# Self Publishing: What's An Artist Worth?



## Morrus (Mar 10, 2018)

If you're like many other folks who have recently delved into the foray of self-publishing 5E products, you've probably quickly realised that art is expensive (actually, I dislike using that term - it's not expensive for what it is). Some people are lucky enough to have artistic talent which lets them illustrate their own products; others need to rely on the hard work of other contributors to help bring their words to life. This short article covers a few basic ways you can get your product illustrated. Welcome to a well-established community of small and self-publishers in the RPG industry!

[h=4]Are You A Writer Or A Publisher?[/h]
First things first, it's important that you start from the right perspective. If you're producing and selling products, and using artists to illustrate them (we'll leave out editors and layout/design people for now), you're not just a writer any more. You're a _publisher_. A small publisher, perhaps, but a publisher nonetheless. Being a publisher isn't the same thing as being a writer - it requires different skills; and as a publisher, albeit a small one, you have a new set of responsibilities. Publishing ain't always easy, but it can be rewarding.

If you just want to be a writer, that's a different thing. As a writer, you don't need to worry about art, someone else can edit your work, someone else does the layout, someone handles the marketing, someone handles the accounting. If writing is the thing you really want to do, consider instead approaching a publisher and writing for them. They'll do all the (non-written) hard work, and you'll get paid for your writing. 

But if you're doing the whole shebang - using artists, selling the work, and so on - you're a publisher.  You may prefer to think of yourself as a struggling writer, but you've taken a step beyond that; and as a small publisher you need to consider the hard work of others involved in bringing your words to life. You may be surprised to find that that can take as long or longer than your actual writing, and involve just as much hard work! 

[h=4]Don't Work For Exposure[/h]
Now, art isn't cheap. Or at least, it shouldn't be - it is possible to persuade artists to work for peanuts (or worse, for _exposure_) but doing so is exploiting them. A quick Google search will reveal hundreds of articles about how artists should not work for free or for exposure, and the reasons why, so I won't belabour the point here except to say that it is important. I even wrote a similar article (focused on writers, not artists) a while back.

That might mean you can't afford art, at least at first.  That's totally OK. It's OK to not be able to afford something, and to work towards being able to afford it, and books with little or no art are just fine! However, there are other options which mean that you can actually afford art and pay your artists a fair amount. Every small publisher has gone through this - if you look at DTRPG, you'll see_ thousands_ of small publishers who have gone through that very thing. Don't panic; it's not a new problem. If you keep producing quality stuff, you'll be able to start slowly improving the production values of that material. "But I can't afford it" is not a great reason to exploit somebody; it's a great reason to hone your craft and reputation and work towards being able to afford it. In the meantime, starting with little or no art is just fine; if your writing is solid, you have a great starting point.

That said, in this day and age, there are some amazing resources which enable you to early circumvent these barriers. It's a pretty wonderful time for self-publishing!

[h=4]Some Solutions[/h]
The most obvious one is *Kickstarter*.  Let's say you need a thousand dollars to illustrate your short book (like I said, art is not cheap - I spent £20,000 of Kickstarter funds on art for my WOIN books). A Kickstarter campaign to raise that thousand dollars has a number of benefits.  First, you find out in advance if folks want your book. Second, it has its own marketing value all of itself. Third, it means you can pay your artists a fair wage. Fourth, if you raise more than your thousand dollars, you start making profit before even putting the book on sale. Fifth, you can then sell the book.

That's a win-win situation. Your book ends up looking good, everybody gets paid fairly, you make money. It's hard to find a good reason not to do that, especially when your back-up plan is to ask artists to work for free. Work out what art you need, work out how much it costs, and there's your Kickstarter goal. When your book gets funded, your artists' fair pay is built-in to the model.

I would normally include *Patreon* as an option, but the logistics are a bit awkward there. Certainly it's very suited to lots of small items, but if you want to use DMs Guild (which I assume most folks reading this do) the exclusivity clause at DMs Guild makes it slightly tricky getting your product to your patrons. I'm hopeful that some loosening of the rules (or a much needed extra feature - comp copies for DMs Guild publishers) is in the future, as that would make for the ideal solution.

What other options are there? The other obvious solution is *stock art*. There are stock art locations where you can buy art rights inexpensively, or even *free public domain art*. Those artists make their money by selling the same art to lots of people, rather than doing custom work just for you. There's the big places like Shutterstock, and there is tons of stock art available on DriveThruRPG. WotC has released some art to be used as stock art on DMs Guild (for free!) In fact, there are hundreds of places you can get stock art. Here's a quick list:


Shutterstock (stock art)
British Library (free public domain art!)
DriveThruRPG (this is one of OBS's sites, like DMs Guild; make sure the usage terms are viewable before you pay for anything)
The Getty's Open Content Program (thousands of public domain art pieces)
Pixabay (stock art)
NASA (if you are writing sci-fi material, NASA's much of photography collection is all public domain)
iStock (stock art)
Jeshield's Stock Art Patreon (an interesting approach)
National Gallery of Art (public domain)
OpenGLAM (collections of pubic domain art)

Now, there are places you can get art done for next to nothing. I personally feel that doing so is unfair. Some artists may well be willing to work for peanuts because (a) they don't know better and think that's the only way to get started as an artist or (b) they don't need the money as they have a full time job and are just doing it for fun. The former, unfortunately, have their viewpoint reinforced by all those publishers who keep telling them that that is true, when it isn't; the latter undermine the former because they make it look like art is, indeed, a cheap commodity.  For that reason, even if you don't need the money, if you're an artist I hope that you still charge a fair price for your art, because not doing so harms those that do need the money. 

Can you get art  for dirt cheap, or free? Sure. Should you? The desire to get your awesome words out there and looking pretty is understandable and the temptation to do what you need to do to get that done right now is hard to resist, especially if you have no money to spend. I've been there! I asked Claudio Pozas, an artist I've known for 16 years, who started small and worked his way up:
Why not just offer US$5 and use whatever artist takes the bait? There are several reasons for that:

1) You'll get the art you paid for: probably rushed, from a starting, naive artist who is hurting his career more than helping.

2) There's the ethical quandary of offering a payment that is unlikely to support the worker you're hiring. It's a matter of responsibility, when you have the power in the professional relationship (in this case, the job offer).

3) for the publisher really scraping for money, there are several good artists out there that offer stock illustration. Sure, the art won't be uniquely yours, but it's better than to cheat an artist out of a living wage.​

OK, so now you're asking what a fair rate for art is? That depends on a number of things - colour, black-and-white, size, complexity, and so on. The range does, of course, vary - I'm not saying that beginning artists can charge as much as those who have spent years forging their reputation. A well-known artist may charge ten times or more than a new one; that's OK, as long as the new one is still charging a fair amount. 

The average rates I tend to see from artists are in the region of $30 for a quarter page piece, $100 for a full page piece, maybe double that if it's full-colour.  For a well-known artist, you may have to pay much more than that, but for the average freelancer, that's about the average. I asked Claudio Pozas again:
"Fair" depends on a lot of things: the artist's experience, the publisher's size, and the product's reach. At the very least, an artist -- like any other person -- should make a living wage out of his work. In the US, the minimum wage is US$7 (roughly) an hour, and there's talk of increasing that to US$15 (a minimum "living" wage).

If an artist is expected to spend two days on an illustration (between sketching, composition, rendering, and handling alterations), that's about 16 hours of work. That artist, at the very least, should be paid US$240 for his time.

Granted, the artist won't probably work for 8 hours per day, that can be spread out over more days, as the freelancer has to deal with his own workflow, his paperwork, and have time to hone his skills.

The bottom line is that each publisher should be prepared to contribute to an artist's living wage, so we can end the all-too-real image of the "starving artist". I can see a small, quarter-page illustration that could theoretically be finished (sketch + composition + rendering + alteration) over the course of 8 hours (again, putting together the hours actually spent on the image over several days), and the publisher offering US$120 for it.

BTW, those numbers I gave you can be adjusted for, as you said, non-work-for-hire, etc. A b/w quarter-page illustration that an artist can do in 3 hours can start at US$30, easily.​
Now, Claudio is an established artist with a solid, reliable, professional reputation. $120 for a quarter page item isn't necessarily what a brand new artist can command, but they can definitely command more than just "exposure".

What about cartography? Dyson Logos offered this information when I asked: "As a cartographer, I charge $250 for a full page map, $175 for a half-page. This is for "work for hire", my rates are lower if we are dealing with licensed material instead (where I keep copyright and provide non-exclusive use licensing)."

You'll notice that Claudio says that an artist should be paid a living wage for work. Now, there is a problem there; I know it well! You, the publisher are not making a living wage, so why should the artist? It's a good question. It's also not the right question. If your business model doesn't allow you to pay a fair wage for art, the answer isn't "exploit an artist", it's "revise your business model; it doesn't work". Don't pass the pain onto those who depend on you - it is, sadly, yours to bear. There are solutions; they take work or patience, but I've outlined several above (start smaller; use Kickstarter; etc.) It may be that you just can't have the art yet. Don't worry - you can, with time, get yourself to a place where you can have it all! Think of it like hiring a builder or other craftsman to work for you (though those types of people long, long ago realised the value of their labour - you won't get them doing it for a fiver!)

You can do other things to make things fairer for artists, and maybe save some money. Consider *letting them keep the rights to the art*. When I publish, I no longer use work-for-hire art except for very occasional specific pieces which really _need_ to be (and I pay more for them). Work-for-hire means you, the publisher, owns the copyright to the art.  Instead, consider letting the artist keep the copyright (don't do that _instead_ of paying them - do it _as well_ as paying them, but you may be able to negotiate a lower rate). The artist can go on to make money by selling prints and the like; even WotC lets its cartographers do that these days. Hey, head over to my friend Claudio Pozas' art store and buy a print of this gorgeous cover he did for To Slay A Dragon. The odds are you don't _really_ need it to be work-for-hire. If for some reason it does need to be work-for-hire, you can still give the artist permission to sell prints themself.





[FONT=&quot]*Save*[/FONT][FONT=&quot]*Save*[/FONT]​


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## Halivar (Feb 23, 2016)

I don't know. While I agree that artists should not be cheated (and they are, by people that have the money and should know better), there are the exigencies that come with being a poor (sometimes literally!) self-pub trying to scrape together the best product you can offer for $2 on DTRPG.com. I remember the lively Twitter debate you had last week (with Sly Flourish I think?) and tended to side more with the folks saying that underpaid artists and low-cost self-pubs are really kind of in the same boat. Underpaid artists are the only kind of artists many underpaid (underearning?) self-pubs can afford.

Here on EnWorld I've seen artists pleading for work, and publishers unable to pay them more than a pittance. I don't think anyone's actively trying to screw anyone over; it's just a really crappy market to try to make money in. If the lesson we give self-pubs is, "ethically, you should not use art at all" rather than using an artist desperate for commissions of any sort, then I don't know that we have served anyone. I certainly don't see how we have served the starving artist. We may have done well by the higher-tier, established artists by not polluting the market; I don't know.


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

Halivar said:


> If the lesson we give self-pubs is, "ethically, you should not use art at all" rather than using an artist desperate for commissions of any sort, then I don't know that we have served anyone.




That's not the message.  The message is "find another way to pay for it". Kickstarter is an excellent resource, and many people avail themselves of it. It's a wonderful way to ensure that all contributors get paid. 

Start a Kickstarter, then hire the desperate artist for a fair wage! It's more work, sure, but publishing is a lot of work. And your starving artist comes out of that a whole lot better.

Stock art, too, is a great solution. It lets artists use a different model (selling the same art to lots of people) and make their money that way; at the same time it lets the publisher pay very low prices. 

There are solutions!


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## Halivar (Feb 23, 2016)

Morrus said:


> That's not the message.  The message is "find another way to pay for it". Kickstarter is an excellent resource, and many people avail themselves of it. It's a wonderful way to ensure that all contributors get paid.
> 
> Start a Kickstarter, then hire the desperate artist for a fair wage! It's more work, sure, but publishing is a lot of work. And your starving artist comes out of that a whole lot better.



If a self-pub has the means for paying a fair price for something, for instance via KickStarter, they absolutely should, no questions asked. Now running a KickStarter, as you very well know, is a full-time job. I fear many self-pubs won't be able to do that and hold down their day job. I would be interested to know how many self-pubs still need to be bi-vocational; for my part, the most successful publisher I personally know is a group of three guys that still have to work day jobs. Maybe it's different if you're only doing digital? You would know better than me. But it's still a lot of work on top of the work on top of the _other_ work. It looks like a high barrier from the outside.

EDIT: I had actually considered trying my hand at some KS'd RPG tools, until I read your article on the work required for WOIN just for the KS side, and I was like, "Oh, _heck_ no!"


