How I Price My Art

Hey you all. Today we are talking about how to price your art! This is such a hot topic amongst the community especially with those new to freelancing and those who have never worked corporate or with an agency. Now, I know your art is your baby and how can you put a price tag on your baby, besides our terrible foster system in the US, but I digress. When you are working on something you love it becomes invaluable in your eyes and at the end of the day what you say it's worth, is what it’s worth. The real question is if someone is going to buy it for that price tag you’ve affixed to your work. I have full understanding that you may take what I have to say with a grain of salt , these are just my opinions and everyone is entitled to such.

First off, when pricing your work you want to consider these two things i find most important, Materials and time.Your materials are your overhead. Are you using traditional means to create your artwork; paint, pencils, pastels, paper, canvas, do you have an entire space dedicated to you art or are you doing it from the dining room table? Or, are you a digital artist like myself primarily and your material lists, consists of your computer, software subscriptions, digital assets, electricity? The question is “how much does it cost you per piece on average to create this artwork?” I'm not looking for a direct number but for me lets say I get 4 commissions a month and to do all 4 i use Clip Studio Paint which costs around $12.00 a month plus the electricity increase from me working from home on my computer last say $30.00 a month. So 12+30=42. 42/4(my commissions)= 10.50. I have to make $10.50 at minimum per piece in order to make up the cost of my overhead. Now these are hypothetical numbers, keep in mind. My commissions vary from month to month so I just threw the number four out there.

So remember I said there are two things to consider? Your time is sooooooo important. Freelancers often forget they need to make a livable wage. You should not be making less than the Federal minimum wage or even your state's minimum wage.how long it takes you on average to complete a piece multiplied by the hourly wage you decide your worth should be added to the cost of materials. So if it takes you 4 hours to complete a piece and your state's minimum wage is $12.50 then your base price should be your materials ($10.50) added to your base price of $50 or $12.50x4.

That's the math behind it all but there’s a bit more to take into account from an ethical, social and philosophical standpoint. This is all up to but pricing can always be adjusted based on things like, skill level, credentials, and experience. For example, Google says the average salary for a character designer is $39.99 hourly. Yearly the range is approximately $62,000-$110,000. I would consider that people who are making closer to the salary cap have more to consider. Some of those people work with an agent, who they have to pay sometimes 30%. It’s like a finder fee. The agent has access to jobs that would be harder to get without. Companies go through an agent to help filter some of the candidates that would usually qualify but apply anyways. Agents have a vetting system. But on the flip, most of these companies that pay that high end salary, also cover subscriptions and such.

From an ethical standpoint, if you are not needing to pay 30% to an agent, do you need to charge as much as the person making $110,000 a year, maybe not but you can especially if your skill level is one to one. So I use the art work of those working corporations as a barometer for the skill level required for that salary. I may not have the education to back it but I have the skill and experience level. And skill and experience level are important. If you are a beginner it may take you three times as long to do professional grade work. So is it ethical to charge $69.99 for something that clocked you 40 hours to do when the person already making that with all of their skill level credentials and years working at Netflix and Disney or wherever can do it in 15 hours. Technically the project may be on par but because your experience level is lower it takes significantly longer. Clients pay more for expedient turn around time.

Now the skill level is hard to look at objectively. I struggle big time with this, especially when I “unlock a new skill” within my craft. I don’t know if you’ve realized this by now, but I play a lot of video games so it sounds like I’m explaining a role playing game, but the system applies. Remember how I said that I use professional work as my barometer for my skill. I will take artwork from League of legends and put it next to mine to find my areas of opportunities. You have to be honest with yourself and that’s hard when at the end of the day you are proud of what you’re doing. The questions you need to ask are “what are the differences?” and “do those differences make one better than the other?” And “Will those differences affect my pricing/what people will pay?” Skill level affects how your work is perceived socially, but ultimately regardless of what I’ve your art is ALWAYS worth whatever you say it is. These are just the internal ramblings of a freelance artist.

I personally have my base pricing set to reflect $30.00 an hour. The base rate changes depending on the type of art requested, because certain styles do take longer. Depending on the job it can range from 75$-$500 and to some, that seems like a lot and to some it seems like pennies. This is to say it's truly up to you.

Are These a One to One on skill level or do I need some improvement?