Join us for an insightful dive into the world of freelancing in the 3D industry with Chris Kautz and Simon on episode 19 of the podcast. After a technical hiccup that initially lost all recordings, they revisit key topics on freelancing, software evolution,
and navigating the challenges of building a career in 3D art. Chris shares his journey from early days with Poser and Ray Dream to modern practices, while discussing the nuances of using software like Poser and the stigma around presets. The conversation
pivots to freelancing strategies, emphasizing the importance of building trust through initial small jobs, leveraging agencies for steady income, and setting clear contracts to ensure payment. They also touch on the evolving landscape of freelance
work, including the rise of smaller businesses and the risks of unpaid work, advocating for upfront payments and steady income sources. The episode concludes with advice on portfolio presentation, balancing demo reels and websites, and the value of
collaborative projects for skill development and networking. Listeners will gain practical insights and encouragement for navigating the freelance path in 3D art.
Listeners are encouraged to engage with the topics discussed, especially regarding setting up a robust freelance career in 3D art, leveraging both traditional and digital platforms effectively.
Welcome everybody to episode 19.
Actually, we recorded this and the computer that's supposed
to be recording crashed and we lost everything.
So this is a second recording of episode 19.
I have Chris Kotz with me and probably said his last name
wrong.
And we also have Simon.
Today we'll talk a little bit about freelancing and first
we want to know a little bit about Chris.
So Chris, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
My second name is Kaut, because Kaut is a direct for vomit.
Oh, I'm sorry.
Contrary to popular belief, my name isn't Chris Vomit, but
Chris Kaut.
Chris Kaut, I'm sorry.
Okay, so I'm a freelancer.
I do illustration work and also 3D work.
I heard you're a big fan of Poser in the day.
You want to ruin my reputation from the word go.
No, we started off with a pose that was first contact with
3D graphics
and used to use it for setting up models for illustrations.
It was handier to render out a pose-a-pose than it was to
go and take photographs of live models
in the middle of the night for a cheap job or something
like that.
And then after Poser, you got into Ray Dream and Bryce
and all the other shiny stuff.
What is that, this Ray Dream?
I've never heard of it before.
Well, in those days, I'm not sure.
I haven't seen a version of Poser for about,
I think about seven years or something like that.
So it's probably changed.
But in those days, you couldn't really model anything in P
oser.
And Ray Dream was, I'm not sure which company made it,
but it was a modeling program, a poly modeling program.
So you could actually take your poser model into Ray Dream
as an object or something like that,
and then model stuff for it,
and then take all of that into Bryce.
And Bryce had a brilliant rendering engine, fantastic
materials.
And then you could make shiny, lovely pictures with your
poser figure
and ray-dream attributes in Bryce.
In those days, Bryce, I think it's, is it View now?
In GS3?
Yeah, yeah.
You could model, but it was with terrains and stuff like
that,
which is kind of a handy way of modeling.
And actually, my first big job in 3D was a combination of
Bryce poser
and RayDream.
Wow.
Yes, but they're not used in industry,
so we don't use them anymore, do we?
Nope.
And also, everybody starts screaming
when you mention the word preset.
So, what are they?
Presets, no.
Yeah, preset's kind of like a dirty word.
I mean, a poser is a preset program,
but actually when you start up Max
and you put a cube in the viewport,
cube is also a preset.
But you change it to something else.
Exactly.
What are we arguing about?
Presets aren't bad.
Only people are bad.
No, it depends how you use them.
If you just use it directly...
Yeah, there seems to be a lot of hype about it
and there's lots of interesting threads
where people are screaming at each other
and stuff like that.
Poser is a really useful program for quick stuff
which has a low budget or something like that.
My opinion is commercially,
if you're going to do something commercially,
use the easiest thing to get it done that looks the best.
But if you're going to do artistically, don't cheat.
Might as well just enjoy it and don't take the easy way out
.
Well, cheating is a bad word to use, but don't be lazy.
If you're going to do something artistic, put your heart
into it.
Don't just click a button and generate a Veronica or
Victoria model from Poser.
Mostly the people who use the program, it's one of the most
abused programs around
because most people who use it don't really have that much
knowledge
as far as anatomy is concerned.
And once I saw on a CG talk, I saw a fantastic render of a
Poser model.
which is done really beautifully by someone who understood
anatomy.
Mostly, if you render the thing out
and you retouch the joints and correct stuff,
you can have a really nice result.
But people who use those programs
mostly don't know very much about anatomy
or what do you call it, construction.
So you mostly get quite a nasty product.
It's not the fault of the program.
Actually, I think like Poser, they know it's a toy
and they're marketing it like that
because why the hell do Poser models have genitalia?
And I read that you can control the male's guys' plugs,
if you know what I'm talking about.
Well, not only that, but all aspects of the model
can be blown right out of proportion.
You can have hours of fun with your friends.
Squeeze these up in Poser.
Forget about the plugs.
Oh, man.
It's hard.
No, but it's a really useful program.
For instance, say a program like Vue, which has a fantastic
render engine and beautiful terrains and magnificent
atmospheric effects.
You can now have Poser models running around and animated P
oser models running around inside it.
It should be absolutely perfect for, I don't know,
court case animations and all sorts of stuff like that.
So there's absolutely nothing wrong with those applications
,
except, of course, that real CG artists make their own
stuff from cubes.
They start from dots, from vertexes.
They start from the very first vertex.
You can do it yourself.
You code your own engine.