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

Halivar said:


> If a self-pub has the means for paying a fair price for something, for instance via KickStarter, they absolutely should, no questions asked. Now running a KickStarter, as you very well know, is a full-time job. I fear many self-pubs won't be able to do that and hold down their day job. I would be interested to know how many self-pubs still need to be bi-vocational; for my part, the most successful publisher I personally know is a group of three guys that still have to work day jobs. Maybe it's different if you're only doing digital? You would know better than me. But it's still a lot of work on top of the work on top of the _other_ work. It looks like a high barrier from the outside.




Well, I can't get on board an escalation from  "I can't afford it" to "it's too much effort".  Yup, it means work!


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## SerHogan (Feb 23, 2016)

Was really looking forward to this piece and hoping it had some great tips and links to resources.  Instead I got an ethics lecture.


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## Xethreau (Feb 23, 2016)

As someone experimenting with self-publishing (with not disappointing results!) this advice is really useful. I didn't think about my role evolving from writer to publisher. Looking forward to reading this more thoroughly later!

Thanks for your business perspective as always [MENTION=1]Morrus[/MENTION]. Its been indispensable for me.


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## Xethreau (Feb 23, 2016)

SerHogan said:


> Was really looking forward to this piece and hoping it had some great tips and links to resources.  Instead I got an ethics lecture.




I _skimmed _this article and found this. :/



			
				Morrus said:
			
		

> The most obvious [solution] is *Kickstarter*. Let's say you need a thousand dollars to illustrate your short boo... A Kickstarter campaign to raise that thousand dollars has a number of benefits. First, *you find out in advance if folks want your book*. Second, it has its own *marketing value* all of itself. Third, it means you can pay your artists a fair wage. Fourth, *if you raise more than your thousand dollars, you start making profit before even putting the book on sale*. Fifth, you can then sell the book.


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## Halivar (Feb 23, 2016)

SerHogan said:


> Was really looking forward to this piece and hoping it had some great tips and links to resources.  Instead I got an ethics lecture.



I did not know about stock RPG art before this article. That's a big one. 
http://www.rpgnow.com/browse.php?filters=0_0_2893_0_0
https://www.patreon.com/jestockart?ty=h <-- This guy is using the patronage model to provide low-cost stock art.

There are others available via Google search. I just didn't know it existed before.


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

Patreon is also a great option. You can set per-article milestones based on art levels.  The only disadvantage there is that it's difficult to get your product to the customers if you want to be on DMs Guild due to that exclusivity clause.  I'm hopeful that OBS will relax that a little for products like that.


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## Halivar (Feb 23, 2016)

Morrus said:


> Patreon is also a great option. You can set per-article milestones based on art levels.  The only disadvantage there is that it's difficult to get your product to the customers if you want to be on DMs Guild due to that exclusivity clause.  I'm hopeful that OBS will relax that a little for products like that.



Yikes. Does that mean for DMsG you can only use work-for-hire art?


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

Halivar said:


> Yikes. Does that mean for DMsG you can only use work-for-hire art?




No, the usage terms have an exception for art.


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## nogrod (Feb 23, 2016)

*Expensive? It depends...*

I am a small publisher that has purchased at least 100 pieces of art since 2012. My working on margins that are amazing only because there are not in the red is a choice. It is certainly not a reason to complain about the expense of an input I knNow that I have seen the artists processes repeatedly it is not only their time you are buying, but their experience, judgement and professionalism.  I can also now, thanks to getting to know them socially a bit, appreciate how much time artists spend doing non-art things- a big one is chasing down late payments from publishers. Which is why the first few pieces for a publisher are hard to secure. 

Not every project can justify art based on sales projections, mine didnt, but I wanted it to look a certain way. So I began buying a lot of pieces before I launched the Kickstarter to hedge against not getting funded. I recommend the same because you get a chance to work with an artist and focus on what to expect as the project nears completion. Those early commissions establish reputations and set expectations. Even if some art goes unused it isn't wasted, especially if the artist had a good overall experience. Reputations go both ways and a good one with artists is priceless when time is a commodity.

Same thing applies to any for- hire creative (cartographer and sculptors are the other big ones in my case)

Mileage varies but I don't regret the direction I chose, not even the large sums of money spent in the process. I look at it as much cheaper than a golf habit- especially given the dollar to hour ratio


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## Will Doyle (Feb 23, 2016)

Saying that artists who provide content for free are undermining their profession is a little harsh.


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

Will Doyle said:


> Saying that artists who provide content for free are undermining their profession is a little harsh.




Maybe so; but then I've heard from new artists who say that it's tough getting a decent wage when publishers have been conditioned to think art to be of little or no value. It's not that people are deliberately trying to hurt other people, but things have a ripple effect, and if enough people are doing the things, the effects can add up. It's certainly worth thinking twice before undervaluing your own work, although of course an artist is free to value their own work in any way they wish.


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## Greg K (Feb 23, 2016)

I am not sure where Claudio got his information. As someone living in LA, $7 is not a living wage.  It is true, that the Federal Minimum Wage is $7.25/hr, but  that was established seven years ago and at the time was below the  minimum wage of several states including CA (which was $8/hr).  Current California minimum wage is $10/hr (and that is not a living wage in most large cities).

Back when I studied illustration before injuring my arm, my teacher told us our work should not be below $10/hr an hour. That rate was taking into account having to pay for materials, income tax (both state and federal) and other work related expenses something many starting artists do not consider as minimum wage is based on being an employee whom will cover materials and contribute half of social security tax payment (as a freelancer/contractor in the US you pay both portions) . At the time, that was the late 1990s.  A well known rpg illustrator in the early 2000's told me that the rpg rates being paid at the time by some of the major companies was good if you were living in your parents' basement. Many companies do not seem to have increased their rates much since then.

Another issue to consider is the purchasing of all rights. Outside of rpgs and, possibly, comics, freelance artwork and photography is sold for a specific term of use.  It might be a weekend, week, or month  for an ad in a newspaper taking account circulation size (and getting into more specifics of use) , a specific issue of a magazine, a first print run of a book.  Other uses are charged separately or at additional cost under their terms. After the specified term of usage is over, payment for additional usage falls under a new contract.  So this is another thing to consider when discussing payment and desire for many companies wanting full rights.


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

Greg K said:


> Another issue to consider is the purchasing of all rights. Outside of rpgs and, possibly, comics, freelance artwork and photography is sold for a specific term of use.  It might be a weekend, week, or month  for an ad in a newspaper taking account circulation size (and getting into more specifics of use) , a specific issue of a magazine, a first print run of a book.  Other uses are charged separately or at additional cost under their terms. After the specified term of usage is over, payment for additional usage falls under a new contract.  So this is another thing to consider when discussing payment and desire for many companies wanting full rights.




Yep. Not requiring work-for-hire pieces is definitely something to consider.


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## smiteworks (Feb 23, 2016)

Great article.

For another perspective, I would like to throw out the concept of shared publishing. Many people in this industry do work as a labor of love. The work and all proceeds *could* be divided out among all participating parties based on the percentage of work it takes to create the final product. All revenues could then be divided out by that same calculation. This could result in each participant getting paid less than a living wage for their work, but it also means they have a fair stake in whatever upside potential is in the finished work. This requires a large amount of trust in all parties to carry their predetermined load and for the person receiving the funds to provide accurate reporting and payment. Nobody gets taken advantage of here since everyone goes into it with their eyes open. There should be a binding agreement with all terms to determine how much advertising is spent, how much the author(s) receives, the artist(s) receives, the editor, publisher, etc. 

With enough projects like this, you won't always see a large upfront payment, but you will often see a spike of revenue immediately after launch, followed by residual sales on all past work. It is very similar to the model employed by artists selling their art as stock art. They get their money in small, but hopefully frequent chunks that will hopefully pay them more money over time if the market is big enough to bear it.


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## Von Ether (Feb 23, 2016)

SerHogan said:


> Was really looking forward to this piece and hoping it had some great tips and links to resources.  Instead I got an ethics lecture.




Drive Thru stock art

Now that I've paid for the attention with a resource link, I can tell you that one lesson _many_ small business owners need is ethics.

After 20 years as a creative, it seems that once someone becomes a small business owner, they'll turn a blind to a lot of things once they say "I can't afford you" or "I need to make as much profit as I can as fast as I can."

Suddenly, a practice that someone would never agree to, or put up, with looks tempting.

Remember the big guys started with monograph machines and staples. To go a step further, you'll need credit cards, friends with funds, a new mortgage, been in the biz for years or a combo of all of the above.

Regardless, you'll also be missing out on a lot of sleep. A lot of sleep.

Btw, my usual fee for advice like this is either $20 or an expensive lunch.


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## dave2008 (Feb 23, 2016)

I'm working on my first publishing effort to submit to the DM's Guild and I decided I wanted to commission some art.  So I thought I would share my experience thus far: 

*What I needed: 
*I was looking for seven humanoid (mostly) full-color illustrations approx. 1/4 page in size.

*Where I found the artist:*
I browsed deviantArt (http://www.deviantart.com) and found some artist I liked and sent them a note (you may have to sign-up to do this, I'm already a member so I'm not sure).  I sent notes to 5 artist with the basic parameters of what I wanted.  I petitioned artist from a range of talent/skill as I assumed I wouldn't be able to afford top-end talent (there are a lot of pros on DA).  I got a response from 2 artist who where interested within 12hrs.

*What I paid:* 
 The bids ranged from $75 - $500 per piece. Though I really liked the style and feel of the more expensive artist, I chose the lower cost artist and paid about $495 for my art (7 pieces).  I paid through pay-pal.

*What I got: 
* We are two weeks in and he has submit at least one draft of each piece and as many as 4 drafts on some (based on my comments/feedback).  I should be getting the final pieces next week, if not this week, about 4 weeks after I commissioned the art (non-exclusive btw).  Thus far I have been very happy with the results and working with the artist.

*Was it worth it?:* 
 As a first time publisher, probably not financially as I don't expect to make an money on this product.  Personally, I think the value the art adds was worth every penny.  Ultimately time will tell.  If I end up making some money I bet a big part of that will be because of the art.


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## Von Ether (Feb 23, 2016)

Will Doyle said:


> Saying that artists who provide content for free are undermining their profession is a little harsh.




Nope. It's a hard reality. 

https://youtu.be/mj5IV23g-fE
https://youtu.be/essNmNOrQto

The business world overall has this snide/passive-aggressive attitude towards creatives. Either we are less important because we allegedly directly make no profit (because Sales never uses a website, commercial or brochure) or because we should work cheap because an artist can eat the "fun" or "fulfillment" of his job.


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## Klaus (Feb 23, 2016)

Greg K said:


> I am not sure where Claudio got his information. As someone living in LA, $7 is not a living wage.  It is true, that the Federal Minimum Wage is $7.25/hr, but  that was established seven years ago and at the time was below the  minimum wage of several states including CA (which was $8/hr).  Current California minimum wage is $10/hr (and that is not a living wage in most large cities).




I should clarify: as I mentioned, the US minimum wage is (roughly) US$7 an hour (as you said, it's US$7.25). And it's actually not a "living" wage, since there's no place in the US where a single person can live off that rate. And then I mentioned the talk of raising that to US$15, which would be an actual "living" wage, and did those rate calculations based on that latter number (I certainly don't want anyone to starve while doing art). This was based on numbers I saw for regions of Washington state (I just read that Tacoma, WA approved a US$12 minimum wage).

But all of these numbers are examples of how to reach what consists a "fair" rate. Your teacher's suggestion of not working for less than US$10/hour is a good rule-of-thumb.


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## Will Doyle (Feb 23, 2016)

Von Ether said:


> Nope. It's a hard reality.
> 
> https://youtu.be/mj5IV23g-fE
> https://youtu.be/essNmNOrQto
> ...




Publishers shouldn't ask artists to work for free. I think most people would agree with that. But I disagree that artists who *volunteer* things for free are somehow undermining their own profession.


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## Klaus (Feb 23, 2016)

Will Doyle said:


> Publishers shouldn't ask artists to work for free. I think most people would agree with that. But I disagree that artists who *volunteer* things for free are somehow undermining their own profession.




Is it a product that is going to be for sale? If yes, then the artist should get some compensation. I've done free art for charity products, for instance.

I kept a website at Eric Noah's 3rd Edition News and Reviews, where I posted new art weekly: characters, races, oddball mixes of the two, monsters. Sometimes people would contact me asking "can I use this image for my campaign setting blog?", or "can I use this image as my avatar?". I'd allow it, of course, asking only that they put a link to my website in return. If someone asked me "can I use this image on my PDF that's going to be for sale at RPGNow?", I'd either ask for a fee, or just say no.


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## Vicente (Feb 23, 2016)

I was really interested on:

3) for the publisher really scraping for money, there are several good artists out there that offer stock illustration. Sure, the art won't be uniquely yours, but it's better than to cheat an artist out of a living wage.

Is there more information about this? A compiled place with links to artists that offer stock art?

Regards!
Vicente


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## RichGreen (Feb 23, 2016)

Vicente said:


> I was really interested on:
> 
> 3) for the publisher really scraping for money, there are several good artists out there that offer stock illustration. Sure, the art won't be uniquely yours, but it's better than to cheat an artist out of a living wage.
> 
> ...



