Workflow to make it through the year....

[Iain Denby]

If I charge $2500 for a particular building, and it only takes me 10 hours to complete, then I just made $250 an hour. But if the same building takes 40 hours to complete, the hourly rate drops down to $60. My point is, sometimes I can finish a building in 10 hours or less, sometimes it takes a lot longer. If my fee stays roughly the same either way, it all balances out.

Exactly, so it is important to balance that up with 'what the finished job is worth'. That way you are charging the client the correct market value. On some jobs you will be up on your horly rate and some your down. My clients are paying for the finished image , they couldn't care less how many hours I worked on it.

 

 

Taking the image that Hockley91 has posted on this thread as an example, with the amount of work involved to model and render it, I think a top notch image would be about £2500, and a very poor image , probably about £1200. (I think it's about 2$ to the £ at the moment).

 

Remember, there will ALWAYS be someone somewhere who will charge less than you. You also have to take in to account the quality of work YOU produce and the service YOU offer.

[mbr]

Those prices seem reasonable, although I am sure you can get a mediocre image for less than a grand.

 

I agree about the job price being more important than hourly. Sometimes you have to gauge the 'pain in the ass' factor, too. Will your client demand phone conversations or meetings that lasts hours, numerous times a week (I had one of those - picking the damn colors!), or are they a 'great job' for whatever you give them? Those factors can change your hourly rate without you laying a finger on your computer.

There's also the issue of 'getting better'. Sure, we all want to get better, but sometimes it's better to get done than worry about perfection. Cutting your loses, or capitalizing on your profits, depending on the situation.

 

Software and hardware issues will always pop up, usually when you don't want them to, so that's something to budget in somewhere, too.

[Ernest Burden III]

Remember, there will ALWAYS be someone somewhere who will charge less than you.

Right, and that someone turns out to be Timmatron! You charge too little! Here's how you must look at it: If your work is of a sufficient professional quality to be competitive with the generally-accepted level of work 'out there' then your rates should be similar. Charging a lot less hurts you and the profession. On the other hand, if your work is NOT good, it could be FREE and still be useless to your client. It is unfortunate that some of them shop on cost alone, but in the end it will be their projects that suffer.

 

Look at the time it takes just to 'service' a job--phone time with the client, maybe even an office visit or two (thank you Internet for ridding me of most of this lost time), proposal writting, invoice writting, collection calls. Where do you bill for that? If you add all of it up you will find that it can take hundreds of dollars worth of time just for the 'business' end of the work, before you've drawn a line. It may not = $500, but it's worth factoring in.

 

My advice is to set your rates a little higher on a flat basis. Be prepared to lose a job. One $1200 fee is better than two $600 fees (see above). If you want a way to offer a lower price come up with an hourly rate but make it good money, your client is making a very limited commitement, and/or a daily rate. I hear from clients that some renderers just bill 'em per day. One of these at something like $4000 plus travel expenses. But he works fast, so they pay it, he's busy.

 

My father says that his goal was to be the most expensive renderer in NY. If he heard of someone charging more than him, he would raise the rates. Even with that he couldn't stand to keep doing it and quit just before I started. He was a damned good renderer, too.

 

Now I am struggling with pricing of digital work. The usual model of a set price per rendering is not so useful with virtual environments, since additional views do not require the same time as the first. When you paint 'em, you have to draw the perspective by hand for each and then paint each, so not much discount for extras. Digital is different. I am now pricing the first image high enough to build the space and do the render, but additionals can be 1/2 or less. Animation costs as much as a pile of renderings, but once you've built the space, doing a pile of renderings isn't so much more work.

 

To the guy with the animation in Chicago--you have underbid the work. Your fee would MAYBE cover the renderings, though even that is pushing a low hourly yeild. And showing exterior AND several interior spaces in 1.5 minutes? Doesn't leave you much time to appreciate anything--'sorry, gotta move on'. Sorry to be critical.

 

[ February 28, 2004, 09:13 AM: Message edited by: Ernest Burden ]

[mtutaj]

Thats why I was asking.. and I agree that I would like my prices to be higher as well, the one way hour drive to meet with the client once a week for a 2 hour meeting digs into that time as well..

 

now the various views that I give them are from one space, it might be bar, dining, dance floor, etc. so each view will have other parts of the views in it.. The exterior is really staright forward..

