Lemma Soft Forums

Yeah that seems to be the current method of buying with artists, Ryuno, but I've noticed the issue is mostly that if the artist finishes a few assets, but then can't finish other assets later the customer is losing out because they spent money on these assets, and now has to buy assets from a new artist and risks the game looking disjointed with opposing art styles. And requesting an artist imitate another artist isn't always a possibility. With music each piece can be complimentary to another piece, from a different musician without making the game feel like its done by multiple opposing groups.
Hence the whole payment upfront feels safer to me. If I've completely finished three or four assets, been paid, and then cant finish the rest for some reason I can't issue a refund on the ones I've already done just because the whole set isn't done. But if I work in stages leveling my energy equally over the work and providing things in waves and something happens, I find it completely fair to offer a refund if I cant get to the end of the lineart phase. This method wouldn't actually benefit me personally at all, but save the buyer from shelling out a good chunk of money on assets they may have to scrap. The big issue is trusting me to issue a refund in the case of failure on my part, and second, the large chunk of money required to do this in full.

What I'm trying to figure out is how to leverage the risk away from the buyer as much as possible. Create an optimal plan, and if the buyer doesn't want to do that and still just wants to go with paying per asset (or whatever else they fancy) they can still do so.

Amecha wrote:And requesting an artist imitate another artist isn't always a possibility. With music each piece can be complimentary to another piece, from a different musician without making the game feel like its done by multiple opposing groups.

I have to disagree: in any of the games I worked that had more than one composer involved, I've been told how obvious it was when the tracks weren't mine. Even if you use the same melodies and chord progressions, production is a big part of what is the "art style" of music.

I do understand where you're coming from and I hope you can figure something out with buyers.

Fair enough. I'm not personally well versed in music but I've heard it stated before that it can be somewhat easier to pull in a new composure. I'm sure I wouldn't notice, especially if the overall ambiance of a secondary piece was completely different to provide a different mood. I also imagine switching between something with an uplifting ambiance vs a creepy ambiance could be a huge shift for a composer. Like an artist switching between an unrealistic style, to hyper realistic portraits, to abstract. Most people cant identify my work broken between those styles so with ambiance shifts I had tentatively assumed something similar was true for composers. I imagine for two different composers doing something upbeat the differences would be jarring even if one was trying to imitate the other. It was kind of a blanket statement, sorry!

Amecha wrote:Yeah that seems to be the current method of buying with artists, Ryuno, but I've noticed the issue is mostly that if the artist finishes a few assets, but then can't finish other assets later the customer is losing out because they spent money on these assets, and now has to buy assets from a new artist and risks the game looking disjointed with opposing art styles. And requesting an artist imitate another artist isn't always a possibility. With music each piece can be complimentary to another piece, from a different musician without making the game feel like its done by multiple opposing groups.
Hence the whole payment upfront feels safer to me. If I've completely finished three or four assets, been paid, and then cant finish the rest for some reason I can't issue a refund on the ones I've already done just because the whole set isn't done. But if I work in stages leveling my energy equally over the work and providing things in waves and something happens, I find it completely fair to offer a refund if I cant get to the end of the lineart phase. This method wouldn't actually benefit me personally at all, but save the buyer from shelling out a good chunk of money on assets they may have to scrap. The big issue is trusting me to issue a refund in the case of failure on my part, and second, the large chunk of money required to do this in full.

What I'm trying to figure out is how to leverage the risk away from the buyer as much as possible. Create an optimal plan, and if the buyer doesn't want to do that and still just wants to go with paying per asset (or whatever else they fancy) they can still do so.

the truth is that there is no right way, just know your rights and start with rules that both understand. as far as payments goes, paypal is really the only way to hand off money to another person or risk thousand of dollars into a court battle (Tempus told the reasons why its never a fail safe plan). these articles should give you an understanding on how many other artist do business:

http://protectart.deviantart.com/journa ... #Copyright

http://lucky978.deviantart.com/journal/ ... -468025801

firecat wrote:
the truth is that there is no right way, just know your rights and start with rules that both understand. as far as payments goes, paypal is really the only way to hand off money to another person or risk thousand of dollars into a court battle (Tempus told the reasons why its never a fail safe plan). these articles should give you an understanding on how many other artist do business:

http://protectart.deviantart.com/journa ... #Copyright

http://lucky978.deviantart.com/journal/ ... -468025801

Thank you. Although its worth saying I've already been doing commissions for about 3-4 years already and I'm pretty well versed in this information. I know paypal is the go to, and I'm not trying to find a work around for that. Simply other things to implement that would put buyers at ease. A payment decision that would make them comfortable because as I've done it before was payment upfront in full, no refunds after lining. This just doesn't translate well to large projects like this. And even if its half upfront that still doesn't fix the issue of if the artist can't continue at a certain point. If two or three assets are already paid for and completed and the buyer tries to begin the next set and the artist cant continue legally there is no obligation to continue. The copyright laws and paypal's protection can't help with that. Because you got what you paid for regardless of not getting what you intended to eventually buy and pay for. Also the problem of meeting deadlines, etc.

