ahhh ive been struggling trying to get myself out there and find some customers for my art?? any suggestions regarding price/advertisement/art is welcome!!
i price stuff like this for $30 based on minimum hourly wage
(this ones a draft i know the hairs bad)
Your art is beautiful, but I remember from your commission post that you require real life refs for characters? I could be wrong, but I imagine most people probably don't have that.
I think more information in your commission post could help? Like what exactly you need from people to work with, or about your process.
I'm having the same problem as you right now and it's really frustrating for me because I recently knocked all my commission prices in half so it was like $2 an hour for my work and I literally didn't get a single commission so like...shrugs.
Anyway I misread your words and I thought you were saying you charged $30 / hr at first and I really thought that was a reasonable price for someone of your skill level. However rereading and seeing that you just charge $30 for the entire piece, I was really shocked at how low that price is.
poptartle ahh yeah ive seen that a lot. not sure what art community would want stuff like this??
hedgemaze yep i ask to recquire like a stock photo for reference of pose but not for appearance?? maybe i should reword that
@Akiko_Takayuki <333 ahh thank you
@crixa oof im sorry :''"") it kinda sucks ! but thank you for the input !! i'm gonna try and clean up some stuff, get more outreach and see where i go from that
thanks yall for the responses!! i found em all helpful :)
I hope you don't mind me popping in! I've been doing commissions for almost two years now so I thought I could help a little but more.
Kind of going off on what Hedgemaze mentioned most people won't have a real life reference to give you along with their character. It's easier for most users to give you the character and money then leave it at that. Having to also get a real life reference may throw some of them off especially users who are new or not used to doing commissions. I would suggest changing it to 'please provide a stock photo of the pose you want' in your art thread to help minimize the confusion and help those interested in searching for some get it. I would also suggest linking some stock image websites (preferably ones that let you use them as reference without paying) so those interested can search around. The easier you make it for a client to get things together, the better!
This is one of my favorite stock sites: https://unsplash.com/collections | It's more focused on environments and stuff itself than humans but it dose have plenty of them and the photos in there are free to use! Finding more sites like that to help your clients get the stuff you need to start can help a great deal. Alternatively, you could mention the clients themselves could take photos of their preferred pose(s) provided they are comfortable sending one of themselves/a friend your way.
As for prices, I think they are fine. If the $30 mark is the min hourly wage where you live then that works. I would suggest bumping them up as you are selling a skill and shouldn't be paid minimum wage for that, but I understand when you start you sometimes have to take a hit to get out there. I would keep them at that price, then raise them later once you get a decent enough following/a few commissions under your belt. Even if it's just a dollar or two it will help in the long run. It would also good to expand to more sites than just toyhouse to help reach more people if you have not done so already. Any place where you can be constantly posting new art and getting people to both see and interact with you and your artwork will help expand your business. When you get on these new sites (if you are not on them already) it's not enough to just post your art and pop off for the day. You need to interact with the community, like/comment/talk to other people and on their art as well. Sometimes people who will love your work may pass you or miss your stuff if you don't get to them first so it's good get yourself out there as well by interacting with them too.
That's all I can think of for the moment. I hope some of this is useful to you!
have you tried checking out artists and clients
i prefer to sell my art on there because it feels the safest and its the most convenient for me
maybe you'll have more luck there?
Have you tried to advertise some of these on Tumblr? You can use hashtags by putting in a tag for any fanart that you've drawn before which helps people to see what you can do with the character they like and hopefully they buy. Definitely try Fire Emblem as well, people go nuts over art in that fandom (me included lol)