These are a summarized version of what has been a lifetime of experience (I am now 60) and categorized into the list of “successful actions” that any artist could apply to pretty much anything. Just remember that this is an action list. It is not a theory or concept. These are actually things I did and continue to do but are filtered into a generic form that anyone could use.
Overall as you move through your career you will find yourself at various points along a path of hills valleys and plateaus. In other words times when you seem to be struggling to get out of a low valley, times of climbing into greatness, times where everything is falling apart or nothing happening at all (coming down the hill into a valley) and finally times where you think all is well and you are cruising along at some new level of success. Things are not getting better but they do not seem to be getting worse.
The key thing you have to remember is that at no place along this path will life allow you to keep going at the same level. If you are not moving up, gradually, over time, you are moving down. There is no real such thing as a straight forever even line.
Therefore when you are on a plateau, you should be planning an attack or offensive to move up to another level. In other words the comfortable plateau should be thought of as another valley out of which you need to climb to another new level. And maybe that time is less desperate than a previous valley, but you need to use that time to double down and move up. And it will almost always require an investment of time and/or resources.
Now also, there are overall elevations to consider. For example, you may not have achieved enough success to make a full time living. But within this lower level, you will still find times when you can level up easier than others. Lower plateaus so to speak. That are higher than previous valleys.
And overall, starting out, you need to first set up a plateau from which you can launch your first new offensive. To do that you need to have subsidy. Either from a job doing something else, savings, borrowing money, or some means to make a living, or live and eat, while you prepare for the next thing. And the next thing in this case is your first paying gig as a freelancer. In other words “don’t quit your day job” as they say…lol
OK, so this is not the list yet… sorry. I did not realize it would take as much to explain this sort of outline first. I will come back in another post later when I get more time for the “actionable” list.
I dabble in this a little and one thing I’ve learned is to always spend an hour to google your client. And if you decide to do smut (it does pay, say what you will but it does pay) make sure you use a pen name to do your work under. This way ten years from now you don’t have that ‘thing’ haunting you. And of course maintain some standards and lines if you do that.
Here is my Website! I dont have social media so my site is more then just a portfolio. Please Check it out and its open to criticism. https://www.colexiumstudios.mobi
I don’t live in America so I can’t judge if it’s easy or not to find some jobs were you live, but as said, I would advice you to try to join some CG community and try to work for a company rather than doing all this on your own.
All that said, you can start by doing freelance work , and look for companies at the same time.
Working with other artists will help you getting better at it big time , and also they will share their experience of the industry , provide good advice ect…
Probably if a company is involved , that means bigger projects , and you may be payed better than freelancing.
Also, it’s good to know that a company may look for as much as experienced people than beginners that can handle the monkey work and later improve and work on more advanced stuff.
If you’re on your own, you’ll have to master several techniques at a professional level from modeling to rendering, animation ect… It’s really valuable also but a tougher road to take.
I’ve looked at your site and there is really good work there, IMO you’ve got all that it takes to start working professionally especially in arch-viz. That doesn’t mean you should stop to improve, there are always room for improvements.
One thing that you can do, is to show less work but just the better. There are some really good stuff, but also image that looks more like test scene, or less professional / finished work.
Show only the best of your work, and the most professional, like the 10/15 best images, maybe without categories.
The animation category is a bit below the other work, maybe try to include a little montage of various shots taken from various scene and make a showreel out of that. Something in the lines of that : https://vimeo.com/7809605 , even if it doesn’t need to be as good, it’s one of the best animation of it’s kind IMO.
All that said your work show that you are already quite advanced in CG , I’m sure you’ll get some money out of it !
These kinds of sites will always push the prices even lower, I do not recommend any freelancing site to people from the EU or the USA, due to the min earnings requirements.
+1 Every designer/layout artist and the like will be confronted with that “option” sooner or later; “We can’t pay you a full fee, but it’ll give you great exposure!” (I know I have been!) Just say no. For one thing, if they’re making money out of their business, so should you. Secondly you’d be undercutting all the other professionals, making life harder for everyone.
Most importantly, create a portfolio as diverse as possible, but of course it has to be stuff you feel comfortable and competent with. The way to get jobs is to have other jobs to show for, and in lieu of that, a good portfolio will carry you a long way when you’re looking for employment. Also, be bold, don’t shy away from projects that stretch your creativity. (Within reasonm of course.)