Drivethrurpg is a good place to start: 
http://www.drivethrurpg.com/browse.php?filters=2893

Hope this helps


Rich


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## Toriel (Feb 23, 2016)

I believe that anyone who works hard and full time - whether they are writers, painters, playwrights, sales people - should make a decent wage that lets them afford a nice apartment with all the necessities, some vacation time - everything that is needed to live a fulfilling life.

Unfortunately, until there is a major change in the way the business world works, we won't see it anytime soon.


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## Greg K (Feb 23, 2016)

Klaus said:


> But all of these numbers are examples of how to reach what consists a "fair" rate. Your teacher's suggestion of not working for less than US$10/hour is a good rule-of-thumb.




That was nearly 20 years.  $15-20/hr is probably a living wage these days,. However, the US now requires health insurance (or be fined) and freelancers need to factor in material costs and periods of no work (as do  painters, plumbers, electricians, and mechanics). So, probably, the minimum should be $25-40/hr depending upon where one lives (maybe more). 

 The $25-$40 above is also before sales tax. I am not a lawyer or accountant, but I have been told that in many US states, art work changing hands of ownership is subject to sales tax unless the purchase is for reproduction rights only (meaning the publisher only has use for a limited time and purpose and the artist maintains ownership and can sell the work again at a later time). Again, I am not a lawyer or accoutant, but a tax preparer told me that if I didn't charge sales, it was coming off what I did make based upon sales. One should check with their accoutant/ tax preparer to see if these are true (just relaying what I have been told for consideration).
If working for a larger client, the rates should be higher.I had instructors tell me that they had one rate for mom and pop.  However, when dealing with larger business and corporations rates would go up. So they might charge a mom and pop $50-$100/hr for limited rights (with a minimum),  but much more when dealing with a large corporation like McDonalds , Hasbro, Mattel, or Microsoft.  If either wanted full rights, the costs becomes much more.


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## prosfilaes (Feb 23, 2016)

It's all about supply and demand, and your article proposes to drive up the supply of cheap art (public domain and stock art) and drive down the demand for new art. Public domain art does not pay artists. Cheap stock art may pay the artist a living wage for the time spent on that piece of art, but it reduces the number of pieces of art being sold. If a good stock artist sells a work 10 times at $15 a piece (or 30 times at $5 a piece, and only a third of them get used), that means one good artist gets $150 for ten uses and nine artists get nothing. Is that better than ten artists each getting $15 for a commissioned piece of work? You certainly haven't improved the status of the artists who got nothing.

At the end of the day, your ideas would produce a market that spends less on art (given PD art) and employs far fewer artists at a much higher rate. I'm pretty sure that the artists who you've deprived completely of work are not fans of that idea.


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## kenmarable (Feb 23, 2016)

prosfilaes said:


> I'm pretty sure that the artists who you've deprived completely of work are not fans of that idea.




Wow, not loading the argument at all there. Now Morrus is responsible for depriving artists of work??? 

Two things: 1) In the long term, this will benefit all artists and creative types. When a site as popular as the Huffington Post can get by with paying nothing to writers (yes, they pay $0, not even paying too little, but paying *nothing*), then there is a problem. If money is being made, those who create the value need to be paid, and unfortunately that requires some major culture shifts in the business world, but without those shifts, artists will continually leave the field because they can't afford to keep working in it.

2) Several times it is mentioned that there are ways to find the money to pay artists. Kickstarter and Patreon have been specifically named... several times. Or not buying full rights and letting the artists sell prints, or a variety of other options. It's a false dilemma to think the only options are paying crap to 90% of artists or never hiring 90% of artists. Repeatedly the point has been made, that there are ways to pay artists a fair rate for their work. It might not be easy, but if you want easy, don't become a publisher.


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## AriochQ (Feb 23, 2016)

I am working on a DM's Guild product.  I got one of my son's high school friends to work on the artwork for a 50% cut of whatever profits we realize.  It is by no means 'professional' quality, but:

1.  It is a good experience for him.  We have been talking about deadlines, revisions, etc.  All the things that he will run into later in life as an artist.
2.  He gets more experience as an artist.  He intends to major in graphic design, so it can't hurt.
3.  It is fun for me (and hopefully him).
4.  I view DM's guild as an extension of my hobby with an added bonus that it may pay for a few more gaming goodies (I have another job to pay the bills). 50% of the profits barely matters to me, but for a high school kid could seriously increase his income.


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

Vicente said:


> I was really interested on:
> 
> 3) for the publisher really scraping for money, there are several good artists out there that offer stock illustration. Sure, the art won't be uniquely yours, but it's better than to cheat an artist out of a living wage.
> 
> Is there more information about this? A compiled place with links to artists that offer stock art?




There's a list right there in the OP.


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

prosfilaes said:


> It's all about supply and demand, and your article proposes to drive up the supply of cheap art (public domain and stock art) and drive down the demand for new art. Public domain art does not pay artists. Cheap stock art may pay the artist a living wage for the time spent on that piece of art, but it reduces the number of pieces of art being sold. If a good stock artist sells a work 10 times at $15 a piece (or 30 times at $5 a piece, and only a third of them get used), that means one good artist gets $150 for ten uses and nine artists get nothing. Is that better than ten artists each getting $15 for a commissioned piece of work? You certainly haven't improved the status of the artists who got nothing.
> 
> At the end of the day, your ideas would produce a market that spends less on art (given PD art) and employs far fewer artists at a much higher rate. I'm pretty sure that the artists who you've deprived completely of work are not fans of that idea.




Stock art wasn't my idea.


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## Vicente (Feb 23, 2016)

Morrus said:


> There's a list right there in the OP.




That's a list of stock art websites (or public domain art), not of artists offering stock art. Most of them don't group art by artist either (which is kind of useful).


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## Morrus (Feb 23, 2016)

Vicente said:


> That's a list of stock art websites (or public domain art), not of artists offering stock art. Most of them don't group art by artist either (which is kind of useful).




The stock art websites list the artists.  There are tens of thousands of artists.  I find it useful to search the art by keyword, and once I find one I like, look at what else that artist has done.


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## prosfilaes (Feb 23, 2016)

kenmarable said:


> Now Morrus is responsible for depriving artists of work???




To the extent that he successfully encourages (a) people to not become publishers, (b) use public domain work or (c) spend their art budget on stock art by established artists instead of new art by new artists, yes. It's a law, the law of unintended consequences; this is a complex system, and intervening in it will have consequences you didn't intend.



> In the long term, this will benefit all artists and creative types.




Creativity is an attribute of humans. Probably the majority of people have had dreams of being authors or artists or musicians or actors. Many of them have acted upon it. Most of them end up as mailmen or sysadmins or some other non-creative profession. That's the problem here; jobs that many people can do don't pay well, and that goes double for jobs that people would rather do instead of other jobs that pay better.



> but without those shifts, artists will continually leave the field because they can't afford to keep working in it.




Microsoft might be able to spend more on art, but I'm pretty sure that the total art budget of the RPG community is roughly constant. Say it's a million, to grab a number much higher than I believe; that'll support 20 artists at 50K a year, or 50 artists at 20K a year, or 200 artists at 5K a year. Since I'm pretty sure there's 200 artists who want to grab a part of that RPG art budget, if the working artists are going to get a living wage, most of them are going to have to stop competing for a slice of the pie.



> 2) Several times it is mentioned that there are ways to find the money to pay artists. Kickstarter and Patreon have been specifically named... several times. Or not buying full rights and letting the artists sell prints, or a variety of other options.




With the exception of artists selling prints, you're just moving money around in the community. The amount of money people are going to pay for RPG books is not significantly going to be expanded by Kickstarter and Patreon. You can't get blood from a stone.



> It's a false dilemma to think the only options are paying crap to 90% of artists or never hiring 90% of artists.




It's quite simple; you can't increase the money you're spending by a significant amount without increasing the income. And increasing the income of an established industry is slow at best. If your art budget is $200, and you plan on paying your commissioned artists 10 times as much, your choices are less art, more public domain art, or stock art. It's rarely going to be an option to just jump your art budget to $2000, and certainly not industry-wise.



> It might not be easy, but if you want easy, don't become a publisher.




If you remove 90% of the publishers from the industry, so go the people they would pay.


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## Wallraven (Feb 24, 2016)

prosfilaes said:


> Creativity is an attribute of humans. Probably the majority of people have had dreams of being authors or artists or musicians or actors. Many of them have acted upon it. Most of them end up as mailmen or sysadmins or some other non-creative profession. That's the problem here; jobs that many people can do don't pay well, and that goes double for jobs that people would rather do instead of other jobs that pay better.
> 
> ...
> 
> It's quite simple; you can't increase the money you're spending by a significant amount without increasing the income. And increasing the income of an established industry is slow at best. If your art budget is $200, and you plan on paying your commissioned artists 10 times as much, your choices are less art, more public domain art, or stock art. It's rarely going to be an option to just jump your art budget to $2000, and certainly not industry-wise.




This reminds me of something that one aspiring author said - it was along the lines of "JK Rowling should retire so the rest of us have a chance at success."

Your answer seems to be "make everyone equally unable to have this as a fulltime career".

Not everyone can be successful in a creative career. Or any given career. Those who are better (or luckier, or more popular, or whatever) will rise to the top, the rest will struggle (and maybe quit).


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## prosfilaes (Feb 24, 2016)

Wallraven said:


> This reminds me of something that one aspiring author said - it was along the lines of "JK Rowling should retire so the rest of us have a chance at success."
> 
> Your answer seems to be "make everyone equally unable to have this as a fulltime career".
> 
> Not everyone can be successful in a creative career. Or any given career. Those who are better (or luckier, or more popular, or whatever) will rise to the top, the rest will struggle (and maybe quit).




Your last paragraph is surprisingly free market, given that you're arguing against the free market. Why not let those who struggle selling $5 commissions struggle and those who are better succeed?

I'm not saying necessarily that we should or shouldn't do anything, but let's not imagine that what the article proposes is good for all RPG artists; the proposal would reduce the amount of art being created for RPGs and prevent artists from competing on price, pricing many artists out of the market. That's arguably a good thing, but let's acknowledge the consequences of the actions.

It's interesting that you respond derisively to an idea to raise the wages of successful writers (on the back of a billionaire writer) in an argument against an idea to raise the wages of successful artists (on the back of many minimally successful artists.)


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## dave2008 (Feb 24, 2016)

prosfilaes said:


> I'm not saying necessarily that we should or shouldn't do anything, but let's not imagine that what the article proposes is good for all RPG artists; *the proposal would reduce the amount of art being created for RPGs and prevent artists from competing on price, pricing many artists out of the market*. That's arguably a good thing, but let's acknowledge the consequences of the actions.




That is what _you_ think would happen.  It is not a fact, but your opinion.  It is entirely possible nothing changes or the opposite of occurs.


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## Von Ether (Feb 24, 2016)

prosfilaes said:


> It's all about supply and demand, and your article proposes to drive up the supply of cheap art (public domain and stock art) and drive down the demand for new art. Public domain art does not pay artists. Cheap stock art may pay the artist a living wage for the time spent on that piece of art, but it reduces the number of pieces of art being sold. If a good stock artist sells a work 10 times at $15 a piece (or 30 times at $5 a piece, and only a third of them get used), that means one good artist gets $150 for ten uses and nine artists get nothing. Is that better than ten artists each getting $15 for a commissioned piece of work? You certainly haven't improved the status of the artists who got nothing.
> 
> At the end of the day, your ideas would produce a market that spends less on art (given PD art) and employs far fewer artists at a much higher rate. I'm pretty sure that the artists who you've deprived completely of work are not fans of that idea.




The head scratcher to that assumption is why aren't the big companies also using stock art for the majority of their work. At most, they pay for for quality work and then eventually resuse some of that art, but overall when publishers get enough budget, they opt for original art because it offers something that stock art doesn't

A customized image that supports the vision of the product, which is the goal of any publisher with an average project, which should have a professional budget. 

But if your goal is to sell something for a few bucks and the budget option is No Art (and no artist is making money) or Stock Art (where someone is at least making a some cash), then I'd suggest going stock art.


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## MNblockhead (Feb 24, 2016)

I'm used to a large percentage of the TTRPG community being unreasonably cheap when it comes to paying for content. So I guess I shouldn't be so surprised at how many publishers exhibit the same cheap attitude. Such publishers are really hobbyists hoping to make some money on their hobby, but having little business sense. It is easier than ever to find public-domain art, especially for fantasy settings. But so many times those who have taken that route end up with a cheap-looking product because the art isn't custom-built to the content. Even with public-domain or inexpensive stock art, it takes someone with an artistic bent to select art that harmonizes together and captures the "feel" of the content. Layout too is an art and I think layout becomes even more important when you use non-custom art. 