 

What seems to help me also sometimes is knowing what kind of client they are as well. If I am doing work for something in the rich part of town, my prices increase sometimes almost double.. I do cad work as well.. but then in other parts I might drop my usual rate a little. all depends on what is going on.. If I am completely swamped.. my Price will increase as well.. I've gotten quite a few cad jobs that people needed last minute and paid over $50/hr for just drafting work.. And you always have to get some kind of retainer.. The only time I don't is for a very select few clients who I have known for a long time.. one of my first renderings like 6 years ago, I waited 18 months to get paid $750..

 

I have to say this has turned into a very informative thread..

[mbr]

It's a tough balance deciding costs. I lost a job a short time ago to a guy that does just horrible work (think orange and purple skies with the FormZ default clouds - just aweful!!). On top of that, the potential client hated working with him. But when push came to shove, he under priced me by 30%, and I gave what I thought was a more than reasonable (pretty cheap, I thought) quote. I lost the job.

 

You really have to try and gauge the client. Do they want reliability, quality, and a good relationship? Or the cheapest. Also, who will pay for it? Is it their client or out of their pockets.

Lots of factors to think about. Once you are established and have steady work, then you can be more idealistic about how much you charge. I am not in that position and have just moved across country (3rd time in 2 years), so it's tough finding consistent work.

 

Make a plan for yourself and strategize how you will get what you want, and what your goals are.

[Iain Denby]

But when push came to shove, he under priced me by 30%, and I gave what I thought was a more than reasonable (pretty cheap, I thought) quote. I lost the job.

Yeah, but I bet the client regrets it, and would consider coming to you again next time. YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR.

 

You really have to try and gauge the client. Do they want reliability, quality, and a good relationship? Or the cheapest.

True. I tell my clients that I don't claim to be the cheapest, but I do claim to be one of the best! (sales pitch ). Obviously, I'm in the privellaged position of 'being established'.

 

You have to ask yourself: Do you want to be:

*The cheapest?

*The fastest?

*Most versatile?

*Creator of the best quality?

*The nicest!?

 

Allot of people/Companies survive very well on being just one of these.

 

(I'm rambling...I don't really know where I'm going with this!)

[Tim Nelson]

And Ernest says he isn't a good businessman!!

 

Well I will due my absolute best to start charging more on my jobs. Its just tough to gamble at first when you are tyring to support not only yourself but also your wife - good thing we don't have any kids otherwise I probably would not have quit my job in the first place.

 

So hopefully you (Ernest) can understand where I am coming from. I've never had the advantage of having a mentor to guide me through this whole process. My father is a news writer and has always been afraid to take certain risks that I wish he had. You had the benefit of a having an older family member that did the same thing you are doing now - and apparently he was very successful too.

 

So you see, I'm just trying to make things work here and get paid to do something I really love doing. I didn't have any work for the first 3 weeks of the year and still I've made more than I would have at my full time job. I am only optimistic about the future of my business, thanks in part to this forum.

 

Of course, I'm upset to learn that I am severely undercharging on my jobs. I don't thnk its fair to other renderers around the Valley but at the same time I don't think its a huge threat either. But I don't plan on keeping those rates for long. I am the type who wants to be the best at what I do, not the cheapest. And as my reputation slowly grows in this area, and my quality of work rises, so will my rates, and the number of jobs I have to take on to support my family.

[Iain Denby]

Just heard something on the TV which is very appropriate to this thread.

 

An Editor of a Tabloid newspaper was asked why he put up the price of his paper, which makes it more expensive than his competitors?

 

He replied: 'when you charge less, after a while you are valued less'

[hockley91]

Timmatron,

 

You sound just like me around 6-8 months ago. I was having such a hard time coming up with numbers. You're right, it is hard when there is no basis for comparison. That's one of the reason's I wanted this thread to open up. I wanted to know what other people think and charge. I still have that inner monolouge going on in my head..."am I charging too much? Maybe I should take off a few hundred dollars....nah....let's add a few hundred....I"m worth it.....well, will this actually take you that long to do it? Is this fair?" I was amazed though when I did charge the $1,400.00 for that rendering and the client was like, "Okay, let's do it!". Sometime's you've got to test the waters and take that jump and see where it takes you....

[hockley91]

Ernest,

 

I forgot to mention that I did read the David Wright articles late last year regarding marketing yourself and the business aspect of all this. I found them very helpful, but I still felt I needed another point of view and some hard numbers to work with.

