I’ve been freelancing for eleven years and I love it! Despite the high highs and low lows, overall its been a great career choice for me. But freelancing is not for everyone. I’ve written about the drawbacks and benefits before. Recently I came across a great post written by Chad at ProFreelancing.com that looks at it from another angle:
13 Reasons Why You Should NOT Be A Freelance Writer
The article is aimed at writers, but you could substitute “artist” for “writer” and his comments would still hold true. I agreed completely with every reason on his list except #5 (“Poor Typist”), which obviously doesn’t apply to artists, and possibly #6 (Poor Marketing). Everything else is dead-on.
I certainly wouldn’t want to discourage anyone from pursuing a freelance career. But before you take the plunge, you would be wise to take Chad’s advice to heart.
Great points are made in the article and I agree with all of them. I love my job but sometimes get discouraged when clients don’t always pay as they should. I think sometimes they forget illustrators and their agents have bills, too!
Hey Cedric, thanks for passing this along! I saw the title in my RSS feed and thought “hey, I wrote something like that!”
Anyways, thought I’d let you know that I read your blog regularly – keep up the great work!