I'm not sure I'm fully on-board with some of the guild mentality and union vibes I'm getting from the OP, but hiring people who value themselves to ask for a rate they can live and thrive on (and regularly get people to pay it), only makes sense. In my business I've learned this the hard way. I've bought the services of many artists, copy writers, Web-site designers, and programmers over the years and almost every time I went cheap, I've regretted it, with it often costing me more because of wasted time or even scrapping what I bought and having to pay someone more competent to redo the project. 

One thing I don't think the OP emphasized enough, is the importance of finding the right fit. It is demoralizing to hire expensive talent, someone who is obviously capable, only to find out that they just are not able to carry out your vision. Learning about art can help improve your ability to describe what you are looking for and better determine if the awesome portfolio of an artist will translate into awesome art for your project. I really love listening to pod casts or reading articles were product directors and artists talk about their collaboration and how they came up with the art for a work. See some of the stuff with Chris Perkins and other talking about the Curse of Straud for example.


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## Von Ether (Feb 24, 2016)

MNblockhead said:


> I'm used to a large percentage of the TTRPG community being unreasonably cheap when it comes to paying for content. So I guess I shouldn't be so surprised at how many publishers exhibit the same cheap attitude.




It's the only hobby I've seen where people get irked if they can't use a 20 year-old supplement.


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## prosfilaes (Feb 24, 2016)

dave2008 said:


> That is what _you_ think would happen.  It is not a fact, but your opinion.  It is entirely possible nothing changes or the opposite of occurs.




It's entirely possible that the proposal will fulfill the conditions set for the end of the universe and cause an end to everything. It's a bit unlikely, though. I suppose all predictions of the future are in some sense not fact, but that still doesn't make it reasonable to dismiss any analysis of a proposal as just "opinion".

The proposal says that publishers without much money should go without art, use public domain art or use preexisting stock art. That is, the amount of original RPG art commissioned will be reduced. The proposal says that publishers should not pay bottom dollar for art. That reduces the power of an artist to bargain based on cost and encourages publishers to pay for artists who already demand a decent price, instead of newbie artists trying to get their foot in the door based on price. Those seem like reasonable conclusions to me.


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## prosfilaes (Feb 24, 2016)

Von Ether said:


> It's the only hobby I've seen where people get irked if they can't use a 20 year-old supplement.




Really? I haven't seen it. I have seen people use 20 year old skis and complain about new digital SLR cameras not being compatible with 20 year-old SLR lenses. 20 year old camping gear works just fine if you don't mind the weight. Dover keeps many 50-year-old math books in print; heck, they have at least one 20-year-old computer book in print. Even in the rapid moving computer world, TeX has been stable since 1982 and Java is reasonably backward compatible to 1.0 in 1995. The processor in your computer is (theoretically) fully backwardly compatible to the 8086 released in 1978, despite Intel repeatedly trying to put the axe to the line. In 2001, the Itanium was offered as a replacement and bombed... and it's still being produced, because even in the computer industry, there are some places where a company has to support even a failure for 15 years.

Some upgrading of equipment in any field is to be expected. But ending up paying thousands of dollars and then having new stuff be incompatible is a pain, whether there's good reason for the forced upgrade or not. Why shouldn't people get annoyed?


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## Plane Sailing (Feb 24, 2016)

Thanks for a great article, Morrus!

I'm in the last 38 hours of using Kickstarter for exactly this purpose - to fund professional artwork for my sci-fi RPG which I'm just in the process of publishing. I'm currently 166% funded (why not take a look? https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1283988566/starguild-space-opera-noir-tabletop-rpg)

The one additional thing which is worth mentioning is that for a kickstarter you may want to prime the pump by investing in some professional art before the kickstarter to show what you are intending to get. I'm really glad that I got a cover done by the magnificent Claudio Pozas; I wish I had had more confidence in my kickstarter and had ponied up for a few additional pieces of work up front 



Halivar said:


> Now running a KickStarter, as you very well know, is a full-time job. I fear many self-pubs won't be able to do that and hold down their day job.




I think that is an unfounded fear.

I have an extremely demanding day job, but I've had no problem giving my kickstarter the care and attention which it needs - certainly enough to help it get to the point of being funded. 

It takes time and effort, yes. But it isn't like a real full time job; it is an investment in time that you need to make.

Real pay for real artists is a worthwhile call.


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## dave2008 (Feb 24, 2016)

prosfilaes said:


> I suppose all predictions of the future are in some sense not fact, but that still doesn't make it reasonable to dismiss any analysis of a proposal as just "opinion".




Your statements are, to this point, 100% opinion.  You have provided no facts.  However, I do not dismiss opinions, I find great value in opinions.  



prosfilaes said:


> The proposal says that publishers without much money should go without art, use public domain art or use preexisting stock art. That is, the amount of original RPG art commissioned will be reduced. The proposal says that publishers should not pay bottom dollar for art. That reduces the power of an artist to bargain based on cost and encourages publishers to pay for artists who already demand a decent price, instead of newbie artists trying to get their foot in the door based on price. Those seem like reasonable conclusions to me.




It is also reasonable to conclude that paying artists less than a fair wage or even nothing at all leads to artist failing to succeed at their craft because they can't make money, reducing the talent pool and thus the amount and, perhaps more importantly, the quality of art produced.

Heck parents regularly push their children away from being artist for this very reason.  Just imagine how much wonderful art could be produced if parents encouraged their children to be artists because they can actually make a good life with their art!  

It seems to me that the prevailing evidence suggests:  low pay = low quality and quantity of art.


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## prosfilaes (Feb 24, 2016)

dave2008 said:


> It is also reasonable to conclude that paying artists less than a fair wage or even nothing at all leads to artist failing to succeed at their craft because they can't make money, reducing the talent pool and thus the amount and, perhaps more importantly, the quality of art produced.




Where's the money coming from? You can't have the same amount of art made at higher prices on the same budget. There's no people getting rich off our industry. 



> Heck parents regularly push their children away from being artist for this very reason.  Just imagine how much wonderful art could be produced if parents encouraged their children to be artists because they can actually make a good life with their art!




How much does Elton John make? I'd say that's a good living. And yet parents push their kids from being musicians for the exact same reason they push their kids from being artists. There are more people who want to be artists and musicians then the world has demand and money for art and music. If parents pushed their kids to be artists, it would just be worse. Increasing the supply of artists reduces the amount that they're going to get paid. That's supply and demand, economics 101. 



> It seems to me that the prevailing evidence suggests:  low pay = low quality and quantity of art.




Someone above linked to http://www.deviantart.com/ . I invite you to look at it. One can discuss the quality of art on the Internet; that's in the eye of the beholder. But to seriously claim that the low pay of artists produces low quantity of art is to ignore the Internet, wherein millions of artists are showing off their works, frequently without someone else covering the hosting costs like DeviantArt does.


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## dave2008 (Feb 24, 2016)

prosfilaes said:


> Where's the money coming from? You can't have the same amount of art made at higher prices on the same budget. There's no people getting rich off our industry.




More artist = more talent = better art = better sales = higher demand = more artist.





prosfilaes said:


> How much does Elton John make? I'd say that's a good living. And yet parents push their kids from being musicians for the exact same reason they push their kids from being artists. There are more people who want to be artists and musicians then the world has demand and money for art and music. If parents pushed their kids to be artists, it would just be worse. Increasing the supply of artists reduces the amount that they're going to get paid. That's supply and demand, economics 101.




Again:  More artist = more talent = better art = better sales = higher demand = more artist.



prosfilaes said:


> Someone above linked to http://www.deviantart.com/ . I invite you to look at it. One can discuss the quality of art on the Internet; that's in the eye of the beholder. But to seriously claim that the low pay of artists produces low quantity of art is to ignore the Internet, wherein millions of artists are showing off their works, frequently without someone else covering the hosting costs like DeviantArt does.




Ahh, but how great would the art be if we paid them more - that is what your missing.  I also never claimed low pay = low quality.  I said better pay = better quality.  There is a difference.

Also, I provided the link to DA, I am a member and contributor to the site, but I am not a pro.  However, I lot of the art (at least a lot of it that I follow) on DA is from professionals who are paid for the work the are posting.  All most all the high quality stuff was either specifically made for someone (video games, MtG, WotC, Pazio, Marvel, etc.) or by professionals showing their personal projects.  And indeed you can purchase the art or commission an artist (which is what I did).  So DA is not really an example of free art.

Finally to be clear, I don't necessarily disagree with you, I'm just open to the possibility that better pay could work for everyone.  For example, many corporations in the US complain that raising the minimum wage will be bad for business / ruin the economy.  However, states that have increased the minimum wage have not had this occur.  Some have had a small dip, some have actually improved, but in most cases it has really had no effect.  Somehow the economy excepts the higher wages without adversely effecting the rest of the economy.  I think it could work for artists as well.


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## AriochQ (Feb 24, 2016)

You could use the same argument for those people generating the DM's Guild content that requires the art, i.e.  "By publishing gaming material for cheap, you are hurting SERIOUS writers.  You should demand full price for your material or not produce it at all!"  Looking at it that way, the original argument amounts to cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Essentially, it comes down to supply and demand.  Should people produce art for $5?  Probably not.  But if that $5 is the difference between eating dinner or going to bed hungry?  Hand me a pencil!  Although that example is extreme, it demonstrates a point.  Not all art is created equal and the market will end up paying what it is worth based on supply and demand.  Unfortunately, there are a lot of people trying to make a living as artists, and that depresses the market.

Like I told my college roommate who declared he was a true artist and would never become an art teacher...It would be great if we could all make a living from our hobby.  What does he do now?  Art teacher...


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## Halivar (Feb 24, 2016)

AriochQ said:


> You could use the same argument for those people generating the DM's Guild content that requires the art, i.e.  "By publishing gaming material for cheap, you are hurting SERIOUS writers.  You should demand full price for your material or not produce it at all!"  Looking at it that way, the original argument amounts to cutting off your nose to spite your face.



To be fair to Morrus, he also thinks freelance writers should also demand fair pay in this thread: What's a Freelance RPG Writer Worth.



			
				Morrus said:
			
		

> If you're doing work for somebody, and you're not being paid, you are being exploited. (Doing work for somebody is different to doing work with somebody). Volunteer work obviously falls outside this category, but volunteer work should clearly be volunteer work, not work paid in "exposure" (see below).
> Never work for the promise of "exposure", or for "experience". You should work for money. This is a common tactic, and is often puffed up with nice language, but it is exploitation and you should look out for it.


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## AriochQ (Feb 24, 2016)

Halivar said:


> To be fair to Morrus, he also thinks freelance writers should also demand fair pay in this thread: What's a Freelance RPG Writer Worth.




And that is why we ended up with unions.  Of course, certain lawmakers are legislating unions out of existence in the U.S., but that is topic not appropriate to this forum.


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## delericho (Feb 24, 2016)

Will Doyle said:


> Saying that artists who provide content for free are undermining their profession is a little harsh.




If you'll permit me an anecdote from another field...

Back when I was learning to play the bagpipes, the topic of playing at weddings (and how much to charge) was raised. At which point the suggestion was that if you wanted to play for free, then that was fine (though you'd probably only really do that for friends and family - why would you give up your time in that way for a stranger?); and if you were going to charge for your time/skills then that was also fine.

But... if you were going to charge for the service then you should charge the going rate for doing so (currently £120ish for a wedding). For two reasons: firstly, if you didn't think you were good enough to charge that full rate, it meant you weren't good enough to charge at all. Secondly, by offering to play for a lower rate you were undercutting the market and forcing prices across the board down - and while _you_ might be doing it as a hobby/labour of love/whatever, there are other people for whom it represented an important part of their income, and by driving their pay down you'd be harming them.

IOW: I don't think people providing content for free are "undermining their profession", though they should probably be selective in who they do such work for, but I do agree that fair rates of payment (for paid work) are worth supporting.


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## dave2008 (Feb 24, 2016)

AriochQ said:


> You could use the same argument for those people generating the DM's Guild content that requires the art, i.e.  "By publishing gaming material for cheap, you are hurting SERIOUS writers.  You should demand full price for your material or not produce it at all!"  Looking at it that way, the original argument amounts to cutting off your nose to spite your face.
> 
> Essentially, it comes down to supply and demand.  Should people produce art for $5?  Probably not.  But if that $5 is the difference between eating dinner or going to bed hungry?  Hand me a pencil!  Although that example is extreme, it demonstrates a point.  Not all art is created equal and the market will end up paying what it is worth based on supply and demand.  Unfortunately, there are a lot of people trying to make a living as artists, and that depresses the market.
> 
> Like I told my college roommate who declared he was a true artist and would never become an art teacher...It would be great if we could all make a living from our hobby.  What does he do now?  Art teacher...




My only point was to show a different point of view that is valid.  I've done that. So I'm good.  Thanks for the discussion and I hope you see that there is more than one way to look at a situation.


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## Will Doyle (Feb 24, 2016)

delericho said:


> IOW: I don't think people providing content for free are "undermining their profession", though they should probably be selective in who they do such work for, but I do agree that fair rates of payment (for paid work) are worth supporting.




