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Commission Feedback Thread (Anything you wish I'd do?)
a year ago
General
Haio! With October rolling around I'm continuing to figure out next steps to grow as an artist and make what I'm doing more sustainable <3
Offering commissions at all was an experimental process for me, and I haven't really updated rates or the commission format since I started. So it's good for me to check in occasionally and ask about what different floofs would like to see! :3
Current commissions that I offer:
★ 60/90 minute sketch commissions ($35/$50): these are the commissions that have seen the most interest since I started offering them. They're done in a single setting, live, and commissioners usually get the results sent over within a day or two. They're designed to be quick and simple and to allow floofs to commission random ideas they have without committing too much.
★ Polished commissions ($50 per hour): these are standard polished commissions that are charged at an hourly rate. I went with an hourly rate because I was worried about mis-estimating required times, and so that clients would have a lot of flexibility: you can ask for changes or additions at pretty much any part of the process and I'll usually say yes, as long as you understand that the changes might alter the number of hours.
★★★
So that's roughly where I am. Some questions I have:
★ Are 60/90 minutes good times for sketch commissions? I've had a few floofs ask about offering 120 minute commissions, something to bridge the gap between 90 minute sketches (which are effectively $35 an hour) and full polished commissions (which are $50 an hour). I've also had multiple clients commission multi-part sketch commissions, which are a lot of fun but do make me worry that the format might not be serving them well. I've been tempted to offer an even lower-cost 30 minute timed sketches with the caveat that they couldn't be planned much in advance. I like the idea of having something that's accessible and fun and a little bit impulsive, rather than extensively planned.
★ Should I charge hourly for polished commissions, or charge per-project? If I switched to a fixed price I'd likely need to add more rules about when edits could happen and about subject materials. I think that the hourly prices are more straightforward and flexible for both clients and for me, but I'm aware that this isn't a typical pricing model for most furry commissions, which typically have a set format and set price, and limits on the numbers of subjects or species. I've wondered a few times if hourly rates aren't part of the reason why I don't see a ton of regular interest in polished commissions.
★ Are prices a barrier? I'm not sure that I can do anything about this, trying to do art full time there are limitations to how much I can discount my work and still make a living on it. But I'm aware that there is a large price difference between the hourly rate for sketch commissions and polished commissions, and if you've looked at my commissions before (either polished or sketch commissions) and thought, "I would love to get that, but just can't afford it" - that's still something that I can think about when planning future pawjects to try and come up with more accessible offers.
★ Are my commission terms difficult to find or understand? Is there anything you'd like to see worded differently? Is there a resource you'd like to see to make it easier to get in touch or keep up with which commissions are currently active? Are there changes you'd like to see to my delivery method for finished art?
★ Should any stream times/content be adjusted to make it easier to join/view streams? I've been thinking for a while about potentially moving Monday's stream earlier in the day and making it endo-only and scat-free (so no fatal digestion or overly cruel vore, no rape, and no scat, but still NSFW-allowed). I don't have a good sense of how many critters (if any) would like to be able to tune into streams but are thrown off by either the time or the content warnings.
★★★
I've also been thinking about other commission offerings on a limited basis. I'd love to hear thoughts on any of the following ideas:
★ Would you like to see YCH commissions? And if so, are there particular subjects, scenarios, and species would you be interested in? YCH commissions would have limited slots, but I would charge per-project, not per-hour. Whenever I made one, I'd post the base image and announce how many slots were available and any relevant species and restrictions. These would be a once-and-a-while type of commission. I'm particularly interested in what subjects people and critters would like to see if I started offering these? Scenarios with recurring characters or settings? Custom Pokevore cards? Fully unique one-off premises?
★ Would you like to see group commission offerings? I've thought a little bit about allowing multiple commissioners to pool resources for a single commission either featuring multiple of their OCs or a scenario that both commissioners enjoy. This would need a lot of thought, so if it is something you'd like to see, please give me some details on how you'd want something like this to work :3
★ Would you like to see comic/subject sponsorship? Over on Subscribestar I occasionally run non-binding polls about what I should work on next. If I offered a way for followers to directly sponsor and pay for me to work on specific storylines in the Forest, with Max the Eevee, or even one-off pawjects, that could make it easier for me to devote more time to polishing and finishing comics. What's tricky with this is that I'd still want to retain creative control over the comics that I make in those settings, but I know that I jump around a lot as an artist and sometimes that means WIP comics stay WIP for a looong time.
★ Is there something else you wish I was doing that I'm not doing? Like I mentioned at the start of this, while it feels like a long time already I've only been offering commissions for a short while, and I'm still trying to figure out what terms work. So while I can't pawmiss I'll do everything, I'm very open to suggestions about things that I should tweak, change, or start offering.
