priced a commission at 320, then my partner asked how many hours it took and I changed the subject
So I took a commission last month, a gouache portrait of this woman's dog, small, maybe 5x7, and I quoted her 320 and I felt SO confident about it in the message. Sent it, she said yes immediately, and I was like ok cool I'm a professional.
Then it took me eleven days.
Not eleven days of work, obviously, but eleven days of the thing sitting on my desk while I redid the left ear four times because the fur kept going muddy, which is a gouache problem I created for myself by underpainting too warm. Plus two full sessions just on the background because she wanted "the same green as her sofa" and I had one blurry phone photo of the sofa. And the framing, which I did myself because I'm cheap, and I chipped the corner and had to start the frame over.
My partner asked, very gently, like genuinely curious, "so what's that work out to an hour" and I literally said "oh I don't really think about it that way" and went to go water a plant that does not need water.
I do think about it that way. I think about it constantly. I've just decided that the number I'd get if I actually divided it is a number I'm not ready to see yet, and there's something kind of insane about that, right? Like I'll happily tell a stranger 320 with my whole chest but I won't do one division problem in my own kitchen.
Anyway she loves it, she sent me a photo of it on the wall next to the actual dog, and I'm not saying I regret the price. I'm saying I quoted the version of me who paints fast and it got done by the version of me who repaints an ear four times. Still working out which one of those people should be setting prices.
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The eleven days is the honest number and the 320 is the dishonest one, and you already know which of them you're avoiding telling your partner. But the ears aren't really the story either. You underpainted warm, then fought it cool, layer over layer, and gouache punishes that because it goes milky the moment you load it. The fix is not the fifth ear. It's that you now know what warm underpainting does to fur, and that knowledge is what the next commission is actually paying for. Charge for the second dog differently than the first. That's not gouging, that's just how any of this works. I did the same thing for years with a turpentine-and-wax surface I kept rebuilding because I'd sealed it too early. The lesson cost me about four canvases before it stuck.
The knowledge-is-what-the-next-one-pays-for line is right, but I'd push on one part. You're telling them to charge for the second dog differently because they learned the warm underpainting lesson. Mostly true. But sometimes the lesson is that the underpainting was the work, and the muddy ear is what happens when you keep fixing instead of starting over. Two sessions on the sofa green and four ears is not a pricing problem, it's a decision problem, and those are not the same bill. First dog you learn the material. Second dog you learn to throw the board away at hour three and eat it. Charge for the throwaway too, or you'll keep paying for it yourself.
ok so the "throw the board away at hour three and eat it" line landed like a slap, in a good way. because you're right that I keep calling it a pricing problem because a pricing problem has a number attached and I can argue with numbers, but "I didn't want to start over" has nothing to argue with, it's just true and it's embarrassing.
and the sofa green was absolutely a decision problem. I sat there for two sessions trying to mix the EXACT green off a phone photo she sent me, which, she was looking at it on her own phone with brightness all the way up, the green doesn't even exist. I was chasing a color that only lives on one screen. that's not underpainting knowledge, that's me not having the guts to say "this is the green, it'll read as your sofa, trust me."
so fine, I'll take it. the ears are a decision problem wearing a technique costume. but I still want to know what you actually do at hour three when the drawing underneath is good but the color isn't. do you photograph it first so it's not really gone? because I think that's the thing that would let me eat it
ok the "charge for the second dog differently than the first" thing genuinely reordered my brain a little. because I've been thinking of 320 as like... a moral fact about my worth or something, and it's not, it's just the price of dog #1 where I was also paying tuition. I learned the warm-underpainting-fur thing on her dime and I'm not gonna pretend that didn't happen.
the "dishonest number" bit stung but in a good way, haha. I did change the subject. I literally said "anyway what do you want for dinner."
curious though, when you say you did t... (I assume that cut off, but did you keep a log of hours on your early ones? I keep meaning to and then I don't, because part of me doesn't want to know)