Financial Frustrations In Creative Career

[Focus Shift]

I'm 23 years old, my skillsets are in video editing, 3D animation, music, pretty much anything related to multi media. After the spring semester of 2018, I dropped out of college to create an animated series. It didn't pan out and I felt horribly depressed for six months. After dealing with some mental health issues I found stability in some freelance work and various projects. However, lately I've felt frustrated because everything feels like a time suck from everything else. If I work on freelancing and making content for others, I get paid, but that takes away time from creating content for my channel (and it's not enough to even move out and be on my own, 10,000 dollars or so a year). If I create content for the YouTube channel to build an audience for the more ambitious projects, that takes time from 3D animation, etc. Sometimes I'm unsure about whether or not I should have gone to school for 3D animation, however the average salaries of graduates of those schools aren't that good, and I feel my skillset is decent enough to where I wouldn't have to go back. Leo once mentioned that 3D modelers/animators make 50 to 100 dollars an hour, and that just blows my mind. In the long term, having my own content would feel better, building a community, providing value and thought provoking insights, while making a living. Freelancing has a more immediate pay off, although I don't know how to find clients who would be serious enough to pay me thousands of dollars or more per project, so I could move out and live on my own. My end goal is to create an animated series, but that is very time consuming, would require a lot of funding, and a team of highly dedicated people on board. 3D animation is what I'm most passionate about, but I'm unsure how I'd make my own vision full time. If anyone has any suggestions for how I could get better clients, or turn my channel into a more viable business, it would be of great appreciation. Perhaps you've even seen a few of my videos, it's "Focus Shift Media" if you'd like to see some of the content and give me any feedback. Thank you so much for any input that you have  And Leo, if you're reading this, you were a huge inspiration that gave me the artistic confidence in myself to drop out of school and pursue this full time. 

Blessings,

   -P

Edited January 28, 2022 by Focus Shift

[universe]

28 minutes ago, Focus Shift said:

I'm 23 years old, my skillsets are in video editing, 3D animation, music, pretty much anything related to multi media.

Dude I don't know where you are living but I've seen these industries taking off big time!

You have anything BUT an unclear financial future

Now if you would be in the hotel business... or travel industry as a whole. Well...

 

Your path isn't straight ahead. And there is no way for you to know right now what that path will look like. Don't limit yourself to freelancing or youtube. Maybe in the next month you meet a group or a someone who happens to know the owner of a football club who wants to get into media by starting a new series and is looking for an animator. Or someone sees the work you have done and wants you as a partner for his production company. Or you yourself get an idea about a new service/product you want to offer that combines your creativity in a way you have never imagined before.

These opportunities can happen (and often do happen) where we least expect them to be. Don't try to "learn" and fact check your journey. Have your goal in mind and set sails in the direction you think is right. Check if it is bringing you closer and adjust accordingly. Build up momentum.

[puporing]

@Focus Shift I sort of know someone who's doing freelance 3D animation, combined with graphic design and illustration, so more like marketing side of things. He was doing pretty well/steady most of this clients seem to be startups or well established companies, maybe some networking could help with that.

[flowboy]

5 hours ago, Focus Shift said:

In the long term, having my own content would feel better, building a community, providing value and thought provoking insights, while making a living. Freelancing has a more immediate pay off

Forget about "long term" and "short term".

All I hear when people say those words, is "what I really want" and "what I would kind of accept".

You are not having to provide for yourself yet!!

That is a great opportunity to create what you want long term, NOW.

Save yourself 10 years of struggling to pay the bills so you can 'finally' do what you really want.

Take all the time for yourself, live at home with your parents if I understand correctly, don't waste any time freelancing if it's not what you actually want to do. Take all that time and put it into your "long term" plan. Then remove the word "long term" from it.

Life is short and you are more powerful than you think.

[Yarco]

Creative people suck at business, marketing, and selling their craft

Business people suck at being creative

If you can get halfway good at both, or partner with someone to handle the half you're bad at, that's when you can make bank $$$$$$.

