How Much Does Animation Cost Per Second? (Click to see the blog post)
When a client approaches me for animation work, the trickiest part is always negotiating the price. Most individuals interested in freelance animation don’t realize how much time, money, and effort goes into even the simplest of cartoons.
Above, I’ve listed famous examples of animation, along with how much each second cost to create (Budget Adjusted for Inflation / Running Time). Hopefully this can help other animators and potential clients judge pricing more clearly.
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AcidX
That's a great post man.
In the past, I've worked with a sales team who sold small little animated clips for websites, as a part of our web designs. They struggled with pricing and how to structure it so I had to write/explain it and basically winged it.
Then explaining to other personal clients that the going rate generally starts at about $1k per minute of animation, for an independent animator .... the clients always try to undercut and act like they know better because they had a budget in mind.
This article is going to really help calmly push that point home in the future. Nice one :)
calslater
Awesome, I'm glad! Yeah, freelancers don't have to charge THIS much, but it'll help clients realize Pixar level stuff doesn't come cheap.
What I usually do is start with their budget, since that's the most solid variable, and let them know the time/quality they can expect.