estimation of the value for some images I've made

General Forums Blender and CG Discussions
1

Hi there !

Here is a funny thread. I’ve made images for a client a while ago, and I have trouble getting paid.

I agreed a price with the customer, and it seems that they are not so willing to pay the full bill now.
If you type “bowlus” on google images, you’ll see some of them (1st and 3rd for instance).

Here as well

Now, I’m curious. I think I will sit on part of my money, but…

What do you think these images are worth ?
Say, one of them ?

I had to model everything except kayak, iMAc and bath-suit

For each angle I rendered open and closed view so that they could create their own cutaway.

2

If I had to quote the project, I’d estimate ~$1100 for the first image and ~$300 for each addtional view.

edit: Especially since they are selling them for around $100,000, a couple grand for product renders is totally appropriate.

3

Yes, I would imagine the modeling work would cost $1K-$3K and the rendering about the same… so altogether I’d expect to pay $2-$5K for such a project.

If you can’t get paid on time, send the bill to collections…

I actually saw these posted elsewhere in a press release/story, I didn’t know they were done with blender!

4

Yet if you’ll go to any freelancing site, you’ll get the same work done for about 300$. Which makes me sad :frowning:

5

Nah, you won´t get that quality for 300 anywhere.

6

I hope you have this agreement in writing.

7

Fantastic work and I agree these renders are extremely high quality. Imagine a professional photographer would be charging in the $5000 range for images like this… and of course it’s impossible to do.

Let this be a lesson to all of us, that the client never gets images without being heavily watermarked until the tab is paid in full.

8

Where do you live and on which internet are you on? I want to move there :slight_smile:

The thing is, you can check these jobs, there are loads of them on known freelancing sites,
there are also bids with references and portfolios so you can check your competition and their pricing.
Thats why I’m sad :slight_smile:

9

Hey!

Convert working hours into money and lets see what gives. I guess you should charge around 25 to 35 EUR a hour of work. Considering the high level of your work i guess the 35 EUR a hour is more appropriate. That work is worth 2000 to 5000 EUR.

swene - considering you are from same country as me. How much would u charge if we say that for cleaning an office u get 12 EUR a hour!

People you need to hold prices high for urselve and for the community. Dont poop in ur own soup!

Heads up!

10

Hi, fellow countryman! Yes, I completely agree - I’m not even arguing. I’m just reflecting the reality on the freelancing market.
But often the situation is either you get paid for a project with a rate of 15€/h or, the alternative: you don’t
get the project and you stay without a job, because you wanted 25€/h for it, and so the next fella in line (with a decent enough portfolio) gets it. Again, just saying it’s a sad reality. If there isn’t anything else on the plate at the moment, I’m guessing most would take the 15. And kudos to OP’s work, don’t get me wrong here :slight_smile:

11

Trouble is, you get other freelancers trying to lowball the price. I tried to bid for a job at $20 an hour somebody came along offering to do it at $5 per hour. Not everybody is after quality, a lot of them just want the job done cheap.

12

It’s nonsensical to ask anyone but the client what these images are “worth”. To anyone but the client, these pictures are worth nothing. If you want to know what they’re worth to the client, ask the client.

That you now publicly survey fellow “artists” (who all fail to point this out to you) is not only extremely unprofessional, it also tells me you failed to do the most basic thing: Negotiate the terms upfront and put them into a contract.

If you get paid by the hour, you send them the bill for the hours. If you get paid a fixed sum, or in parts, send them those bills. If they refuse to pay you, if they’re in breach of contract; talk to your lawyer.

For further reference: F*ck You, Pay me

13

Agreed. To me they are worth nothing, I have no use for these images. To the original client they are worth what they agreed to pay and the OP agreed to accept as payment, nothing more.

Something is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it.

If what they are willing to pay is less than what you are willing to accept as payment then you don’t accept the work.

if they haven’t paid then that is something totally different to what a particular piece of work is worth.

14

Don’t be obtuse, he wanted some opinions on what a reasonable quote would be for that project. That’s not a nonsensical question at all.

