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Example video included, wondering on price for this type of work.


erikpilon
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Hello guys,

 

I picked-up a contract for making a 3D visualization walkthrough of 2 new apartment buildings and office building attached to the same base, being built in Dubai.

 

The guy told me that he wanted to have a similar video as link provided below.

 

First we see the earth with clouds, then zooms to a Google maps and we see a blueprint style of the buildings with descriptions of distance like, exactly like the first 45 seconds of this video.

 

Then for 2 minutes we see the buildings being built with surroundings like the video here, starting at 1:15.

 

Then 1 minute, typical walkthrough of lobby, apartment rooms, etc.

 

Now, the thing is, they only have blueprints of the exterior and it's being built already, and they said they have no idea how the interior will look like.... and that it's up to me using 3D, to figure out how it'll look like from the inside, oh boy.... but still pretty cool.

 

The guy told me the budget is tight, and considering he wants small boats and people walking around, and I would need to model the surrounding buildings and a ferris wheel, no idea how much work this will all be, but I have 60 days to accomplish.

 

I will probably have to buy/download/outsource models, then the render farm...

 

I will be asking for 5,000 USD, I'm alone on this project right now. I'm pretty sure this isn't enough. But what do you guys think? I calculated, working 4-5 hours per day (after full-time job) for 60 days would come to about 16$/hr. Yeah... I'm pretty sure this isn't enough after calculating.

 

Let me know boys and gals!

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Perhaps a bit more.. (much more) to the number.. if you need to buy models, render at renderfarms etc, you will pretty much hit negative soon with that "interesting" cost price.

 

I would also advice you to stick with smaller scale stuff first if you havent gotten the hang of quoting yet. Just stills etc.

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I wouldn't take this type of job on if you already have full time work. This job just seems like it will consume your life for those 60 days and you'll end up taking a loss when you look at effort versus income.

 

Besides, if they can afford to build 2 apartment buildings plus an office, they can afford to pay the render guy a bit more. 5,000 US is exceedingly low for this amount of work.

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You are looking at licensing footage and/or images. You are looking at Motion Graphics. You are going to have to pay for render time on a farm somewhere. Animating people is not easy or simple and you will have to create a couple of reviews I'm sure. Which means you will be buying render time for each review. And then you have to edit the film and potentially license music.

 

You should be looking in a range above $50k ($100 an hour). Above $100k ($200 an hour) even. $16 an hour is just you doing everything. When you pay other people you have to add their fee to your rate. A MoGraph artist is going to at least $50 an hour and suddenly you are in the hole for $34.

 

Don't accept this job.

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Erik,

I have done project fordevelopers in Dubai and 5K is way low, land and development over there is expensive, if your client is building two towers he have the budget to pay for a good visualization that he will use for a long time, everywhere!

No matter where you live in this planet 5K is way low for what they are asking, I know they are demanding clients but it is easy to push them down to the ground when you explain all the work involved for all what they want, if you want to keep this gig, do your math of how much time you'll spend, what else you'll need to buy to produce, and really what you can provide, as Corey mentioned this job is easy a $30K in China, rest of the planet $50K or more depending.

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I've seen a small studio (1 man) in Canada, working on big project...charging around 200$/h and it was muchhhh less work than what you are showing us here! They asked 100$/sec for the video and it was just a simple fly-tru. What your client is asking is insanely more complex/time consuming. Do the math!

 

Oh and by the way, why would you work in Dubai...for 16$/h...seems crazy lol

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Thanks for the replies guys,

 

I really wish my question was posted 3 days ago when I wrote it.. and not moderated and posted yesterday...

 

Simply, competing against the many desperate skilled Asians and Indians here is hard for me, they can do extremely good work for so so cheap, at $4/hr. Many of these companies here would rather get the cheapest price than quality, and that's why the 4$/hr people get more jobs than the ones asking for the regular amount. So it was fear of losing the contract I guess and desperate for money, been screwed more than once in the job market because of this exact reason.

 

I emailed the agency yesterday morning asking for $8,000. But after reading all of your posts, I emailed this morning again to mention to their client that I forgot to add an extra 0 in there.

 

I wouldn't be hiring many people, I am primarily a filmmaker and have done graphic animations and videos for commercials and short/feature films. 3D has been a past-time of mine for many years though, this is my first time going into a paid job for my 3D. So doing the first 45 seconds of the video will be a breeze, last night I already went ahead and out of boredom created the earth that was supposed to be the intro of the video. Tonight I'll animate it and have it matched to the Google Maps image.

 

It really seems that $100,000 - $250,000 for a 3 minute video is so much, laughable, and exaggerated, but this is me not knowing the value of this type of work, do you guys really make contracts in those ranges?! How much do you think I would bring home from this amount after all the expenses?

 

I moved to Dubai from Canada in May, so I'm really new to the job market, architecture, and interior design, so I thought I would cut the price down so I may prove myself to them/myself. Anyways, I will let all of you know what they answered back.

 

By the way, what program do they use in the video I posted? This does not seem like Maya, are they using SketchUp?

Earth.jpg

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I know of some firms that would charge upto $1m for an animation, granted they are for huge developments in Dubai, and yes they do get the work.

