Lets start a business!

[PhilWesson]

i'd love to, but i need to work on my skills

[coupon]

Viva la Credibility!:) good luck man there's no shortage of good ideas/talent

[gra4mac]

Hay TerrestrialSea I like the way this is going. I assume you are thinking of a distributed group of subcontractors agreeing to work on comon projects. Rather than setting up an office in one place and getting a local team together. Doing the distributed thing has some advantages: you don't have employees so the company doesn't have to chip in on the taxes and bennifits, the parent company can be located in the member's area with the best tax situation. I can tell you Canada is not the place to be. Sounds like Sweden is even worse. You need someone in the Bahamas. The members would have there own thing to do localy and would work with the group when the project is bigger.

There are some problems too: there is a lot more organizing of a distributed work flow, members have to be very comminted to the project to make it work, there is a time delay for transfering data.

I think the advantages outweigh the problems, at least on a small scale. The way to get started, is to get a group together and produce a short animation to test the workflow and member compatability.

If this gets going, you might want to set up a Yahoo group, or similar, as a central place for members to share images, scripts, data, etc. This kind of group collaboration has been, and is being done, at least on a volunteer basis. It would be interesting to set up aworking studio this way.

With some good planning, a group of commited people could make it happen.:thumbsup:

Cheers, Graham

[vorlon]

I read your other thread, I agree business side of this is just as important as the artistic side. And your idea here sounds interesting, I'd like to see how you go about it.

[ssalo]

theoretically good idea but geographic location of team members can be problematic too; different time zone can lead to delay in work process (ie. responding to emails etc).

[TerrestrialSea]

I like what you guys are saying!

Having a network of sub-contractors would be the best approach in the begging start-up phases. I'm sure many of you who would be interested already have full time jobs that you are already devoted to. My dream of course would be to have a localized office somewhere convenient. Having the office would solve a lot of problems as far as organizational concerns go. From the office, having subcontractors would be a lot easier as well as advertising.

The business structure I have in mind would be a Partnership. I would need several people who are serious about a production company to come on board with their two cents (hopefully a lot more that!) so that an office could be set up and people hired as subcontractors to do the work. Eventually I would want a studio setup for the people who would sign-on as full time workers.

Getting funding for this type of venture shouldn't prove difficult. There are many venture capitalists and government funding programs that entrepreneurs are able to tap into.

Costs I would expect to run into and account for.

People
Computers
Software
Business Licensing Fee local/state/international
Office
And Office Supplies
Utilities
Taxes
Accounting
Ect...

Those are just off the top of my head. I'm preparing a more complete and error free business plan in a couple of days when I have a little more time to think thing through entirely.

As you can see, this might actually work! Well that’s how I see it anyways. Some more input would be really nice!

[gra4mac]

Originally posted by ssalo
theoretically good idea but geographic location of team members can be problematic too; different time zone can lead to delay in work process (ie. responding to emails etc).

Actually, it's not a big deal. I was the director/producer of an internet collaboration short animation about a year ago. We had people across North America, South America and a guy in Sweden. Once you get into a working rythm, you know who is when and if you will hear back from them today, tomorrow, or yesterday. We also had chats on our Yahoo group at a time that worked best for everyone. Unfortunatly, the project ran out of steam at the storyboard stage. I am planning a similar project, but will not put out the call for help until after the boards are done. This way the modellers and animaters don't get bored and leave the project, hopefully.

Cheers, Graham

[ndog]

"Getting funding for this type of venture shouldn't prove difficult. There are many venture capitalists and government funding programs that entrepreneurs are able to tap into."


With enough enthusiasm and perserverance you should be able to pull this off. I would really love to see this suceed.

Regarding funding, there is no free ride.

You need to convince lenders that they will see a profit in a reasonably short period of time and that their money is not at risk of loss. Something easier to do if you get a group together and get some business first, kind of a catch 22 situation.

Venture capitalist are increasingly more wary and are likely to be tougher to aquire funds from. On top of which venture capitalist are extremely rigid with regard to missed milestones regarding income. If you aren't profitable by the time you have agreed to, watch out.

Never take money from relatives for this kind of thing.

[gra4mac]

I wonder how well it would work to get a DEDICATED small DEDICATED group together and develop a show, did I mention DEDICATED group. The group would create the bible, show concept,characters, a few show outlines, and a show teaser. Then aproach suitable production companies with the idea of a co-production. This would show the talet of the group, and make life easier and cheaper for the production company. At least it would be good practice for the group.

