Transcripts
1. Introduction: [MUSIC] Hi, my name is Harry and I'm
a Professional Artist. I've worked for over a decade as a professional artist in
multiple different industries. My jobs have included creating user interface art for a major video game
developing company, a green screen footage editor, and a 3D background artist for a video production company. I'm working as a
lead 3D artist and later a studio director for an award-winning architectural
visualization studio. During my career as a
professional artist, I quickly realized that most
non-artist clients simply didn't think the same way I did when it came to
creative projects. This led to frequent
miscommunications that frustrated both myself and the client and lead to an overall more contentious
project than it should have. Over the years,
I've developed many different email writing
techniques that I've incorporated into my
workflow that have dramatically improved
client communications. Clear and effective
email communication is the basis of a solid
project foundation. Miscommunications during
these early phases can cause a project to go off the rails and acquire a lot more time, effort, and money to
get it back on track. In this class, we'll
learn how to write clear and effective emails to our clients as artists
working in a creative field. We'll be learning techniques
such as client idea guiding, effective question
and email formatting, dealing with overestimates and underestimate of the
difficulty of our work, and nailing down a deadline
with an elusive client. This class is meant
for any artist or aspiring artist that wants to learn how
to communicate easily and effectively
with their clients. These enhanced
communication techniques will lead to more
completed projects, happier clients, and
more repeat customers. We'll put the skills
we learn into practice with our class project. You will successfully
answer one of four hypothetical email
chains with a client. Each one of these
emails will focus on a specific issue that you
will need to deal with in a clear and effective
manner using all of the tips you've learned
throughout this class. Feel free to answer
all four mock emails if you want the extra practice. After you've crafted your
response to the situation, post your replies
to the gallery for my feedback on how well
you've overcome each issue. I hope you'll join me in
this class as we learn valuable email writing
techniques geared specifically towards artists
and creative professionals. I'll see you in
the first lesson.
2. What Common Issues Do We Face?: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we'll discuss common issues
you've likely run into as an artist communicating
with non-artist clients. After we define the
most common issues, we'll dive into each one in the following lesson and learn techniques to
overcome each one. What issues do we
face most often? As artists, our clients are
most often non-artists. Non-artists may find
it difficult to express their artistic
ideas and words, even though they
have a clear picture of what they want
in their minds. Artists need very
specific information from their clients in order
to complete their work, even if the client is unable to provide those
details clearly. We need to be able
to guide our clients through their ideas
so that we can get a clear picture of what
they actually want and can provide them the
artwork they paid for. The next issue you might
run into is when you're asking your client for answers to your important questions, however, they only
answer a few of your questions while
ignoring the rest. Alternatively, they could be
answering your questions, but with irrelevant information, meaning you're no closer to understanding what
they actually want. Due to their inexperience, our non-artist clients may have little understanding of how difficult something
actually is for an artist, so they will underestimate
difficult things and sometimes overestimate
easy things. This will warp their
perception of how long a project will
take to complete, or how much it'll cost them. Lastly, you might run
into a client who won't get you an actual
deadline for the project. They might say they needed
as soon as possible, or alternatively, there is no deadline at all
for the project. It's very likely that
neither of these is true and both have
their pitfalls. In the next few lessons, we'll be going
over each of these issues in their own video. We'll go over some real-world
examples and learn how to best deal with each
of these situations. I'll see you there.