 

Those figures are not exaggerations at all, it is amazing how quickly you can burn through $100K on a job like this, especially when there is no fixed design. Just wait until you are on your umpteenth re-render because they dont like the colour of the floor or the way a person walks. Three weeks can easily become 3 months or a year.

 

I wish you luck and strength for this one.

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Generally it's bad business practice to up your asking rate after your first bid. You can't go, "I'll do this for 5,000. No, 8,000. Wait, I forgot, 80,000."

 

Don't compete with the $4 an hour rendering firms. If you find yourself up against one, simply walk away and let the job go. The client doesn't respect you if they are looking for the el-cheapo option and you'll never win. Even if you win the bid after a downward trending bidding war, you'll operate at a loss so what's the point? You'd save more more if you just sat home and played video games all day.

 

As others have said, this isn't a cut and dry process. How do you know what the inside is supposed to look like? Your design ideas and tastes probably won't match theirs. So you'll get this type of scenario...

 

Client: "We like the render but we don't like the swiss coffee paint color. Can you make it swiss mocha?"

You re-send renders

Client: "Well, we don't like swiss mocha either. Can you make it more white but less white, but not was white as white. Off white, but not gray. No purples."

You re-send 15 renders

Client: "We like the swiss coffee color."

You re-send renders because you forget to save all of the iterations

Client's client: "I like purple"

 

Design work during the rendering phase will drain your budget faster than anything you'll ever have seen. The old saying is absolutely true, design by render is an EXPENSIVE process.

 

Where I used to work, we had a job with a $300,000 budget. yet because we failed to manage the client and their many requests, we ended up taking a big loss on that job. Changes add up and they keep adding up. Just like putting water on Gremlins.

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Generally it's bad business practice to up your asking rate after your first bid. You can't go, "I'll do this for 5,000. No, 8,000. Wait, I forgot, 80,000."

 

Don't compete with the $4 an hour rendering firms. If you find yourself up against one, simply walk away and let the job go. The client doesn't respect you if they are looking for the el-cheapo option and you'll never win. Even if you win the bid after a downward trending bidding war, you'll operate at a loss so what's the point? You'd save more more if you just sat home and played video games all day.

 

As others have said, this isn't a cut and dry process. How do you know what the inside is supposed to look like? Your design ideas and tastes probably won't match theirs. So you'll get this type of scenario...

 

Client: "We like the render but we don't like the swiss coffee paint color. Can you make it swiss mocha?"

You re-send renders

Client: "Well, we don't like swiss mocha either. Can you make it more white but less white, but not was white as white. Off white, but not gray. No purples."

You re-send 15 renders

Client: "We like the swiss coffee color."

You re-send renders because you forget to save all of the iterations

Client's client: "I like purple"

 

Design work during the rendering phase will drain your budget faster than anything you'll ever have seen. The old saying is absolutely true, design by render is an EXPENSIVE process.

 

Where I used to work, we had a job with a $300,000 budget. yet because we failed to manage the client and their many requests, we ended up taking a big loss on that job. Changes add up and they keep adding up. Just like putting water on Gremlins.

 

lol

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That's happened to me a couple of times where they told me "That's too low" but that might have been because they invoiced their client

for my renderings plus 15%.

 

But then I had one client who after the job was finished and I submitted an invoice said "That's too much" and paid me

75% of the amount I charged. I let it slide because I was in awe of his "cojones".

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Well, for my first job, I expected to go through some sort of hell to learn from. Still waiting for it to happen, but it should all be good. In the end, I'll be able to see if this is something I actually want to do for the long run, or go back to film. Although I think I would enjoy this just as much.

 

Does anyone here have any example images/videos to share with prices attached to them, for future reference? I would really love to compare quality and duration of work and see the worth of them all. Personal work or other would be much appreciated.

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  • 2 weeks later...

If you really emailed them $5k and are now asking $80K I can guarantee that you will not get this job.

 

I have to say that if you are not highly experienced in this type of work, you can get in a lot of hot water quick. If a client does shell out $80K and your product is late or doesn't meet their expectations, then you are going to be in trouble. Maybe even legal trouble.

Edited by valerostudio
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Yes well... I have only given them a price like this:

"I will charge 26,000 dirhams"

 

Then followed the email with:

"Oh no! I hope you didn't email the client yet, I missed an extra 0 in there while typing, the original price is 260,000 dirhams"

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No offense.. but walk away before its too late. To me it seems like you don't really know what you are doing and you haven't even priced up thing such as models, outsourcers, render farms etc..

 

Have you ever done an animition like this before.. if not the an $80k job is not the place to start..

From personal experience I also don't think you will be able to turn this over in 60 days working part time after work.. have you allowed for a few weeks worth of reviews with the client.. a large chunk of time and money rendering and rerendering changes.

 

If this all goes wrong you can find yourself being sued for more than that $80k.

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I would not want to see the render costs. They're going to be epic! (in a negative way lol). Also, since they count on you for the interior design (materials, furniture etc) expect them to ask for a bazzilion changes...ending up costing even more for rendering! But go for it if you feel confident and you have good possible partners to help you if things ends up more compicated than expected!

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