Cheers, Graham

[xzevlin]

Just some thoughts on developing a show. Since I've never actually pitched one yet, take this as the thoughts of someone who thinks he knows everything, but really may know absolutely nothing.

I'm working on a pitch right now for a series of 1 minute episodes that will potentially be part of a big subscription based animation site. I've also almost finished writing a show bible for a 22 minute show. What I've learned from both of these is that at some point after all the brainstorming is done, you need to hand off all the ideas to one person (hopefully a really good writer) and let them put all the pieces together. If everyone thinks of themselves as a writer and wants to keep sticking their ideas in, then things will get muddled and nothing will get done. You really need one person to take the reigns at some point early on and become the person that makes all the final decisions.

And let the artists do the art, the writers do the writing, and the business people just do the business. When the business people think they're the writers and the writers think they're the artists, then you have a problem.

[gra4mac]

Excellent advice xzevlin. Good luck with your projects

Cheers, Graham

[pwhitlock]

I am interested. I tried to start up a graphic design and web development busines in my home town but I couldn't get any help on projects. I ended up doing everything on my own and got swamped basically. But this is definately interesting.

[gra4mac]

There is a short article at AWN about business plans for animators that might be useful. There is a lot of other info at AWN worth looking at.

http://mag.awn.com/index.php3?ltype=search&sval=career&article_no=1615

Cheers, Graham

[gra4mac]

Originally posted by TerrestrialSea
I'm preparing a more complete and error free business plan in a couple of days when I have a little more time to think thing through entirely.

As you can see, this might actually work! Well that’s how I see it anyways. Some more input would be really nice!

Hay TerrestrialSea. just wondering how your plans are going. I know that life has a way of filling any time voids. I always liked the quote "Life is what happens when you are busy planning the future".

Cheers, Graham

[YankyBJeans]

I think this idea is great! I would be totally down to help with something like this. I dont think everyone needs to be in the same place. Work can be collaborated on in chats and emails and forums and then divied up to the workers. I think it would work great and if nothing else, produce some awesome work for everyone to enjoy.

Yanky

[gra4mac]

This kind of collaboration can be alot of fun. I really enjoyed my last project, even thought it never got finished, and so did the people who stuck with it. Not only can you produce some awsome work, in much less time than one person alone, everyone gets a copy with their credits for a reel. If you have a business plan, and all goes well, you might even make some money. You won't know until you try.

One way a group could get going is to put out a call for people into developing a project from the beggining. Some people that would be handy are writers, character and set designers, storyboarders, and very importantly someone(s) who will oversee the project and see it through. If you can't find writers, you can develop the story right in the boards. It is tempting to jump right in to modelling and animating, but a little planning will make a much better production and save a lot of backtracking.

Cheers, Graham

[unLevel]

It sounds like you're wanting to do something like i wanted to do with Co Labs, have a group of specialized artisans (concept, modelers, story writers, etc) who "adopt" promising projects and work on them as a group...the money would be distributed once the game/movie/whatever was published...

Don't know if that was exactly what you were going for terrestrialsea, but it's just an idea that I've been toying with in my spare time...

[gra4mac]

Don't keep us in suspence unLevel, how did Co Labs turn out. Did it get off the ground, are you in the planning stages, or is it on the back burner simmering? Good name for your group BTW, my group was called LightWork Animation, as in "many hands make light work".

Cheers, Graham

[unLevel]

hehe

You guys hadn't forgotten about us?
Well, here's the sad (not really sad) ending....

We were all students, we were all busy, and we just let it go...

We still have the forums, which I think were setup just the way we wanted, though we now have no artist group to work on it....

Also, right when we were planning some of Co Labs, I was making friends in high and low places, all under the banner of freeing the world of cg with collaborative projects...then the thread got started here in these forums for a collaborative projects forum here at cgtalk, and thanks to many like-minded people, well, you know the end of that story, we now have a collaborative team projects forum here (it's in the critique category, if you guys didn't know)...

I would love to have it start up again, but our biggest problem was that we were all pretty much new to the cg game, and we didn't have a whole lot of money to start...

Also, another problem with going the way as we were, was that we might be in direct competition (what an ironic term when talking about collaborative projects...hehe...) with cgtalk's collaborative team forums..

This place has more artistic talent than my mind can comprehend, let alone match...

no money+no talent= no business...

I'm amazed someone actually remembered us..