The first point is that you have to qualify when it is good or not good to accept “non paying” work. And under what situation it is Ok for you, to make that decision. And only you can make that decision. No one else has the right, and no one else should be hanging a “it is overall bad for the industry”, or “doing a disservice to other artists as a whole”, because you decided to work for little or no pay for your own good reasons that only you can decide.
I think it is a fallacy in thinking that there is some kind of virtual network of employers or freelance workers that tallies up what people are getting paid and then generates a new salary expectation based on that. Or even some way in which people network to share stories in a way that would affect people’s ability to get paid fairly. It just does not happen. And if there is any kind of overall effect, it is light comparatively to what is imagined.
What does happen is people are aware that in different markets people will charge different amounts. This is very real. And there is nothing you can do about it.
But the second and most important context is this:
I will bundle up and categorize and fully profile a group of people who are “would be” employers that are fools. “Low lifes”, “Jerks”, whatever you want to call them. They don’t get it. And they never will. And their MO is to take advantage of people. Or their MO is that they really have no clue about what it takes to get artistic work done. And this can come in the form of people who pay “well”, but at the same time ask for about 5 times the amount of work than what is realistic - within the time frame. And they are needy and demanding. You will know them when you meet them.
Then there are the special cases where they are just full on dreaming and narcissistic. They have some message from destiny that they are the leader of people. And that alone qualifies them. So yes of course, arrogantly they think, all these artists should contribute tho their dream project and in the end everyone will be uplifted into some new realm because they got behind this self-righteous fantasy.
These projects always fail.
And the jerks rarely get anything accomplished either.
Both general types fade away into obscurity and no one ever hears of them.
It is extremely rare - though it does happen - that these projects get made. And the word gets out that the artists never got paid. And when this happens there is such a backlash in the community that any employer worth his salt would not touch this kind of a project and are themselves offended by it.
So that leads to what is left. And that is the employers that are great to work for. And employers who might be hard to work for, but pay just the same. Both these types are your bread and butter. And I have found these people to be very upstanding people and are just offended by the notion that anyone who ask you to work for free as you would be in normal circumstances. And they are not affected negatively by what other artists do - pay or not. They are motivated by their own professional standards.
The rest of them, you can more or less, forget about. They don’t have the negative impact people fantasize, should you find some grey ares in-between or knowingly or unknowing work for one - as a way to gain experience.
And this leads to my main point. And that is that you decide what to do. For your own reasons.
And this leads to what would have been one of many points of “action advice”. And that is, don’t do it for money. If you have one mantra you keep, that keeps you going, it would be, you are not doing this for the money. Money is not the objective.
Now, go ahead. Quote that out of context if you are looking to troll this post - I know you are out there… lol. I am just going to say that. Because it fits in the below context:
And that is that you have to move vertically and horizontally in your career. And if you always do it for what pays, you will never advance. Or rather, I should say advancement comes slowly and without many spikes if at all.
Also I say this as someone who built my practice up from nothing, zero, zip, to owning a studio and hiring artists to work under me.
And I did it mainly by applying this as my main principle. I am not doing it for the money. That is not the motivation. And it truly isn’t.
I have fought and scrapped and dealt with the highs and the lows. I have worked for the worst and the best and I have turned down work, been tricked, learned my lessons. I have fought hard to negotiate fair deals and have been as shrewd financially as I felt I needed to be to get a good contract. And I have let clients walk who would not pay what I wanted. All of it.
But on the way up, (and I am still working on it believe me) I have made hard choices to either work for little or no pay, and to advance myself. Purely and only for the reason to level up - and in doing so - create a great product.
Life is this way. It does not matter how you do it. Lock yourself up and make a killer reel, work within the context of a non-paying project and do the same.
The only thing you should be sure and secure before doing anything. And that is a) will I be able to actually finish the project - or my part of it - and will I have access to the results for my reel? And b) Will it allow me or motivate me to level up in such a way that I can increase my chances of getting work.
Those are the main considerations that have driven my decisions.
Most of the “free work” scenarios are not worth dealing with. So you can do well to avoid them. But don’t make it a hard rule. You will inevitably find yourself in a situation where you can do something for little or no pay and get something much more valuable.
