I would like to take on commissions. How to? (Beginner)

[Mexikorn]

My name is Lukas and I love maps. My favorite part of worldbuilding is designing the maps for the world and trying to ensure that everything makes perfect sense. (I don't like fantasy maps) Long story short, I want to convert my skills I have gained so far and put them to use. See if I'm good enough that people want to have the kinds of maps I do and if not, get feedback and hone my skills. I don't aim to make money off of it, at least in the beginning, really I just want to gain experience and a dialogue/valuable feedback from my commisioners on what they want and honestly I'm running out of ideas.

If you're interested in having some simple maps created for you or help me get in contact with someone who does I'd greatly appreciate that. Here are some of my works so far:
Harelle Heightmap.jpgSylissia-01.jpg

P.S.: I create my maps in adobe illustrator. I have multiple layers there. For instance some displaying the biomes, the regions, kingdoms, precipitation, river names, geography names etc.

[Redrobes]

Hi Mexikorn,

I think its a good thing that your asking about it instead of just wading into the melee that is commissions. First of all I would say do some free ones first and then you can get a feel for what people want from commissions in general. Also, the free requests, by their nature, tend to be less restrictive and more lenient with the requirements. Also, with the free ones you can bail on it if your not getting on well with it and also the client will have to accept whatever you put out since there is no contract. Speaking of contracts its a good idea to do the free ones and get a feel for what to do before having contracts written enforcing what you must do to satisfy the contractual obligations. A free commission has no obligations. You as the artist are also free to do what you like with the art you create without fear of offense or copyright (for the most part). Of course some people might take offense at your free work but that's their problem. When its free you get what you paid for it.

Having a selection of results from working for free commissions gives you a gallery of maps to show the standard of your work. When a client requests a map they might select based on your style instead of just price and quality. I always strongly recommend that people requesting a commission for money look at resulting previous commissions from an artists *on this guild* instead of other sites. Some people can take others work for their own and claim to be great and run off with payments. Onus is very much on the individuals to vet the artists and due their own due diligence. So good to have that built up as a reputation of historical completed commissions from the commission requests through to the final delivered maps.

Also bear in mind that some people on the guild are awfully good and if your client is making a proper product with a good budget behind it and needs great artwork for it then they have a wide range of choice to pick the best. Thus naturally, some members here are going to get a lot more commissions than others. I say this so as not to get any discouragement and it may take time to be competitive in the market. Those great artists here are likely to be setting a fee which is higher and also may have a wealth of work lined up with little free time to do any more which differentiate you and is where price and availability might mean your successful. So its all about where you place yourself and to know that information means you need to get in there and work at it a bit to get a feel for it.

[Mexikorn]

I appreciate the reply but it's been a few days now and no one has reached out to me. I don't know how frequented this forum or how long one has to wait to get an offer for a commission but I figure I'd better show a sign of life to show that I'm still alive and that the offer is still on the table. Perhaps I should create a thread in the commissions subsection of the forum for more exposure? Perhaps I should become more active and/or participate in the map contests to become more well known around these parts? idk

[Tiana]

Participating in the map contests is the best way to get prompts delivered to you on a regular basis. There are 2 a month so if you do both, you get 2 weeks to work on each map. The commissions section is for people to post about work they have available, not work they want.

[Gamerprinter]

Um... all I did was join the Cartographers' Guild back in 2007 and participated in monthly map challenges. After the second win, I got contacted by a small publisher asking for 3 maps, which I did for $25 each, since I was just starting out. I then started posting maps on Facebook, Google+ (which doesn't exist anymore), ENWorld, and other RPG gaming sites, where I started getting asks for commission work. Since 2007, I've done about 1500 maps on commission, though one client, Legendary Games, for example, has had me create 350 maps for just them in the last 4 years. So if you're lucky, you'll find a happy publisher that will hire you for all their maps!

I always ask clients to provide either a rough draft (it doesn't matter how crude the draft is, as long as you can understand it) or a very detailed textual description of the needs of the maps. If I am confused about anything in the drafts or text provided, I ask and get a clear answer before starting the work. If you're slow at map creation, meaning if its going to take you more than a day to create map, provide visual updates of your work status. Once you're done, you'll have to wait until the publisher, or author (sometimes publishers hook you up directly with the author, since any questions about the map the author is the best contact). Once completed you'll need the publisher/author to agree that you've met your commission, then to your preagreement regarding payment - get paid. You might need to tweak maps immediately after your work, or sometimes months away, when the map is about to be published and something wrong hadn't been caught until just prior to publication - it happens to me all the time.

Oh, and the other obvious thing, if you don't have one already, get an online portfolio of your work. It doesn't matter where, I have both DeviantArt and ArtStation, though the latter seems more professional, and I seem to get higher end publishers - for example, the art director at Paizo Publishing (you know Pathfinder and Starfinder) found some maps of mine on ArtStation and I did a commission for Paizo based on that. Though I've done Paizo work before - the art director wasn't aware at the time.

[damonjynx]

@Gameprinter Some very good suggestions there.

I sent an inquiry to a publisher regarding doing something like the Savage Worlds One-shots or one-page dungeons (as a sample I sent my "Crypt of the Witch King" one page dungeon entry) and mentioned that I also did cartography. I've done quite a bit of work for them since. The hardest thing is getting a foot in the door.

Make maps, just for fun and practice. Post them here in the appropriate sub-forum and ask for feedback. You'll be amazed at the quality of help you get and how fast you improve. Partake in the challenges, they get you doing things well outside your comfort zone. Start a finished maps album here - you can use this as your portfolio for prospective clients. Check in the "Commissions" thread and throw your hat in as Redrobes said. Most of all just persevere.