Ok, time for rant:

Co Labs HAD TO BE A GOOD IDEA. Why? I just started hosting projects from the wip forum here on my own set of forums, getting them their own webspace and such, and I started getting pm's and emails from fellow cgtalkers asking "why are you helping others like this, what do you plan to go with this, and how can we help"

WHEN PEOPLE WANT TO DEVOTE THEIR TIME TO SOMETHIGN YOU STARTED, WITHOUT EVEN ADVERTISING, something, somewhere tells me it was a good idea...

EDIT: thanks for liking my name, maybe you guys would like to have all of us band together and use that name? I wouldn't mind at all, just either let me help some, or just keep me informed on how it went...hehe...

One good thing is, there's quite a few people interested it seems...maybe we might can finally get something substantial made?

I'm all for it, and as some of you may know, I got more ideas you can shake a stick at :arteest: and I'd be more than happy to help, as a "peon" or whatever title I may make myself...

[Per-Anders]

hi, i love the idea of getting groups of freelancers together, but there's one thing you guys should be aware of. unless you are a "company" it's illegal for individual businesses (i.e. if you're a freelancer then your'e considered a business) to collude or discuss pricing :/ this essentially means that it's illegal for freelancers to work as a collaborative to get jobs thus you need a third party company (an agency normally). these laws hold true for most countries including the us and the uk (where i assume most of you are from).

so if you want to get freelancers together to make a business then you have to think about these things.

[unLevel]

actually mdme_sadie, if the artists were in a partnership with each others, as well as eventually in a seperate partnership with the leaders of each project htat they worked on....

any cg lawyers here?

I understand your point, and I personally would be motivated to do such work WITHOUT paid acquisitions, ie, what collaborative projects are about in my opinion, but you make a VERY valid point...

Oh, and for those of you interested, the forums are still up (check my web link on my post)...

I don't expect them to start back up, I've got too many forums to visit now anyways, but I DO BELIEVE THAT WE HAVE THEM SETUP AND ORGANIZED IN THE BEST WAY POSSIBLE...

terrestrialsea, mr. thread-starter, you're runnign the show, at least starting this episode, so I'd greatly appreciate your thoughts contrary or contuitive of my own...

[TerrestrialSea]

Thanks Unlevel and Mdme_Sadie for your insightful comments. Graham Clark I have finished the business plan and I will be sure to post it soon. For legal reasons posting it on this thread would prove to be very difficult for me to do. So I must first make sure I have a few laws and regulations understood before I share it with everyone.

As to the comment made by Mdme_sadie, you are correct! A freelancer is considered a "Sub-Contractor" and does need an Agency to work for. The goal of this thread to is to create one such agency. My ultimate goal would be to have a business setup where we would hire many sub-contractors as well as full time employees to do post-production and other creative work.

At this point in time my life has taken some odd and unexpected turns on the road of life. The bad economy doesn't help either. I wish that some of my aspirations of running a business will come true, but in the short-term I am a little depressed about the way things are currently. I am sure that when the war with Iraq is all done with I can resume my efforts with more strength and efficiency.

Currently I am unemployed and the focus of my attention is on paying the bills and keeping the car running. I am sure allot of people can relate to my situation. The little money that I do have to spare goes into a saving account with a 4 percent interest rate. This will be the money I will use to get my business ideas off the ground.

I have recently met a man that has some connections to a business that distributes franchises. I have talked with him for several hours about what that would involve and the risk. This may be a different avenue I may choose to explorer. But as always I take everything I hear with a grain of salt. I have been pushed around and used before and I am careful not to repeat the past. If I do decided to go another route I will notify those who could benefit.

As always Have fun and Challenge Everything!

[unLevel]

So, do you still feel that a group of artists could join forces, under some "organization" or at least a name, and work on projects together? Whether for money or for naught?

[gra4mac]

Originally posted by unLevel
So, do you still feel that a group of artists could join forces, under some "organization" or at least a name, and work on projects together? Whether for money or for naught?

I have no doubt that it could work, but some groundwork has to happen first. It sounds like TerrestrialSea is working on his and it will be interesting to see what comes of it. This might not be the right moment, but if enough people think about it and share thoughts and findings, sooner or later it will happen. I wouldn't be surprised if someone isn't doing it already. I know there are lots of volunteer projects working over the net.

Cheers, Graham

[unLevel]

I do hope so, and that hope is shared with the hope that Co Labs will be such a group...