I make my own 3D programs
Yeah
I'm his line of praying system
I went to Korea and went to the Intel factory
Made my own processor
Beat that
I programmed two artificial intelligence guys
For the interview
No I'm kidding
You're a god Ollie
I'm a dreamer
There's a difference
Oh you're poor
Yeah
Hey, old dreamers are poor.
Sucks.
Sucks.
I noticed that if you want to be rich, you have to be bad.
Look at Bill Gates.
He screwed over a bunch of people, and he's filthy rich.
Yes.
He gave us Windows, didn't he?
Yeah, but I like Windows.
I hate the Mac OS.
Hey, let's get into a Mac PC war.
Simon, you take Mac.
I don't like Mac.
Me either.
Okay, we win.
Jan, we can't have a fight if we all agreed.
So we're going to talk about the perils of freelancing,
weren't we?
Yeah, yes.
You wanted to know how to start up in freelancing.
How can I get filthy rich in freelancing?
That's the question in everybody's mind.
How do I drive?
Do I use models?
Seriously.
How do I drive a Porsche?
What did Simon say?
Make pose models.
I get so many requests.
I'm like, oh, could you make me this skin, this pose model?
I turn them down.
What if they pay like 50 quid a go just for like some new
haircut or something?
It's easy money, man.
It's easy money.
One easy money.
You have to learn to swallow your pride, man.
Yeah, but I can do bigger jobs and more money now.
Simon, it's either Posda or cute green furry caterpillars.
Take your pick.
Who does that?
We lost all of that.
We had the joke, the caterpillar legion of doom, which got
lost.
yep thank god anyhow you wanted to know how to how to how
to start off not i mean being rich is
is the next step right but you want to know how to start
being a freelancer yeah and i told you
just uh open the front door of your house or run onto the
street and scream i'm a freelancer and
you are a freelancer but uh getting work is uh is is
another thing so that's the fun part
how does one get work in freelance the big question i'm
still asking myself after 18 years
how do you how do you get known and how do you get work and
uh what's the best way to do that
and uh because things are changing constantly we uh get
some information also on the cg talk
from people who write in and say it's incredible uh after
my first couple of jobs uh which
which got used commercially, just inundated with work.
Why is that?
Because people like people,
the employers like people who have done commercial work
before.
Yes, they're nervous.
They're all nervous.
Most people in huge companies are terrified of making
mistakes
and getting stung themselves by freak dweeby artists
who deliver late or deliver wrong file formats
or make something totally different to the briefing.
So it ensures a sort of a trust.
It means that somebody has trusted you to make something
and it's being used.
And usually it's not the most pretty thing in the world,
but it's a practical thing.
So the hardest thing is to get the first jobs
and to get them used and to put those on your website.
It doesn't matter how ugly they are.
If they're ugly, they'll be believable.
All of us 3D artists are absolutely fascinated with making
sharp, pointy stuff
which is useless for children, women or amoebas.
And we do that because we push the envelope constantly.
We're trying to impress other CG artists.
We're trying to get a little gold beaker on CG talk.
Everybody's after that.
And tend to forget that the viewing public is just getting
used to 3D.
They are kind of a little bit further than a Toy Story
phase of looking at 3D.
So what mostly gets used is stuff which is not creepy.
So like I told Ollie earlier, I was in Amsterdam at an
agency which hires out 3D artists.
And the guy who talked to me said, well, I love your folio.
It's got great quality, but it's creepy.
It's really creepy.
He said, if I see one more alien, I'm going to throw up.
He said, why can't you guys make cute little beep-beep cars
with big eyes?
And that's what they're kind of looking for.
So if you want to be a success in the ad area,
then you should be making cute furry caterpillars.
That's how you get the Porsche, right?
That's the first guy with the Porsche.
I've got to say, my first three jobs, right,
they were all making stereotypical, like, big robots, all
of them.
It's completely pointless.
I can't use any of them now.
Actually, the thing I...
Did you get paid for them, Simon?
Yeah.
Paid for them?
Yeah, good rate as well.
Something like £30 an hour.
Yeah, what was it for?
For ads or for game industry or...?
For games and for movie.
Oh, and movies.
Yeah.
So it was more than one polygon.
It's the criticism that you incite.
Actually, as Chris was saying before, it's all about the
contacts.
I moved into this new neighborhood one time, and I had a
friend.
And then he had this friend who needed some 3D work done,
and he introduced us.
And then those were my first jobs.
So the first job was like, the city wants to make a motoc
ross track,
but they wanted a 3D visualization on how it would look
before they actually built it.
So I had to go and make the track and everything.
It's okay-ish.
The camera work was pretty bad because my friend did it.
But it was a cool experience.
My first job, it's all about the contacts.
Well, what you notice is also that all the friends I have,
which is also totally wrong.
If you want to be a huge enormous success,
then make sure all your friends are in the industry.
But all my friends have absolutely nothing to do with
industry
except one guy who's a printer.
But there's a group of about eight guys
and actually they're getting used to it.
They had absolutely no idea what 3D was
and they thought it was some kind of spaceman,
which is really true.
But they're starting to get used to that,
which means also, I think, awareness of 3D
and what you can use it for is synchronicity.
not only in industry itself, but also just the people
around you.
So I'll be doing some ninja chick in jujitsu stances
for a friend of mine who's running some sort of sports
school.
But it's nice that these people are also becoming more
aware
of what 3D can be used for.
It's hard explaining what 3D is.
I was really happy when somebody said Toy Story.
I thought, wow, hey.
It's easy to explain what it is.
It's just hard to sound cool while doing it.
No, actually, like saying, okay, so you have vertexes and
polygons,
and then you have textures and bones.
Oh, it's horrible.
Because you have to explain what a vertex is, what a
polygon is, what a texture is.
