wait... you can actually make money at this?

Hazardswake · Post by **Hazardswake** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 5:50 pm

thereforeiam wrote:I dunno, as Ghastly once said "The best kind of hobby is one that brings more money in than it costs"

That's horribly misquoted but I think if it CAN easily bring money, it's a wonderul thing to make money off something you love.

Good point. If you can still have fun with it and make money, all the better.

Dotty · Post by **Dotty** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 6:05 pm

Indeed. It's a fun experience, webcomicry. ^_^

Post by **Kisai** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 7:29 pm

Some of the better money in webcomics is in comissions.

The better you draw, the more people will pay for the stupidest thing. Take Ghastly for example, he did another parallel comic for someone and named a price for it, and got to keep all the rights to it.

I know someone else who could easily make thousands of dollars a month in comissions if the comissions weren't so stupid and it didn't pain her to draw them.

IF you draw well, and have the time, you have no reason not to accept commissions. If you can make over 2000$ a month in just comissions, you may as well quit your day job and draw comics as your hobby and comissions as your job. Just don't sell yourself short, if you are getting too much work, raise the price to the point you can keep up.

On the flip side.

Some of us are also talented in other ways, and we get the short end of the stick. Writers tend to get a bit ignored, the people who design or operate the website get doubly ignored, the muses get ignored, etc.

In all likelyness I'd offer to code/maintain peoples websites for a fee if they moved off CG, I have more than enough experience with hosting systems, and it would shave off the time that you'd have to spend setting the system up and maintaining it.

I'm too stretched for time as it is to do any more "free projects", I've been canning "potential" projects left and right because either CG eats up all my time, or one of the potential projects does.

Biev · Post by **Biev** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 8:36 pm

When looking at the popular webcomics (I know Megatokyo and Applegeeks do it from time to time) it always amazes me how much the drawings they auction on eBay go for. I always wonder, who's the guy who bit 2 grand for a sketch? No, really, who is that guy? Does he not pay rent? Does he think once he puts this up in his room it will help him get laid?

The most I've ever gotten for one of my drawings was a medal and a fuschia gym bag. That my mom forced me to carry in public. You know, back when parents thought glow-in-the-dark type colors were cool.

KittyKatBlack · Post by **KittyKatBlack** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 8:39 pm

Biev wrote:The most I've ever gotten for one of my drawings was a medal and a fuschia gym bag. That my mom forced me to carry in public. You know, back when parents thought glow-in-the-dark type colors were cool.

Back in the 90's it was all about the Neon, baby.

Turnsky · Post by **Turnsky** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 9:28 pm

before i can even think of garnering money from the public for this, i must
1) rewrite/redraw the first one or two chapters of my comic (it sucks, and i want it to be presentable)
2) work on something that'll warrent the money, (just parking a paypal button on your frontpage doesn't work)
3) get the time to work on both.

Faub · Post by **Faub** » Tue Jul 11, 2006 11:21 pm

A couple people wrote:... commissions...

That's fine and good and all. I have had people ask me to do commissions. Then I name a price and never hear from them again. A lot of times they ask whether I do commissions, I say sure. I give them my card and never hear from them again. I once had a teacher offer me money to do a portrait of him for a present for his wife. I went so far as to setup a time and I bought a piece of bristol to draw on. To date, the session has never happened.

Commissions ... meh.

VinnieD · Post by **VinnieD** » Wed Jul 12, 2006 1:23 am

If you have a few good examples of your art you can try to take commissions through eBay. I've had some success with that since your client is obligated to pay and will be aware of the price up front.

You can get commissions like mad at cons if you're good at drawing fast. People in cons are much less price concious and will gladly shell out for one more memory of those few happy days.

Princess · Post by **Princess** » Wed Jul 12, 2006 2:51 am

faub wrote:
A couple people wrote:... commissions...
That's fine and good and all. I have had people ask me to do commissions. Then I name a price and never hear from them again. A lot of times they ask whether I do commissions, I say sure. I give them my card and never hear from them again. I once had a teacher offer me money to do a portrait of him for a present for his wife. I went so far as to setup a time and I bought a piece of bristol to draw on. To date, the session has never happened.

Commissions ... meh.

Exactly- I have had so many people tell me "Mimo I must get you to draw me a picture" ,but as soon as I mention actually paying for it *tumbleweed*

Starline · Post by **Starline** » Wed Jul 12, 2006 3:31 pm

I find if you list the prices for your commissions on your site, people will tend to email you more about it. http://www.candicomics.com/commissions.html

Post by **Kisai** » Sat Jul 15, 2006 4:35 pm

starline wrote:I find if you list the prices for your commissions on your site, people will tend to email you more about it. http://www.candicomics.com/commissions.html

I think you are undervalueing your comissions. Faub might be overvaluing his.

http://www.spacecoyote.com/commission.php , and yes people pay those amounts from what I know.

That guy · Post by **That guy** » Sat Jul 15, 2006 4:58 pm

Earthsong and Sluggy Freelance shock me every time they make donation requests. Put simply, here are ways to make a few bucks webcomicking (but don't expect to pay rent with it):

1)Books. Lulu or CafePress help you make & sell books online.
2)Merch. CafePress is the easy. Free for you. Made on-demand. They set a base price, you set an overhead.
3)Commissions. "I'll draw you a picture for a dollar." Raise it as you feel you deserve.
4)Donations. "Starving artist - please help." See Don't do it often, and don't expect much. Paypal has donation buttons you can set up.
5)Extras. You can offer backgrounds, icon sets, etc. for a few bucks. I've paid for ZebraGirl backgrounds, myself.

Obviously, the larger the fan base and higher quality your comic, the more $$ you're likely to get. There are lots of ways to expanding fanbase and improving your comic - but those are sunjects for another thread.