many clients don't know good art from bad and if they can buy bad art cheap, why pay more for some (the good) art? (I mean, if they don't see the difference anyway...)
Yup, I think this is a big, big problem.
And often (young/new) illustrators will work for nothing just to get something under their belt. I wonder also if people see artists working in their spare time - simply for the love of doing it - that it can't then be regarded as hard work.
Most definitely, I have even seen an ad for artwork that expected work for nothing because "you enjoy doing it"...then there are those who just don't even understand what they are looking for, calling for a "sketch artist" when what they are actually looking for is a storyboard artist.
The worst I have seen though was an ad a while back looking for what I like to call Photo-chopping...you can imagine what they wanted, "we have some photos we want to use...photoshop expert who can cut and paste elements from the photos together..." and paying around $100 for it if I recall correctly. The new kids (some literally) then see this and think "Wow...a hundred bucks just to photo-manipulate some pics...I'm on it!" only to get surprised by how many pics they are expected to do or something like that.
I'm glad I saw this thread. I was contacted this weekend by a potential employer to do some B&W illustrations for cards in a board game -- creatures, items, and whatnot. The standard of quality was very high, with previous cards done by a well-known, published fantasy artist who shall remain nameless. He was no longer able to continue on the project, so I was being asked to fill his shoes. I decided to do a test to see what I'd come up with, and it came out OK, more or less compatible with the previous cards, after around 2 hours of work.
It's an indie game, self-published and all, so I expected the pay to be low. And I thought my initial offer was a real low-ball, at $50 per picture.
Imagine my surprise when I was offered $10 per monster image, $5 for items.
I was told by the client that this was more or less the going rate for the project. I've seen videos of the original artist working in black and white, and the man's a demon. He can crank out a piece in no time, so maybe that was an acceptable rate for him. What I took 2 hours to do he can probably put together in 10-15 minutes. But even so, it seems obscenely low.
A good rule is if I can drink the pay faster than I can produce the art, it's not a job worth taking. >=
But because I'm a noob with no CV to speak of, I am still considering taking it, and just sending him things in dribs and drabs, so it'd be like getting paid for my warmup sketches. On the other hand, I feel an obligation to say no just on principle.
y'see that's the catch 22 in all of this. For someone to start in this business they have to start at the bottom, you can't charge big money because you have no CV to speak of. So you have to take lower paid jobs to climb the ladder, it's inevitable that someone will work for less money. I guess the more well known and established the artist, the easier it is to refuse bread and butter pay and only work for the right money.
Smolin if you work at Walgreens you would make way more than that, so you really shouldn't waste your time and energy. If each monster take one hour to make, you get paid $10 an hour, so that's total BS. please don't take that job.
Yian 2012
y'see that's the catch 22 in all of this. For someone to start in this business they have to start at the bottom, you can't charge big money because you have no CV to speak of. So you have to take lower paid jobs to climb the ladder, it's inevitable that someone will work for less money. I guess the more well known and established the artist, the easier it is to refuse bread and butter pay and only work for the right money.
I have to disagree Kaz that's what these people want you to think.. Your CV is your portfolio not a list of clients. If you make kick ass work you shouldn't need to get paid peanuts at any point especially in the internet world of today. You can promote your own work easily and don't need to land a job to get your work out there.
y'see that's the catch 22 in all of this. For someone to start in this business they have to start at the bottom,
I don't pretend to know the fantasy/concept market - at all! - so that may be true if you have a contract and expect annual wage rises, benefits, training, etc. In freelance editorial work - generally speaking - you are paid for the job and there's usually a going rate, regardless of experience or age. If you are talented and skilled enough to attract the eye of an art director then you should be paid the same as anyone else who fills that space in the magazine/newspaper/website. For some the going rate is based on column inches, others the hours taken.
There are exceptions of course. Big name artists can ask for more than the going rate or, more often I suspect, be offered it in order to secure their services. If you're fast and experienced you can knock work out quickly and be free to earn more - if you're lucky.
It's a minefield. But going back to my original post, I don't think I can remember the last time a plumber offered reduced rates because they were new to the job.
Good rule of thumb, Smolin. I think that rate on offer is a joke.
Taking the extreme case of Brad Rigney or cryptcrawler on DA. He didn't post anything on line until he thought it was good enough to be published. He has high standards. I doubt he was paid as much as he will be able to command now but I'm sure he never worked for the amounts mentioned here.
Dan Luvisi shows another more effective way to spend your time (rather than do work for peanuts) by making his own art book which is awesome. Now having sold the rights to the film Last Man Standing.
Really in a round about way I'm just agreeing with the idea that if it won't pay the bills and a min wage job will your probably better with the min wage job until your good enough. Accepting poorly paid jobs will no doubt only attract others paying poorly. That may put you off altogether as you'll be working more hours for less and less money.
I find this sort of thing to be ridiculously inconsistent. It seems to depend entirely on what the client thinks it is worth.
I have only been working digitally for the last 6 months or so. Still, I have been a traditional artist for almost my entire life, just like you lot I imagine. I remember being commissioned to do a piece of work for a magazine when I was in college, a simple black and red drawing on a single sheet of white A4 paper. It took my about 20 minutes and it sucked verily! But the client LOVED it, raved about it and I was paid £100 for it. I felt embarrassed to get so much (at the time), but he said it was worth twice that to him. Honestly, the quality of the drawing was ribbish, I was only 18 years old (a long time ago now).
I have worked on pieces much longer for less and much simpler for more. There is no consistancy to it. But I was taught in college (all them years ago) that "you wouldn't work in MacDonalds for less than minimum wage, so why would you on an artists commision", that should be the standard!
Clients who want to pay you peanuts for your work are taking the micky. I know it's easier said than done, but either look to sell your stuff to another client, or explain that the rate that you have been offered is too low. An art director once told me "whatever material costs you have, you should charge double and add your hourly rate on top."
voluspa:
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