Freelance illustration price samples

The illustration business is like a snowball... the more commissions you take, the more people will see your illustrations... and the more new commissions you will get. This is all very well, but unfortunately the price of a freelancer is in most cases also like a snowball: The more known they are, the higher are their prices - the snowball gets bigger and bigger.

I find that attitude both strange and wrong. Sure, the audience will respond more to a style they know and have seen before, but this doesn't necessarily mean that the artist has worked longer or harder with the illustration, does it?
My basic policy is that I aim at a fixed monthly income. This means that the price You will have to pay to make me take Your commission is directly connected to how long time it takes me to make the illustrations... and not to how many people who have seen my illustrations.

If Your commission is relatively small, I will work with a fixed price per hour, and for larger commissions I work with a similar fixed price per day.

Below, I have shown a collection of different illustrations taken from this homepage together with the price You would have to pay for a similar image, to give You an idea of the price level.

All prices are without cost connected to postage and cashing of international checks.

If You want to, feel free to take a look at an example of a production in progress, taken from an earlier commission!

For details on the system of payment, feel free to take a look at the FAQ section

Sketches Prices from 53 Euro Sketches are done mainly in pencil or crayon. They are not cleaned up. Cleaned-up sketches Prices from approx. 67 Euro Cleaned-up sketches are based on lose sketches, and are done in either pencil or pen. Illustrations for newspapers are also in this category. The sample with the trees is a series of cleaned-up sketches. Simple colouring by computer Prices from approx. 80 Euro Simple coloures drawings are based on cleaned-up sketches who have been scanned and coloured by computer. Simple colouring means that either the motive is simple or that the colouring is done without shading. Colours and shading by computer Prices from approx. 100 Euro More complicated images with several characters or background. These images are coloured by computer, just like the simple illustrations, but the colours have been shaded and more complex effects may have been added. Detailed images shaded by computer Prices from approx. 143 Euro This category contains large complex images, images with contour colouring and images with backgrounds. The colouring is done by computer. Complex combination techniques Price approx. 143-572 Euro A complex combination technique is used whenever Jakob use more than one separate illustration technique to make an illustration. It could mean colouring using water colour or other hand-done colouring styles, as well as comics and pencil-shaded illustrations coloured by computer. The mentioned price is the price of a single illustration. Upon agreement on a longer series or the illustration of a book, the price will drop drastically, because the price is calculated using days and not hours.