Can I pay people to make complete Doom sprites?

[Linguica]

gemini09 said:

So if it's a hobby project, then the bounty should be in that vicinity.

Why? Work is work. If you want someone to make something for you, it doesn't matter what YOUR reasons are. They are still doing the same thing.

[gemini09]

Linguica said:

Why? Work is work. If you want someone to make something for you, it doesn't matter what YOUR reasons are. They are still doing the same thing.

Eh, then 10$ should buy you exactly as much it does in Africa as it does in America.

[jute]

raymoohawk said:

to the OP and to anyone whos interested im available for commission (for monster spriting, since its the one thing i know how to do). if your interested feel free to pm me

I think that people in the FreeDoom/Blasphemer/Zauberer community would be interested in crowdfunding your work on those projects. Have you considered starting a Patreon, or posting in the FreeDoom forum to see what people think of the idea?

[esselfortium]

It's true that few people can be expected to be interested in paying for artwork for a free project. It's not entirely outside the realm of possibility, but it's not likely to happen often. This doesn't mean, though, that artists have any obligation to do free or nearly-free work for a project they have no personal investment in.

When designing a free project with no budget, you effectively have two options for original art assets: You can get a skilled artist really excited about your project, such that they will want to spend countless hours working on it with you ("with", not "for"), or you can do the art yourself.

$50 is not likely to make the difference between "no thanks, not interested" and "sure, I'd love to spend the next few weeks/months working on this".

[fraggle]

In the past people have suggested finding money to pay people to work on Freedoom. I've tried to discourage it where possible just because I've been concerned it could complicate the project. For example if sprite artists are being paid then why not level authors? etc. I'm not opposed to the idea of paying people for their work but I'm concerned about how it could change the nature of the project once money started being involved. Suddenly it's perhaps not just this open source crowdsourcing project any more but people are getting paid and where's my cut?

Plus I always had this idealistic vision of Freedoom as a project where the community was coming together to produce something that was a demonstration of its collective talents. The old Freedoom website even used to say this. Maybe that vision didn't play out as well in practice but giving up and just paying people to do it seems kind of sad.

I guess the counterargument would be the free license that has meant money has been involved, even if not directly. It's been well-documented that people are selling Freedoom on eg. the Android Play store for example. And I've seen esselfortium and others express their reticence about contributing to the project because of this. It's completely understandable: the difference between Freedoom and other large Doom collaborative projects (which have rarely involved money or payment) is that in those other projects the text file usually forbids any kind of commercial usage.

[Blastfrog]

fraggle said:

I'm not opposed to the idea of paying people for their work but I'm concerned about how it could change the nature of the project once money started being involved. Suddenly it's perhaps not just this open source crowdsourcing project any more but people are getting paid and where's my cut?

I hadn't considered any of this, but I'm inclined to agree. Freedoom has actually been doing pretty well as of late, I don't think it's a good idea to risk jeopardizing that momentum.

That being said, it could work out for other projects, but should be decided on an individual basis.

[kb1]

Sodaholic said:

This isn't my thread, and I was actually offering services.

Sorry, Sodaholic, I'm a retard!

You know, a lot of people would sprite for free. Sure, I'd pay $100/hr if I could afford it. How about source port development? Should everyone pay the devs for each code fix/new feature? Should we all charge $10/hr to answer questions about modding?

I have no intention to insult anyone with a low offer. This community has always been about free maps, free source ports, etc. Most people freely share their work. The money thing could be considered an incentive - I think of it as a reward, as pizza money, as a "thank you" to people that would otherwise do the work for free. It's not "peanuts" to everyone, and it's a better offer than "dude, can you make me some sprites, pretty please?"

I've got a project that involves hundreds of sprite modifications, each of which might be very easy (but, a lot of work as a package). I would consider paying per sprite, but it ain't gonna be a ton of money, that's for sure. I can't afford it. And, this is the type of project that will be useless, unless all of the sprites eventually get done, so it's a bit of a risk for me.

And, yes, there's the issue of having paid a boatload of cash to get the project done, then turning around and giving it away for free. That's much more painful (and impractical) when the cash amount gets larger.

But, that's also part of the incentive - I assume that the person paying for these sprites will give the WAD away to everyone, including those that created the sprites. Those sprites can be used again and again, by people that didn't pay for them, including the artists. And, again, it's $80, or $100, or a few hundred that that person can make, doing what they love to do. It's an offer, which can be accepted or declined. If it's not interesting enough, or not enough money, then don't do the job, or negotiate for what you think is reasonable.

But, it's not an insult, or a ripoff, in any sense. Telling every artist reading this thread, that they need to charge $1000, or $20/hr, or whatever, will simply have the effect of no one getting cash, or sprites. Yay.


@Mithran Denizen:
I didn't mean to forget to address you're well-thought, articulate response. I understand, and fully agree that, most anyone trying to hire an artist is going to probably be picky, and a pain in the ass. Furthermore, you are correct: The artist should get compensated properly for their work, if it's up-to-par - which should be verified early on in the process.

But, again, for low-res sprites, in a 20+year old game, for a free custom mapset that will be given away to the community... It's just not practical to expect full price. That's why I mentioned crowd-funding, which is more appropriate.

[Ladna]

esselfortium said:

$50 is not likely to make the difference between "no thanks, not interested" and "sure, I'd love to spend the next few weeks/months working on this".

Pretty much exactly this. Unless you're desperate, your free time is surprisingly valuable.