Your video editing alone is worth at least $50 - $100/hr. Destiny's current video editor makes $200,000/year

To turn your channel into a more viable business, I think you need to hold off on the animated series for now. Putting out one high-quality animation a month isn't going to build an audience or start generating income for you fast enough. Ideally you need to find something you can put out once a week fairly easily without burning out in the process.

I think a lot of the high-level stuff you're making videos about now could be too niche to quickly get widespread success. If you're willing to temporarily sacrifice your vision a bit and do stuff with more mass appeal, it could get you there faster. What comes to mind is making animations about current events. I bet an animated video explaining what's going on in Ukraine right now would blow up. The problem is you need to identify what's going to be big news and start working on it right away in order to get the video out while it's still relevant. Just an idea.

Sometimes you gotta sacrifice your vision and make the "How to make a girl squirt" video before you can start talking about enlightenment to 500k people.

[Leo Gura]

5 hours ago, Yarco said:

Sometimes you gotta sacrifice your vision and make the "How to make a girl squirt" video

Or maybe the enlightenment videos are just a way to hook you into learning about how to make girls squirt

- - - - - -

@Focus Shift Getting clients in a field like 3D animation all hinges on your portfolio. If you build an awesome portfolio people will want to hire and work with you. And until then no one will.

The big money in 3D animation is not in modeling or animating per se, it's in the project management side and the artistic direction side. If you can demonstrate that you have the skills to spearhead and complete exceptionally artistic 3D animation projects, from start to finish -- that's where you can earn some big bucks. A vanilla 3D modeller is not going to earn a lot. You either need project management skills, art direction skills, specialized technical skills, or a unique artistic style. To gain paid well in digital art you need to develop yourself as a unique and standout artist, with a specialized style.

Check out how digital artists feature themselves on ArtStation: https://www.artstation.com

Freelancing can be hard to start off with. You might be better off developing a portfolio and applying to studios as a full-time 3D artist or animator. This would allow you to develop skill, experience, and build up a savings. After a few years of that you could transition to freelance. You could also work on improving your portfolio and technical skills while working for the studio. A studio environment will force you to rapidly develop your skills. Try to find a good studio that will invest in your growth and push your abilities to the cutting edge.

[integration journey]

@Focus Shift your youtube channel is fucking awesome. I loved the dating video. I'm looking forward to watching more of your videos 

[mmKay]

4 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Or maybe the enlightenment videos are just a way to hook you into learning about how to make girls squirt

R e c o n t e x t u a l i z e d. Org

[Focus Shift]

@Yarco That is worth considering. I do have some content in the works that is a bit more practical that more people could relate to. My next one being "How to deal with people's sh*t!" 

[Focus Shift]

A lot of good input here, so here's a list of action steps I've complied based on these insights 

Following your passion, become dedicated - I've mapped out all the content for the year on a monthly schedule

Networking - There is a Steve Vai guitar camp I signed up for over the summer, there might be some people who need music videos there.  

Portfolio - Curate items to apply for certain types of projects/clients 

Lastly, passive income - I would like to make courses out of my skills. Does any one have any insight into how to make the most out of gumroad/patreon? A lot of artists talk about that, but  there's a lot of marketing that goes into it. 

 

[Yarco]

20 minutes ago, Focus Shift said:

Lastly, passive income - I would like to make courses out of my skills. Does any one have any insight into how to make the most out of gumroad/patreon? A lot of artists talk about that, but  there's a lot of marketing that goes into it. 

If you want to make full-length online courses for something like 3D animation, I'd look into using an actual online course platform like Teachable, Thinkific, Kajabi, etc. Look at the pricing and features, I forget which one seemed like the best value when I was looking.

I would price your courses at $100 minimum. If you want to make $30k/year from courses, it's way easier to sell 300 courses @ $100 than 1,500 courses @ $20.

Gumroad / Patreon I feel like people aren't in the mindset to pay more than $10 or $20 for something, I could be wrong.