I also have thought about starting a freecgnetworks, including a free site for resources, such as tuts, textures, and model libraries...

[beaker]

TerrestrialSea:
Do you have any past experience in the animation, video games, film or advertising biz producing or managing?

>>So, do you still feel that a group of artists could join forces, under some "organization" or at least a name, and work on projects together? Whether for money or for naught?

Atleast in LA there are many employment agencies for freelance CGI people in film and television(http://www.d-a-a.com/ http://www.vsearch.com/ http://www.rydek.com/). There are also a few companies I know of that produce their own work and they "lease" out their artists for work to other companies around the country(icepond).

[beaker]

I forgot to add

The trouble with this kind of idea is that you really need connections for this kind of thing. You need to have worked in the biz for a while and know alot of people. Alot of this is about trust that your going to get the job done and knowing the right people at advertising agencies to get the jobs in the first place so you can bid on them. Unfortunatly no one wants to deal with people who have no experience or any track record because frankly it is just way too high risk to give you thousands of dollars that they have no idea if your going to get the job done on. You have to put together a reel in the first place to sell little network of artists. If you have a bunch of stuff on your reel with no real commercial work on it then I dont see how you can sell to anyone except people in for the really cheap work like 3am commercials that cost $1000. Many startups will hire a person with a nice backgroud of work on their reel because they can assimilate that reel into their own and use it as a selling point to get work.

Connections are so important, that I worked for one company where they had a director that had all the connections for most of their work. He decided to leave and all the work from the company dissapeared in a second. All because of people he knew and had a working relationship with.

[gra4mac]

Beaker, this is very good info and deserves consideration if you want to atract outside work. The way I see this working is to create a niche and produce your own work. I know this will sound like I'm dreaming or something, but it has been done.

"Big Idea was founded in a spare bedroom by computer animator and storyteller Phil Vischer in July of 1993. With one computer, little capital and no connections, Phil set out with the goal of creating values-based family media products.

Working with two young art school grads and friends volunteering on weekends, Phil completed the first half-hour episode of VeggieTales..."

"By the end of speaking with him, I discovered how an artist with a clear vision who takes advantage of an untapped public demand can start a new animation corporation out of his spare bedroom. "

For more info on how Phil got started, check out:

http://www.geocities.com/jonahmovie/Jonah_files/page01.htm

"Since starting the studio in a spare bedroom in 1982, graphic designer Arlene Klasky and animator Gabor Csupo, both passionate advocates of artistic experimentation, have built a company housing more than 300 employees..."

Klasky Csupo history at:

http://www.klaskycsupo.com/data/history.html

I'm sure there are others that I don't know about.

Added later.

"The Woodpile Cat, a 26 minute featurette done out of Don's
Garage broadcast on HBO."

From:

http://members.aol.com/toonschool/nimh.html

Cheers, Graham

[xzevlin]

I think Don Bluth started making The Secret of NIMH in his garage with a couple of other guys.


So the key to a successful business is to get a garage.

[nin_10_do]

The main problem I've seen with small businesses of any kind is unrealistic expectations. A lot of people will say that they want to start their own business so they can be their own boss and not have to work as hard. That's the exact opposite from the truth of it. When you start up a small business you gain some flexibility but you also take on a lot of workload that was always handled by your employer before. Accounting, purchasing, management and business decisions all become your responsibility. When you add in the debt load a new business usually starts under, you are basically married to that business for the next 5 years at least. If you want to succeed every spare moment of your time will likely involve the business somehow. The cost of failure can be very high, debts still have to be paid and you may end up owing thousands of dollars or filing for bankruptcy.

The network of freelancers idea eliminates the office related problems but adds a few new ones. Because you have people scattered all over the place coordination and communication become critical. The skill and dedication of your crew is important as well, what happens if you lose a few key people? It's a lot harder to replace specialised skill sets then most people think and you have the added problem of integrating a new person into the workflow. Another problem is actual pipeline decisions. You'll rarely end up with a group of artists that use the same software and even if they do, plug-in and workflow differences can cause chaos throughout the project.

An idea like this takes a great deal of planning at all stages and many freelancers are simply not used to planning ahead to that degree. You would probably need a dedicated management team or very careful planning to pull it off. I'm not trying to be pessimistic or anything, it's just that most small businesses fail within 5 years usually for the same reasons.

