You want me to do something?  I can probably do something.  Let’s discuss the process behind making me do something!

My commission process is pretty straightforward, really, so I’ll let you know what you’ll be getting yourself into right out of the gate here:  If you have something you want me to draw, I can probably draw it.  If you want me to do something else, like a song or a simple game or something, I can probably do that, too.  Regardless, I’ll need the best information you can give me regarding what you want and how you want it.  From there, I’ll get to work putting things together and keep you posted every step along the way so we can catch any problems early and make sure you pretty much get what you want.  When the item is question has met your satisfaction (or as close to it as I can pull off, but I’ll do my best!), you give me money, and I give you the full, high-quality file or whatever’s appropriate for what you’re asking me to do.  Pretty simple.

Keep scrolling through for the step-by-step and FAQ, but if you want it in brief, here we go:

I presently work for $9 USD per hour, rounded to the nearest 15 minutes.  I accept Paypal, which in turn accepts credit cards but charges a rather nasty, albeit small, fee on my end for doing so, and I can do character art, illustrations, comics, and simple game programming/art/music.

What this means is that if you want my art style applied to your characters, I can do it.  If you want me to illustrate your story, be it a kids’ book or a more mature novel, i can do that, too.  If you want me to make a game, I can possibly help with that, or, rather, if you want me to help with the artwork or music in your game, I can do that too.  I’m fairly versatile.

However, in the event you want me to help with a larger project, I still expect payment for my work when the work is completed. Not when your work is completed; if your game or story doesn’t get seen through to completion, that’s not my problem if my work was.  I will not accept payment “once we’ve made some money on it.”  If you have a proven track record, however, I might be able to cut back on the hourly rate in exchange for some royalties.  :b  But a man’s gotta have money, so I unfortunately can’t much afford to just sit back and wait on other people to get things done.  You pay me when I do the work.  Very simple.

All that aside, if you’re interested in commission work drop me a line.  If you need more info, keep scrollin’ along.

Process

Step 0: Concept

The concept stage varies.  The given example here is my ref sheet for Oku, where I also went ahead and did a nice little finished image of the guy.  Commission ref sheets will usually come with color if that is the end goal of the overall commission, but it’ll usually be kept very simple and there simply as reference and to get the OK from whoever’s paying me.  Typically, expect it to be a rather basic drawing of a character to try and get proportions and the like all cleared out right away.

On the other hand, if you want me to do comic work for you and the character’s going to be doing all manner of things, something like this isn’t so out of the question.

Time spent on ref sheets does count towards your overall time – I do expect to get paid for these, because I’m doing them as part of the overall process, but in the end they’ve consistently helped me get things right early on, which ultimately can save you a lot more time than it costs to put one together.  It works out best for everyone involved, so I’ve made a pretty consistent practice of doing it, but depending on the commission it may be completely avoidable if the character has existed beforehand and I’m given the reference materials to work with from the word go.  On the other hand, if you don’t have that sort of material for me to work with, this usually doesn’t take too long and’ll probably add about an hour to your overall total.

for the sake of these examples, I’m pretending I didn’t need to make a ref sheet so you can get a good idea what the typical established character commission would cost, as they’re really the most common kind.

Step 1: Sketch – 30 min., $4.50

Sharet, my beloved little midget thing, shall be here for my example.  Simply because she’s the most recent thing I’ve done that serves as a decent, straightforward one.  She’s right out of my noggin’, granted, so you can probably expect things to go a smidgen slower on commissioned work, but she makes a fair step-by-step example.

In this case, it’s hard to get a better reference than “I made this up myself and wanna draw it,” so consider it an example of what can happen with good information.  This is her concept image, so it’s also pretty similar to the sort of things you can expect on a character sheet, give or take her wild knifey pose here.

Step 2: Inks – 1 hr., $9.00

Inking is, typically, a pretty quick process of going over the sketch and refining things accordingly.  As such, there’s not a ton to say.  Typically, though, you can expect a few different sketches of a character before we go for an all-out work, especially if you don’t have a previously constructed character sheet or anything.

And, no, I don’t know what I was thinking with her hair besides “HUUUURRRRRRR LOOOONNNGGGG”.  This is why in a commission proper I wouldn’t use the concept sketch for the finished piece, but apparently I was just stupidly antsy to get this little brat out of my head.  don’t worry, Sharet, you’ll have your proper showing one day.  For now, be my Vanna White.

Step 3: Colors – 2 hr., $18.00

You can typically assume colors will just up and double the time consumed by anything I do.  It’s a good rule to work by in figuring out how far you want things to go, so do bear it in mind.  I’ve a few coloring methods, some faster than others, but it loosely falls into about that area pretty consistently, if not more when things get complicated.

In Sharet’s case, the colors are pretty simple and thus didn’t take too awfully long.  Crazy hair or not, she serves as a good example of my typical coloring style.  I can also cel-shade or just go completely wild experimenting with all sorts of things,s o if you want something else, tell me and, as always, give me any examples and reference that you can.

