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[hydroxy]

I'm starting a project with the backing of an external funder at the start of the New Year.

I am on a strict deadline to have it all finished by March 30th.

The game is a 2D platform action/puzzle game with approximately 100 levels planned.

The game will need approximately 4 different tile sets for different zones of the world.

Will also need a splash screen, menus and any additional art assets covered.

The artist will not need to work 9-5, he chooses his own hours, as long as the deliverables are met I'll be happy.

Its a decent undertaking and will take lots of effort.

I've never done anything like this before. So I'm asking how much will I need to pay an artist to complete this work.

Similarly if I am employing a musician also. For the same project what sort of payment would be expected?

I'd be looking for new music to be created for each of the zones, music for the menus and splash screens. Is there a possibility of getting pre-existing music for cheaper perhaps?

I understand that there are a lot of open art and music assets available right now, however I am just wondering if I took this route for creative content how much is it likely to set me back?

Thanks for reading.

[Kenney]

It's hard to tell, how many sprites do you need and do you have some reference images which style you'd like or the amount of detail each sprite needs?

[hydroxy]

It's hard to tell, how many sprites do you need and do you have some reference images which style you'd like or the amount of detail each sprite needs?

Most of the sprites I'll need will be environmental art, enemy sprites and protagonist sprites. It's difficult to say right now of the exact number but I'd say overall there will be approximately 250 or so.

The style should be fairly detailed 32x32 sprites. See my signature for the type of game I'm working on but just imagine much more detailed and with 4-5 different tile sets for the different zones of the game.

[Müsta Klaki]

250 sprites or 250 frames? Some artists charge per hour, some charge per piece. Anyways, per frame on an animated sprite is like 2-5 bucks each if they charge by piece and not by hour. By hour who knows, depends on how much they get done which is based on artist skill/complexity of the sprite. It could take one artist 3 hours to deliver a fully animated protagonist sprite-sheet (complex) while it takes another artist 3 days, quite a big price difference.

Musicians often charge per 30 seconds/per minute, prices go up greatly if actual instruments are included. I'd say for a 30 second loop you're looking at maybe 40 dollars average, for a 1 minute trailer theme maybe 60-100 dollars. Sound effects are around 5 bucks a pop. Some musicians have different growth per minute, so the first is 30 dollars, second is 50, third is another 60, so for a 3 minute song it would be 140 dollars, as opposed to a musician doing a flat rate of 30 dollars per minute where the end price would be 90. These prices are based on electronic music. Electronic doesn't mean beeps and boops, you can get fantasy-themed violins and pianos that are electronic and sound great.

So, it's very iffy. My advice, shop around a bit in the portfolios.

[joseph ¯\_(ツ)_/¯]

So, realistically, a lot. I wouldn't expect to find a reliable, competent artist who works for less than ~$30/hr.  If we imagine you hire an artist at 30 and they can turn each sprite in two hours (!), that's ~$15k.

You might get super lucky and find the triple threat of someone who's cheap because they're young/dont know how to price themselves, undiscovered, and actually experienced enough to be reliable/dependable... But I wouldn't bet on it. Maybe you can squeak in close to $20/hr in the pixel art scene cause their rates are weirdly suppressed. I know some phenomenal pixel artists who work that cheap, but it's pretty weird -- the skills they have could be reasonably quickly converted into traditional 2d art or Ui skills where they'd make vastly more, so you should consider finding one unlikely.

People throw around numbers a lot lower than that in the indie scene sometimes but... That's basically entry level wage in the grownup industry. Excuses are made involving cost of living in certain parts of the world, etc. But if an artist quotes you something halfway under the going rate they'd make working for johnny mobile games, you need to ask yourself: Why would a professional artist price themselves lower than what they could make from another client?


This is sourced from:

-Bunches of my friends and acquaintances have been on both sides of the professional freelance artist arrangement.
-I do art for a living (although I should note -- any numbers I'm giving are general, and not my own)
-forum posts and general experience
-The gamasutra game industry salary survey: http://www.gamasutra.com/salarysurvey2014.pdf which, note, is for in-house jobs, where the artist gets benifits, ISN'T paying more for health insurance and ~30% out of pocket taxes, and has stable work.

[hydroxy]

250 sprites or 250 frames? Some artists charge per hour, some charge per piece. Anyways, per frame on an animated sprite is like 2-5 bucks each if they charge by piece and not by hour. By hour who knows, depends on how much they get done which is based on artist skill/complexity of the sprite. It could take one artist 3 hours to deliver a fully animated protagonist sprite-sheet (complex) while it takes another artist 3 days, quite a big price difference.

Musicians often charge per 30 seconds/per minute, prices go up greatly if actual instruments are included. I'd say for a 30 second loop you're looking at maybe 40 dollars average, for a 1 minute trailer theme maybe 60-100 dollars. Sound effects are around 5 bucks a pop. Some musicians have different growth per minute, so the first is 30 dollars, second is 50, third is another 60, so for a 3 minute song it would be 140 dollars, as opposed to a musician doing a flat rate of 30 dollars per minute where the end price would be 90. These prices are based on electronic music. Electronic doesn't mean beeps and boops, you can get fantasy-themed violins and pianos that are electronic and sound great.