Yes, you're right. I guess that's my stance too. 

Another anecdote. My fiancee is a freelance artist, generally taking commissions from small businesses (she's probably why I spoke up in the first place). She charges professional rates. Clients often approach her for work that is underpaid, or ask her to work for exposure. She soon learned to turn down such clients, and rarely undercuts her daily rate.

Last year she got chatting to a woman in our local town who was struggling to set up her own business. My fiancee offered to help out by providing a logo for her letterheads. In return, she agreed to be paid in cake. That woman has since got her business off the ground, and recently came back to my fiancee with a proper, paid commission. Now, you could argue that this woman a) shouldn't have tried to set up a business without funding to pay for letterheads, or b) paying artists in cake sets a precedent for other small businesses to pay in cake too. 

I think the reality is that many cottage industries rely on a bit of charity to get off the ground, and during that phase they can only offer what they have, or promise something for the future. If they carry on paying cake when they're turning a profit, that's a different story.


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## kenmarable (Feb 24, 2016)

dave2008 said:


> More artist = more talent = better art = better sales = higher demand = more artist.




I think this gets to the underlying assumption that prosfilaes is coming from. With talk of an "established industry" and "where is the money coming from?", prosfilaes is working from an assumption that the industry is a zero-sum game. For that to be true, there has to be an unchanging number of customers with unchanging budgets. I disagree with both of those. Both can and do change (hopefully upwards!).

So if, like me, you disagree with the zero-sum premise, then the rest of the argument is unconvincing.

*IF* the industry is a zero-sum game, then there is some mathematical truth to the point prosfilaes is trying to make. However, if better products can lead to more sales overall and more revenue in the industry (as we believe), then the math isn't convincing in the least.


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## Acr0ssTh3P0nd (Feb 24, 2016)

Will Doyle said:


> Yes, you're right. I guess that's my stance too.
> 
> Another anecdote. My fiancee is a freelance artist, generally taking commissions from small businesses (she's probably why I spoke up in the first place). She charges professional rates. Clients often approach her for work that is underpaid, or ask her to work for exposure. She soon learned to turn down such clients, and rarely undercuts her daily rate.
> 
> ...





I think another difference here is that your fiancee herself came forward first with the offer to help, rather than her being asked to do a job that drastically underpaid. If an artist offers their services for a lower cost, then that's their decision to lower the monetary value of their work. They have seen a cause that intrigues them and decides that the money isn't the main point. And that's cool! The artist is still receiving the money that they decided they need to do the work, and they most likely won't be making it a regular thing.


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## dave2008 (Feb 24, 2016)

kenmarable said:


> I think this gets to the underlying assumption that prosfilaes is coming from. With talk of an "established industry" and "where is the money coming from?", prosfilaes is working from an assumption that the industry is a zero-sum game. For that to be true, there has to be an unchanging number of customers with unchanging budgets. I disagree with both of those. Both can and do change (hopefully upwards!).
> 
> So if, like me, you disagree with the zero-sum premise, then the rest of the argument is unconvincing.
> 
> *IF* the industry is a zero-sum game, then there is some mathematical truth to the point prosfilaes is trying to make. However, if better products can lead to more sales overall and more revenue in the industry (as we believe), then the math isn't convincing in the least.




You got it; however, the truth probably lies somewhere in between.


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## Morrus (Feb 24, 2016)

AriochQ said:


> And that is why we ended up with unions.  Of course, certain lawmakers are legislating unions out of existence in the U.S., but that is topic not appropriate to this forum.




I'm why you ended up with unions?  That's very flattering.


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## prosfilaes (Feb 25, 2016)

kenmarable said:


> *IF* the industry is a zero-sum game, then there is some mathematical truth to the point prosfilaes is trying to make. However, if better products can lead to more sales overall and more revenue in the industry (as we believe), then the math isn't convincing in the least.




You're quibbling with the details, and using that as a justification to ignore everything. At what rate do you think better artwork will allow the RPG industry to grow? Is it really the lack of pretty artwork (as opposed to roleplaying content) that's holding back most small RPG companies? The history of the RPG industry says to me that as quality has grown, as many minor third-party companies are turning out work that puts to shame early 80s TSR work, it hasn't meant that the industry has grown. It's just raised the bar on what's considered acceptable.

One of the things that annoys me about this is: I saw a Kickstarter that offered as an add-on an original musical theme for your campaign. I talked to my brother-in-law, a skilled composer who never managed to break into business and who went back to his day job as a sysadmin, and he said the prices charged were pretty reasonable. In my upcoming Kickstarter, if I go to him and ask for him to do that for my Kickstarter, is it really my job to second-guess the price he asks? I feel it pretty paternalistic, when someone puts out a tile and names their price, to act like it's outrageous that someone pays their price.


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## dave2008 (Feb 25, 2016)

prosfilaes said:


> I feel it pretty paternalistic, when someone puts out a tile and names their price, to act like it's outrageous that someone pays their price.




As far as I have seen you are the only one making that claim.


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## wcpfish (Feb 25, 2016)

As a publisher, writer AND artist (btw I have made most of my money as a fine artist and not as an illustrator)  I can say without hesitation that artists who undervalue their work help destroy the industry.  

Imagine you are a world class chef.  You went into debt up to your eyeballs to get into a top school.  You came out and worked your way up over four levels from prep line to eventually having your name on your own place.  You employ dozens of people, you paid an expert to design your menu, your atmosphere, everything.  The location cost you an arm and a leg but it too had to be perfect.  You have now worked your butt off over half a lifetime and you're starting to have just enough money to drive a new car and to take a once a year vacation.  Guess what? 

 Joe Retired Guy sets up a little stand right next to your restaurant and offers his "awwww shux I'm just glad folks like it Saffron Curry Chicken for 1/6th the price of yours.  Joe Retired Guy just cooks for the LOLZ and he's from a long line of trust fund babies. He doesn't need the money- cooking is just a "little hobby" for him.  

Joe has just wrecked your business. 

 I have seen more truly great "Little Old Lady Weekend Hobbyist" Painters than I can count and they all just want "Oh....I dunno is $25 too much?" for their paintings.  It devalues the hard work of every other artist out there.  It's the reason artists are seen as cute/whimsical/eccentric types who clearly only want to work for the love of colors.  Don't be that artist...please.  Charge a fair price for your time, materials, and level of experience, stop wrecking the rest of us who have to feed our families.


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## delericho (Feb 25, 2016)

wcpfish said:


> Imagine you are a world class chef...
> 
> Joe Retired Guy sets up a little stand right next to your restaurant and offers his "awwww shux I'm just glad folks like it Saffron Curry Chicken for 1/6th the price of yours.  Joe Retired Guy just cooks for the LOLZ and he's from a long line of trust fund babies. He doesn't need the money- cooking is just a "little hobby" for him.
> 
> Joe has just wrecked your business.




The World Class Chef has nothing to fear from Joe Retired Guy. People will still pay for quality. (Well, unless JRG actually _does_ match WCC for quality, but if that's the case then one of them is in the wrong job.)

The people that Joe Retired Guy poses a threat to are the other small businesses - those who run their own little stands but who do need the money, or the person who runs the breakfast diner where the food is fine but not world-beating. Those are the guys Joe is undercutting and (potentially) matching on quality.

(And it's also worth noting that those little guys are under far more threat from McDonalds than Joe will ever pose. But that's outside of the scope of the RPG-artist analogy, so I'll not take it any further.)



> I have seen more truly great "Little Old Lady Weekend Hobbyist" Painters than I can count and they all just want "Oh....I dunno is $25 too much?" for their paintings.  It devalues the hard work of every other artist out there.  It's the reason artists are seen as cute/whimsical/eccentric types who clearly only want to work for the love of colors.  Don't be that artist...please.  Charge a fair price for your time, materials, and level of experience, stop wrecking the rest of us who have to feed our families.




This I agree with. As I said up-thread, I think donating your time and effort is fine, and I think charging for your time and effort is also fine. But if you do charge, you should charge the going rate - precisely for the reason you give.


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## araquael (Feb 25, 2016)

Well, this thread finally made me get around to resetting my enWorld password! Huzzah!

As someone who has written professionally, floats around the dregs of the film industry and lives with and around full time artists, let me tell you: making art is work.

Not only is it work, it costs money to do. 

Of course you can volunteer, but you don't do yourself much good. You cannot keep working for free in the hope that one day the grand spotlight of internet adoration will shine on you. You can do it a bit. But you won't be able to do it a lot. The best exposure is that gotten from a series of paid gigs. For several reasons, not least of which a paid gig will be part of a paid product with production values and editing and so on - in other words a product people will appreciate and remember. A paid gig, even a not-so-well paying one, comes with the wonderful feeling of maybe going out for coffee or dinner with friends with the proceeds with you in the buzzed-up knowledge that you got paid for your talent. Means you'll keep doing it, even as you deal with editorial notes, change requests and whatnot. Makes it easier to have a professional portfolio of stuff which will have acquired a reputation. 

For artists, its a deal more important. Writing is reasonably cheap. Doing art costs. It means paying for things like a desk to work on, which is only good for doing art on, getting a lightbox, getting paints, getting some editing software, getting a tablet thingie to draw on. All of those things tend to degrade over time, so they all are going to eventually need replacing. And that's not even counting other costs having an art career might involve. Most of the full time artists I know make their money from big gallery shows - but the night they are wining and dining at the opening or the vernissage, they are usually thousands of dollars/pounds/whatever in the red. The big show had fees, their application fees and agency fees and and and and...  Point being, art costs to do. Most artists are often doing a variety of different things to subsidise the art. Sculptors might work as 3d animators to pay the bills part of the year, or save up for application fees, or take smaller gigs to subsidise the big gigs. Remember too, that life gets mysteriously more expensive as you get older.

But what has that got to do with someone who just wants to draw some orcs and sexy elves? Well its fun doing it, and you can put it up on deviant art and people can like it.  But soon as someone says "I need you to draw the orc with a battleaxe, not the spear you have been using" it becomes work. It's already work, but now its adjusting your talent, skill and energy for someone else. Work. 

I know we're all meant to be part of exciting start up companies and doing stupid amounts of work for no reward in case there's a sudden buyout by Facebook, at which point we all become zillionaires, but the reality is, most people will work a job, and expect to be paid by the hour or a salary commensurate with the time they put it. It might be what you trained for, you may believe in what you are doing, but you're still figuratively drawing those battleaxes. Now imagine you're working one of those normal jobs and you've been waiting all week for Saturday to roll around. You're going to watch netflix, you're going to have coffee with a friend, maybe play something from Steam. Now imagine your boss calls you at 2pm to tell you there's been a rush order and everyone needs to come in. You'd kinda want to be paid. You'd be less than thrilled if you got in on that saturday and discover that since a few odd souls volunteered to come in and work for free, that you were now expected to work for free too.

It's work. You need to be paid. The problem is, the entire internet and modern media runs on content, which people are making all sorts of money off, and everyone's expected to generate it for free. Even your buddy's dog pictures on facebook is content being monetised by facebook. Hell your brother's spat with his ex is monetised content. Some people's dog videos and internet spats, done for free, are so effective that they get gigs doing branded content online and become stars with millions of youtube hits. Turns out, they aren't being paid either. But imagine the internet without them all.

Sure, everyone's creative, but only a smaller subset of people can turn that personal creativity and hobby into something marketable. If you have that knack, you owe it to yourself.

tl;dr - making stuff is work. Don't volunteer for something someone is making money off of (remember, the DM Guild is a way for WOTC to strengthen its brand value - it's cheap content to value add to the sold D+D products). The world expects you to work for free, because you are "creative." It's fulfilling. Until you find yourself scratching out that beautiful spear you just drew for a battleaxe that needs to be just so.


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## araquael (Feb 25, 2016)

Also, as for going rates to charge as an artist: how much do you earn per hour doing whatever other thing you do? If you're a student or something, use the local minimum wage.

Now double it. This is the holy word of artists around me. Basically, if you are a full time artist, then endless amounts of your time will be spent filling in forms, applying for grants, applying for shows, dealing with paperwork and bills. You're a small business after all. You are paying yourself for the art-work done and the other-stuff work done. If you are not a full time artist, you're basically working overtime. You are being asked, and asking of yourself, to give your best when you've already given your best to something else. And you're still going to be dealing with production notes, paperwork and revisions and the time footprint is never quite what you think it is. 

It's also why the person who fixes your sink, or comes to set up some new TV all charge someone about $60 and upwards per hour.


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## spectacle (Feb 29, 2016)

One more option is to use stock art, but personalize it. With a program like Photoshop you can easily take a stock picture and modify it. Change colors, cut out elements, change the background, mash two pictures together to get a unique illustration for your product.

Sure, you need some skill with the program to do it, but it requires far less skill than making art from scratch, and takes less time too.


