... Last night I made a small text change to my signature file, and this morning I discovered that the the Coca Cola emoticon: :coke:, is no longer in the 
emoticon list -- yes, I checked, and the 
can is still there, but the :coke: can is missing, 
is up with that?!
deviants have spoken. Coke deserves to have it's emoticon brought back, and I think Dr. Pepper deserves one too!
Can you say R - E - S - P - E - C - T ?
Let me start this blog by promising that if I commission you to work on a project with me, I will not only be respectful of you and your work, but I also promise to respect your opinions, feelings and desires. It doesn't mean I'll always agree with you, but I will always treat you with respect (even if you are being an @$$). You never know who you are going to bump into on dA it could be your next client, and old/new friend, maybe a future boss, or the next freelancer you hire -- who knows.
Okay, okay, enough of the warm fuzzies... I need to vent a little.
[soap box mode on]
Just yesterday I was IMing with a dA friend who is working on a commission for me. He said he never takes money until the illustration he is working on is done. That way he doesn't feel guilty if he has to postpone or cancel the commission. Handling things this way is a perfectly reasonable course of action. It is also reasonable to expect payment up front, or a 50/50 arrangement. Each of these payment schedules has its pros and cons for both the commissioner and the artist. I also told my friend, that I hadn't been burned by anyone on dA (at least not yet). So I hear people asking. "What's the big deal Joe? As long as everybody agrees who cares?
Well, usually it isn't a big deal, but every once and a while... Some of my readers may know that dA is mostly a place where I concentrate on my hobby art. So far, I have interacted with about two-dozen dAers. Some of these folks are becoming fiends and I regularly interact with them, while a few are just acquaintances and I only chat with every now and then. With most of these dA friends, I approached them and asked if they were able and/or willing to work on a commission for me. Until today's bad dA experience -- which at its heart was just a simple communication error, I never really had any problems with individual dAers. Sure, I've gotten a few "no" responses from artists, one or two "I don't have time" answers, plus a few who just don't return e-mails. However, most of the dAers I have met seem more than willing and eager to share their skills and expertise.
This is all good stuff, until I forget the first cardinal rule... "Operating under the premise that people are inherently stupid will never put you in a situation where you will be disappointed." I hate this rule, but all to often it is too true...
For the last couple of weeks I have been going back and forth with a dA artist about a commission. Last week the artist shares a sketch with me. It is good, not perfect but really quite good. So I ask the artist to make 2 important changes. One of the changes is pretty trivial (work-wise); the other is much more involved. The artist agrees to make the changes, but warns that any additional changes will cost more money on the commission.
Generally, that wouldn't alarm me, but in this case it should have been my first clue that something was not right. The second clue (and first strike) was shortly after the first, when the artist indicated I should add an additional $5 to the commission price we agreed upon, to cover PayPal fees. I mean, who doesn't know PayPal charges a fee to the money recipient (it is a cost of doing business). Unless you've only used Xoom (which passes fees on to the buyers directly) then this should be the seller's responsibility. Even though I was hesitant, I agreed to the increased charge.
The 3rd clue (and second strike) came last night. I hadn't heard anything during the week, and I thought the artist was going to send me a final sketch version of the picture before I sent the PayPal transfer. In the grand scheme of things, I was the one who was mistaken about this (I'll blame language barriers, but I should have been paying closer attention), so I apologized for my error. But in the meantime, the artist starts sending SCUD missile e-mails calling me a lair and accusing me of playing games. I sent one more message, again indicating that I was sorry for the mix-up, hoping that the artist would stop sending the SCUDs. But the artist continued to reply with curt and inflammatory messages -- going so far as to call my integrity into question.
Now I am the first person to admit I have no clue what is going on at the other end of a dA connection. Maybe this artist was burned one too many times, and so was concerned about loosing money. On the other hand, the artist doesn't really know what is going on my end either (like, that I had the money sitting in my PayPal account waiting to be transferred). The artist was also not aware that that one of the departments I manage at my employer is the marketing and communications department (plus my Mom is a graphic designer, and my sister is the creative director for a major US magazine). As a result of my job, I deal with writers, graphic designers, photographers and printers every day. I negotiate contracts with these folks, direct their projects, etc... Because of that experience and because of my Mom and my sister, I not only have lots of experience directing design projects, but I know how to treat (and how I should be treated by) professional artists.
So now we've got all these SCUDs flying around. At first, I was just going to eat the abuse and pay to get the commission finished. But the fact is that the third, and final, strike is really attributable to my second cardinal rule... the one that I learned from my Mom, "People only accuse you of the bad things that they would do themselves, in similar circumstances" -- my Spidey sense is tingling -- strike 3.
By this point, I have come to the realization that it will be best to end the relationship as professionally as possible, so I e-mailed the artist and expressed why I was terminating the commission. I was polite, but firm. Since no money had changed hands, all that was really lost was some time on both our parts. I apologized again and wished the artist good luck on whatever comes next.
Of course, the next morning, I open my e-mail, and find a last SCUD missile. Figuring that discretion was the better part of valor, and needing to go find another illustrator to do the job anyway, I ignored the message and blocked the artist from my dA profile, and went on my merry way -- my first bad dA experience is now out of the way
I feel sooo much better!
[soap box mode off]
To all the other dAers I've commissioned (or talked with, about a commission) thanks for all your hard work and respect. I appreciate both!
- Joe
P.S. I have a couple more Deviant stamps that I have been working on and some art I commissioned to upload -- as soon as I get the new scanner working. But still no real progress with TurboCAD
:thumb32539252:
:thumb46150111:
