Brett wrote:
>
>So, you don't do your work as work for hire? You leasing them their
>site graphics?
>
>If not WFH, why not? I tend to charge them up front for everything--and
>if that means we have to pay a graphic artist more for full rights, then
>we bid it that way. When they pay, the work goes away and I move on.
Depending on the situation, sometimes we do work for hire. I simply prefer
that the relationship be defined in the contract up front, rather than
after the fact.
When a designer does work for hire, there are several risks. The biggest is
that someone else may be hired down the road to modify a web site, and it
may end up looking nothing like the artist's original. In fact, it may be
something of an embarrassment. A graphic designer's portfolio is all
important: it is how we sell our services. With print work, there's no risk
of alteration. I simply put the printed piece in my portfolio, and that's
that. But Web sites are never fixed, so when the client alters a Web site,
I may lose a valuable component of my portfolio. I may have spent 3 to 6
months on creating a Web site for you that could serve as evidence that I
know how to do all the latest bells 'n whistles. If you change the site so
that it's no longer something I'd be proud to display as my work, then I
end up with a huge hole in my visual "resume."
The other risk is loss of future income that may arise from changes to a
Web site. If I've signed away my rights to the art, then I've also given up
my rights to future income from changes, as well as any quality control
that ownership of the rights affords me.
>
>Similarly, with the latest project I required in the RFP that graphics
>not only be created originally in print-friendly format (yes, we pay
>extra for it, but it means they'll likely get both contracts if they can
>meet the requirement), but I want original photoshop files (with layers
>preserved) as well.
We sometimes work this way. We have a client to whom we give Photoshop
layers. This client sends us very high-dollar work from the Silicon Valley
area, so I don't mind cooperating with them in this respect. We've never
had a request for print-friendly art, but rest assured that we'd charge
significantly extra for Photoshop work assembled at 300 ppi instead of 72
ppi. (In actuality, we do our original Web art at 144 ppi, but it's still
much faster than working at 300 dpi and requires less disk storage space).
No one seems to be having a problem with this . .
>.. Not going to pay to have the color of the text on the icons changed,
>or a background layer altered, over the long term when I can do it
>myself in 3 minutes.
Keep in mind that when you do this yourself, you run the risk of devaluing
the artist's portfolio piece. You may be capable of doing it yourself, but
I've seen some real abortions created by our clients who thought they knew
what they were doing. Stuff like making a transparent gif on a white
background for use over a colored background, leaving a raggedly-ass
looking white matte edge around the graphic.
>
>Guess there might be reasons an artist would approach it differently,
>but in my current hat, I sort of see what I'm bidding out as buying the
>package, and the package includes photoshop files, code snippets and
>everything else I need to understand the site they're building for me.
>Contract can say they can re-use elements of graphics and code, but just
>not in any way that is competing with the look they're doing for us.
Again, I have no problem working in any way that meets the clients needs,
as long as it's defined up front in the contract and as long as we are
fairly compensated. What I really hate is when the client makes
ill-informed assumptions about ownership of artwork after the fact.
I would rarely be concerned about reusing artwork that I'd created for you
as a client, other than retaining the right to display it as a portfolio
piece in our book or on our Web site. In fact, in twenty+ years in
business, the only time I can recall reusing artwork was when I reused clip
art we'd created for Geocities--a very unique situation since we've never
created clip art for any other client.
>
>Anyway, I'm sort of curious as to what's driving the long term
>"ownership" attachment to the work?
Profit, quality control issues as listed above. Also, I'm going to be a lot
more liberal with the client who pays me $30,000 for a site than I am with
the client who pays me $3000. If I work for cheap, then I need to hang on
to ownership to assure future income. I'm not going to give away the whole
kit and kaboodle. We're working on a low-budget site right now where
fine-tuning, tweaking, additions, changes, etc. have earned us nearly as
much as we made on the original site design. If I didn't own the files, I
would lose out on this income, as the client is an artist who might
otherwise feel capable of making the changes himself, however badly.
Suz
Suzanne Stephens, Dave Stephens Design; Ashland, Oregon
541-552-1190, 541-1192 http://www.KickassDesign.com/
CyberCircus Grand Prize Winners http://www.thecybercircus.com/
Web Page Design for Designers: http://www.wpdfd.com/wpdres.htm
Clip Art: http://www.freeimages.com/artists/
Tender Loving Care Interactive DVD movie: http://tenderlovingcare.cc/
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