 

I think this has been a great thread and I am amazed at how everyone is opening up.

[Ernest Burden III]

I did read the David Wright articles late last year regarding marketing...but I still felt I needed another point of view and some hard numbers to work with.

No problem, but David Wright's articles are as good as they get.

[archawhat]

I think Dibber sai it best: what do you want to be? We all want to be the best, make the most money but still give a fair price. I have yet to see this world. I have been doing 3d work for close to a year and know that I way underbid myself. The problem is competition also. Everyone else charges so low that they get the jobs 95% of the time and the 5% of the other time does not always seem worth it.

 

Case in point: In Utah they have a yearly event called the 'Parade of Homes". A lot of people bid for this project mainly to be recognized. They have used the same guy for the last three years with a wide range of emotions from the people that submit their homes to it. Most of the people are submitting a $1,000,000+ home and want the rendering to reflect that. Thet feel shorthanded when they see the final outcome and do not have a say in it. I asked my boss if we were going to try it this year and looked into it. We found out that the guy who does it does two things: 1. underbids to a point where he actually losses money and 2. always has an in to do it. Fair? I think not, but what are you going to do?

[Chad Warner]

Its funny you mention the parade of homes--my father has entered a couple of houses he has built into that, and I saw the renderings that were done for them, and thought they didn't do the houses they were portraying any justice.

 

-Chad

[3Dar - 3D architectural re]

I'm totally stunt after seeing what you people charge for that render! I've been doing some rendering for a while and funded www.3Dar.com

We have a lot more detailed rendering for half the price you are charging!

I think, after all, everything depends on where in the world are you located.

The budget for the attached picture actually was USD 699 and that included 3 shots!

If any of you have any works to send us, I think we might have a good deal.

Regards to all of you,from argentina.

German

[Brolloks]

Adding my 2 cents in ZAR currency....

 

I'm in South Africa (anybdy else from SA in this list??) and just started freelance after th last company went bust. We did work for Canada originally and charged th same numerical amount but one in Canadian $ (CAD) and the other in local South African Rand (ZAR) at an exchange rate of

1.00 CAD Canada Dollars = 4.81884 ZAR South Africa Rand.

 

We charged, and I still do, at a price per job ie. R4500.00 for the model plus first 2 perspectives and around R1500 for every additional still assuming that it comes off the same model. This would translate to 4,500.00 ZAR = 714.552 USD. Going above this seems to reduce the number of clients

 

Animations start at around 20 000 ZAR (3,175.36 USD) but can go up to a lot more if the client has a lot of detailing.

 

Guess that was my 2 cents (ZAR) or since I'm doing conversions = 0.00317511 USD.

[dwright]

I strongly recommend taking no notice of competitors at bidding time, is a total waist of your time and energy; simply charge what you have to charge, work that is for you will come naturally to you with your intent as the push, and work that is not for you, it will simply not come. It is very simple, forget about others competitors think about you (or you company) think that you deserve it and that you earn it, however this does not mean “I want to charge 10K extra just because I think I can or have the space”. Calculating what you need to charge comes with practice, and as I said before, you need to be very realistic.

 

A second point one that is hitting all of us around the globe, for good and for worse, is globalization among b2b services. Agreed, Argentina, India, Mexico, China, and so forth are “harming” USA/EU businesses, however they are doing better, good for them, not so good for us, in a way is actually good, good for the world, I hope (in my opinion) and I do not take sides.

 

The way for the affected ones to combat this is very tricky, and lowering prices is not the way to go, or hire them, not necessarily a way unless you make them part of your company. What I had been proposing for a long time is that we re-shape our “product” / “service”, to “something” that globalization can’t easily touch; however that new “service” will let them participate at a lower level. For them to really compete, will eventually require expensive travel costs, expensive executive sales for then they will need to increase their fees to balance a bit the equation. If we limit our b2b services to just renderings and so forth, in the end, there is no real growth, if we expand into something else, and use our talents then we can put some inertia into something new. There is abundance for all of us, I think is just a harmonizing time.

 

Just think what other things you can offer that relate to what you do, you will need to expand your ideas, you may no longer be a “rendering firm”, think wider than that, think beyond technology, think about human interaction, about providing a more complete “package”, I think that is what current world scenario wants us (those being affected) to do. As I said, I am not taking sides, nor I want to communicate that any party is wrong, just want to communicate the challenge.