3. How to Guide Your Client's Ideas: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we'll tackle our
first common issue. Your client isn't
able to clearly describe what they want
you to create for them. This happens for a
multitude of reasons but the most obvious
one is that they just aren't as familiar
with your art as you are. Our goal in our email
communication should be to guide the client to an outcome that
they'll be happy with. This might be you taking the
vague idea and shaping it into an attainable goal
or you may need to work with them through the
process of fully articulating the idea that they
have in their head so they can get exactly
what they want. Let's go over the process from
two different approaches. In the first situation, the client has given us a
vague idea of what they want. You can tell that they're having some trouble explaining
exactly what they want due to the lack of experience they have
with this topic. In our first email back to the client we need to take all of the information
they've given us and form it into a
concise direction. By reciting back to
them what their idea is from your perspective it
accomplishes two things. First, it allows you to get your thoughts straight
and on paper. This is an important first step for you as the artist
because it will illuminate what you
do know and what you do not know about the
client projects so far. As the artist, you're knowledgeable enough
about your work to realize where there are gaps in the information
you were given. This is your opportunity
to make note of these missing parts
in your response. Second, you're demonstrating to your client that you
are knowledgeable about your particular field and you are able to
take what they've said so far and formulate it into a concise plan of action. This will inspire confidence in your work and make
them more receptive to any future ideas or adjustments you might need
to make in the project. A second course of action
that guide our client through their ideas is one vault
picture references. As artists, we are trained to visualize concepts
in our mind without the need to always have direct representation
of this on paper. Your non-artists
clients will likely not develop this skill
quite as adeptly as you have and as such may find it difficult to verbalize what
they can see in their mind. This is where picture
references come in handy. When you feel confident you have at least a vague
idea of what they're looking for comb through your past work or look
online for examples that most closely match what you think your client is expecting. This will give your
client and immediate visual to pair with
their idea that they can use as a springboard for further describing what they
want you to do for them. Concerning a visual reference
I recommend you identify exactly what part of the image you're calling attention to. Try not to send
an image and just let the client
derive your intent. This will more than likely lead to miscommunication later on. To make your visual
references as useful as possible highlight
specific parts of your image using colors. That way a client can refer to exact parts of the image by their color rather
than trying to think of a way to describe
the detail or else attributing a name
to this detail that is incorrect or
confusing to you. For example, if
you were painting a landscape for a
client and they ask you to remove the trees in the background but they actually
meant for you to remove the trees in the foreground
you might have made a costly mistake by following
misinformed direction. This could be avoided by
clearly marking each area with trees in a unique color so the client can
refer to them easily. If somehow after all of your communications back
and forth still haven't figured out a concrete idea
of what they want ask them to instead send you a visual
reference of what they want. If likely prior to their
reaching out to you they saw something that
gave them the idea for the project you're
working on now. They'll hopefully be able to at least provide
you that image as a starting point for
your conversation using the techniques
we just discussed. In our next lesson,
we'll be learning how to ask our client effective
questions so that we can get all the
information we need to complete the project. I'll see you there.
4. How to Write Effective Questions: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we'll discuss how
to form clear and effective questions
for your client. This is integral to getting all the information
you need from your client in order to complete their project on
time and on budget. Inevitably, you will need to ask your client questions as you
work through their project. The way you ask your questions makes a huge difference however. A common approach
would be to write your questions in
paragraph form, just like any other email. It's typically what most people default to when
writing an email. However, there are some significant downsides
of this approach. The most obvious downside
is your questions just don't stand out from
the rest of your email. They simply look like any other section of
your email that at first glance tells the reader nothing about what it contains. Your clients are likely
busy with other tasks and their communication with you is only a small part of
their tasks for the day. They may only be
skimming your emails for important details
and are likely to miss things in a wall of text. This is where bullet
points come in handy. I know it might
seem like a really minor or obvious thing, but bullet points
have a lot of power within an email when it
comes to readability. When we break our questions
in a bullet points, we give our client
a clear signal that this part of the email is
different from the rest. It calls attention to possibly
the most important part of the correspondence with them. We avoid the problem
of questions being hidden in a
wall of text while also making each
individual question more readable as a by-product. When using bullet
points for questions, be sure to use them each time you have more than
a single question as it let your client know that anytime they
see bullet points, that feedback is
required of them. It makes their lives easier by making the skimming
process less tedious for them and it makes
your life easier because you know they are
actually seeing your questions. In my experience, clients will often copy your
bullet points in the reply and simply write their answers in a different
color next to each point. This can make understanding their answers much
easier for you as well. Our next technique when asking your client questions is to ask them in a yes or no
format whenever possible. By avoiding complex
multipart questions, we allow the client
to give us answers to our questions with as
little effort as possible. This means it will
take up less of their time to write a response, which makes them more likely to answer every question we ask. Your client would rather answer five yes or no questions than have to write out a paragraph to your complex multipart question. For example, if you were
designing a logo for a client and you need to know if the client would
prefer a wordmark, a combination mark,
or a pictorial mark, try asking your
question like this. Will your logo contain
only a symbol? Will your logo
contain only text? Will your logo contain
both text and a symbol? This method avoids using
terms client might not know, and it gets you a clear answer
to the questions you have. If the client feels the need to elaborate further
than yes or no, they can certainly do so, but it puts the
choice to write more in their hands
rather than yours. Either way you get the answer to your question even if they leave it as a simple yes or no. If it's simply isn't
possible to write your question in a
yes or no format, try to break your questions in a smaller points
that can have less complex answers to them than if you asked
it all in one go. In our next lesson,
we'll learn how to deal with a client
that is under or overestimating the
difficulty of the requests. I'll see you there.
