What are good places to get commissions?

[WaterWitchRPG]

Hello to this great community!

I have a question for the long term professional in the field, what would be the best course of action for a beginner mapmaker, who wants to make it as a full-time fantasy cartographer? Are there any special sites other than this one to showcase and look for clients? Is it better to contact publishing houses directly, or game studios, or are there some sort of artist agents that do that sort of thing? How to do this most effectively?

I had a good start in the last half a year, and I'm putting all my time into this craft currently, as last year wasn't so kind to my old job. However, I feel like I've hit a ceiling for the time being and I can't seem to get a full-time load with this work yet. I understand it's only a start for me and I need to practice a lot more, but I'm serious about it and it would be so great to get some sort of business advice.

I would appreciate your help and experience a lot, as I absolutely love doing this, and really want to develop my style and get a chance to work on some awesome worlds in the future, while being able to sustain myself with my work. What would be the best steps?

[Tiana]

Are there any special sites other than this one to showcase and look for clients? Is it better to contact publishing houses directly, or game studios, or are there some sort of artist agents that do that sort of thing? How to do this most effectively?

-No, this is the best site to be on. Participate, post your art, apply to jobs when they're posted here, and you'll get a trickle of income, it will be 'part time' still but everything else you do will depend on your goals long term. As of present the Cartographer's Guild is fairly unique in its focus. Your other options would be to join forums relevant to the specific hobbies or careers that you may target as your customers. Authors, for example, so participate on a writing website. RPGs, so start playing them and getting to know Dungeon Masters. Etc. Identify a potential audience and go to that community, not necessarily a mapping/artistic community.

-I have never cold called. However, I will talk about my work if it comes up organically in conversation, which is why I recommend community participation in a place a buying audience would be found. I recommend not exactly what you say here, but to always ask your clients to refer new clients.

-No, there is no such thing as a cartographer agent and anyone who pitches that to you is a scammer. There's only networking or advertising. Agents don't deal with single pieces of art like this, and it's extremely rare you'll work with one as a customer, it's far more likely to be an independent author who hires you than an agent, or a publishing house. When I got a publishing house client I asked them to refer me to other Canadian publishers they might know who need maps once we were done with our map...

-Selling assets / creating passive income is a vital component of making a career out of this, I feel it is possible to get enough individual clients, but it helps a lot to have sales from a storefront. You do watercolor, so make watercolor texture packages, I buy those so often. RPG components are fairly saleable right now, I would recommend it to anyone seriously intending to be a cartographer, it'll get you a good step in with meeting future clients if you become involved in the RPG community as many of those fans of the game go on to write modules that need maps. Or make maps to sell on DriveThruRPG.

-Make a portfolio that is self-hosted and not bound to any service changing with time.

-Put something on there that isn't your art, and is attractive bait for someone who is of the target audience you aim to capture as a buyer. Like free textures that someone has to sign up for an email letter to receive, that's one I've seen a few people do. I have map making brushes on DeviantArt.

[Adfor]

A wealth of knowledge to be sure. I didn't ask the question, but the answers are great, Tiana, thanks.

[Tiana]

Thanks, Adfor. I was writing it and thinking, I guess I should just write a book or a static post to refer to at least, I answer this kind of question often. XD

[wminish]

Thanks for the information you've posted here Tiana, it's been really helpful. Like WaterWitchRPG I'm also trying to find my way from amateur to professional but I'm not quite as far along. Working out how to approach commissions has been (and continues to be) quite challenging, there seems to be an unwritten standard for the way most cartographers approach commissions. The advice about creating passive income is great as well, I've heard a bit about this before (though not specifically related to cartography) and I've been making efforts to try and get some of this going.

One other resource I have also found quite helpful is this video from the youtube channel WASD20. It's actually how I first discovered the guild. Although Nate only really talks about commissions and not much about other monetisation and doesn't say as much as I would have liked to know about commercial vs non-commercial commissions.

[WaterWitchRPG]

Thank you a lot, Tiana! A lot of good information, especially about passive income, I will need to take time to process it I will keep discovering the website and all the resources created by the community. Hopefully, I could be helpful at some point, too.

Do you mind if I get in touch in DMs with you about watercolor textures, to ask what you normally are looking for in these and where do you buy them?
That sounds interesting to me but I never knew that was a thing in demand.

[WaterWitchRPG]

One other resource I have also found quite helpful is this video from the youtube channel WASD20. It's actually how I first discovered the guild. Although Nate only really talks about commissions and not much about other monetisation and doesn't say as much as I would have liked to know about commercial vs non-commercial commissions.

Thank you, very helpful and clear video! I'm definitely feeling like I'm off the mark with pricing now

[ChickPea]

Thanks, Adfor. I was writing it and thinking, I guess I should just write a book or a static post to refer to at least, I answer this kind of question often. XD

We've got the blogging facility as part of the forum software, and you could use that, if you wanted. It's quite rudimentary (understatement!) but for a post that's mostly text, it'd be fine.

[WaterWitchRPG]

I have one more question, about pricing. I understand the per-hour pricing for mapmaking, but how do you approach the commercial license prices? What would be a price difference for a private game map and a commercially used map for a video game, book, etc?