Missed this post=(...

Ya pretty much what has been said covers it.

I have done a few jobs for small unknown places as well as 1 or 2 with companys that i've heard of.

Contacts are a must if you can get them it just covers both you and the employer so both of you know whats expected how much money and time frame for the work to be done.

Money for art work I usally ask for a bit upfront to buy supplies depending on the job. For design jobs a bit of cash gets me new markers, paper. etc. For the digital stuff money comes when the job is comepleted. The employer doesn't get the final model till money has been paid and has signed off on various jpgs along the way.

I've done charcter design work where the money was actully really great for just concepts as well as having a nice clean contract. Then sometimes you fall into the possible jobs where they want the whole farm all at a cheap price. Sometimes depending one the situation I've have taken a few.

Hours change from project to project... Usally as an artist you will have a idea how fast you can produce the work so you take that and add a few hours just incase something comes up that takes the project a bit longer so your covered.

The main thing with freelancing is like Mike said is contacts. Once you start getting a bit of recognition from contacts and other artists work becomes a bit easier to find.

Ever since I complete the Cyber Frog I've been contacted many times for small modeling jobs as well as being approched by a magazine and a CG art book to use the image.

Right now Kev and Dave keep me pretty busy so I pretty much working fulltime for them and they are great to work for.

Hope that helps bud..