#Price for Animations?
10 messages in this thread
Help!
I'm trying to establish price rates for my animation work. I want to keep the
prices competative, not undercutting other animation artist too much as this
does not help the industry. Can any of you pros help me get a clue as to
decent rates to charge.
I have heard of ranges from $250, per finished second to $1,000, pfs and up.
How do you figure rates? Is it based on the complexity of the animation, time
of the finished product, time spent at computer modeling, etc., all of the
above? Do you charge the same rates (if by the hour) for the rendering time or
is that a separate rate? How much extra can you charge for IPAS special
effects?
I don't expect anyone to give out privileged information, but some general
guide lines would really help.
Thanks – Greg
It is tough. customers want to know what it will cost before they give you a
PO. but they generaly don;t know what they want! what I do is spend a few (non
billed )hours with the customer getting a feel for what it is they want, then
go home and wip up a proposal, based on how much time i estimate job will take.
this is a "not to exceed $XXXX." quote with lots of excape fine print, incase
they have changes, and they always seem to. Proposal has place for us both to
sign… this becomes paper for start of buisnee. I try to finish work for just
slightly less than proposal, but never can tell. most of work I do is billed at
$60/hr , and several associates are in the $45 – 75 /hr range depending on
skill level and investment in iron/software, and hubris. anybody who thinks
'tooning is a get rich quick scheam – WAYS&WCIGS? (What Are You Smoking and
Where Can I Get Some?) Lots of Hard wwork and giving customer fair value is
probably the most demanding part. Most of the smaller business Ive dealt with
so far seem to choke on anything more than $5k-$10k. If you can find out how
much they have in theirt budget you can sugest what they can get for that
amount – laarger companies can come up with $20-50K no problem, but expect a
lot for their money. hope this helps some, and bon chance! Dr Dave – Wyeknot
inc
Dave,
Thanks. Your info gives me a place to start. On my first time out I shot out
a price of $300 for an sample animation I though would take a couple of
evenings. The customer jumped on it and I started to work. I quickly realized
that I had bitten off more than I could chew. About 10 evenings of work later I
delivered the product. I was lucky to make $2 an hour on that one. Anyway I
learned to look before I leap on that one.
Thanks again for the help! – Greg
that happens a lot! what i try to do is distinguish between time it take to
learn, and the actual time it take to do the job. Custstomer isn't paying for
your (or mine) education. And untill you have your black belt in 'tooning, a
certain amount of time is spent learning. Thus – that same job may take you
only a few evening – a year from now. keeping track of the hours helps build a
data base for quoting future work. lots of luck and stay 'tooned. Dr Dave –
Wyeknot, inc.
PMJI – I charge between $150 – $300 per finished second depending on the level
of compexity. Most flying logo stuff I can do for $150 pfs more complex
animations move on up the scale. Of course to a degree you need to know how
long its going to take and this comes with experience, but this is a workable
range and I hope it helps. -JE
Greg,
What DTI has implemented is a series of "set plays" that the customer has to
"fill-out" or sign before the quote is supplied. Basically, what I would
suggest is the following:
1) Give a fixed price on doing a storyboard. Make a storyboard template
which has a screen, some lines for descriptive text to one side and a place
for a customer's initials. Ours has 3 screens per page. After the customer
initials each sceene in the stroyboard, then you can give a fixed animation
price.
2) Have a standard contract written up which states that if changes are made
to the animation which deveate from the SB, then it will be charged a
$xxx/hr.
3) Have well defined customer approval points in the animation process and
have these also spelled out in the "standard contract". I'd suggest
a) Storyboard
b) Geomerty, Materials and Lighting
d) Keyframing
e) Final render preview (typically 75% screen FLC) and a couple stills
At each step, have a place for them to initial. After these points if
changes are made, then charge them $xxx/hr.
If you have all of this paperwork ready … the contract .. the blank
storyboard sheets it accomplishes a couple things. First, it lends a high
level of credability to you since you obvioussly have "been down this road
before" and it is very professional. Second, this may sell the customer to
just let you bill'm per hour for the animation .. to much paperwork and you
show them that to provide a fixed price, they will not have the freedom that
they would get on an hourly basis.
Ang
Hi Angelo,
I appreciated reading your approach to proposing and pricing animation work.
Very professional. My approach is similar but I am still a little new at this I
am wondering about a couple of things.
In your "Standard Contract" do you specifically nail down what the work is to
be used for? I am getting at the notion that an animation created for a
national broadcast is essentially more valuable than one that may only be
presented to three hundred people at the stockholders annual. The issue is one
of intellectual property and ownership of copyrights. A Graphic artist who
creates a terrific image for a client only is licensing the use of the image
for specific purposes. The artist continues to own and control the image and
the copyright. It is the same arguement for software developers.
How much do you charge for storyboarding?
Michael
Michael,
>> standard contract deal with limited rights
No it doesn't. I'm sure Greg Pyros and others more involved in broadcast would
have better insights.
>> price for storyboarding
We have a range that we charge based on the size of the job (total amount of
services we will provide). I don't differentiate between model building,
storyboard consulting, animation consulting, etc … it's all at the same.
>> billing approach
The main point that I was trying to make was a suttle one (but you don't want
to make it suttle with your client). If a client wants a fixed price, you MUST
make them aware that they are giving something up for that. That they will
have to make descissions and stick with them and that YOU will not eat the
increases in time that their changes create. In all my professional services,
I usually say something like following.
"Look, if you require me to make a fixed price bid, the risk is on me and I am
going to increase the price a small % as a cushion. You wouldn't put you or
your business in the position that "at best" you are making your minimum. 9
times out of 10, you will pay more with a fixed price than if you simply let me
charge you our hourly rate. Therefore, on an hourly rate, we could be much
more flexible and interactive with you during the project…."
Its real important to make it clear that they may pay more and are giving up
flexibility for the security of a fixed price. Many customers will come back
with an hourly rate and then a total "cap". This is a trap!! The customer get
the best of both worlds. No matter how "padded" the cap is, the customer will
run it up to the limit .. and then demand final changes which you will have to
eat.
Make it an either/or proposition .. either fixed price or hourly .. make sure
they know the pro's and con's of each method and then let them choose which one
is right for them. <got a little long winded on that one .. <g>>
Ang
Angelo,
Well said. I got your point the first time around but I am glad you laid out
the detail or your logic. You are absolutely right, people will revise you to
death. It is much more professional to get it all out on the table up front
and make it clear so that there are no misunderstandings. That way everybody
knows in advance what is to be expected of them.
Thanks for explaining your thoughts, I am sure that others here will benefit
from what you have learned.
Michael
Angelo,
PMJI, you make excellent points and I'm filing them away for future reference.
I often work hourly with a "cap" which I haven't figured out if it is good for
me or not. The reason for this is I almost always finish within the "cap"
amount, and I wonder if I would have been better off giving a fixed bid of the
same amount as the "cap" and then I would have made more money. I seem to make
the most money when I bid based on a price per finished second, say $250 for an
engineering animation, and since I'm pretty fast now, can make $100 per hour on
such a project. If I charged an hourly rate I would never dare to ask anywhere
close to that amount, but it's a lot safer.
I'm still refining this process even after several years of consulting <g>.
Martin