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## Klaus (Feb 29, 2016)

spectacle said:


> One more option is to use stock art, but personalize it. With a program like Photoshop you can easily take a stock picture and modify it. Change colors, cut out elements, change the background, mash two pictures together to get a unique illustration for your product.
> 
> Sure, you need some skill with the program to do it, but it requires far less skill than making art from scratch, and takes less time too.




Just be sure the license of the stock art you purchase allows for that kind of intervention (most don't).


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## spectacle (Mar 1, 2016)

Klaus said:


> Just be sure the license of the stock art you purchase allows for that kind of intervention (most don't).



That's just plain wrong. Stock art wouldn't be of much use for anyone if you weren't allowed to modify it to fit in your product.


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## dave2008 (Mar 1, 2016)

spectacle said:


> That's just plain wrong. Stock art wouldn't be of much use for anyone if you weren't allowed to modify it to fit in your product.




Legally you are wrong and Klaus is correct.  If you stating your opinion or moral objection, well that is another matter.  Just read the license, it will tell you whether or not and how much it can be manipulated.


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## kenmarable (Mar 1, 2016)

spectacle said:


> That's just plain wrong. Stock art wouldn't be of much use for anyone if you weren't allowed to modify it to fit in your product.



I would suggest reading some stock art licenses. Some allow a wide range of modifications. Some only allow resizing and nothing else. As to which is more common, I won't claim authority without actually checking, but a) my general impression from stock art I have seen is that resize-only is more common, and b) I would trust Claudio as a authority on this given that he actually is a professional artist and has been in this biz for quite sometime. He knows what he's talking about.

Edit: FYI Most stock art (at least at DriveThruRPG - a great resource for this stuff) either explains the rights in the description, or, quite often, includes the license itself in the preview. So it's easy to see what the actual rights granted are.


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## spectacle (Mar 1, 2016)

Allrighty then. I've never seen a stock art license that prohibited modification, but I will accept that they exist. I suggest getting art from stock sites that don't restrict their customers, and avoid doing business with sites that have too strict terms


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## Vicente (Mar 1, 2016)

Btw, talking about free art or public domain art, it is worth noting that Kevin Crawford, creator of Stars without Number and other OSG inspired games, makes all his art usable for other publishers as part of his stretch goals on Kickstarter. He just achieved that stretch goal with his latest Kickstarter, Godbound:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1637945166/godbound-a-game-of-divine-heroes/posts/1506975

According to him, that means there are already $20k in free art usable by other creators from all his games, which is really cool.


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## dave2008 (Mar 2, 2016)

spectacle said:


> Allrighty then. I've never seen a stock art license that prohibited modification, but I will accept that they exist. I suggest getting art from stock sites that don't restrict their customers, and avoid doing business with sites that have too strict terms




Just because you haven't seen it doesn't mean it isn't there.  I never paid any attention to the stock art license until I started thinking about publishing.  It was there all along, I just never bothered to look into it before.


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## MichaelSomething (Mar 9, 2016)

Another option is to go to a convention of some type.  There are plenty of artists there!  Wheel and deal baby!


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## Reflected_Shadows (Mar 15, 2016)

Sound advice, great post. Be careful about NASA photographs. Some of the more popular magazine shots, for example, were edited and that particular edit belongs to someone. So, be sure to check that the image of NASA you want to use actually is public domain. About 80% of the time, you are safe. About 20% of the time, a particular image was edited and post-processed by someone or a company or magazine, and that particular "rendition" is owned by someone.


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## Plane Sailing (Mar 16, 2016)

Getting the image directly from the NASA site seems the safest bet there.


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## Jeremy E Grenemyer (Mar 19, 2016)

For the DMs Guild sourcebook project on Cormyr that I am working on, the rates I am being charged for artwork are in line with the numbers given in the OP/article for quarter page black and white through full page/full color art. 

The rates are fair and reasonable. I only wish I had a bigger budget and the ability to hire additional talented artists.


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## Gnarl45 (Feb 12, 2017)

I think another thing to take into account is where the artist is from. The minimum wage in most developing countries is $200 to $500 per month. When you pay a Peruvian $200 for a cover that takes him or her 16 hours, it's an amazing pay. In case you're wondering, the minimum wage in Peru is $250 per month for 48 hours of work per week (I live in Peru). Minimum wage is even lower in some South East Asian countries!


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## M.T. Black (Feb 12, 2017)

This is a really helpful article, Morrus - thankyou!

My own experiences on the DMs Guild broadly map the trajectory that Morrus has described. My very earliest publications used free stock art and some public domain pieces. As I started to build a small audience, I had money to buy stock art for covers (I stopped doing any internal art at all for a while). I was able to get some surprisingly good covers this way. 

My next step was commission maps (rather than ones I'd hacked together myself). Then I was fortunate enough to have a few best sellers, and I'm using the funds now to commission some art (as well as layout). I'm still relying quite heavily on stock art, mind you. However, I think Morrus is perfectly correct that you have good options at each budget level - from zero budget onwards.

There is one wrinkle in the pie when we talking about a "living wage" for artists. The talk so far has been about a living wage for artists in America. But what about artists in my native Australia? Or Morrus's UK? Here's where it gets tricky - what about the many (highly talented) artists now working out of the developing world? Is there a good reason why America should set the benchmark for the rest of the world? Even in the US, the practical living wage for someone living in rural Kansas is vastly different to that required by someone living in downtown New York. Which area sets the pace. 

These are the hard questions that globalisation raises, and we won't solve them here, but it means that the "living wage" argument is less straightforward than it might appear.


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## fantasyclipinks (Mar 10, 2018)

*My two cents*

What a great thread. Wish I had seen this earlier.

 I used to do a ton of freelancing in the RPG industry, but failed to get a paid a few times or fell for Paid on Publication traps after turning in finished work. Just be sure to get 50% deposit and don't send your high res (300 dpi tiffs) art until the client pays via paypal after approving the art as web quality only jpegs! 

That said, most of the client I've worked with over the years have been exceptional, and many I consider friends now.

Presently, I have a handful of great, long term clients, as well as produce my own RPG product lines and hire myself as the artist. I finally love Monday mornings!

I have produced art for my Fantasy Clip Inks line for years now, and just published our 20th stock art set, but there is only so much a publisher can do with stock art. If and when I hire other artists for The Mutant Epoch RPG, I'd try and hire a mix of talented newbies, as well as try and get some more affordable quarter page images from industry veterans like Eric Lofgren, Bradley K. McDevitt, Stefan Poag, or Peter Mullen, as paying the full page rate might be too steep for me at this time.

Looking back to when I started doing work for Fantasy Flight Games, Goodman Games, Kenzer and Company and dozens of other d20 publishers of the time, I was never asked to do stuff for free in return for exposure... but then again, things might be different now. So, If I were a new artist wanting to get my name out there, and while waiting for clients, I'd set up a stock image brand and sell sets or individual images on RPGnow and Drivethrurpg.com, etc. Its great practice to produce finished inks, draw daily, experiment, increase your speed and offers income for you and affordable art for talented writers and indie publishers.

Just my 2 cents.

Have a great day,
Will McAusland

_Links to the artists I've mentioned in this post:_
Eric Lofgren  http://ericlofgren.net/index.php
Bradley K. McDevitt  http://www.bradleykmcdevitt.net/
Stefan Poag  https://stefanpoag.com/
Peter Mullen http://pmullenblog.blogspot.ca/


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## stigand (Mar 11, 2018)

thanks for the info on how the business works on the other side.  neat to learn


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## Von Ether (Mar 11, 2018)

fantasyclipinks said:


> What a great thread. Wish I had seen this earlier.
> 
> I used to do a ton of freelancing in the RPG industry, but failed to get a paid a few times or fell for Paid on Publication traps after turning in finished work. Just be sure to get 50% deposit and don't send your high res (300 dpi tiffs) art until the client pays via paypal after approving the art as web quality only jpegs!
> 
> ...




I know some industry friends who have graduated from using clip art to hiring those same artists later for custom pieces. So this method does work on some level.


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## Inchoroi (Mar 11, 2018)

Morrus said:


> That's not the message.  The message is "find another way to pay for it". Kickstarter is an excellent resource, and many people avail themselves of it. It's a wonderful way to ensure that all contributors get paid.
> 
> Start a Kickstarter, then hire the desperate artist for a fair wage! It's more work, sure, but publishing is a lot of work. And your starving artist comes out of that a whole lot better.
> 
> ...




Morrus, please do more articles like this! I just started doing a little writing for a 3pp, and this is super useful.


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## Kobold Boots (Mar 11, 2018)

Morrus said:


> I'm why you ended up with unions?  That's very flattering.




I shall be waiting for the next incarnation of the Doctor that looks much like you and is responsible for kicking off the Industrial Revolution in England by buying up all the farmland and forcing the former landowners to work in urban factories... 

KB


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## jrowland (Mar 11, 2018)

My 2cp:

There's always, purposely crappy (ie cheap or self drawn) art. Stick figures and the like. Hand drawn dungeon maps without fancy cartography, hand drawn region map that "old-one-eye drew when he wasn't that drunk". You get the idea.


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## Yaztromo (Mar 13, 2018)

I have no direct publishing experience (and I'm glad about it!) but I have friends that told me that actually getting the artwork from the artists they employ, apart from the due money, takes also a lot of time.
From what I can understand from the other posts, sounds like there are plenty of artists ready to jump at the opportunity of working, but this doesn't stack up with the feedback that it takes a lot of time to get your artwork delivered.
Can anybody explain this, or my friends working in publishing are probably in a strange/uncommon situation?


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## Morrus (Mar 13, 2018)

Yaztromo said:


> I have no direct publishing experience (and I'm glad about it!) but I have friends that told me that actually getting the artwork from the artists they employ, apart from the due money, takes also a lot of time.
> From what I can understand from the other posts, sounds like there are plenty of artists ready to jump at the opportunity of working, but this doesn't stack up with the feedback that it takes a lot of time to get your artwork delivered.
> Can anybody explain this, or my friends working in publishing are probably in a strange/uncommon situation?




Project management is a skill like any other. That’s the primary skill of a publisher. It’s not for everybody! 

Plan ahead, leave enough time for art. Good art isn’t quick. Don’t send out your art call while your layout artist sits waiting. 

Like any freelancing relationship you build contacts with artists you work well with and who prove to be reliable. There will always be mishaps along the way; you chalk them down to experience and carry on. Eventually you find you have a great workflow with a group of awesome freelancers. But it takes work.


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## Von Ether (Mar 13, 2018)

Yaztromo said:


> I have no direct publishing experience (and I'm glad about it!) but I have friends that told me that actually getting the artwork from the artists they employ, apart from the due money, takes also a lot of time.
> From what I can understand from the other posts, sounds like there are plenty of artists ready to jump at the opportunity of working, but this doesn't stack up with the feedback that it takes a lot of time to get your artwork delivered.
> Can anybody explain this, or my friends working in publishing are probably in a strange/uncommon situation?




Not only does good art take time, freelancers have to be like squirrels and save up for the lean months. That means taking on as much work as you possibly can when it's offered.

To put it plainly, it's almost arrogant to assume but the artist is just waiting around for your particular piece to work on immediately. 

Always assume you are is going into a queue and plan accordingly.


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## Morrus (Mar 13, 2018)

Von Ether said:


> Not only does good art take time, freelancers have to be like squirrels and save up for the lean months. That means taking on as much work As you possibly can when it's offered.
> 
> To put it plainly, it's almost arrogant to assume but the artist is just waiting around for your particular piece to work on immediately.
> 
> Always assume you are is going into a queue and plan accordingly.




One shouldn't need to assume anything. Both parties should be clear about their expectations and agree upon a deadline. That's what contracts are for; they take away the assumption part.


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## Von Ether (Mar 13, 2018)

Morrus said:


> One shouldn't need to assume anything. Both parties should be clear about their expectations and agree upon a deadline. That's what contracts are for; they take away the assumption part.




True. Though if a new publisher is wondering why they should plan waaaay ahead for art (How can it take weeks to do one character piece?!?) It's part of the "Art takes time." + "You are now in the queue." equation.


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## Yaztromo (Mar 14, 2018)

I see. Thanks for the (logic) explanation!


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## The Black Ferret (Mar 14, 2018)

For my foray into self-publishing, i did my own art, for a few reasons. Mainly, I wanted it to be _my_ work, 100%, as it was a bit of a passion project. I also did not want to use stock art, as I wanted more accurate depictions of the characters, and I didn't want the financial risk of paying artists and getting in the red. Good thing, too. It never took off, unfortunately.


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## trancejeremy (Mar 15, 2018)

Another thing you have to watch out for if using stock art, is some artists have a one use only bit in their license. I blew $10 on a nice piece of art only to find that out. Now I'm afraid to use it for fear of wanting to use it for a reason project down the line.

This is really my fault, but it would be nice if DTRPG/RPGNOW/OBS managed the stock art better - categorizing it by license (modification, limited uses vs free, is line/b&w also included) and even if it's actually stock art in the first place. Having the terms & conditions of use right on the page, not as part of the download.  I've bought art that was labeled "Stock Art", but then didn't have any license or any contact info for the artist.