Thanks! <3
Offering commissions at all was an experimental process for me, and I haven't really updated rates or the commission format since I started. So it's good for me to check in occasionally and ask about what different floofs would like to see! :3
Current commissions that I offer:
★ 60/90 minute sketch commissions ($35/$50): these are the commissions that have seen the most interest since I started offering them. They're done in a single setting, live, and commissioners usually get the results sent over within a day or two. They're designed to be quick and simple and to allow floofs to commission random ideas they have without committing too much.
★ Polished commissions ($50 per hour): these are standard polished commissions that are charged at an hourly rate. I went with an hourly rate because I was worried about mis-estimating required times, and so that clients would have a lot of flexibility: you can ask for changes or additions at pretty much any part of the process and I'll usually say yes, as long as you understand that the changes might alter the number of hours.
★★★
So that's roughly where I am. Some questions I have:
★ Are 60/90 minutes good times for sketch commissions? I've had a few floofs ask about offering 120 minute commissions, something to bridge the gap between 90 minute sketches (which are effectively $35 an hour) and full polished commissions (which are $50 an hour). I've also had multiple clients commission multi-part sketch commissions, which are a lot of fun but do make me worry that the format might not be serving them well. I've been tempted to offer an even lower-cost 30 minute timed sketches with the caveat that they couldn't be planned much in advance. I like the idea of having something that's accessible and fun and a little bit impulsive, rather than extensively planned.
★ Should I charge hourly for polished commissions, or charge per-project? If I switched to a fixed price I'd likely need to add more rules about when edits could happen and about subject materials. I think that the hourly prices are more straightforward and flexible for both clients and for me, but I'm aware that this isn't a typical pricing model for most furry commissions, which typically have a set format and set price, and limits on the numbers of subjects or species. I've wondered a few times if hourly rates aren't part of the reason why I don't see a ton of regular interest in polished commissions.
★ Are prices a barrier? I'm not sure that I can do anything about this, trying to do art full time there are limitations to how much I can discount my work and still make a living on it. But I'm aware that there is a large price difference between the hourly rate for sketch commissions and polished commissions, and if you've looked at my commissions before (either polished or sketch commissions) and thought, "I would love to get that, but just can't afford it" - that's still something that I can think about when planning future pawjects to try and come up with more accessible offers.
★ Are my commission terms difficult to find or understand? Is there anything you'd like to see worded differently? Is there a resource you'd like to see to make it easier to get in touch or keep up with which commissions are currently active? Are there changes you'd like to see to my delivery method for finished art?
★ Should any stream times/content be adjusted to make it easier to join/view streams? I've been thinking for a while about potentially moving Monday's stream earlier in the day and making it endo-only and scat-free (so no fatal digestion or overly cruel vore, no rape, and no scat, but still NSFW-allowed). I don't have a good sense of how many critters (if any) would like to be able to tune into streams but are thrown off by either the time or the content warnings.
★★★
I've also been thinking about other commission offerings on a limited basis. I'd love to hear thoughts on any of the following ideas:
★ Would you like to see YCH commissions? And if so, are there particular subjects, scenarios, and species would you be interested in? YCH commissions would have limited slots, but I would charge per-project, not per-hour. Whenever I made one, I'd post the base image and announce how many slots were available and any relevant species and restrictions. These would be a once-and-a-while type of commission. I'm particularly interested in what subjects people and critters would like to see if I started offering these? Scenarios with recurring characters or settings? Custom Pokevore cards? Fully unique one-off premises?
★ Would you like to see group commission offerings? I've thought a little bit about allowing multiple commissioners to pool resources for a single commission either featuring multiple of their OCs or a scenario that both commissioners enjoy. This would need a lot of thought, so if it is something you'd like to see, please give me some details on how you'd want something like this to work :3
★ Would you like to see comic/subject sponsorship? Over on Subscribestar I occasionally run non-binding polls about what I should work on next. If I offered a way for followers to directly sponsor and pay for me to work on specific storylines in the Forest, with Max the Eevee, or even one-off pawjects, that could make it easier for me to devote more time to polishing and finishing comics. What's tricky with this is that I'd still want to retain creative control over the comics that I make in those settings, but I know that I jump around a lot as an artist and sometimes that means WIP comics stay WIP for a looong time.
★ Is there something else you wish I was doing that I'm not doing? Like I mentioned at the start of this, while it feels like a long time already I've only been offering commissions for a short while, and I'm still trying to figure out what terms work. So while I can't pawmiss I'll do everything, I'm very open to suggestions about things that I should tweak, change, or start offering.
Thanks! <3
