New year and my blood pressure already rise...

[simmsimaging]

I might be misinterpreting your point Brett, but I strongly disagree with the notion that if something takes you less time, it's worth less.

I do agree that time is the only way to consistantly quote, but if a task takes you less time due to investment in your skills/staff/set-up then your rates should increase to reflect that. Granted, I am talking skilled tasks here (modelling, texturing, re-touching) not technical speed increases, such as rendering...

Extrapolating your idea at it's most basic level - those that are faster & more efficient at their jobs would end up earning the same amount as those that are not.

I think you might be misunderstanding me, but I'm not sure. If I read you correctly your first two points are actually kinda contradictory: if something takes less time, but is not worth less then you are not seeing time as a consistent way to quote, at least not in a way that makes sense to me?

Perhaps the confusion is this: when I say a job that takes less time should cost less, I am not saying your *rate* should be lower, only that you should charge for the amount of time you put in. This is relative to your *own* time and rate to do the work, not to someone else. Someone else who is less skilled will take more time, but it is very unlikely they are charging the same hourly/daily rate. They *should* be cheaper than you - but by the hour is how you would measure it (or by the day- whatever unit of time you like to bill by) not by the 'job'.

To simplify: you set your rate to reflect your perceived and actual value (your skills, the overhead of software, hardware, staff, training time, rent etc, etc.) Then you charge by the hour to work. If a job last year took me 2 days and this year takes me one day then I would charge 1/2 the money this year (assuming it's all labour for the sake of the point) - but by the hour I'm still making the same (also assuming my rate hasn't changed for other reasons).

I find this can be hard to swallow at times, because it *feels* like I'm working for less, but that's just instinctive thinking about the value of a job without thinking about how that value got there in the first place. When I really think about the cost of the job it sits just fine.

Because so many factors can change from job to job, and it's so hard to track variables I find it simplest just to go by the hours in and make sure I'm comfortable with my hourly rate. This way I don't have to worry about what a job *might* be worth to someone else or at some other time in any kind of abstract way. It's all very concrete and easy to measure.

Make better sense now, or am I still off base?

/b

[AJ Jefferies]

We still use time as a constant factor but as our service improves, we adjust our daily/hourly rate accordingly - this is across the board mind, we don't change our rates on a per job basis. For example, we currently charge approx 35-40% more than we did say 3 years ago.

If we didn't do this then we'd be increasing our workload but always earning exactly the same.

Does that make sense?

[simmsimaging]

Totally. They are two very different factors: hourly rates, and how much you actually charge per job based on the hours in. It gets confusing when they get mixed up inappropriately. I was originally just speaking about the latter and taking the former as a given. I think we are on the same page.

As a side note, I wish I could say the same about rates: my rates are lower now than they have been in a very long time. Market pressures being what they are... That's for retouching though - CG rates are stable.

[Sawyer]

Hmm - I think really what drives this is market forces not what we want to be paid. If we get faster then we can charge more and get more clients - do more work in the same time and make more. If it is worth $500 a view to a client to have renderings done - then we can figure if that will take us 10 hours or 3 hours or 30 hours. You can spend 50 hours on a building but if its not worth it to the client you are wasting your time.