I tried to explain that when my girlfriend started crying.
I just told them I do magic, and that's it.
And it's not a lie.
It's the first thing you said.
That's been true, right?
No, actually, sometimes I remember one time
I was explaining to this girl
and I didn't want to come off as a big nerd or a geek,
so I just told her,
I just pass out in front of my computer
and drill on the keyboard.
When I wake up, it's all done.
And I left it at that.
All right.
The masterpiece button.
Yeah, I just drill on the keyboard and it's done.
Pretty sure she believed me.
All right.
another possibility for
freelancers
which is often overlooked
is agencies
agencies are really gods
and
how do you get into an agency
yes
and what do they do for you and how does it work
exactly
I just started working for an agency I've done some work
for
about 10 years ago
it's an agency in Amsterdam
and
Oh no
What they do is
Are we still there?
No, we lost our last sentence
Ah, you're still there?
Yeah
Thank God
I thought it was a complete rush to get
As he does his
It could have
No, I don't want it to
Computer has developed taste
Computer has developed taste
We have Simon for all this rubbish
We have Simon for good luck
Why am I good luck?
I don't know
As long as he leaves his plugs alone
plot to one time and everything will run smoothly.
I'm good.
All right, anyhow, agencies.
So agency comes to you with work,
which is a huge part of the job,
and they're really good at client contact,
so they can take a lot of that burden off too.
They're terrific at getting most information out of a
client,
that's possible to get and to give it to you in terms which
is understandable.
And they will collect the money at the end of the job,
which is another huge part of the work.
If you read a book by Harris, Getting a Job in Computer
Animation,
which is one of the best books I've ever read,
I disobeyed every rule the guy has written, so that's why I
'm still poor.
But I recommended it to everybody.
One thing he says about freelancing is that it's really
amazing.
You only have actually 15 weeks in the year which you will
be working for full time.
The rest of the time, you'll be looking for work,
collecting money,
updating your system and your hardware and software,
and learning how to use the new stuff.
bookkeeping, all sorts of stuff.
So what an agency does is it charges about 25% of the job.
They'll take 25% of it.
But in my opinion, actually 75% of the work you do,
only 25% of it is really the actual work,
and the rest is all the stuff which is on the peripherals.
So agencies are really, really, really worth every cent.
If you can get in good with a reputable agency,
and I'm not talking about people who email you stuff saying
,
we're going to represent you, and they send you to America
or something
for a rigging job when you're a texture guy.
I'm talking about real reputable agencies in your area
which are to be trusted.
And they're really worth gold, those people.
And if it's an experienced agency, they'll look after you
really well.
So that's also something for freelancers, something which
is often overlooked.
What about outsourcer.com?
Do you know anything?
I've never got a job from them.
Never.
Done nothing for me.
Actually, they did something really nicely for me.
They printed one of my crappy interviews.
So I'm eternally thankful to Simon for that.
I'm sure he's unbalanced, but it doesn't make any
difference.
so I'm still eternally grateful.
Yeah, I mean, I've probably made more jobs off it than
anyone else.
It's a good reason to do it, isn't it?
Yeah, I made quite a lot, actually.
You could make an outsourcer podcast announcing available
artists,
available jobs, stuff like that.
That'd be interesting.
I might do that.
You could do that with me if you want.
Yeah, sure.
Have you heard of an agency called the Candy Lab?
It's out of interest.
It's candylab.co.uk.
Nope.
Sounds sweet.
Just saying you know me.
Wanting to represent me, which is strange.
The Candy Lab.
Yeah.
Sounds like a drug operation to represent the Candy Lab.
They've worked with Electronic Arts, where I suck at,
Nike US, Sony Entertainment, and top 20 UK advertising
agents.
I don't know.
Take a gamble.
You want me to ask my magic eight ball if it's good or not?
Yeah.
Okay, hold on to me.
Well, one thing with agencies.
Yes, Simon.
You go, Simon.
Yeah.
I'm all calling Orson.
One thing with agencies is you have this thing where some
of them demand that every job you do, you do through them.
Ah, that's forgotten.
No, this is not so abnormal.
and it sounds kind of freaky, but the agency I'm working
for demands that if,
because I'll be doing, in place of the 3D stuff, I'll be
doing visualizing work for them.
They demand that all visualizing work goes through them for
two years,
which is okay with me.
I don't mind at all.
But other agencies, especially English agencies, agencies
in the UK,
demand that every job you do goes, or get, goes through
them.
And this isn't a bad thing if you get huge amounts of work
from that agency
because if they can ensure that you have good income
through a year,
then it's worth it.
If they can't guarantee that,
then there's really no sense in signing all your work over
to them.
Do you understand what I'm talking about?
Yeah.
So watch the contract
Look at the contract
Be careful
Somebody dropped something
Yeah the magic 8 ball
Oh you dropped your plug
No wonder you're such bad luck
Pick it up before you bleed to death man
Yeah
Actually the magic 8 ball said the Candy Lab
Is most likely a good company
And trust me this ball is always right
Especially when I don't need it to be right
And that's from somebody who says
rabbit twice each, at the beginning of each month.
Yeah, it's good luck.
Oh.
Actually, the first thing I said
this month was, what the hell?
Unfortunately.
So you got sick, lost your podcast,
your mummy's computer crashed.
Yeah.
He's got a computer from his mummy, folks.
You got what?
It's free.
Did it work for my computer?
If anything overheats, that's the problem.
Anyways, we're off topic.
Maybe you've got a hot mama.
No.
I was a late baby, so my mom's pretty old now.
Yeah?
Yeah, I'm pretty sure she's...
At least 24.
All right, this is really off topic.
This is really off topic.
Okay.
Okay, so where were we?
The whole thing was freelancing.
Yeah.
Before you said there were like five sections of freel
ancing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Five sections of the 3D industry where it's possible to
freelance in,
except for films, which it seems that most people,
except for a few, are sort of freelancing in a way anyhow
because they're only taking on for the length of a
production
and then let go when the production is finished.
Like we said, the first area would be advertising,
and that's the furry caterpillar area,
where guys making heaps and heaps of money and having a
great time
and making inane stuff that sells, that the public
understands.
And the second area is the niche area,
which is chaps messing around with CAD and making it look
great in 3D Max.
And that's the V-Ray bathroom guys.
There's also driving around in Ferraris and Porsches and
stuff like that.
And then the third area would be the, what do you call it,
the soulless, perfect woman face with the perfect bump map
and the blurry background.
So that's the movie area.
It's sort of a glamorous area.
And they're driving Ferraris as well.
And then the guy with the holes in his shoes and Odoritis
that should have been finished in January,
that's the 3D geek area there.
sharp, pointy stuff which is neither good for children,
women or amoebas.
And that's what I do.
And you go broke doing that, so don't do it.
And then there's one guy left over and he's somewhere in a
bunker in Tijuana
hacking into the mainframe of the Pentagon and sending vig
ils to Cleveland.
And that's the game, guys.
So that's the other area.
But you have to be able to do miracles on Polly.
So it's a difficult area to be in.
Well, maybe not for long with the new games.
Yeah, yeah, well, I don't know.
Did you notice that GameGuys can't get into movies?
Why?
Don't you know the reason why?
No, why?
They're scared to death.
Movie the Creepies are scared to death of 3D GameGuys.
Really? How come?
Well, you can imagine, right?
This guy comes from the 3D game industry,
and he goes to work at a movie studio.
And the first thing he does is he goes to the TD,
and he says, well, what do you want?
And the TD guy says, well, we want to have a dragon.
He says, okay, you want a dragon?
How much have I got to work with?
And the TD guy says, well, we can have a billion pollies.
Now, the game guy faints, you know,
because he's just trying to imagine a billion pollies.
And then comes to and says,
well, for a billion polis,
I can give you a dragon that shoots flames out of its armp
its,
250 rotor blades shooting out of its butt,
and some periscopes coming out of the nipples,
and saliva, which is interactive.
And not only that, but I do it with one hand behind my back
.
You'll have it in 20 minutes.
So all the people in the movie industry,
terrified of games, people,
because they're the ones who are making miracles happen
with absolutely no resolution at all.
I mean, that's the reason why you game guys
aren't ever going to get into the movies.
Whoa! Access violation!
Whoa, what happened?
Hello?
Can you hear me?
Yeah.
Well, I'm getting access violation here because I told the
truth.
You're not being censored.
No, somebody has hacked into my...
Oh, this is great.
You're being hacked right now?
Yeah, I've been hacked.
Really?
Yeah.
That's weird.
Who'd want to hack you?
I think Lee of CG Talk, because I said something bad about
movies.
Maybe it's Lunatic or Roberto.
Oh, Lunatic.
He's much too nice a guy.
And by the way, when we talked about Roberto's amazing
podcast,
Can you hear those warnings?
Which warnings? No?
Oh, man.
Oh, there's that thing again.
Hey, Winston, I'm going to kill this program.
I'll be back in a minute.
All right.
All right.
Just talk amongst yourselves.
Okay.
So, Simon, what have you been up to?
I've been in bed all weekend.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's probably a good moment to explain why this show
is kind of late.
It's late because I was really, really, really sick for the
past two weeks.
And I couldn't do anything at all.
So, but now I should be on schedule and have another
interview planned up after.
And I think Chris is back.
Who's the interview you're going to be with?
What?
Peter Draper.
He's about to come.
He's a 3D Max guy.
He has a cool side genome.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, he should.
Geomorphic.co.uk, I think, or .com.
I'm not really sure.
But it has some awesome tutorials and things to learn.
Okay, I'm calling Chris now.
So, wow, silence is bad on radio.
That's why I edited it out.
Yeah, but to edit it out, it's kind of lazy.
And I have other things to do after.
Do some homework after.
Something?
No, but, oh, man, I really don't want to edit it out.
And this is going to be very boring.
Tell a funny story.
I could tell a joke.
I could talk about freelance if you want.
All right, sure.
I think it's good to always get on a really good side
when you're doing your first job.
Do your first job.
If you know there's going to be more work afterwards,
do it really cheap and really quick,
because I did.
I didn't do it well,
because this weekend I did a really fast job,
and then the client said that he's actually going to
put all his work through me from now on
and actually basically fire some of the freelance guys
because I charged half as much.
Even though I'm going to end up charging
twice that on the next job.
I'm actually charging three times that
on the next job already,
but it's a good idea to start low and gain trust.
I don't even work with a contractor anymore.
How much do you get paid?
If it's not too personal.
Hourly rate?
Yeah.
Even if it's something simple,
I'm just working like 15 pounds an hour.
That's 30 US dollars.
But I was working,
did two hours of work the other night
and charged, yeah,
I don't know, 20.
I was charged,
it was about 50 pounds an hour
for some, like,
hyper-complex modelling and mapping.
So does that mean
you can't buy the Porsche yet?
No.
I can buy a new processor, actually.
I can't buy a new,
a new,
completely brand new rig
at the end of the summer, hopefully.
Oh, cool.
What's the most you've ever made
from a job?
No, the best,
this is funny
because this wasn't even for a job.