Step 4: World’s Easiest Background – 2 hr. 15 min., $20.25

But I’m a nice guy so I’d probably just call this twenty bucks even.  I’m capable of far more interesting backgrounds than this, but the image is part of a series that’s kept things pretty simple so i decided to stick to my guns and focus on making an interesting character.

In simple terms, if you want a full, colored commission, something like this is probably the fastest of the bunch.  It’s a simple, colored image of a single character, and it’ll probably run you around $20 by itself.  Multiple characters will make things take longer, as would a decent background, but this seems to be the most common kind of thing.

I may get some more examples up in time of more complicated things, but for now this’ll have to do.

FAQ

Why don’t you ask for the money upfront?

A lot of artists do this and frankly I would too if I could guarantee any sort of timeframe something will take.  Something as simple as a character sketch could vary wildly from five minutes to a couple hours depending on the character and what I’m given to work with in terms of reference material.  Aside from that, the idea of collecting upfront may work wonderfully in sales, but I’m being commissioned for hire here and I can’t think of many employers that would pay you for work you haven’t done yet.

How do you determine your price?

I work by the hour.  Typically, the less information I get or the more detailed the work is, the more time every step will take.  If you want something elaborate, yes, that will take me a while.  Plan accordingly, but take solace in the fact that I do not charge for time I spend in emails.  If I don’t feel I’ve been given enough to work with, I’ll do my best to catch it early and ask for more information before your commission ever goes on the clock.

What happens if your fee goes beyond my budget?

This is partly avoidable, kind of.  If you tell me your budget right off, I’ll do what I can to keep it in mind and have a bit of leeway if things get cut pretty close.  That said, if your budget is $20 for a full work, and I only get to the lines (as that’s just over two hours’ of work you can afford), I’ll let you know where things stand when your budget is met, and we can figure out the rest from there.

That said, I’ve no problem doing things in chunks.  If all you can afford for now is the line work, but you get the money for colors and the sort later, I’ll more than happily pick up where we left off and finish things up for you.  Just bear in mind that if we work in chunks, you’re paying me in chunks.  As I’ve stated earlier, I expect payment for the work I’ve done. 

What if I decide partway through that you’re not able to do what I want you to?

Pretty painless, really.  It’s your money and I don’t much want to waste it, so just let me know and we’ll cut things as they are.  I’ll still want payment for what I got done, but you’ll still get all my progress and what not, so worst case you’ve something to show another artist what you are or are not after.  Again, I try my best, but there’s some things that I’m just no the best suited for.  Likewise, I’ll try not to waste your time if I feel something is beyond my abilities or like I won’t be able to fulfill your request within a stated budget (ie. you want an entire 12-page comic for 50 bucks.  That’s not going to happen).

What if I just don’t pay you?

Well, then, you won’t get the finished work, and I’ll try and make back what I can from it via print, auction, or whatever else I can.  Also, you cna be pretty sure I’ll never work with you again!    And should you protest, the work is not yours until you’ve paid for it. Once you pay for it, you can do whatever you want with it.  Spit on it, print copies to wipe your butt with, use it to line your hamster cages, I really don’t care.  You paid for it, you can do what you want.

What do you do with the art once I’ve paid?

First things first, I send you the finished work, in full-quality glory, via e-mail.  With that, I’ll usually ask if it’s okay if I submit it to my assortment of art portals and, if I feel particularly fond of it, I may also ask if you’d be okay with me offering prints of it.  Whether you agree to either of those or not, I won’t protest, but the prints thing tends to earn favor points with me, and if it makes enough I might even share.  Before you get your hopes up, tho, just know right out I’ve rarely sold more than one or two of anything, so most likely you saying I can offer prints largely just gives me a chance at a couple more bowls of cheap ramen.

I want a character drawn.  What do you need to do this?

Bear minimum would be a description of the character. Obviously, I’m not psychic, so I’ll need at least that.  If there are existing works of the being in question, or photo references of the sort of clothes they wear, or just about any visual representation of the person or things related to them, that has the potential to save you quite a bit of time.  Which is good for you, because…

I have no visual reference for my character(s).  How will that work?

This is actually pretty easy, but I do want people to know it right up front.  If all I have to work with is a character description, I will probably start out by trying to make a quick reference sheet for the character(s) in question.  This usually only takes an hour or two, as the attention to detail is really focused more on making sure we’ve got our visions aligned than making sure every last thing is perfect.  Typically, this entails making sure the character’s body build is what you want, their clothes and accessories and hair and all that are arranged in a way that you like, and, when applicable, their colors are correctly arranged and what not.  It sounds pretty complicated, but I handle most of it and try to be pretty quick about it.  Also, if communication stays clear right out we can work out issues in this step of things instead of at the last second before the work is finished, which gets it done faster, and consequently means I have to charge you less for the finished thing.

In short, it’s an early step that tries to save both of us time in the long run.  Pretty win-win, really.

I have some crazy landscape/environment/scene in my head.  Can you draw it?