Even Udemy you probably won't be selling a course for what you deserve. But the upside of Udemy is it's probably the largest online course platform, they host it all for you, and you show up in their search so the marketing is basically done for you.

Expect about 1% of your audience to convert whenever you launch a product... so if you made a video announcing your new course on Youtube today to 1250 subs, you'd probably sell 12 - 13 copies. $1,200 minus fees, hosting costs, etc, let's say $1,000. If you can create your entire course in about 50 hours of work, then you should get at least $20/hr for the time you put in pretty quickly, then you can do marketing to continue getting more sales over time.

[EugeneTheSage]

Experienced 3d artists don't recommend going freelance while you are a newbie, neither they recommend doing 'your own thing' they recommend going to the studio where your skill will ramp up and after 5-6 years you are ready to go to freelance. As a 3D modeler, I've made the mistake of doing my own projects. First I've decided to do a model of a tank in a steampunk style from my own concept, but this project was too big for me. Then I've tried to do a steam engine model, but again - too big. I wasted a lot of time on such indulgencies and now I do courses all the time - my skill develops fast and I don't intend to perform some 'own' projects in the next few years. 

1 hour ago, Yarco said:

I would price your courses at $100 minimum. If you want to make $30k/year from courses, it's way easier to sell 300 courses @ $100 than 1,500 courses @ $20.

I think you should forget about selling courses before developing outstanding skills yourself and forget about 100$. This top-rank tutorial costs 45 bucks.

https://cgmasters.gumroad.com/l/zTVHi

I would recommend you focus on developing skills instead of following your passion.

 

[Focus Shift]

@EugeneTheSage I'm no newbie. I've been a user of After Effects since 2014, and a user of Blender since 2012. I even have a few clients. The income however, is not consistent enough for me to move out and successfully be on my own. The problem is not my technical abilities, but finding the best way to generate the income with the skills I have, while also having enough time to develop Focus Shift.

This is some of my work:

https://www.artstation.com/pthibault7823

 

Edited January 31, 2022 by Focus Shift

[Leo Gura]

4 hours ago, Focus Shift said:

The income however, is not consistent enough for me to move out and successfully be on my own.

That's the most common problem with freelancing of any kind. It's not a consistent paycheck.

[EugeneTheSage]

@Focus Shift Sorry

[Superfluo]

5 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

That's the most common problem with freelancing of any kind. It's not a consistent paycheck.

How do you deal with that? Any advice? More and better self-promotion? More networking? Being an introvert, this seems a crucial sticking point for introverts or people with poor networking skills (which obviously is solved by improving your networking skills and social skills). How to strategically deal with this obstacle?

[Nahm]

19 hours ago, Focus Shift said:

people who need music videos there.  

Just curious, no deeper implication here.. do you have any videos you’ve made for someone else’s songs which you could link? Thanks. 

Steve Vai btw, ??. Pretty amazing. 

[Michal__]

What Leo said about building a portfolio + getting a job, so you can move out. 

You can go stock shelves at walmart for 8 hours a day and then work on your business for 4 - 8 hours. You will have to get rid off your hobies and plan out your meals so that you dont spend too much time eating but once your business takes off you can do whatever you want and you will be in a better position than people who managed to get their degree.

If you dont have the energy to work after your day job for so long, then take modafinil every morning 4 days a week, until your business starts generating enough money for you to be free.

Btw if you work on your business while living on your own, you will

a) be less distracted (by other people who lived with you)

b) be in a better mindset, therefore more likely to succeed

c) learn how to manage your time properly

 

[ItsNick]

Perhaps you could research possibilities such as working part-time or with a flexible contract (I personally got a unique job at a tech startup for 2-3 days a week)

 

Now if you add up income from a part-time job and you focus on increasing your online income streams, move out to a small apartment, and keep your living expenses low, then you might still have enough time left to do what you need to do to advance your creative career.

Edited January 31, 2022 by ItsNick

[Focus Shift]

@Nahm Here's some examples