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## Sunseeker (Mar 16, 2018)

trancejeremy said:


> Another thing you have to watch out for if using stock art, is some artists have a one use only bit in their license. I blew $10 on a nice piece of art only to find that out. Now I'm afraid to use it for fear of wanting to use it for a reason project down the line.
> 
> This is really my fault, but it would be nice if DTRPG/RPGNOW/OBS managed the stock art better - categorizing it by license (modification, limited uses vs free, is line/b&w also included) and even if it's actually stock art in the first place. Having the terms & conditions of use right on the page, not as part of the download.  I've bought art that was labeled "Stock Art", but then didn't have any license or any contact info for the artist.




To add on to this: the price most artists will charge for a "commission" is for non-commerical use only.  Want to nail it up on your wall?  Send a copy to your grandma?  These things are generally acceptable (though some artists are more strict).  Want to use it on interior art for your new RPG?  That's gonna cost you extra, sometimes extra flat fees, sometimes percentages.  It will often require you to sign a different contract with the artist.

So folks should keep in mind that commissioning an artist for commerical work can be a different beast than private commissions.


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## Morrus (Mar 16, 2018)

shidaku said:


> To add on to this: the price most artists will charge for a "commission" is for non-commerical use only.  Want to nail it up on your wall?  Send a copy to your grandma?  These things are generally acceptable (though some artists are more strict).  Want to use it on interior art for your new RPG?  That's gonna cost you extra, sometimes extra flat fees, sometimes percentages.  It will often require you to sign a different contract with the artist.
> 
> So folks should keep in mind that commissioning an artist for commerical work can be a different beast than private commissions.




Artists you’re going to interact with commissioning  work for a commercial project don’t quote personal commission prices to publishers. That’s never happened in my 18 years of publishing.

And if your contract doesn’t already specify what rights you’re purchasing, it’s not worth the paper it’s written on.


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## M.T. Black (Mar 16, 2018)

trancejeremy said:


> Another thing you have to watch out for if using stock art, is some artists have a one use only bit in their license. I blew $10 on a nice piece of art only to find that out. Now I'm afraid to use it for fear of wanting to use it for a reason project down the line.
> 
> This is really my fault, but it would be nice if DTRPG/RPGNOW/OBS managed the stock art better - categorizing it by license (modification, limited uses vs free, is line/b&w also included) and even if it's actually stock art in the first place. Having the terms & conditions of use right on the page, not as part of the download.  I've bought art that was labeled "Stock Art", but then didn't have any license or any contact info for the artist.




I haven't seen this before. Can you link me the art piece so I can see?


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## Alexander Kalinowski (Mar 16, 2018)

Morrus said:


> And if your contract doesn’t already specify what rights you’re purchasing, it’s not worth the paper it’s written on.



Depends on who drafted the contract. If it's the artist's standard contract, any ambiguities will probably be ruled in your favor.


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## Morrus (Mar 16, 2018)

Alexander Kalinowski said:


> Depends on who drafted the contract. If it's the artist's standard contract, any ambiguities will probably be ruled in your favor.




If you're going to court over a piece of artwork, that's the least of your problems.


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## Sunseeker (Mar 16, 2018)

Morrus said:


> Artists you’re going to interact with commissioning  work for a commercial project don’t quote personal commission prices to publishers. That’s never happened in my 18 years of publishing.
> 
> And if your contract doesn’t already specify what rights you’re purchasing, it’s not worth the paper it’s written on.




There are a lot of artists who simply advertise "commissions" simply with "contact me" pages or sometimes price guides.  Of course they don't quote private comission costs to the publisher, because the publisher has already inquired about commercial work.

But someone looking around and not actively contacting people may see "Commissions: $30" and not understand those are _private_ non-commercial commissions.  That's all I was pointing out.


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## Alexander Kalinowski (Mar 16, 2018)

By the same token, it's possible to reach consensus regarding the contract situation amicably in the case of insufficient clarity. Most artists aren't jerks plus chances are you mentioned on first contact with them what you're intending to use the illustration for.


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## pauldanieljohnson (Dec 28, 2018)

Another option is Upwork, a website that facilitates the whole process of finding, hiring, working with, and paying an artist. I haven't used it yet, but I'm considering it for my next project.

However, in my experience, publishing gaming material is almost never profitable enough to be anything other than a hobby, and you'd be very lucky to make back in revenue the amount you spend on professional art.  I'm not saying don't spend money on professional art, I'm just saying don't do it because you think you'll make substantial money on it.


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## Morrus (Dec 28, 2018)

pauldanieljohnson said:


> A
> However, in my experience, publishing gaming material is almost never profitable enough to be anything other than a hobby, and you'd be very lucky to make back in revenue the amount you spend on professional art.




Sure you can. You just have to use the right tools, like Kickstarter!


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## trancejeremy (Dec 29, 2018)

M.T. Black said:


> I haven't seen this before. Can you link me the art piece so I can see?




Woops, missed this months ago. But since this thread is bumped, it is Dean Spencer. He is really one of the best stock art artists, but his license is one use only

http://www.deanspencerart.com/license

To be fair, he does link to the license on his product pages. However, it would be nice (and I think DTRPG should require) mention of the terms on the license on the page itself, not a link.



Morrus said:


> Sure you can. You just have to use the right tools, like Kickstarter!




It's not just the tools. It's how you use them, as well. You either have to build up a brand name, have a good internet presence,  or be a good pitchman. My one foray into crowdfunding resulted in literally zero pledges.

It's not unlike my one experiment of trying to sell a module instead of setting it to PWYW. Literally no one bought it in the first year, after which I set it to PWYW, which brought in a little.


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## Jharet (Dec 31, 2018)

This is a good article.


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## dchart (Jan 6, 2019)

trancejeremy said:


> Woops, missed this months ago. But since this thread is bumped, it is Dean Spencer. He is really one of the best stock art artists, but his license is one use only



This is true, but if you back his Patreon at even $2.50/month, you get unlimited uses of any of his stock art you buy for as long as you are a patron. You also get access to his stock art at (effectively) lower prices, although you need to plan in advance.

He's a good example of an artist using creative approaches to square the circle of needing to make a living in an industry that has no money. (And I've been a patron of his for years.)


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## GreyLord (Jan 7, 2019)

I haven't read through the entire thread, but can surmise my experiences with some of the industry as follows...

Before I go on, I should say this is MY OPINION...

The problem I see is that MANY artists think they are BETTER then they are and WORTH MORE than they really are.  

If an artist really is THAT good, I'll pay the price for them, but there are so many of them out there that THINK they are worth it, it's ridiculous.  

I know one artist that said they charged $300 for a piece of their art.

This is an artist that had graduated college, never had ANY artwork really published except for that with relatives, and their artwork looked more like a cartoon than anything I wanted.  The bigger difficulty is that they could NOT CHANGE their style, as an artist they were VERY limited.

I'd pay them $25 for what they offered, IF I even wanted it.  

This artist probably thought I was trying to cheat them.  In reality, as the one who would be PAYING such a thing, I WAS the one who they were trying to cheat.  WHY would I pay them $300 for a piece of art that was basically useless for what I needed it for when I could use that same amount of money to hire a full time artist (at around 42K a year, or something around $20 an hour) who would could put out the same or better quality at 2 or 3 pictures a day (which is $80 per picture at that amount per hour, or with benefits around $120 per picture), OR one ten times better in the style I wanted for a similar or lesser price when hired?

Or if I did it on a per hire basis, once again, WHY should I pay them that amount to an unproven artist?

Even more so, since I can do art myself, perhaps the bar should be they should at LEAST BE ABLE TO DO ART BETTER THAN I DO if they want to get paid, OR expect similar payments to what I get.

Now, if I were starting out, and didn't have the funds, I MIGHT offer to share profits with the artist.  It would DEPEND ON HOW MUCH TIME was spent in their art and what quality it was.  

IF I spend 500 hours writing and editing a book, but they spend 80 hours illustrating...what is a decent percentage to split with them.  In that light I'd say a 20/80 split simply due to time investment.

Of course, that is risky to the artist.  If they get a bad seller that return may be zero dollars, or even in the negatives.

If they are REALLY lucky they might make a small profit of less than $100 (which equates to less than $2 an hour).

OR, if they hit the bonsai they may actually do well...but it is rare.

AS has been alluded to, stock art is a good option IF you know you are good and are just starting out, or various other avenues.  Getting an AGENT that works with publishers is probably a better idea.  They have an idea of just how good an artist really may be and whether they are worth their weight or not.  

In addition, it SAVES publishers and writers TIME as they do not have to waste it with hack artists who think they are underpaid when in reality they have just self inflated their own egos on how good an artist they really are.

That does not mean I think that an artist should roll over and accept anything that is given them, and DEFINATELY NOT just do art for exposure.  The same would apply to a writer a publisher.  IF the writer is not a proven writer, WHY would you waste your art on them without something at least compensatory.  A writer should not expect an artist to spend $50 on art supplies, a dozen hours or more on an art piece and then get paid shillings on the pence just for the opportunity to get their artwork out there.  

Depending on the type of artwork needed, let's take an illustrator that works at a decent rate of at least four pieces a day, or for a full cover type illustration, at a maximum a week (normally a LOT less, we are being very lenient in some ways).  For a beginning artist, we'll say they get above minimum wage and give them $15 an hour.  That means for a quicker piece of art, even if we say only two a day, you could expect an offer somewhere between $60 and $100...and that is around what I might expect for it.

If it is really something done quick, then if it takes less than an hour to do, $15 is NOT unreasonable.  

Something that takes longer, let's say a weeks worth, should be around $600 at that rate.  If it takes you longer than that, perhaps you should rethink how you compare to other working artists.

This is a beginning artist.  You are NOT at the top of the food chain.  You are NOT proven yet, and to expect to be paid MORE than full time employed artists is pure arrogance.  I see this a LOT with artists just getting out there.  They want you to pay $1000 for a commission on junk that is unproven.

This is harsh, but AFTER one pays their dues (meaning they work their way upwards in recognition, background, etc) should they expect top tier pay for their work.

However, someone who wants to do illustration (as opposed to other forms of artwork) should realize that many publishers already have their stock standard employee/contractor artists already set.  These people are NOT looking to pay someone MORE than they would those they already work with.  Normally they are not even WILLING to cut their trusted illustrators for someone else (and doing so causes bad faith).  If they DO start handing out artwork requests it is because there is more art they need than their normals can handle, and in that instance they are probably going to want to pay LESS overall then their current group is paid.

I do NOT advocate anyone asking to be paid in pennies or simply for exposure.  If it is a startup type thing, then asking for a percentage of the profits is reasonable (in my estimation) if the thought is that pricing is too expensive.  However, I also think that asking hundreds of dollars for a piece of art when someone is new to the industry, unless it is a bigger piece, is one of the MAJOR problems a LOT of starting artists make today.

They think they are the next big thing, and they should be paid as such, when in reality no one wants to pay them those types of amounts except the truly desperate and those who do not know any better.  Reasonable pricing should be looked at, how much time it costs the artist and how much materials they spend.

No one should be charging $25 for a quick sketch that takes them less then 15 minutes when they are low or mid tier...though if they want to try their luck at carnival/fair caricatures and charging that...go for it.  (most art is not seeking caricature type art work).

On the otherhand, even a starting artist should not expect anything less than $50 for a day's worth of work, or even $80 if it takes them a day to do something.  One should be paid at LEAST a minimum.  

Of course, the other thing to realize is HOW FAST you can work with an effective ability.  Illustrators at times are given deadlines and expectations in regards to how fast they can work and how much.  Some of the top illustrators out there that I'm aware of are NOT the best artist (believe it or not).  They are relatively good artists that can work quickly.  Time can be money.

There are many different scales out there on how much out there.  On an average I would say around $20 an hour is a good level to base the amount of money you charge once you are not just at the basic level of a nobody.  

IF YOU DO GET REALLY well known, charging $1000+ per picture is not unknown, especially if you are illustrating a book (and then you could get anywhere from 15K to 50K depending on the book).  

Expecting that right out of the gate though, I think that's a crazy notion that FAR too many beginning artists expect these days and it ends up biting them rather than helping them.  

(and vice versa, too many starting artist devalue what they do too much and think that they will work for exposure on unproven projects.  Sure, it can work out once in a while, but there are far too many failed projects for me to really think that is a good idea either).

For self-publishing, I'm a cheapskate typically and either do the art myself or con someone I know to illustrate it if their style matches what I am looking for.  A more recent RPG project I did (well, in the past few years, so a few years ago) it was basically a trade.  I did some uncredited writing for them (which was probably valued around 15-20K) in return for a few of their illustrations (some of which I liked, some which I didn't, but used anyways).  That is an example of unpaid work (in theory) but it was NOT uncompensated (I did a LOT of work prior to that in trade for the artwork I received in return).