Selling to buyers who are getting assets for a VN is completely different than doing straight commissions, and the consumer seems to be getting screwed over a lot by this. And I really want to mend that and create a safe consumer/producer relationship with my consumers should I chose to sell here. (If not I can just continuing doing what I do on the other sites I use.) I like VNs. I love them, and I'd love to take part in the creation of them outside of my own plans to make a VN myself. I'd love to have my art in them, but I don't want to try and sell here and accidentally turn around and hurt the indie developer. I can't in good faith swear I'll complete all the assets for a game unless I'm signed on from the beginning for the whole task. That way if I have to back out I can offer a refund.

Amecha wrote:

Thank you. Although its worth saying I've already been doing commissions for about 3-4 years already and I'm pretty well versed in this information. I know paypal is the go to, and I'm not trying to find a work around for that. Simply other things to implement that would put buyers at ease. A payment decision that would make them comfortable because as I've done it before was payment upfront in full, no refunds after lining. This just doesn't translate well to large projects like this. And even if its half upfront that still doesn't fix the issue of if the artist can't continue at a certain point. If two or three assets are already paid for and completed and the buyer tries to begin the next set and the artist cant continue legally there is no obligation to continue. The copyright laws and paypal's protection can't help with that. Because you got what you paid for regardless of not getting what you intended to eventually buy and pay for. Also the problem of meeting deadlines, etc.

Selling to buyers who are getting assets for a VN is completely different than doing straight commissions, and the consumer seems to be getting screwed over a lot by this. And I really want to mend that and create a safe consumer/producer relationship with my consumers should I chose to sell here. (If not I can just continuing doing what I do on the other sites I use.) I like VNs. I love them, and I'd love to take part in the creation of them outside of my own plans to make a VN myself. I'd love to have my art in them, but I don't want to try and sell here and accidentally turn around and hurt the indie developer. I can't in good faith swear I'll complete all the assets for a game unless I'm signed on from the beginning for the whole task. That way if I have to back out I can offer a refund.

maybe you are over think it, instead of trying to find "the best way for you" it should be teamwork with the developer and his staff. it doesn't have to be the perfect meeting, any website to give small message on anything insures that you are still with them. long projects need teamwork that's what i'm 100% sure and so any kind of communication with the team can insure better results than spreading people.

My method tends to be like this:

• - Talk what'll be needed. If they only have a rough idea that's fine, a min baseline with potential to increase works for me.
  - See if we can work out some kind of bulk offer depending on the amount
  - Once we both agree on price, I give them an estimate one when I can get started
  - Ask for payment after showing them a sketch that they approve of (for that piece of art)

This mostly works for me because the sketch is the biggest hurdle in terms of getting going; sometimes stuff comes up and I keep my client in the know but once that sketch is done and approved I find it a lot easier to keep going. They have the sketch so they know I'm not lying about working on it, and if they run off with a 30min sketch it's not as bad as running off with a 3hr+ finished sprite.

I also add bigger clients on skype so it's really quick/easy to notify them of problems/questions. I've never had people run off on me yet and I haven't had people complain about paying about the sketch but your mileage may vary.

As far as I've been comissioned, I followed these steps with the client (almost all of my commercial comissions have been characters, so I'll focus on that):

- I got to know as much as possible about the characters and story, and provide a few sketches to cement the design.
- From there, I choose a character and start working on it. I send my client different steps during the process to greenlight them.
If I've been asked for a little quantity of characters, I ask for a partial payment after the flat colours. If this is a long-term project with lots of assets and I have good experiences and relationships with the client, I trust him/her and keep working after finishing the character.

- After finishing the character in all of its poses, clothes, etc, I ask for it's corresponding payment (be it the rest of the price after the flats, or full payment depending of the circumstances I stated before), and I start working on the next one after receiving it.

I haven't had many clients (since I'm still not "open for comissions" in a public way right now [I'm getting stuff ready to open my thread]). But as far as I've been working this way, I've had no trouble whatsoever with anyone, nor I'd had any dissatisfied client.