5. Dealing With Misestimated Difficulty: In this lesson, we're learning how to deal with a client who is underestimating the
difficulty of their requests. They think something is easy when it's actually pretty hard. Or alternatively, a client who is overestimating the
difficulty of the requests, they think something is hard when it's actually pretty easy. This is a problem you'll
commonly come across after you've sent the first drafts
to a client for feedback. Upon seeing your work, they will hopefully
like what they see. However, they will almost always have something
that they want changed. This is where their
general inexperience with your craft comes into play. For our first example, let's assume you are a 3D animator and
you've been hired by a client to create
a funny animation of a cowboy riding a scooter. You send off the
first draft animation to the client, and luckily, they love it, except they want you to change the
scooter to a bicycle instead. You realize immediately that all the work you did to
animate the cowboy on the scooter is wasted if you need to change it to
him riding a bike. This will set you back a lot of hours reanimating the character and will likely cost the client more money
due to the setback. So we have a few
options in this case. Our first two choices
are not great. We can accept the
change and mentioned nothing of the setback
it will cause us. This will force us
to work extra hours of overtime to get it
done by their deadline. Losing money out of our
pockets in the process. Or we can decline
the change and tell the client that
it isn't possible with no further explanation. The client is unhappy
and will likely be difficult to work with for
the remainder of the project. Now let's talk about
the better solutions. First, we can let the client
know immediately that the request won't be possible within their current
deadline and budget. We need to explain to them in layman's terms why
the request is too difficult and time-consuming to complete based on the
current project description. We then have a few
options for the client. We let the client know
that the requests can be made, however, we will require additional
time added to their deadline. Make sure you are specific about the amount of
time that you need, and there will be a fee associated with the
additional work required. Alternatively, we let
the client know that their request won't be possible within the current
deadline and budget. However, we can work
with them to find a compromise that will work within their
deadline and budget. In this last example, let's assume we've
asked the client why the originally proposed
scooter no longer works. In our conversation,
we find out that their marketing manager thinks
scooters look too dated, they only suggested a bicycle because it was the first
thing that came to mind. They are not tied to
the idea of a bicycle. They just want something
other than a scooter. We can then explain to
them that the bicycle was too time-consuming
to make happen. But switching the
scooter to a skateboard would be a lot easier due to the similarity of the movements. This will allow the project
to remain on budget and on deadline while
still accommodating requests to remove the scooter. Clients are not as often tied to their ideas as they are
their budgets and timelines. They will usually
default to protecting their bottom line rather
than their ideas. In both of the last two options, we salvage our
relationship with a client while avoiding additional
costs on our end. Our clients most often underestimate the
difficulty of the requests. They do overestimate
the difficulty as well. Luckily, these situations are significantly easier
to deal with. If a client overestimates the difficulty of their request, meaning they think
something will be really difficult to do but in reality, it's actually pretty simple. Let them know right away
that their request is possible and actually
not difficult at all. By being honest with your
client that a request is easy, even though they
thought it was hard, you give them the
confidence that you are working in their
best interests and aren't going
to overcharge them just because they
don't know any better. This not only makes them
happy in the moment when they realize this request won't
hurt their bottom line, but it also makes them more
receptive in the future, if you need to tell
them that they are underestimating the
difficulty of a request. You demonstrated
to them that you know what you're talking about, and they will be less
resistant to any changes you feel need to be made to
keep the project on track. Whether a client is underestimating or
overestimating difficulty, the key to the project's
success is just being honest. A little bit of
goodwill can go a long way in client
relationships. In our next lesson, we'll
be learning how to get an actual deadline from an elusive client.
I'll see you there.
