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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Eosin the Red" data-source="post: 1453764" data-attributes="member: 168">First Contact or Art For Sale!First ContactI am a neophyte in the art world. I mean, I don’t know jack. Lucky for me the fist two people I bumped into were darn helpful. First, like I mentioned earlier, I needed a map. I debated the possibilities and settled between two cartographers – <a href="http://www.velocity.net/~westwinds/" target="_blank">Christopher West</a>  and <a href="http://www.morningstarillustration.com" target="_blank">Morningstar Maps</a>. Christopher West tends to do more small location maps with very few large regional maps and truthfully, I suspected he might be a little rich for my blood. I had spoken to Clayton several times in the past when he started up Morningstar and his mapping is top notch. He also saved me some guesswork by listing his basic prices.I wrote to Clayton and he is a swell fella. We talked about contracts since I asked fairly bluntly what type he preferred and he mentioned that he had a basic one. We discussed finances, one of the bummers about being new is that I need to put more upfront than someone who has established a reputation. It was nice speaking to someone as a regular fella since I am not real good at professional lingo, after all I call most of my customers “Honey” and I wear pajamas to work. I am more than just a little laid back. Clayton accommodated that well.Next I wrote to <a href="http://www.stornc.rpggallery.com/" target="_blank">Storn Cook</a>. This took several days and when I got no reply after seven days, I sent a reminder note. Storn is also a really nice guy who indicated that he had responded to me earlier. So much for trusting my e-mail account. Storn gave me his basic prices but indicated that he was too busy to tackle my assignment right now. Rather than just head on down the road, I asked for suggestions. He recommends an open call at RPG.net Freelancers Forum.I should mention that I am averse to telling good people “no.” A personality defect of mine that has proven bothersome at times, it was for this reason that I approached individual artists in the first place. I do have a cardinal rule in life – when you ask a pro for his advice about his profession, it is best to assume that some divinely inspired insight of your own is probably not as well thought out as the “Professional Opinion” after all they call them professional opinions for a reason. So, I found myself registering on RPG.net, I lurk there occasionally but had never posted before.I placed this ad on Thursday:Man was I overwhelmed. I got close to 30 submissions. I found out something weird in the process. I sent each person an e-mail thanking them for their submission and confirming that I had received it. Some of the artists were quite surprised that I had bothered to respond to them. To be honest, it was a pain in the kiester. Writing notes to a couple dozen artists took up a great portion of my allotted work time for several days. I guess that not many folks send confirmation letters.You might also notice a few lessons to be learned in my ad – I never included my real name. That was a little embarrassing. I am always Eosin on the net cause there are no other Eosin’s but probably not the correct way to introduce yourself to professionals. Some people are also reluctant to send emails to you but feel perfectly fine posting to a message board? I can grok that.I sent everyone the little note and gave myself until Monday to make the decision. That was not enough time. Yes, I have already made my decision and it is posted over at PRG.net but stick around here and find out some of the pains of making decisions between a horde of talented people. Next article: You want HOW MUCH! Subtitled: “Honey, I just checked our bank statement. How much was this game stuff going to cost?”</blockquote>

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