I did a job really well and the client was like, yeah,
great.
And I said, oh, there's another £400 you owe me.
Could you just send it over?
And he goes, oh, yeah.
I'm like, you don't really need to do it in a rush.
He goes, oh, no, go check your bank.
Went downtown, checked my bank.
And he paid in £1,600 as a bonus.
A pot above what he'd already paid.
Something like US$3,000 at the time.
Wow.
As a bonus.
What?
And my work was absolutely horrible.
hey hold on uh the i've also connection for like five
minutes to the other computer and that scared
me so i'm going to save it really quick just in case oh i
know to record this again would be
horrible hold on not not that you guys are horrible but you
know it's the fact of losing
so much work is let me just save it really quick okay so we
're back i'm going to have to merge
these two files after but better be safe than sorry does
that mean you can edit out the like
the dodgy bat at the end.
Uh, no.
I would ha-
Now it would be even harder to edit.
Oh, alright.
Heh.
Well, I hope you guys don't mind.
No.
But it's a bit weird.
Is Tristan this cool?
No, he-
I guess somebody actually really hacked him.
Heh.
Because he's gone still.
I hope nothing bad happened.
This could be Judd.
She dropped the magic 8-ball.
Ah, I said he gets for making fun of the magic 8-ball.
I'm seriously thinking that this magic eight ball is just
possessed.
Every time I ask something, it gives me the answer I don't
want.
It always comes true.
Anyways, we're getting off topic.
Since we're off topic, I want to start a new podcast called
ConfessCast.
I'm hopefully trying to record it tonight.
You can check it out, www.confesscast.com.
And the objective is that people submit their confessions.
It'll be anonymous.
I'm trying to get a submit page, but right now you can
submit through email.
And what I want people to do is submit like an audio clip,
their confessions.
If you say your name in the audio clip, obviously it's
going to get played.
But if you don't, you remain anonymous and you give your
confession.
You know, get something off your chest.
But tonight I'll try and record it.
It'll be fun. Interesting.
So what do you think about that, Simon?
Has anyone actually submitted yet?
No.
Right now the submission thing is by email,
and I think that scares people.
A simple PHP text, like the chat room,
do you like it?
You could just use part of that.
Yeah, I'm going to ask Ruben, who's an awesome guy,
to see if he could do it.
He could do it in like five seconds,
but we could catch him when he's free.
Yeah.
But yeah, I have a few confessions, like 20-something.
I'll read them and record them, and hopefully they seem to
catch on.
And I'll have Google AdSense, and I'll be rich and famous,
and I'll be driving the Porsche, living in California,
quitting CG,
throwing away CG cast, living la vida loca.
Of course, none of that will ever, ever happen.
I don't know.
I wouldn't, you know, say something will never happen.
It won't.
I have special luck.
Really special luck.
What I don't want to happen happens.
What I want to happen doesn't happen.
I don't know.
I don't think Chris is coming back,
so maybe we can end the show.
It's kind of too bad because the first show
you recorded was going pretty good,
but the computer crashed.
Lost everything.
He'll probably be back.
That's a short email.
He's got your email, hasn't he?
Yeah, I have him on Skype or
he'll probably send me a message on
CG Talk. But it's weird that
so much is conspiring against
this episode from being released.
How many things
now?
You lost your first connection.
Got sick for two weeks.
I got taken down by some
horrible illness. Helicopter almost
crashed into my house.
Your plug's not working.
Yeah, the plug's not working here now, I think.
Ah, and he's going crazy.
Chris's mic wasn't working at the beginning.
That's my sex.
Well, I don't know.
Well, let me stop it and let me save it.
You pick it up later.
No, just...
That's the end of...
We have like 20-something minutes.
No, we have 30-something minutes, so it's pretty good.
Maybe we can do another show with Chris in the future.
I can continue.
All right, so people, if you have questions, comments,
criticism, send it to info at cgcast.com.
Also, if you want to find a freelance job,
go to outsourcer.com.
It's outs-sourcer.com.
What?
Like a horizontal dash, a minus, I guess.
All right.
So that's it for today, April 2nd.
We wanted to do an April Fool's joke,
but that was also not going to happen because we got sick.
That's Europe for you.
All right, so peace out, everybody.
Bye.
And an anticlimactic ending, but yeah, whatever.
That's better.
Okay, Chris is back.
This is the alternative ending.
Apparently, somebody tried to hack Chris.
So we can continue.
We have two endings.
How about that?
Brilliant.
Just delete the first one.
Nah, I can keep it for fun.
Just mind us plugging.
And me and Simon acting very sad.
Oh, yeah, I get to hear that part, right?
Yep, we are just sad.
Chris, Chris, where did Chris go?
He just left us all alone.
Oh, God is with us.
God is with us.
He's left.
Okay.
Well, it's been very nice talking to you, Chep,
talking at you, Cheps.
We've had a very exciting session.
Simon had helicopters in his front garden,
And Oli's mom's computer blew itself up.
So couldn't ask her any more than that, could you?
Nope.
Actually, it was the most exciting podcast ever.
That's nice.
That's nice.
Yeah, that's right.
It's pretty cool, actually, because somebody tried to hack
you.
My computer overheated, and Simon almost got hit by a
helicopter.
So for world security, Oli, you know that you have to say
rabbit rabbit the beginning of each month instead of what
the hell yeah exactly it's really weird
when sonny wakes you up early in the morning oh i thought i
saw lights in your rooms boom that's
true you have lights most weird lights in your room all the
time because you're a computer boy
so yeah but i had it off like my wall opens and wakes me up
like really early in the morning i'm
like what the hell and i thought you had lights in your
room technology is taking over yeah but
There is no lie.