[beaker]

Originally posted by Graham Clark
Beaker, this is very good info and deserves consideration if you want to atract outside work. The way I see this working is to create a niche and produce your own work. I know this will sound like I'm dreaming or something, but it has been done.

Actually I see creating an original piece of work by a bunch of unknowns that you want to sell as more achievable then just trying to get commercial work to do with a network of unknown cgi people(Especially if you have no experience).

>>I think Don Bluth started making The Secret of NIMH in his garage with a couple of other guys.

Yea, well Bluth kinda worked at Disney as an Animation Director before he did that :) Also the "couple other guys" were lead animators at disney too.

[Flog]

Great great topic. I would love to see this come to light. I myself wanted to find collabers, and have found some, but then some just don't pan out, people have lives and it is asking alot to have people work on your project.

Great things could be accomplished, alla www.ninjai.com. Almost Disney like quality from people working together. And they have been offered some deals, that well they could have made money but didn't sell out.

But thing is finding talented and dedicated people. I wish people would spend more time working together. I mean we see all the beautiful pictures here and sometimes I wonder. Woulnd't it be great to work together. Then I see all these Star Wars and Gollum models and nearly throw up. I'm like why don't these people use their time to collab and make something worthwhile. Gollum has been done, the story told. Why not be part of a new story, never before seen.

I don't think it would be to big a deal if some freelancers worked together then pitched the show. I don't think many legalities are behind that. I seriously doubt everyone on the force.net or the folks at Ninjai have to report to the government or anything here in the US. So work together all. I'd love to see the business proposal.

Keep up the enthusiasm guys, I hope it pans out. Maybe in time I can contribute to the cause.

Hey Unlevel!!!:wavey:

[unLevel]

:wavey:

I had a major brainstorm the other day, partly b/c I got to talk to one of the "founders" of Co Labs, tjbeseda (also a fellow cgtalker)

We've both been super busy with school, and I'm in the middle of a research paper and a 700+ page book review (the book's about math, if that sounds painful enough)...

I might be able to re-organize and salvage Co Labs, as well as Collaborative Industries, and a few other top-ultra-super-secret projects in my head...so I may be pm'ing or emailing part of you guys soon with the new organization, and the new attitude...hehe...

I don't know how long it'll be, I have like, NOO time right now, but as always, I think too much, so who knows?

TerrestrialSea, if you do get a business plan organized and made up, please post it here, I would be very interested in reading it...

oh, hi, flog, long time no see...:wavey: :applause:

[gra4mac]

Originally posted by Flog

But thing is finding talented and dedicated people. I wish people would spend more time working together. I mean we see all the beautiful pictures here and sometimes I wonder. Woulnd't it be great to work together. Then I see all these Star Wars and Gollum models and nearly throw up. I'm like why don't these people use their time to collab and make something worthwhile. Gollum has been done, the story told. Why not be part of a new story, never before seen.



You are right Flog, there is an amazing amount of talent on the forums and it boggles my mind thinking about getting some people to work together. I wonder though if modelling and animating for most folks here is a recreation, even if thay are pros, and working on a project is like work. It can take the enjoyment out of if by having a deadline. Most probably won't be interested, but for the few who ar, the rewards are great.

I see this needing a magic mix of people that may take a while to find. You need a focused group of dedicated people with a wide varieaty of talents, and someone to coodinate and maintain the project, and keep moral up, and be able to do this day after day for at least a year.

It would be good to get some input from other collab groups.

PS. I think that Day Off The Dead id also a collab project.

http://www.dayoffthedead.com/

Cheers, Graham

[unLevel]

Graham Clark, you hit the nail with the giant hammer!!

I'm going to re-enterate Co Labs into the cg community as an "art group" with specialized artists, who will, after getting everythign organized and see how we work together, start "adopting" projects to work on as a group...

I think the organization "art group" might suite our pupose best, and we'll work on a few small projects before we start working on other people's projects..

I do hope that one day we can work directly with cgtalk's collaborative forums, or our own set of forums, and once we get everything organized, and fix our place within Collaborative Industries, it should be full steam ahead...

Oops, I think I just told you guys part of my super-duper-top-secret plan...

Right now, I think we only have 3 people who are officially with Co Labs, the "art group": me, my brother, and tjbeseda...

Tell me if you guys are interested, and when I'm ready (ie, talk to the other 2 guys, get a few sites built..etc...) I'd be more than happy to have you guys join us...

Or, if you've got ideas on how to further things, please tell me...

[unLevel]

Or, are you guys mainly concerned with how a group of artists can work together for $$?

