Thread "About Commission Art" in forum "Comic Talk and General Discussion *"

Posted at 12:07PM, Jul. 8, 2006

I never done commission art before so I am wondering, how much would you charge for it?

Posted at 1:07PM, Jul. 8, 2006

Depends on skill. Anywhere from 25 cents to thousands of dollars. Of course, a thousand dollar piece would have to be pretty intense.

Posted at 1:07PM, Jul. 8, 2006

I haven't seen your art at all but guessing from the fact that you're 13 you may want to start low.

When you buy art you're not just paying for the hours spent on it, but the years of learning that happened beforehand.

Posted at 10:07PM, Jul. 9, 2006

Most people also usually create a scale. Sketches are one price, inked another, colored another… how many characters, is there a background, etc. They also usually say if there are things they're good/bad at drawing, that way if they can't do mechanical things very well they aren't asked to draw a mecha.

Unless someone already has an audience, most people find it difficult to get commissions. Generally, for a stranger to pay for someone's art, the artist has to be fairly good. Just a warning. :) It's not really a gap market that needs filling.

I'd recommend searching google for commission price lists and also perhaps commission processes. Some people will do preliminary sketches and show them to the buyer, etc.

Posted at 11:07PM, Jul. 9, 2006

With the few commisions i've done i have charged "by the hour".

I figure out a estimate on how many hour it can take, and set a price for an hour.

Posted at 12:07AM, Jul. 10, 2006

Vega's method is pretty reasonable as well. I know of people who have gotten 'burned' by doing a commission because once they show the buyer the sketches, etc, the buyer suddenly becomes very picky. They want things a certain way, they want changes, could you add a background? What can happen is that, although they contracted for a certain amount of money, the workload (and annoyance level) goes up, making the picture more valuable (time/money wise) than they are getting paid for.

Calculating work by the hour limits how much of your work goes into it and decreases the possibility of being taken advantage of. However it's important to be fair when working by the hour - calculating your rates based on the assumption that you'll always work at top ability, etc. It's tougher to work when you're not as motivated to do something so you'll probably work more slowly on a commission than you would on something you're really inspired to do.

My advice would be to ask your friends for some typical commission ideas (generally RPG characters in my experience). Do them and keep track of how much time you've spent doing them, and how much time each part took (to draw, ink, color, etc.) Then ask your friends how much they'd pay for your drawing. Come up with some kind of average. If they'd pay $20 for something you spent 4 hours on, then that's $5 an hour. (Which is pretty reasonable for someone just starting, but we don't know anything about your skill level. People pay for skill and polish.)

Posted at 12:07AM, Jul. 10, 2006

I know of people who have gotten 'burned' by doing a commission because once they show the buyer the sketches, etc, the buyer suddenly becomes very picky.

Yes, that is the reason why i started the hour thing. There was this job that never seemed to end where i just kept doing more and more artwork but wasnt getting payed anymore for it.

Now I basically tell the buyer how many hours it will take to make the artpiece and the price for each hour and then i stick to that price. (Even if it should take longer for me to draw it.)

Then if they want more, i charge for more hours and so on.

Most people that want commissions think its so easy to "just" make that change and "just" add that thing, when i usually has to re-draw the entire thing just because they changed their mind. Its easy to get fooled and do twice as much work for what you get payed.