I agree that if he didn’t get a contract, that’s a noob mistake, but that wasn’t the question.

15

Hey Gwenouille, I really feel for you. No one really knows the environment you negotiated in - was it over the phone? through an intermediary? etc. But I sort of see both sides of the issue here.

At the risk of losing the job, it’s a good idea to ask the DA (director of art, or AD depending on where you are), “Why do you want this done in 3D?” If the answer they give is something like, “I don’t know, isn’t that the easiest way to do it?” then there’s trouble down the line and someone needs to explain that if they just want a still illustration then vector or raster is what they have confused 3D illustration with. The time required to produce one or two 2D illustrations is much less than the time it takes to finely model something like this, and much more in line with what they seem to think is fair payment for your work.

Obviously one way to look at it is if they ask for it that’s what they’re going to get, but on the other hand it might save a lot of trouble to say’ “Hey, if you just want two still cutaways, no animation, no flyarounds, I can do that in Photoshop for you for a lower price.”

I apologize in advance for my obtusity! Also, my comments are entirely based on my assessment of those images and the assumption that the outdoor images are someone else’s photographs and not your renders. If those are actually your renders as well then you are indeed asking way too little!

16

Er… a price was agreed upfront and after delivery the client doesn’t want to pay that…

Looks like you can’t hold back the work as they already have it…

so things get tricky now… is the work not what the client expected? Did it deviate off brief?
do you have anything in writing?

As creator you can still hold copyright over the works and stop them using them unless they pay (other than Fair use)

Try talking first but if that’s not working a solicitors letter asking them to pay or takedown any of the images they use based on your work… probably not worth actually going to court but the threat may be enough to make them pay.

Of course if they just got itchy feet and decide they don’t want to use your artwork anymore then you’ve lost out unless you have a written contract and even then it’ll come down to what was agreed to be delivered, payment mechanisms and approval causes…

I guess his thread means you probably got ‘stiffed’ for your time.

A sad truth in art that the time it takes to make or craft something has no relevance on its actual worth!

17

Hi guys, thanks for the numerous replies.

Some answers to your questions and remarks:
Things in this case are not as simple as they could be. The client is the employer of my sister, and i got the job thanks to her. I’ve sent a quotation, and got nothing back : my sister was the one exchanging infos with me, and because the schedule was very tight, I went straight to work without waiting for anything else other than infos on the model’s dimensions, structure, materials …
She is based in Canada, I live in France, so I never met the customer directly, only once per Skype
The fact that the work was going on well, without the employer saying anything about the amount of the quotation was comforting me into thinking that everything was al-right.

Now, don’t get me wrong: regarding the way to conduct a professional/client bond, I got it all wrong and admit it completely: I didn’t get any real agreement from the boss (I was taking my sister’s word for it), and gave away the images without watermarks nor payment.

@Beer Baron and Richard Marklew: yeah, I get your point, and it does make sense. But I needed to know if i was in a realistic ballpark with my quotation, to know if that was the reason. So all the answers I got up there helped me.

@Michael W: NO, the client is fully satisfied. The images are exactly what they needed. I don’t want to go into any legal battle, nor claim copyright things, etc… I am a rather poor violin maker/ woodworker based in France, and they have a much higher financial force, over there in Canada/USA. I did this job because it was fun to make, and because my sister was involved. And that’s possibly where it all started to go pear-shaped…

The problem is that the guy is a really nice guy, and the whole story is rather a case of misunderstandings. I am convinced I should have been more precise and methodical with my dealing of the commercial side of it, so it’s my fault really.
But in the end the images are fine, and the quotation was fine, be it on the “cheap” side…

Thanks for your input !

Can i ask a moderator to lock that thread ? Or can i do it myself as OP ?
I got all the infos I needed about about pricing
I don’t want this thread to turn into some rant against this company, as i am the one to blame. This would bring them bad publicity and it wouldn’t help my cause !

Fell free to contact me per PM if you want to.

18

Closed at OP request