[gezstar]

This might have been covered to some extent previously, but... here's my specific case: I just got offered work with a comics publisher here in the UK doing painted sequentials. I'm just starting out as a freelancer, so obviously this is good news for me, but... I have no idea what the norms are for page rates

Does anyone know what an 'average' page rate for a small-publisher comic is? I just don't want to agree to something that turns out to be slave-wages. And I think it's going to be a co-created thing (me being one of the creators), so does that have any bearing on the money side of things? I guess there are no hard and fast rules for this, but if anyone who knows about comics could help, I'd be really grateful

[B0b]

theres talk of $100 an hr stateside - so i guess thats �60 hr over here..

[Matthew]

I know that there have been a lot of discussion of these things, I don�t know any prices and I don�t work with graphics, yet...hehe.
Anyway, here are some links to the earlier discussions:

http://forums.sijun.com/viewtopic.php?t=31754&highlight=charge

http://forums.sijun.com/viewtopic.php?t=30515&highlight=charge


dunno if these helps, try the search function otherwise.
Matthew

[Alpha_Meta]

I thought American comic artists worked on a page rate - if they were lucky. One comic artist I met (not a big name) seemed to be happy at $60 a page. On the other hand the big guys, the Todd Mcfarlane's and Jim Lees, back when comics were doing well, were pulling 6 figures a month. Or so I've heard.

At any rate, if you're going to be a co-creator, get a lawyer and have a contract drawn up detailing your rights to your creations. You don't want to be like the guys who created Superman - you should make royalties off every use of your creation from here to eternity.

[Socar MYLES]

I'm pretty sure the usual rate is much higher than $60 US per page, even for a complete unknown. Especially if you're talking about fully painted work, not inks.

Now, I have to admit that I don't really know for sure, since I have never done any sequentials for any major company. However, I have painted backgrounds for other people's sequentials, and even the lowest-paying of such assignments was $100/page. Since the pay for the background artist came out of the real artist's salary (I think), the full page rate must have been more like $200-$300/page, unless I am vastly mistaken.

All but one of these assignments were for interiors, as well, so I'm not misleading you with cover rates.

I guess it would vary for whether you are doing colour or grayscale, as well...grayscale tends to pay less, which is annoying since it's actually more difficult in a lot of cases. Well, according to me, anyhow.
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Dignity isn't important. It's everything.

www.gorblimey.com - art

[Alpha_Meta]

You're writing from Europe, aren't you? No doubt you're comment is more useful for gezstar than mine. I'm in the States and our industry couldn't be in much worse shape than it is. I'd take pretty much any comic job I could get just to have a foot in the door, and I'm far from being the only one.

[Socar MYLES]

Well, yeah, but I'm talking about US companies here. I could be totally, totally off-base, as well, since I've never done any sequentials for any large companies, like I said, only background paintings. I probably shouldn't have opened my big yap, since I can't honestly say I know what the page rate is for fully painted work.

However, my GUESS would be that painted colour work would HAVE to be around $200/page, minimum. Considering that comic pages tend to be, what, 10.5" X 15.5", if you include the gutters on the edges, and especially if you are using traditional media you will probably do the actual painting at a larger size than that, you'd have to be a total machine (turning out 2 or more pages a day) to justify doing it for less. Either that or have a day job, I guess. I mean, if you're inking, 2 pages a day is very do-able. I can do that easily. But painting...nah, I can do ONE page a day grayscale, one every two days or so in glowing technicolour...or two full-colour backgrounds per day, no characters.
_________________
Dignity isn't important. It's everything.

www.gorblimey.com - art

[Tzan]

Those were interesting links to the other threads on billing. While I dont do contract art I am a self employed architectural designer. Yeah its not the same but you might find it interesting anyway

I do additions and new houses.

Additions:
I bill in three phases (like that other guy does). 1/3 up front. 1/3 after the preliminaries are approved and the final 1/3 at the very end. I charge $60/hr which is about the lowest rate you will see. Other people charge more 80-100+ and I probably should too. The weird thing is that many people complain about the rate as it is. Since I do work for home owners who never paid for this type of work before its sometimes hard to convince the cheap people. So a 1000 square foot second story addition ends up at $1500-2000 I always give a range and never a flat rate.


New houses:
are billed in thirds also but I offer flat rates or hourly for those. If people give me an existing plan to modify I charge about $1.50 - $2.00 per square foot, depending on complexity. If its a new design $2.00 + a design phase $1000 per design. So a 3000 sf new house with existing plans to start with will be $4500-6000 depending on my mood

Sometimes being self employed is like having an artistic license to be poor

[gezstar]

Thanks a lot for the info guys. To be honest, I'll take a low wage as long it's not a complete joke.

Yeah , I think 60 dollars a page is a low extreme - Socar's figures sound more like it. Very nice art by the way, Socar

[Tom Luth]

I have never heard of hourly rates in comics. However pages rates are all over the place. Small publishers (which can include two guys in a garage) can be minimum wage, or less. Realistically, starting rates at legit small publishers can be $20-50 a page for writing, $35-60 for pencils, about the same for inks, and from $35-75 for digital color. Starting rates at major publishers such as DC, Dark Horse, Marvel, etc., are higher. In the range of $50-80 pg writing, $60-100 page pencils, similar for inks, and $75-130 for digital color. Rates have more to do with sales of a title, than amount of work involved. Mind you, actual rates can be very different. Painted pieces are harder to sell, and rates vary for many reasons.

I've worked in comics, on-and-off, since '74, and have always found it necessary to do work outside of comics, due to the sporadic availability of work.

Tom Luth
www.thomasluth.com
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www.thomasluth.com

[Tom Luth]

BTW, check out the forums on www.comicon.com for further discussions on the comic book biz.
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www.thomasluth.com