6. Dealing With Elusive Deadlines: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we're learning how to
get an elusive client commit to a deadline. When proposing a
project to a client, there's always a
discussion about the time it will
take to complete. In most cases, the client
would either provide a timeline right away that
you need to adhere, accept, or decline, or you will
tell them how long it takes you to complete the project and they will accept or decline. In both of these situations, a deadline is known upfront. However, there are times when
this won't go as planned. The first issue you might encounter is a client
that won't give you an actual deadline and only says that they need it
as soon as possible. The client thinks this
imposes a sense of urgency, however, the ambiguity only
complicates the project. The lack of a true deadline
and leaving it open to as soon as possible
leads to a lot of issues. The first issue is that
it puts the artist under undue stress because they can't effectively
budget their time. The artist only knows that the client would
like the project done yesterday and isn't willing
to let off the gas. The second issue with this vague deadline is if the client is only
prioritizing speed, you can't prioritize
quality at the same time. That means corners
will be cut and the final product will suffer in order to meet the accelerated
and ambiguous timeline. If the client receives
a subpar product, it reflects poorly on you and is likely to sour the relationship. How can we avoid
all these issues? First, we need to start
by asking the client to define what as soon as possible
actually means to them. Let your client know that it's difficult for you to budget their project effectively if there are no set goals to meet. Let them know that it's
in the best interest of the project budget and quality for them to give you
a definite timeline. Hopefully after
your explanation of the importance of a
defined timeline, they relent and give
you an actual date. It's now up to you
to let them know if this new timeline is acceptable based on
the current budget. If not, you'll need to work
with them to either cut back on the scope of the project or let them know that
more time is required. You can follow the
same approach from the underestimating
difficulty lesson to arrive in an acceptable
deadline if it's too short. In our second situation, let's assume that you've asked the client to provide
a real deadline, explain the importance of it, but they still remain
elusive on giving any details on when the
project needs completed. This is where you need to take the reins of the
project and give them a deadline if they are unwilling to give you
a meaningful one. Do you fear the client might
be difficult to deal with? You might want to add a bit of extra buffer time
for unknown issues. Give them a precise amount of time for each phase
of the project. Make sure you allot them a specific amount
of time to provide you feedback on
the project if you require their
continued comments. Deadlines can be totally
sabotaged if you require feedback from
your client to proceed, but they have no urgency
to give you that feedback. After you propose your timeline, you'll finally get some feedback from the client, good or bad. If the client doesn't
like your timeline, they will finally
give you a reason for the resistance and provide
you an actual timeline. At that point, you need
to decide if they're new deadline is feasible
to complete on budget. If not, consider giving them some adjustments to make
it possible on budget. In our first example, the client is pushing you to
work as fast as possible. What happens if the client
has no urgency at all? What if they say the project
has no deadline at all? They aren't worried about how
long it takes to complete. Often, no deadline actually means they haven't found
out what their deadline is. This means that when they find out when they need it done, they'll spring it on you
with little warning. This can obviously
put you in a bind as the person who needs to
complete the project. The process for solving this is similar to the as soon
as possible issue. Give them a precise
amount of time for each phase of your
project and also allot them a specific
amount of time to provide you feedback
on the project, if you require their
continued comments. We need to impose the
sense of urgency in them to keep the project moving. If this deadline works for them, now you can better budget
your time and avoid a project that drags out
forever and loses you money. If this deadline doesn't
work for them, congrats, you've now discovered
the secret deadline they had in their
mind all along. You can work from
here and figure out a compromise to meet
their needs on budget. In this lesson, we've learned
the pitfalls of a timeline that's too aggressive and a
timeline that's too passive. In our next lesson,
we'll be discussing our final class project.
I'll see you there.
7. Our Class Project: [MUSIC] Welcome to
the end of my class. It's now time to discuss
our class project. Our goal is to implement as
much of this knowledge you just gathered into a
mock email experience. We'll be answering mock
emails from clients that each exemplify a key
issue we discussed. The goal should be to
pick at least one of these mock email situations and provide a well-thought-out
response to the client. Bonus points if you
answer all four emails. In the first email,
your client is having a lot of trouble
explaining what they want. They're being vague and using made-up terms to describe
what they want you to create. Get them back on track and get a clear idea of what
they want you to create. In the second email, the client isn't answering
the questions you ask, and when they do, they answer
them in an unhelpful way. Formulate your
questions in a way that will get your
client to answer your questions clearly and get you the info you need to
complete the project. In the third email, your client is
inexperienced in his overestimating the difficulty
of some of the requests, while drastically
underestimating the difficulty of
other requests. Handle both of these situations and keep your client happy. In the fourth email,
your client is being evasive with the deadline
for their project. Figure out the best way to
get a realistic deadline from the client that will
still keep you on budget. After you've crafted your
response to the situation, post your replies
to the gallery for my feedback on how well
you've overcome each issue. Just make sure to tell me which mock email you're responding to. Thank you all for joining
me in this class. I really appreciate the support. If you found the information
in this class helpful, please consider leaving
an honest review to let other artists know if this course is worth
their valuable time. Feel free to check
out the other classes on my profile if
you liked this one. I hope to see you all in my
future classes. See you soon.
Harry Helps, Professional 3d Artist