I think my mom was on something.
Well, like we know with her computer, she's a hot mama.
Keeps overheating.
Well, that's it.
Or is there anything else you'd like to add about freel
ancing?
Getting clients to pay up.
Getting clients to pay up.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's a really nice one.
Like we said in the last recording, which blew up,
there seems to be a change in policy with business.
It seems to be more okay, or there seems to be more smaller
businesses
that find it okay not to pay freelancers, pay them late,
or not to pay them at all.
And I feel the only way out of this is to set the rules for
gameplay right at the beginning,
which can be extremely difficult if you're desperate for
work.
So one of the nice things about the agency is that you have
a steady base
or a steady base for as steady an income as you can have if
you're a freelancer.
And then you can afford to hear no from new clients.
Like I said to Oli, I've been working for about 18 years as
a freelancer,
and I've never, ever worked with a contract.
The only time that I didn't get paid was when an ad agency
went bust,
and they couldn't do anything about that.
So that's the sort of thing that can happen.
But lately, there's been a trend whereby most freelancers
won't work without a contract.
And I'm also not going to do any more 3D freelance work
without a contract.
And one of the guys on CG Talk, Daddy Mac, what he does is
he does sketch phase.
And once the sketch phase has been okayed, then he asks for
30% advance.
so he gives the company a little something
and then they also invest in the job
and I think that's absolutely the only way
to ensure that you get paid
is that you get actually paid beforehand
and delivering your files at the end of the job
is also a good way
to ensure that you're paid before those files are delivered
.
It can come over quite unfriendly to new clients,
but I think if you explain that you're trying to get a
relationship going
and that you do this with everybody in the beginning,
that it'll come over probably less hard.
But you have to be in a position whereby you can afford to
hear a no.
Often I think if people won't use a contract or won't pay
in advance,
there's a good possibility that they didn't intend to pay
from the beginning.
I just did a job for some people in the eastern part of
Holland
and they stiffed me for that job.
And that's one of the reasons why I thought to myself,
well, I'm going to make sure that I have a more steady
income.
And at the beginning of any jobs with new clients, old
clients that you know, it's okay.
It's no problem.
Because those people treat you well because they value your
work.
And they're more interested in building up a working
relationship.
But new clients are always a little bit iffy.
It kind of sucks that people try to stiff you for work.
Yeah, it's weird.
I don't really understand why this has become more
prevalent.
It never used to be like that.
It used to be that the people were – it really takes time
to build up a relationship.
It takes time for you to learn to speak the language of the
client.
And it takes – really the ideal situation is that the
client calls you up and he says,
Hey, Bob, make me a caterpillar.
And you say, okay.
But you know exactly what color caterpillar he wants.
You know how many legs that he needs.
You know what he's going to use it for.
He only has to explain half of it.
Because you've learned to speak his language,
you've learned his requirements.
And that's economically very efficient
and very interesting for freelancers and for companies
because there's less chance that something will go wrong.
And this seemed to be the most important thing
in relationships in the past.
But I think maybe because of technology, because things
travel a lot faster,
there are a lot more fly-by-night organizations.
And these people, I think, are also living on the fact that
they just get out of paying their bills.
And if you're stuck with that, then it can be quite nasty,
especially if you're counting on this job or that job to
pay the rent for next month.
But as you said before in the other blown-up show,
it's good to have a side job just in case when you're
starting out,
like working at a McDonald's or a taxi or whatever.
Yeah, I think that would probably be frowned upon.
And for me, like I said, I've been asked to do visualizing
for an agency in Amsterdam.
And visualizing has very, very little to do with 3D,
except, of course, that your drawing capacity will improve.
But it's for me will be a steadier source of income,
and that will enable me then to afford to hear no from
prospective clients,
which is actually the ideal situation.
So a steady something that will pay the rent is probably
extremely important.
It costs you a lot of money to be a freelance.
You have to pay for absolutely everything.
Nothing is paid for you.
So that's also a way that you can strengthen your position
in the market.
How important is a good demo reel and a website?
And also, what's more important, a demo reel or a website?
I think my site answers that because my site's terrible
and I don't even have my demo reel on there.
And yet I got, what, three job offers today?
so I think it's just the quality of your work
just anything
pictures and being on forums and people
knowing you because the people like see
your posting for work and then click on your
threads and have a look through what
you're doing and what people are saying about your work and
how you
fix them then
it's a lot better way to show off your work
than just a cold bland website
of finished pictures. Fair enough
but
you have a demo reel right Chris?
I've done a couple of
a couple of little demos
and I put them on my website
but it's not
really a showreel.
I think what Simon says
is true
except there
are some companies
that won't
refuse to view a website.
They want a
showreel and I guess
you could break
a 3D work up into
different areas and one of those would be
animation and there are
companies that won't consider you
for animation from a website
they want to see a
demo reel so if you're
after that sort of work then I think a demo reel
would be the ideal way to go
okay so you don't have to
invest too much in a website
I think websites are
absolutely amazing I mean
I come from a time when we
used to have to lug our folio around
some guy would call you up and then you'd have this
folio man i mean we have 550 square meters uh of leather
and you'd haul that all the way up there
and then open it up and uh that those days are gone people
call you up and say well let's uh
let's see you you work and you send them a link and they're
really happy to uh to see you work
on a website websites are absolutely amazing i mean uh you
get all these people who say
I'm worried they'll steal my stuff.
Well, who gives a damn, you know.
Websites save an enormous amount of time
and it's incredibly convenient for companies to view your
work remotely.
