Here's the thing though -- and the place where a lot of Rodimus' issues come from -- you take that job for free, as a hobbyist or someone without a business, and suddenly that job is A Job That Can Be Done For Free. If a company says "hey, can u make us a poster, if we use it u get exposure" -- that sucks, because that's a job that should be paid for. Someone with the design skills to do that job should be paid for that job. There's a culture, among businesses, of "oh, we'll get someone with good skills but no name who's willing to work for free" that makes it hard for professionals to find work that doesn't underpay, because of the wide-spread view that someone out there will surely be willing to do it for free.
The other thing with exposure, on the other end of things, is that it's something you have the power to generate yourself. If Joe Writer has a Really Cool Idea He Can't Afford To Pay Me To Draw but no platform, then me making my own work and putting it out on social media will get me just as much exposure (if not more!) than me bringing Joe Writer's Cool Idea to life.
The first comic job I did was a collaboration; the writer told me she couldn't afford to pay me much, so I was working for about a third of what I would ask now, but I considered it worth it because she had an audience and knew how to write a comic and I learned really valuable skills from working with her!
I've also done a collaboration with friends for an anthology -- I was the inker, one friend pencilled and another friend was a writer; we worked together on a pitch, submitted our idea, and when it was accepted we agreed to split the pay and got to work.
And like, I would absolutely do fan stuff for a creator I admire. I've done guest art for a couple of other webcomics' books for free because I was a big fan!
I don't think it's evil to work for free/low pay or anything; but here's the deal. Who are you doing the work for?
- for a company that claims to have the resources to get you in front of a lot of eyeballs? That company should have the resources to pay you. They are exploiting you. If you wanna go for it like, you can I guess, but you gotta realise that this is the sort of thing that keeps professionals from getting work -- companies know that SOMEONE out there won't mind getting exploited.
- for someone who can't afford to pay you? Then there's a good chance they don't really have that much more of a platform than you do. You could get yourself just as much exposure by making your own comic.
So then, the person I'd be working for has to be able to offer something. They have to have a project I'm super interested in, or be a friend I'm excited to work with, or have skills I'm interested in learning from, or a cause I really believe in. If they don't have anything like that to offer, I'm almost always better off doing my own thing and just, not collaborating.
so it's not, ARTISTS: NEVER WORK FOR FREE, but, Artists: never feel like you have to work for free for someone else. Never feel like working for free for someone else is the only way to get the exposure you want. Don't let people push you into believing that it's the norm and that custom artwork isn't worth money, or that you'd better lower your standards or else no man will marry you no one will ever work with you! It's also a warning to BE CAREFUL, because a lack of pay is the first sign of a lack of professionalism, of not realising how much work the project in their head requires. Sure, maybe this one guy is the diamond in the rough! But a lot of us have seen so many young artists go "it's fine, I know I'm not getting paid so I'm fine with it! It's just for fun!" and then watched that turn to drudgery and frustration before the project is done (or, we've been there ourselves).
Someone who means well but doesn't know what they're doing can be just as awful to work with as someone who's actively exploiting you.
But like, I'm not telling you want to do; I'm not your mom. If you're like "I wanna work on this project for free" I'm not sitting here clutching my pearls like HOW COULD YOU!!! You can do whatever you want. People urging young artists not to undervalue their work and not to work for free aren't saying You're A Bad Person If You EVER Work For Free, but we do wanna encourage artists to treat art as something that has value. There's a thousand voices every day saying you gotta do some work for exposure and your prices are too expensive and come on buddy you're going to have to take SOME free work if you ever wanna make it and heck, it's fun for you so you should be willing to do it for free!! Absolutely I'm gonna be part of the voices that yell back, "NO, you should be paid for your work."
It's your call, in the end. It's your time and your art. Do whatever you want! I think there's a lot of reasons to avoid that sort of work, and a lot of folks are gonna give you those warnings.
But make sure you have a contract, even if no money is changing hands. When someone expected more work out of you than you were expecting to give, that can be a nightmare. If you're working with someone who isn't paying you AND ALSO isn't willing to write up a contract specifying what work you're each agreeing to and what you'll get (credit, rights, share of profits, etc) in return, that is too many red flags.