After getting myself a full time employment and having a bit more disposable income I've been shopping around for a number of higher-priced/quality commissions (originally, my hard limit was $20 per full coloured commission, nowadays i've been investing a number of ~$30 commissions); some artists I found and eventually commissioned was great, not only in the final product, but generally been great people to talk to and to maintain long-term business and friendship. Not to mention there are a number with whom I have commissions for the past 4 years and/or more than 5 times and still going strong
However, they still amount to an agonising minority over the amount of prospective artists I have approached.
You see, for me, commissions isn't simply about paying artists to draw things I want - I also want to challenge artists to draw something that's one step above what they're used to draw, to allow some artistic freedom on the artists' side to experiment things they would have otherwise been hesitant to do so with other commissions, and most importantly, to enjoy having drawn my commission/artists as much as I enjoy receiving their end product and stare at them for extended period of time.
Instead, there have been a number of artists who, after a brief conversation with them, gives me none of those impressions. Most of them gives me one-word answers ("ok", "yes", "thanks" etc), complete refusals to answer general questions ("just pay me and I’ll draw what u want"), or doing a piss-poor job of actually wanting to maintain the commission/communication with their buyers (not in terms of slow to respond, more like not willing to discuss the character details, the ideas, and share any sort of WIPs for possible corrections, or even having a history of rant journals, etc)
I do not deny that the times are tough, pays are reduced and stress levels are high, and artists need all the financial support they can get; but really, if you want to offer your service to other people; is it too much to ask for that you actually give them impression that you want to do the said services you're offering, and perform some sort of customer-retention, instead of just making it sound like some sort of demotivating/demoralising chore, and you'd rather do other things?
I could not be bothered at how dirt cheap you're offering your commission or the quality level of the artwork you offer; but if you lack the human attitude of the whole business, I'm going to invest my money on other artists who are more willing to make the commission a pleasant one.
Maybe I'm just being overly idealistic or my (moral) standards are set to unrealistic levels for artists to follow; so I would like some perspective from Artists' side if anyone would like to offer some.
But otherwise, for the "minority" of artists that makes commissions awesome (and vise versa) , love every single one of you and keep up the awesome work!
Rubycored