And also you have the opportunity, which you didn't really
have before,
to work internationally.
I mean, whole jobs can be done digitally
where you never even meet the other person.
And that's all possible through the web.
So I think websites are really amazing.
But there are some companies that refuse to go to a website
and they do want a demo reel.
And if you're after that kind of web, then you'd have to
make one.
So it's best to have both, right?
Yeah.
Actually, speaking of the old folios, I have to carry one
for school.
And it's pretty cool.
It can be cool at times like when you're showing a friend
something on the train
and you see everybody's looking in your direction,
seeing your work, it's kind of a cool feeling.
Yeah.
Well, a PC.
I have a pocket PC,
but when people see it,
they immediately think geek or something.
But with a portfolio, I think artist or something like that
.
You don't damage too easily.
No, actually, mine has been through the...
Mine is like a...
It's a bit bigger than A3,
and it's made out of cardboard,
and I stuck some artwork on it.
It's pretty cool.
It's gone through the rain, through the snow, and it's
still okay?
No.
You just have to take care of it.
Well, there'll probably be situations where a lot of analog
portfolio
would be important.
I don't know, probably for publishers or something like
that.
But just for sheer convenience, at the moment,
actually nothing beats the web.
I remember turning up to a customer once, and I had this A
's Bureau.
You know that format?
It's bloody enormous.
I turned up there with this, I don't know, I must have had
some sort of short circuit in my brain or something.
So I had this enormous portfolio, and in this portfolio was
a floppy.
It was amazing.
So I opened this portfolio, I pulled this floppy out, and I
felt like somebody who had diminished genitalia.
It was really weird.
It was the first time I'd ever delivered digitally to a
company.
And they found it really normal.
And the guy stuck the floppy into the computer
and this artwork flooped up on the twin screens.
And they were really happy with it.
But nothing beats the convenience of a digital presentation
.
Oh, yeah.
At the moment.
I love digital because, I mean, I can do my work at home
for school
and upload it to my FTP,
go to school computers,
go to my website,
it's folder, school folder,
and then just print them out at school for free
and it's pretty cool.
Yeah.
It's digital.
It's a problem though, isn't it though?
What?
Like if a client's like,
oh, I need to see something
and this happened to me once or twice,
I've shown a client something
and then they've just not emailed me back
because they've just obviously thought,
oh, that's good enough.
Even though it's watermarked,
they just obviously took it and just used it
and probably cleaned off the watermarks.
But if it's for print, it'll be very low resolution.
You shouldn't give them something really high res.
I don't.
They obviously are happy with stealing something low res.
And people can just disappear on the internet.
It's also no problem.
Even if you have their name and their address,
you can't get in touch with them.
Especially if you've had face-to-face contact.
Someone won't just stop.
If you're actually going into a place and seeing them,
they can't get away from that, really.
whereas they can just ignore emails and block you.
Yeah, but Simon, there is a way around that.
I mean, there's one chap on the CG Talk,
he says he does a lot of architectural work for other
countries,
so he works internationally,
and he says, until that amount of money arrives in my bank
account,
I don't touch a key.
Do you understand what I mean?
What Daddy Mac does is he makes concept sketches.
He gets the direction of the job.
He gets that established.
And then he asks for a, what do you call it?
Initial.
In a way.
Yeah.
So that's the way to get out of it.
You have to have something in your hand.
And if you have that money on your bank account, then it's
an insurance.
And you can work up to that amount and then ask for the
next installment.
I'm going to start working in storements, I think,
because I work at 50% upfront,
and then here's the restaurant completion.
But I find that's a bit edgy like that.
I might do it in quarters or something.
Yeah.
Sounds like a better idea.
Yeah.
Well, when Daddy Mac gets strange reactions from new
clients,
he says, well, my children also have to eat.
And that's the way he explains it.
And I think that's kind of reasonable.
And I think the more 3D people and freelancers use this
technique,
the more industry will learn that it's an acceptable way to
work.
It's only that we're sort of at the beginning of a new way
of working.
And like I said, if you aren't really desperate for that
work,
then you're in a stronger position,
and then you can afford to dictate a bit of a strong work.
that you can afford to ask for these terms.
Silence!
Sorry.
I was just thinking about what you were saying
because it's good to get the initial payment, it's true.
But I don't think a lot of...
What if the company doesn't want to give you that initial
payment?
No, then you have your other source of stable income
whereby you can afford to miss that job.
being desperate as a freelancer is absolutely the worst you
ask any salesman you ask anybody if
you're if you're desperate for work then people smell it
from 100 miles away and uh that's
absolutely the worst way to uh to do business if you're
absolutely desperate to uh to get a job
then uh uh then anything can be done with you and that's
that's not what you want to be
That also applies for women.
That's exactly right.
They smell panic from miles away also.
My dad always used to say,
you've got one lady there, you've got a hundred.
If you've got nothing, you've got nothing for a whole year.
They smell the desperation.
Sucks.
Yeah, but business is kind of like that as well.
I mean, selling stuff is like that as well.
You don't want to be in a position
where you absolutely have to have it.
I want to be in a position whereby also words you shouldn't
really,
if you've been in the business for a while or have been in
the game for a while,
words you don't want to hear are try out or spec.
And if you can help it, never word for free because that's
also nasty business.
Unless it's with a real, like, your proper client.
Like, someone you trust.
Because if it's...
The other night, I was working for free for four hours
because I just forgot to quote my client.
But because it was someone I trusted,
I just came to him at the end and went,
oh, yeah, I want £50 for this, by the way.
And he was like, yeah, sure.