So, it's very iffy. My advice, shop around a bit in the portfolios.

So, realistically, a lot. I wouldn't expect to find a reliable, competent artist who works for less than ~$30/hr.  If we imagine you hire an artist at 30 and they can turn each sprite in two hours (!), that's ~$15k.

You might get super lucky and find the triple threat of someone who's cheap because they're young/dont know how to price themselves, undiscovered, and actually experienced enough to be reliable/dependable... But I wouldn't bet on it. Maybe you can squeak in close to $20/hr in the pixel art scene cause their rates are weirdly suppressed. I know some phenomenal pixel artists who work that cheap, but it's pretty weird -- the skills they have could be reasonably quickly converted into traditional 2d art or Ui skills where they'd make vastly more, so you should consider finding one unlikely.

People throw around numbers a lot lower than that in the indie scene sometimes but... That's basically entry level wage in the grownup industry. Excuses are made involving cost of living in certain parts of the world, etc. But if an artist quotes you something halfway under the going rate they'd make working for johnny mobile games, you need to ask yourself: Why would a professional artist price themselves lower than what they could make from another client?


This is sourced from:

-Bunches of my friends and acquaintances have been on both sides of the professional freelance artist arrangement.
-I do art for a living (although I should note -- any numbers I'm giving are general, and not my own)
-forum posts and general experience
-The gamasutra game industry salary survey: http://www.gamasutra.com/salarysurvey2014.pdf which, note, is for in-house jobs, where the artist gets benifits, ISN'T paying more for health insurance and ~30% out of pocket taxes, and has stable work.

250 sprites, that is the upper limit of the required number of sprites I'd say, as I'm going to be doing some work on sprites myself. Quite a few of these sprites are likely to be derivatives of each other also e.g. yellow colored turret, red colored turret, etc... That will bring the time required down considerably I'd imagine. I'd also expect quite a lot of the sprites to be single framed e.g. for walls.

Also keep in mind the nature of my game:



As you can see I'm keeping most things square shaped but I'm hoping to compensate the blocky visuals with a very detailed and distinctive art style.

Hypothetically would this be a good offer:
£1000/$1600 =
Protagonist sprites
Environmental sprites e.g. walls, floors, plants, etc... (4 Tilesets for 4 zones)
Enemy sprites e.g. turrets, lasers, spikes, etc...
Splashscreen
Menu/UI

Would be a reasonable offer to cover the art asset requirements of the game over the 3 month time frame considering the artist only needs to work part time to complete everything on his side?

Thanks for the information on music prices also. Those seem reasonable to me and I don't think I'll have a problem with them.

[dhondon]

That sounds about right ( thats atleast the amount I would charge for some thing like that). But I'm sure you need to specify the exact number of pieces before an game artist accepts the price. When some one writes: " turrets, lasers, spikes" does that mean 5-8 pieces or 20-30?

[hydroxy]

That sounds about right ( thats atleast the amount I would charge for some thing like that). But I'm sure you need to specify the exact number of pieces before an game artist accepts the price. When some one writes: " turrets, lasers, spikes" does that mean 5-8 pieces or 20-30?

OK thanks for the information. I will take this on board for future reference

[Kyle Preston]

The gamasutra game industry salary survey: http://www.gamasutra.com/salarysurvey2014.pdf which, note, is for in-house jobs, where the artist gets benifits, ISN'T paying more for health insurance and ~30% out of pocket taxes, and has stable work.

Thanks for sharing this Catguy; great info in here. Also, Chris Polus shared this spreadsheet that may be useful for you when musicians start shooting your their rates. You can adjust the green numbers to see the how it affects the red ones on the right. Cheers! 

[MAROBI]

Artist I cannot help with but when we were doing our title A-Maze-in we were lucky enough to find Andrew Riley from Lucky Lion Studios, he did us seven fantastic tracks from between 50 and 70 bucks a tune and worked hard to help us find the right feel for the game and made changes when we were not happy.

I cant say enough about this guy, he also does tracks for as little as 5 dollars however they are shared so they can end up being used in other titles aside form your own

http://luckylionstudios.com/

good luck!

[mscottweber]

You can always find pre-existing music for much cheaper than custom music.  There are countless online music libraries that have large selections and simple purchasing/licensing procedures.  Also, many composers have extensive back catalogs that they would be willing to license out to you. Obviously, it might be a challenge to find enough music that fits your needs AND sounds cohesively unique to your game, but this is the most cost-effective way to get music.
(Other than asking someone to do it for free.  PLEASE, if you have funding, pay up front for your assets.  I guess, though, since you started this thread, I'm kind of preaching to the choir.  Good on you  )

Another thing to think about is whether or not you need to own the music outright, or of you would be OK with letting the composer retain the rights to the music.  Many composers have a sliding scale where, the more rights they retain, the less they will charge for the music.  Although this route is not as ideal as owning the copyright for the work yourself, it will get you a custom score with all of the benefits of using a dedicated composer (rewrites, edits, stems, etc) without the high cost that usually comes with it.