Contract and stuff i should watch out for

[hunchback]

Hey guys and girls so i got an offer recently to do some concept work.
Is there a catch all contract i can use somewhere?
What do you guys charge for work?

Im confident in my abilities but the idea of rates and contracts is alien to me. Help would be awesome.

even a link to an old thread or something.

thanks guys and girls and Ilaekae O_O

:assspank:

[dpaint]

You have to get in the habit of asking what the budget is for the job.
Don't be shy, or people will take advantage of you.
You have to have a price for what your hourly rate is otherwise you have no business taking work from anyone. Concept art ranges from 5 bucks an hour to a couple of hundred an hour and more. So it doesn't matter what any one else gets. If they want you they have a budget, you have a price- ask questions.

As for a contract most companies want exclusive rights to your work or work for hire so ask for the right to show it in your portfolio. Ask for their contract and NDA. Lay out how many rounds of changes are free after the initial pass is accepted. How often you get payed if it is a big job. I just finished two jobs that took about four months so I got paid every month. Create an invoice with your name, social or tax id number address
Keep track of your hours and bill with descriptions for the work

Mister contractor
Your slogan
Address
Phone Fax
Email
SS
INVOICE#001
DATE: JULY 14, 2010


TO:
Big Megabuck Games
Address
Zip
phone
FOR: Project
[P.O. #]



DESCRIPTION AMOUNT


Final pass on Interface Buttons for main screen and view 55 hours
Additional Buttons and final pass on all requested interface artwork 12 hours
Additional assets and fixes on main view rooms 93 hours









160 hours
@ XX per Hour


Total XXXX.XX


Make all checks payable to Your Name
Payment is due within 30 days.
If you have any questions concerning this invoice, contact your name your phone

Thank you for your business!

[bhanu]

That is one piece of solid advice.WOW

[Qitsune]

Yep, and that invoice thing dpaint posted, make it look good and turn it into a template, and make a similar quote template, always use them. You will save time and having a good attractive and consistent way to contact your clients looks professional.

[dpaint]

Yeah,
What Qitsune said, I should have mentioned that it is a free downloadable office word template that you can customize. Just google invoice template and a bazillion will come up.

[QueenGwenevere]

If you don't have it already, you should really get yourself a copy of the Graphic Artists Guild Handbook: Pricing & Ethical Guidelines.

It has pricing examples for almost everything, which is a great help in getting an idea of what rates people will expect for different kinds of work. It also has all kinds of sample contracts and other useful docs. Get the latest edition (12th edition, I think.)

Everything dpaint said is great advice, too. A couple of addendums:

You might have a different hourly rate for different kinds of work, if you feel that's appropriate for you - or a higher rate for rush jobs.

In a large job, the client might be more comfortable with milestone-based payments rather than weekly or monthly payments, depending on the client and the job. For instance, X% on delivery of sketches, Y% on delivery of finals (that's a simplistic example, but you get the idea.) Discuss and negotiate with the client.

When figuring out your price, try to estimate how many hours it'll take you to do the whole job and multiply by your hourly rate. Include possible revisions in your estimate (estimate how much time it'll take you to do one round of revisions, and multiply by the number of rounds of revisions you intend to propose. If it comes out high, cut as many rounds as you can get away with until it's within budget. Propose the final result to the client. i.e., "I can do X rounds of revisions for Y price.") If the amount of time you think it'll take you to do the work is very tight given the timeline for the job, consider charging rush rates.

If the amount of time you think it'll take you to do the work is significantly more than the timeline for the job, that's where it gets sticky. You might have to negotiate some compromises with the client - explain that they're asking for more than can be finished in the given time, and either get an extension to the deadline or find a way to reduce the work. How this is done will depend on the job - you might have to cut down the number of allowable revisions to a bare minimum; or the number of sketches you will show per round; or features might have to be trimmed; etc. Or it may mean the work needs to be split among more people.

[Qitsune]

I copied some of the posts in the References about pricing to conserve them!