Freelance Rendering, How much to charge?

[Justin Hunt]

some renders take 5 minutes and some take 5 hours, your method entices me to make my 5 minute renders take 5 hours so I can charge more

[philippelamoureux]

It's not that hard guys. Think of a price you like... and charge that price. Before that, be sure you have decent rendering skills tho :-P

[harryhirsch]

What price? My client said ''Free-lance..so it should be for free'' and when I read that people charge their clients 50 bucks per image, that is almost for free...

[Dave Buckley]

This is something I've been evaluating of my self of late so I'm just going to dump my thoughts here, so I guess my 2 cents.

 

I work to a day rate of let's say £300 for the purpose of the example (sometimes it's less, sometimes it's more - depending on the client).

 

I have a few day rates that I'm happy to work towards. But let's say my base rate is the £300 I mention above - this figure is based on overheads/quality/experience/current market.

 

New Direct Enquiries - I go in higher than my base - if it's a company/person I'd like to work with - I might add a small 'introductory' discount to make the 'higher' than normal quote appealing to the person enquiring. If they accept great. It set's the stall for any future projects with them. If they say it's too expensive - then I'm happy to drop to my base rate of £300 - no big deal - i'm still getting what I want.

 

Other studios - if another studio wants me to do work for them on a freelance basis, then my base rate for direct clients will drop a bit. It's very rare that a studio will be willing to pay you the same as a direct client. This is fine as I only take on studio work when direct work dries up so I see it as 'just keeping the cash flowing'. I also to prefer to work from home so this enables me to offer the studio a lower price as less costs are involved for me (traveling/parking) - for on site work I my rate stays very close to normal base rate - due to the additional costs involved - either way I'm still not dropping below what I'm prepared to drop to. I do find freelancing for other studios is where you have to be more flexible with costs though. To add to this you will probably do a little less work per project when working for another studio, as they take control of project management and other non-production stuff - another reason I'm prepared to lower my base a bit in this scenario.

 

Existing Direct Clients - this is self explanatory as they were once a 'New Enquiry' as above. Existing clients are normally the ones you want to keep - so where possible I'm prepared to tweak my day rate for them depending on their budgets for each job.

 

Exceptions - if a new/existing client sends an enquiry through - and it has a very tight deadline - i'll either turn it down - or I'll accept the fact that it's going to take a few late nights weekend and adjust my day rate accordingly - it's worth noting I'll mention this to a client beforehand. Transparency is key here - I normally find clients (the good ones) are okay with this - but again i'm only making sure I get paid for the time I spend on the job. If it's a really good client and I get regular work from them - sometimes I'll just fit it in regardless of tweaking the day rate - purely to maintain a good client relationship - obviously if it get's a bit silly, i'll request more money.

 

Now for the actual quote - this is purely (Time X Day Rate) and every project is different. As previously mentioned just because it's a 50-storey tower doesn't make it more expensive than a bungalow.

 

I won't quote unless I've seen some form of 'design' and unless I know what i'll be working with. Every enquiry I follow up with a call and find out as much info about a project as I possibly can. Deadlines/budgets/info provided/stage of design etc

 

Only then will I start putting together a quote. I evaluate what info I'll be given and what the desired brief is. I then 'estimate' based on categories of 'PreProduction' 'Production' 'Post Production' and sometimes 'Project Management/Admin/Art Direction' - the last one is a category I'm still toying with - not sure whether to itemise it, work it into the other categories or dismiss it as 'Unbillable Time' - so keen to hear peoples thoughts on that.

 

I firmly believe people spend a lot more time on jobs than they realise and therefore get paid less than they should.

 

So, in my categories - I have PreProd - Understanding the Project/Brief, CAD/3D Model Cleanup, Exploring Compositions. Production - Modeling, Lighting, Materials. Post Production - Rendering/Photoshop. Admin/Project Management/Art Direction - is for things like chasing the client for info, phone calls, meetings, putting proposals together, arranging photographers, managing other freelancers if a job requires them etc - basically anything related to the project that is essential and stops me working on production based elements - the time you spend doing these things adds up.

 

The more experience you have with these things, the quicker is to 'estimate'. You tend to get a better gauge on how long things take and where you end up spending more time on things than you'd previously thought. For example, I nearly always used to underestimate modelling so now I work out what I think and then add another day or half.

 

Some other points - I always work to either 1/2 day or a full day. If I think it will take longer than 1/2 day then it becomes a full day. If I think it's going to take a couple of hours - then it's a half day.

 

No two jobs ever work out the same. And the end goal is to make profit. if you estimate 2 days for modelling and it only takes 1 - then perfect. The job has just become more profitable - obviously you don't want to be taking the client for a ride so this comes down to your own judgement. I wouldn't, for example, Just put 3 days for modelling if I knew it would only take 1 - just to squeeze more money out of a client. But I don't fret over the odd half day here and there because there will be projects that take you longer than expected - because you underestimated. And at some point the same client might ask you to do something a touch cheaper. Swings and roundabouts I guess.

 

I only ever bill hourly for stuff beyond the original scope of the job - so for example - if something comes back to me after the invoice has been paid and they want something tweaking - then it becomes an hourly charge - derived from the original day rate of that job - this is stated in my terms anyway that the client signs before I start on the job.

 

My quotes also allow for ' a reasonable amount of comments/changes ' but my workflow gives them plenty of opportunity to do this throughout the project - i.e. I always get sign off for camera positions/modelling/materials/lighting/ etc, at each stage they can comment or change things - but if they decide they want to change the camera after you've already spent time composing/modeling/lighting that shot - then I might request more money - again this is up to me - if it's a job where I have a lot of budget left because I'd initially overestimated - then I won't necessarily ask for more.

 

Rendering - I always add rendering as a cost - how long depends on the number of images. Firstly it costs electriticity regardless of whether you're actually sat working or not. I never know if I'm going to have rendering issues. Or there might be an unexpected render request whilst I'm working on something else - in which case I'll incur rendering costs for third party render farms.

 

Photography - I also offer this if a project requires it - if I shoot it myself I offer a flat fee which includes things like - travel/accommodation/recce/shoot/post processing.

 

If you ever get an enquiry for a job you don't want - price it ridiculously high - only good can come from this - you either don't get a job you didn't want anyway - or you get a lovely bit of financial compensation for doing a job you didn't want to do. Win win.

 

Finally - you're not just selling an 'image' you're selling yourself and your service and costs must reflect that too. What you charge for is up to you, but you don't want to come across as a penny pincher.

 

P.S. I also allow a minimum of 5 days for each unique space - another image of the same space would be another couple of days (lighting/material tweaks, new camera setup, recomposition of the shot, rendering, post) - only certain situations I'll allow for less - i.e. a completely enclosed minimal bathroom

Edited January 9, 2017 by Dave Buckley

[turchin]

Thank you for writing this up, Dave. I'm only just starting out and I'm not really getting a lot of work yet but I have been asked for my rates a few times, and this kind of insight into a professional business like yours helps a lot.

[Dave Buckley]

No worries. I'm always refining my process but this gives a good basis. The key things are that i don't itemise the actual number of days. Just 'project fees' derived from my estimate of the number of days. That way clients can't say things like 'well we've got a few more days left so can you do this' etc. They have no idea how many hours i've worked each day or what my daily hours are. I might be able to do more in 5 hours than someone else can do in 3 so I don't want to get punished for efficiency for example.

 

I'd also say that its as much about you and your service than it is your portfolio. People do business with people. If you're an idiot they'll only be your client once.