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Hi everyone, I recently was approached by a fellow gamer in our community on that he wanted me to paint some Warhammer Fantasy regiments (and characters) for him.

I have never painted commission and I am not sure what price to set in regards to Skill/ time/ additional work (I will make movement trays and magnetize the models).

I paint fairly fast as I paint in batches (10 at the time) and he did not want my best but good tabletop.

Example of my work (fairly fast as ¨speedy¨ techniques were used)

How much is your time worth?

And is the example picture the level of quality wanted by your friend? If so, how long did that entire project take? From the moment you started clipping sprues and assembling to the moment you coated them and finished basing?

The standard he want (Its close to this standard, somewhat fewer highlights) is worktime by my preliminary estimate 3h for 10 models (sprue to finished with flock and magnetized bases). '
Time = money is a difficult calculation when it comes to commission as the standard of the work comes into play (as mentioned before).

I would suggest maybe looking at the pricing structures of other commission painters who float around Dakka and any other websites that you frequent.

See what they charge and for what level of quality and price as you feel is reasonable.

One of the best things I've heard you could do in regards to payment between friends is ask him to buy you a kit you want for yourself. If he's asking you to assemble, paint, magentize etc etc then I think it would be fair to ask for some models that you've been saving up for. If he wants one box done ask for one box of something else, or ask him to buy you paints and stuff for you to do it. That way you're not trying to come up with a bunch of weird price schemes and there won't be any issues with money going between people.

 Bobaram wrote:
One of the best things I've heard you could do in regards to payment between friends is ask him to buy you a kit you want for yourself. If he's asking you to assemble, paint, magentize etc etc then I think it would be fair to ask for some models that you've been saving up for. If he wants one box done ask for one box of something else, or ask him to buy you paints and stuff for you to do it. That way you're not trying to come up with a bunch of weird price schemes and there won't be any issues with money going between people.

I second this suggestion! I have done "trades" essentially like this, everyone seems happier in the end. Everyone gets something they want

Base cost of the models being painted is generally the minimum you should be getting for your work. For fantasy, where you're painting giant blocks of dudes, you should ask for more.
Even if it's not your best, it's still a lot of surface being painted, and your hobby time being spent on someone else's hobby stuff.

The only problem that could arrive with working for kits is if you take payment in advance.
How on earth are you going to stay motivated to paint for someone else when you've got a tasty new sprue of
something that you actually want to paint staring at you from the other side of your desk!!!

Call me crazy, but are you really suggesting you can do 10 models at the quality level you posted in 3 hours? That just seems.....utterly impossible to me. Even 3 hours per model seems kind of pushing it.

that unit looks great. you obviously know what you're doing and can price your work accordingly.

dont bother with any lowballs.

Cowbellius, it is true that would be impossible but I calculated in actual work-time and not including waiting time (glue and paint drying etc) as I will be doing other thing and not simply stare at the drying paint , my bad for not being as informative as I should have been. However I use techniques that suits me very well and these enables me to paint lots of models fast.
Unfortunately no commission deal was struck as he did not have the means at this time to afford my work (however as a good note I have been contacted by other people in the gaming community when they heard I was ding commission, which I so far have not done... ) Thanks for all the good tips

Butterqwist: Try this pricing structure. Obviously you won't want to charge the same as Meg, but this is a common structure used by myself and several other professional painters like Meg Maples and Aaron Lovejoy. In fact, this is also his pricing structure.
http://arcanepaintworks.blogspot.com/p/commissions.html

The biggest complaint I personally have with the industry right now are people who are trying to do commission work for less than $5/hour when you break it all down. Remember to charge what your worth. No commission artist should be making less than $8/hour for table top work.

Me personally, I start at $10/hour for TT work. When I give a quote I don't break down the price as in "It's going to take me 6 hours for your project at basic TT level, so it'll be $65." I just tell them "For this service the base cost is $65.)

Good luck, your High Elves look great for being a speedy paint job! I think you'll do really well.
Don't be afraid to ask for a lot of money and don't back down on your prices!
If you need anything or have any questions please feel free to PM me!

Alright, looking good

Where in Sweden do you live?

Thanks for the tips ExiledMiniatures, gonna look into that pricing-concept it looked fairly fair (gonna have somewhat lower prices though ).

fishy bob, Im living in Malmo // Malmöe som vi säger i skåne

Butterqwist wrote:
fishy bob, Im living in Malmo // Malmöe som vi säger i skåne

Alright I understand wargaming is rather large in Lund, so you probably won't have any problems finding business in the Skåne area.