The one main other rule, is that no matter what you do, for whatever the pay is, or the situation. Do the best work you can do, or better. Always.
If you are not willing to take a job - no matter what it is - and give it 300% then don’t do it. In my opinon - and experience - it is a waste of time.
If you were to follow these main last rules here, you will have a screaming success!
Your site has the same problem a lot of generalist have, lack of focus. I struggle with the same problem.
Look at your site the same way an employer would. Are they looking at your site looking for a modeler? an animator? Architectural renders? Product renders? Etc.
I would take down anything that does not look like a finished image with a purpose. A rendering of the blender monkey head or tea pot might be ok it doesn’t serve a purpose. While a product shot of a glass of beer has easily indefinable purpose. It’s an image that could be used in advertising etc. Remember the audience has no idea what technical aspects went into making the image and they will not care. Your trying to sell a product, that product is your services. Any images need to support clearly support that goal.
Another kind of tip I would give is that marketing is half the story.
There are some pretty good products made by some around here and some products not so super. Not always the popularity of a product match the quality of it, and that is because the marketing part is done well. For me it is mind-boggling how that mechanism called marketing works. I practise it now 2 year and still not really getting the hang of it. It’s sometimes really frustrating and how consumers/buyers/customers/clients behave looks sometimes random.
There is one thing though I learn over and over again; When you present something, you have to think from the customer’s or client’s perspective. The problem often when we make something, we are happy with it because we are proud we created it. Or sometimes it’s not a point to us that it is not perfect because we know the potential. (Maybe it’s enough for us once we reach that level and don’t go further.). I think to get succes one has to shift the mind. I think we need to look through the eyes of a visitor.
I checked your website, maybe you could consider the following:
Think from perspective of customer/client. Write something, some good posts (with headers, alinea, transition words, renders etc.) In other words, something interesting to read. Not for you, but that what the ideal visitor of the website likes to hear.
Keep only the best renders. Go for quality, not quantity.
Try to make consistency in size of images. (uniform layout, repetition, no fuzz or the like).
Next time when rendering, very small (black?) borders do well sometimes?. Or if your CMS (website editor) has something for that, could also check. Or check if you should at text. Or “foto” collage?
I don’t do work for exposure, but I will do the occasional volunteer project, I have a few friends with orphan diseases and I’ll do ‘some’ projects as gratis if their doctor is doing a presentation and it is for educational value or a pitch for research funding. But you need to pick and choose those battles.
I either work for pro-bono, charging nothing, or for full fees; however I do not do any work for reduced payment for the sake of “increasing my visibility”, or whatever (lame) reasons people give for not wanting to pay living wages.
But then, I live in a high-income, high-cost country, so I’d obviously be at a disadvantage if I’d have to compete with outsourced jobs abroad.
Again, it’s not a matter of looking out for Number one, but also to make sure your colleagues and comptetitors don’t get undercut.
And usually, if you pay peanuts, all you get is monkeys.
OP, after a cursory scan of your folio, it’s quite apparent that the architectual work is by far the strongest pieces and to be clear scenes 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8. Which in turn I’d also suggest culling the rest whereby re-orientating towards archvis, if indeed that’s a viable option/career choice you’ve thought about?
Plus one other thing you might want to think about, is to open an ArtStaion account, the portal has gained increasing popularity over recent years that these days various industries typically leverage as a recruitment resource.
I’m an advocate of giving people what they pay for. If they want a top dollar job we can do that. If they are on a budgets well…we can work something out but the product will be on par with the pay.
And that kinda works out somewhat decent, I do a fair bit of work for broke indies who just need ‘something’ Granted most of what I do is character sculpts and rigging (when I can) but…service is always on par with the pay. I make no bones or illusions about it. And often what indies need is not top tier work, but work consistent with what they already have so it tends to work out anyway.
Problem is that many artists are perfectionist and they often want to please their customer to the level of a perfectionist and this make it hell for many since they are not capable of doing a lower level of quality.
It can be, but even if I meet someone with a budget of X and they need a quite a bit of Y…we can work something out. They may get leftover rejects from other clients they may just get a single sculpt pass per character and minimal texturing work (in which case I normally suggest they go with a makeahuman base mesh ) but…the goal is to get them the best for what their budget it, while still respecting my own boundaries and it tends to work out well enough.
But upfront clear expectations and honesty is a must for doing budget work.