I can draw it, color it, and apply all manner of styles to it to try and suit what you’re after.  If you’re coming to me with something like this, odds are all you have is a written description of the thing, but no worries.  The process would be pretty similar to the one for characters, as, really, an environment is as much a personality as anything else and I’ll aim to do what I can to bring it to life.  Just bear in mind that for the sake of details and minute things I’m not the quickest or best-suited, but for just trying to bring the bizarre to life I can handle myself pretty well.

Will you draw my comic?

Sure, why not?  Just bear in mind I’m also working on HP at any point in time, so if you give a deadline I’m going to give an honest answer of whether or not it’ll happen.  Also, don’t expect me to share your love of Harry Potter or anything and get all disappointed if I don’t nail the characterization on the head with your fanfictions, people.  There are some things that can only be adequately expressed with proper love, so if that’s what you’re after your best bet is to find somebody who shares your adoration of your fandom and work with them.  That said, I love me some Star Fox and Sly Cooper, but I question my ability to draw any of it.  I find this incredibly sad.

The ability to meet deadlines ties rather directly to how much you want done, too.  If you just need me to do line work, that’s fairly quick, and toning usually isn’t too much more unless it’s something more complex.  Colors are typically more time-consuming, and if you don’t like the methods I use in HP you’ll want to tell me outright what kind of look you’re after and I’ll keep in touch with you along the way to make sure things are flowing well.  That said, I also don’t need to draw everything from scratch and am more than willing to color pre-existing linework, too.  If I’m drawing a page, start-to-finish, as I do with HP, then you can expect things to run around 12-15 hours, not counting any ref sheet work I have to do, so it’s probably in your best interests to stick with either line or toned, as they tend to hover around the 4-5 hour marker, which is much more comfortable for those of you who don’t poop money.

With all of that, then, also comes the statement that I can illustrate your written works.
I can totally get into this, as it’s just like comics except without drawing the same mundane scene over and over again for 40 pages.  So it’s what I’m good at, sans a lot of the repetition.  So, if you want me to illustrate your piece of fiction or something (I’m totally at home with kids’ books, too), I’m up for it.

Aside from drawn art, what else can you do?

I can do some music and simple game programming.  I use Game Maker for my game work, so (for now) it’s largely restricted to Windows executables; they’re working on fixing that for Mac users but last I’d checked GM4Mac isn’t around yet, and I’m not sure it will run all the functions and the sort GM8 does.  My Flash skills have fallen below the ability to make so much as a play button since AS3 came around, tho, so don’t even remotely think of asking about that.  :/

If you want an example of a collaborative game effort, I’d check out Candeh Chaos.  It’s a pretty simple game, but it’s also my only joint project presently.  The graphics were mostly done by a friend while I handled the coding of the thing.  It was actually pretty enjoyable, honestly.  It only took a few hours of actual work, give or take a bunch of play testing, and, well, who can gripe about that part?  b:

Similarly, my music is typically focused on use for gaming.  I tend to make loops, but can make outright songs and probably even work with vocals and the like if they’re provided.  People keep citing me as some sort of cheap semi-orchestral electronica, and that’s a fair point on their part.  That said, if you’re after some fairly decent techno I’m probably not your guy, but Erik probably wouldn’t mind your business.  He’s a bit pickier on what he will and will not take, granted, so consider me a distant second choice for that sort of thing.  :b  Also bear in mind that, with music, I tend to rely on a lot of peer feedback, so I’m much more likely to ask for others’ opinions on a piece than I would with the other types of work on here.  If you don’t want that, you’d be well-served to have a good ear for quality and the ability to talk in layman’s terms to me about what needs more work.

As with everything else, though, I still charge by the hour, so just brace yourself for that.  If you have the sprite work and tiles done for a game, that makes it a relatively quick matter for me to put it together.  Likewise for music and a general idea of what the game is. As an instant heads-up, I can do quite a bit of fanciness within the confines of 2D, but if we hit up the third dimension the only thing that sucks at it more than me is GM itself, so you probably shouldn’t bother.

That’s all well and good, but what can I expect to pay on those?

Again, it depends on the resources you give me.  If you want a song done up in FL with a certain set of samples or soundfonts or whatever, I can probably do that a lot faster than “I want a song for an RPG.”  Just like with everything else, the more you can give me to work with, the faster I can get it done and the less back-and-forth needed.  This is something I did in about four hours (with quite a bit of feedback halfway through) that started out as “I want an RPG song for climbing a mountain / cliffs, inspired in part by Woofle‘s own RPG songs and all that SNES Squaresoft influence I’d had over the years, crafted to match the instrument set and general motifs of Urakai.”  “Urakai” is my own RPG project and thus to you guys that was probably a lot of gibberish, but the point is I had some rather specific things I wanted to work with, but also quite a bit of leeway.

So, in shorter terms, you can expect to pay more or less in proportion to what you want and what quality you expect, as well as how much direction you give me, just like with anything else.