Newsflash: The Art of Conning
Technically, this isn’t a “newsflash” because I did not hear about this article in a newspaper, but I think it’s necessary to share. The article in question was written in May of this year, but seems to have just caught the attention of the artist community. A supposedly well-established game designer describes his controversial strategies for securing an artist to draw for flash games. Mainly, he suggests hiring unexperienced artists who believe their work is worth less than it is and to press impossible deadlines on the artist in order to get their work in a timely manner.
I will admit, I’m a bit torn by this article. On the one hand, he clearly describes ways to manipulate others into getting something for nothing. Anything worth having should be worth paying for and it seems unjust to purposefully keep people in the dark in order to get them to estimate a price much lower than it should be just because s/he is inexperienced in terms of pricing. You (the supposed game developer) are deliberately scamming the artist to give you something of high quality much less than its worth; in fact, I’d even go so far to say that you are conning them.
I also feel that it isn’t right to suggest techniques to pressure the artist into doing something fast. Although it is a job, by picking amateur artists, you are guaranteed people who do art, in certain respects, as a hobby. Although he suggests hiring artists who are18+, the notion that they will have more free time and less “IRL things come up that they can’t control” because of their age is bull s**t. I should know, being an 18+ with a very chaotic lifestyle once the colder seasons start up. Personally, I would have very little time to devote to a job, especially one with purposefully impossible deadlines.
Yet, I can see where he is coming from with some of his recommendations. If you are managing a large project with limited funds, budgeting is important and hiring an artist for less money might save you from going bankrupt. Also having deadlines with the artist will make sure that you end up with the work in the end and not waiting years before a trickle of art starts appearing. Paying an artist after the work is done also makes sure that you get your money’s worth. If budgeting is most important, all these things can save a project from failure.
Most importantly, though, is that the article has gotten enough attention that the author added an addendum and apologized to all parties who were offended. To me, the worst offense was his tone, but I can’t hold anything against someone who revises their argument and then apologizes. While I don’t approve of his original article, I am not going to outright flame him, especially since he has some valid points that were explained extremely poorly. Poorly enough to get a large art community extremely angry.
My motives for sharing my thoughts and this article are two-fold: 1) I think people should be a little more cautious about receiving commissions and conducting business and 2) I think those on the hiring end should be a little more cautious about sharing your needs to those you are hiring. I feel that passing along this article will help people make better decisions about the commissions they accept. I am not asking anyone to read this article and ban the author nor to leave nasty, unhelpful comments, but I think it’s important to know that people like him are out there and with that knowledge, it should be easier to make better decisions for both parties.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 10th, 2010 at 7:44 pm and is filed under Newsflash, Nonfiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.