Were you talking about making a quote
or were you talking about actually...
Well, like, physically working for free.
So you were holding the...
Building entire projects for free.
What about collaboration work for fun?
Well, there's a huge difference.
Your collaboration work for fun is that you have something
to say about the briefing.
The worst thing about free work is that you'll get a
briefing.
And a briefing is not necessarily the kind of thing you
would make if you would make something in your own time.
Something you make in your own time, you can put on your
website,
and you can use in your portfolio.
But often the people who want you to make stuff for nothing
give you also a briefing.
which is restrictions.
So it's something you mostly wouldn't make
if you had free choice.
You know what I mean?
Okay, sir.
So you're not getting paid for it.
You probably never will.
And these people are enormously good
at making things sound fantastic.
This will be a great opportunity for you.
And if you make the stuff,
and I've done it before,
I did an animation for free.
And yes, it's good publicity for you.
And I never, ever got anything out of it.
In fact, I lost a client.
Because if you do something for free, then that respect
aspect disappears.
So, free is bad.
Free is bad, except for when you do it with your mates and
you're doing it together.
And you're also putting in an even time.
Like you do your website for free and you do all your self-
promotion for free.
That's the kind of stuff which you should do for free.
Yeah.
I wanted to do like a collaboration project,
maybe start one on CGTalk, see how that works out for F
erman.
Nobody would be making any money whatsoever.
Just to make a little short to see for fun.
That'd be a really nice experience.
But then again, you see, you'd put it on CGTalk
and you would say Bob did the modeling,
Pete did the environments, I did the animation,
and Joe did the sound.
So everybody's getting their name put out there.
That's totally different to people who want to make an
impression in industry
and tell you they have a lot of important contacts,
but they just need a visual or they need an animation
or they have this great tendency to call a 3D animatable
model,
which is fully rigged, to call it an avatar.
Just make a, you can make an avatar in 10 minutes, you know
, make it for me because we have this incredibly important
presentation by so and so.
And those people you'll give work to and never hear from
again.
It's different to a collaboration project like the sort of
thing which you're talking about, which could be a really
nice experience.
But the only thing is time for those projects.
It's like something you do during the summer.
Also, there's no vacations when you're an adult.
No, but you can't get any animation work if you haven't
done any animation.
You can't get any film work unless you've done your own
demos.
So you have to start somewhere, I guess.
Yeah, that's true. Start for free.
I mean, do something for yourself before you do it for
other people.
Yeah, which is basically what you do.
I mean, it's also the strange, I don't know if that part
got blown up in mom's computer too,
but it's quite usual for a business to ask to see exactly
that work which they want from you,
to see that you've done that before.
I mean, it's even so bad sometimes that people say,
yes, we need a bouncing ball that bounces over a glass.
And you say, well, here, I've got a bouncing cube that
bounces over a bucket.
And they say, well, it's not a glass, is it?
You know, I mean, so all the stuff which you're making
and investing all your time in is really to demonstrate.
I mean, they're not going to give you anything
if they can't see that you've done it already.
Inferno, well, it's kind of weird.
Yeah, I got a job the other day,
and people wanted a picture of a logo made out of skin,
and they said they searched the whole of CG Talk
and found my threads where I'd been playing with different
types of skin.
I said, just because I can create this type of skin,
they're going to give me the job?
It was strange, but I got the job, so I was in flame.
Oh, you're kinky.
No.
That's a logo from human skin.
That's kinky.
It's a bit macabre, too.
This was some gangster film or something, I think.
Isn't this a great industry?
No, but that's indeed what Simon says.
It's an absolutely perfect example.
I mean, these guys weren't looking for skin.
They were looking for a particular type of skin.
I mean, that's how crazy it can get.
Yeah, well, I think that's about it.
We have like 40 minutes or probably a bit more,
maybe one hour of recorded stuff.
Not if you count out all the crap.
I'm probably not going to because I don't have time.
Oh, no.
So there's going to be...
No, I have to do some homework after at night.
I have a documentary to do for CinemaPass,
and I'm going to go with my camera, photo camera,
take pictures one by one
going through the entire city
and it's not exposure so it takes forever
and that's going to take me a few hours to do.
Then I'm going to have to go back and prepare and make it
all into one video file so you can imagine
that. So I really have no time
for editing.
Well we'll be cheering for you.
Alright thanks. With your shutter open
in the middle of the night. I hope it doesn't
rain tonight that's the only problem.
Mugged. The eternal optimist
Simon Mugged. This is
Switzerland, you have to be very special to get mugged here
.
Even with a mug me sign, you're not going to get mugged.
Okay.
All right.
Available for mugging.
Do you have a site you want to slug, Chris, your site?
Oh, my site is www.artminusworks.com.
I'll put it in the show notes
alright thanks man
no problem
it's been a blast Oli
yeah it's been great talking to you too
and since Simon left his plugs alone
we've had fantastic
sound quality
yes yes no more exploding computers also
alright
maybe you can come on another time just for fun
because you seem like a cool guy
I'm as crazy as a cut snake
dude
I mean if you want
If you want a podcast ruined, call me anytime.
All right.
Maybe next week can happen.
What?
I said okay.
Okay.
You said it.
All right.
So I think that's...
Was Simon swearing?
Simon swearing?
Was Simon swearing?
No.
I didn't hear it.
Simon, stop thinking.
I didn't say anything.
What?
That's typical you.
You.
What?
What?
Anyways.
So I think that's about it.
Say goodbye, everybody.
All right.
Hey, it's been really great talking to you guys, and I'll
catch you in the mix.
All right.
Peace out.
Catch you later, man.
Peace out.