Even then, I LET THEM RETAIN the rights to their artwork.  That's the other sham I see a lot of.  Many self-published writers want to OWN someone else's artwork.  If they WANT to OWN the rights, that SHOULD cost them a little more money (IN MY OPINION) than the normal going rate...UNLESS it is going to lead to permanent employment or continuing contracts with a company (in which case, no slack should be given on normal pay for the artwork).

Just my two coppers on the entire What an Artist is worth scenario.


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## M.T. Black (Jan 7, 2019)

I've put together a guide to RPG Freelance rates, based on my experiences over the last few years. Your feedback is appreciated!

http://bit.ly/RPGRates


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## dchart (Jan 7, 2019)

M.T. Black said:


> I've put together a guide to RPG Freelance rates, based on my experiences over the last few years. Your feedback is appreciated!
> 
> http://bit.ly/RPGRates



That looks useful, and fits with my experience.


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## GreyLord (Jan 8, 2019)

M.T. Black said:


> I've put together a guide to RPG Freelance rates, based on my experiences over the last few years. Your feedback is appreciated!
> 
> http://bit.ly/RPGRates




For Illustration, depends on the experience and skill of the illustrator.

Your paragraph introducing and discussing rates is pretty good, but the lists that you put down from Spencer probably should not be listed as to what most of those who are inquiring about rates need to know.

For someone starting, I'd never pay them that unless they had exceptional skill.  It's WAAAAY too high.  Good way to never get employed if that's what they are looking for, at least for normal projects.

On the other side of the equation...WAAAY too low for someone who is really skilled and has a good bit of experience.  I'd jump on those rates for full page illustrations in half a second for someone who had a good amount of skilled and showed that they were very dependable.

Average going rates right now are probably somewhere around $20/hr for illustrators (or €19 [typo corrected] perhaps for other areas outside the US) in the West right now.  That's for someone competently skilled that can work at the usual rate of work that other illustrators work at.  Someone just starting out probably shouldn't expect that...and someone with a great record might be able to charge a LOT more than that.

As you state Spencer is an experienced professional artist it means he's been around for a while.  Anyone who's been around for awhile SHOULD know what they are worth and how much they can charge.  They don't need a guide and thus the values you list are probably completely worthless to them.  Those asking the question your guide is trying to answer probably should not expect to charge as much as someone who's been in the industry for a while.  If they do that, unless also working with someone who is clueless or does not know any better, they will lose every time.  IT's simply...if the choice is between the guy that is good and dependable vs. someone who we don't have a record of or a lengthy experience with to know how dependable they are in crunch or how good they can create with a deadline, but they are both charging the same price...most people will go with the dependable experienced pro over the inexperienced unknown every time.

Most of my experience is NOT in the RPG field though, so maybe things are different with RPG illustrators than general illustrators as a whole.


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## M.T. Black (Jan 8, 2019)

Thanks for your comments, GreyLord. 

What advice can you suggest to someone who is looking to hire an artist for their game or book? What does a reasonable rate look like?


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## GreyLord (Jan 8, 2019)

M.T. Black said:


> Thanks for your comments, GreyLord.
> 
> What advice can you suggest to someone who is looking to hire an artist for their game or book? What does a reasonable rate look like?




I listed above a long post about it, but in general I'd probably go with the idea that you take how long it will take you to make the piece of art and multiply it by the hour.

A beginning artist should probably charge NO LESS than $10 an hour.  $15/hr is probably not unusual to charge either.  Then it depends on the size and detail (obviously).  For a sketch of less than an hour you probably shouldn't charge more than $30 -$50.  For a normal piece of artwork that takes around half a day probably $50-$80.  For something more complex, let's say full page...you'd probably be looking at something between $100 - $150.  

This depends on DETAIL and scope though.  

IMO (obviously), the problem dealing with newcomers to the art scene has several factors.

The first is how skilled they are.  I hate to say it, but the better artist they are, the more they can charge.  It really boils down to skill.  The one who has more skill is going to eventually be able to charge more than the one who does not.

HOWEVER...the second variable also makes a HUGE difference.  Dependability.

You can have someone be a master painter, but if that half page artwork takes them 2 weeks but it might take them longer and sometimes they overshoot their estimate by two weeks and it costs you $2500...you have to ask yourself is that worth it?

On the otherhand, you may have someone that can do decent artwork but can dependably put out a drawing a day or a full piece in three or four days.  They charge $350 for the same half page full art that the other guy does...AND you can expect it to be done when they contracted it to be done...

Who are you going to normally depend on getting you the artwork when you need it?

Another example...

You have an artist that only charges you $250 for full page in depth illustrations.  However, you need 5 (so ($1,250 total) of them in a month's time.  They tell you no problem.  Instead...you end up waiting 3 months and you still only have three of them thus far.

On the otherhand you have an artist that charges you $3000 for the same thing, but they will HAVE them when they say they will.  You know from past connections and others good words about them.  When time and dependability is on the line...that (total of $15,000) is WORTH every penny.

When a big magazine is putting out something and they need that cover...they need someone they can depend on to GET THEM that cover WHEN they NEED the cover...not someone who may or may not get it to them.

Unfortunately, only one of those can be seen with new artists.  One can see how their artwork looks...but one cannot tell how dependable they are at first.  

If we go by the equation of 

Skill x Dependability = Price

if either one of those is zero...you should expect to get zero back.  

There are other factors obviously, but those two I think are some of the BIGGEST factors that some people deal with.  For someone looking to hire an artist NOTHING probably is more demoralizing to have everything ready to go but you are still waiting for that artwork that you were guaranteed to have three months or more ago.

At the same time, you don't want artwork that anyone could draw.  You are paying an artist for their ability to do and create art...normally beyond what you or the average individual could do.  

You hit it on the head with your introductory paragraphs describing it.

It is so hard to figure out how much an artist is going to get paid because the variables are so wide and expansive.  

That said, I'd go with the law of averages if one is trying to figure out what should be charged.  Go on an by hourly basis...and with $20hr being the average (that's NOT for someone just starting, that's someone who's been in the field for a while and proven themselves), that's a good basic idea to base what you should charge as long as you are somewhat of a decent artist and have shown yourself to be dependable.

If you are just starting though...you probably shouldn't charge that much until you have good word of mouth (and there are sites out there where you can get a start freelancing in art beyond just Deviant art and such...though it MAY NOT be for RPGs, it can be for a wide range of projects) and good contracts or those who pay you should leave reviews up that will bolster your work history.  I would NEVER suggest one charge LESS than $10/hr (or €9-10/hr), and in some places if you are only working LOCAL contracts (such as cities such as San Francisco, New York, London, Paris) you could probably charge DOUBLE that...but ONLY LOCALLY as outside of those areas it would seem exorbitant...when they are starting out, but they need to build up their history.

Have a portfolio...show off the skill...but the other factor of dependability (also known as experience by some, or history of work by others) and how dependable one is typically has to be built up for a short time before knowing whether one can charge the big rates or not.

I'd say inch up rates gradually as the reviews build up and after a year or two you should be able to charge the normal going rates for whatever area you are working in.  By that time, you should have a good grasp of what your artwork is REALLY worth (and that's the biggest problem with many who are just starting out, they overvalue what they are worth or how good an artist they are...too many junk artists that are really terrible out there), and what you can feasibly charge.  After two years behind you, that's the time to PRESS the limits.  

At that point you can start raising rates dynamically to see just what limit you can get to and still have people coming to pay you.  There are averages, but there is NO HARD AND FAST rules on how much this can be.  If you are extremely talented and very dependable...the sky is literally the limit.  You could have a MASSIVE amount of money offered per illustration (talking thousands of dollars per piece) and you just need to push the limit to figure that out.

I'd probably NOT just limit oneself to RPG illustrator to reach that point though...there's a ton of other illustration jobs out there beyond just RPGs...and if one is building that portfolio of experience...why not stretch themselves in other areas.  They might just meet that Harper's magazine who needs the illustrator badly enough or someone else that pays a LOT more money than some RPG companies are even able to dream about (though there are the big RPG companies out there too such as WotC with MtG).

This is more for a general illustrator though, I have worked with RPG illustration previously but I will say my experience with RPG illustrators and illustration is extremely limited so it may work differently with the RPG industry.


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## GreyLord (Jan 8, 2019)

M.T. Black said:


> Thanks for your comments, GreyLord.
> 
> What advice can you suggest to someone who is looking to hire an artist for their game or book? What does a reasonable rate look like?




So, that long paragraph above doesn't really answer your question, of which I'm sorry, because there is no REAL set answer.  Just as your article states (though not the rates), it's almost impossible to pin down.

It depends on the artist.  

LUCKILY...if you are dealing with someone who is EXPERIENCED (which also probably means they are dependable), they will know their rates already.  You can see their reviews and many of the webpages for freelancers will have a listing where you can see their rates and compare it to others who are also out there.

For someone who is new, it will boil down to how many illustrations do you want, how detailed do you want them, and when you want them.

Let's put a general price of $100 per illustration (just an average to make it easy...so smaller illustrations should be less, bigger illustrations more...this is the whole kit and caboodle).   If I need 50 illustrations, we are looking at $5000 easy.  

They should probably be given at LEAST 3 months to fulfill such an order.  If they require 6 months...that's probably going to be acceptable.  If they start stalling and saying it will take LONGER than 6 months...that's where you start negotiating.  At a year mark for 50 illustrations...I'd start wondering how quick they can work and how dependable they are.

Now let's say I want those illustrations in a month rather than 3 months.  That's going to rachet it up a GREAT deal.  IF (and that could be a big if) they can pull it off, you probably should at least triple if not quadruple that price to at least $15K to $20K.  It could be more than that, even for a new artist.

Another factor, let's say that you want all those illustrations to be full color full cover illustrations.  That should then ratchet it up considerably.  I'd probably say $250 on average, though $500 is probably not a bad askance for in this situation...and at least 6 months of time if not more.  For 50 illustrations you are looking at $25K at least, and if you want it under that time period...let's say in three months it probably should be something like $50K to 100K.

Just some rough guesstimates.

Most beginning artists probably are not going to get these types of contracts and if you are looking at this type of money to be laid out...I'd probably go looking at the experienced artists who have some work under their belts, know how fast they can work and what they typically can charge for that.  

For a writer I'd say look at getting a few black and white sketches for the interior at around$25 - $50 per sketch.  These are not as great detail as a full on illustration, as they are quicker, but normally they are passable.  For the cover, look at spending $500 to $1000 for it.  You'll want a great deal of detail, full color, and all the pizzaz.  You'll also want it with layout which will cost you another amount (covered in your guide already).  

Just some thoughts that more officially answer your question, though it's still sort of out there as actual prices are very nebulous regarding how much you could or should pay.


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## M.T. Black (Jan 8, 2019)

Thanks, this is good practical advice. 

What is your background in the industry, if I may ask? You clearly know a lot about it.


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## GreyLord (Jan 8, 2019)

M.T. Black said:


> Thanks, this is good practical advice.
> 
> What is your background in the industry, if I may ask? You clearly know a lot about it.




Stock and business wise I normally don't get into that here.  

However, on a more personal level I've been involved with writing and publishing for a while, over 20 years at this point (actually longer than that, but 20 years is a nice round number to look at).  It was more with my personal involvement than anything dealing with what I actually did for work.  Some of it has been published by other companies and some of it has been published on my own.   

Got my start originally with the magazines (though back then they did things somewhat differently, similar idea with submissions though).  Moved onto books after a few years.  Unfortunately, not a ton of fiction in there.  I do fiction as a hobby and for fun, but a lot of non-fiction was a side job (not the main one I did to make money, but a side job I did sort of as a combination of hobby/keeping my foot in the door as I made enough money otherwise and couldn't focus as much time on the side job as I wanted).

Currently retired, and now that I have all the free time keep telling myself I should write more but keep getting side tracked with other hobbies and avoiding work (even the side job/hobby).  I tend to spend more time with RPGs, boardgames, and other things these days (and old movies and TV shows) then writing.  I do still tend to do some non-fiction work (last was probably within the past few months) and ghost writing, but I always want to do that novel everyone dreams about.  Obviously...not much progress has been made.

Spend more time looking at the stocks and hoping my retirement doesn't crash as well as the above hobbies I mentioned.  I've gotten into video games heavily for once as well.  It's funny, you get all these big plans for when you will retire, and when you actually do, you spend more time relaxing and doing hobbies than a lot of the other things you thought you would do (such as writing that novel, or travelling the world for fun for once in locations you always dreamed about visiting as a teen.  I suppose some do it, but I just seem to do other things and relax instead).

I have several family members that are active in the industry right now though (and probably one or two that many here would recognize instantly, which is even more of a reason to not divulge a ton so I don't tarnish their good names by being associated with me!!) and if anything, I've learned that there is no one way to success in writing, publishing, or art.

There are probably as many ways to success in these areas today as there are those with the drive and will to succeed in doing it.


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