I personally wouldn't mind working for free, as cg is my hobby, and not going to determine my field of study for the rest of my life...

Sorry, I like to ramble:

The first few projects for Co Labs would be some fun stuff:

Collaborative character making (each person makes a part, so we end up with some funny looking things...)
Collaborative story writing (like seen on some forums, though we'll take it VERY seriously)
Collaborative 2d Graphics (wallpapers, maybe a few other things, to give as free stuff)

And then, maybe we'll make a few projects like that dayofthedead, and small animation stuff, just for practice...

[gra4mac]

Originally posted by unLevel


Tell me if you guys are interested, and when I'm ready (ie, talk to the other 2 guys, get a few sites built..etc...) I'd be more than happy to have you guys join us...

Or, if you've got ideas on how to further things, please tell me...

Hi unLevel. I'm not sure if you are looking for outsiders to join your group or if you are reffering to exiesting members. If you are looking fo rmore members, I'd be into hearing what you get up to, but like you I am too busy to comit to anything now.

Cheers, Graham

[unLevel]

I understand, actually, I am too busy at the moment to really pursue what I'd like to, maybe I shouldn't have gotten anyone's hopes up...

Right now, I make myself sick with the # of things I've got to get done...

[gh0st]

I like this idea and im willing to help you guys if I can as a learning experience. Im a fairly decent graphics design artist and web designer. I am also currently a Junior in High School. Even though my age is quite young for this industry, I was the project leader of a game modification for UT2K3 until it was shutdown due to an upcoming game based on the same event. This idea sounds very interesting and im willing to devote time to it whether it be a paying position or not.

:beer:

[gra4mac]

Hi gh0st. I don't think anything is about to happen here. So far, we are just thinking outloud about the possibilities. You can likely find a group to join in the Collaborative Projects Form on the main page. A person with graphics and web skills would be very usefull, and age dosen't matter. One of the neet things about the web is, people are judged on what they can do and not what they look like or how old they are. Good luck.

BTW, do you have a web site to show your stuff?

Cheers, Graham

[JIII]

geez this sounds interesting, almost gives me a reason to hang out in the general discussion forum.

This would be a good Idea and if I can see your business plan it would totally rock terrestrial.

but one thing you have to remember is to keep things small. I have tried to start a few little businesses in my life and the one lesson i have learned is that do the small stuff then the big stuff. cause starting big is a recipe for disaster.

also another problem potentially is trust. you will need some sort of out side agency to manage any money. when people live completly on the other side of the world it becomes hard to guarantee that the money is not embezzled.

I am not saying anyone would do this. but money is a very corrupting thing and some of the best people can become sucked into greed far too easily.

baiscly watch your back.

thats all I have to add today.

[gra4mac]

The money issue is a big one, and would need to be figured out early in the game. Establishing trust is key to this working. Trust that the work will be done as agreed, and trust that the work will be payed for as agreed. There would need to be a lawyer involved to set things up , but at some point it will come down to trust. That is a good reason to start small and work up.

I know someone doing some spec work for a pilot. I will ask him how the payment thing is working.

Cheers, Graham

[unLevel]

Speaking of a business plan, where is it, TerrestrialSea?

If it's super-duper-top-secret...then I understand....maybe...:eek:

[Brassfire]

Wow.

I also have thought about something like this. I can totally relate to the "unemployed" part, and the "too busy" part... I also have very, very little experience or connections in the art and entertainment industry, although I am working on that.

Starting small is the only way to go. First do a plan that shows what you want it to be, then CUT that down to the baby steps it will take for you to actually succeed. You have to determine your priorities. Even though it's best to dream big, you have to keep that in mind AND take a close look at what is doable.

If you're unemployed you have to take care of that first, because if you're not around, your long-range plans aren't going to happen. If you have a flair for organization, you don't have to be a starving artist OR a sell-out, you can be a profitable artist who is true to your dreams. ;)

For me, I have just finished a program to create a business plan. I chose to start as small as possible with web hosting, even though I am working as best I can on a small amateur game project. The web hosting will hopefully fund my own small financial needs within 1-2 years as well as give me a lesser cost for online project hosting. (It's been difficult to find good free hosting for my projects, you all probably know that feeling.) As the web hosting business grows, I will be able to get the training and software I need for the game project. So by starting out on a shoestring and being careful, I can build success on top of success.

TerrestrialSea - I would encourage you to post only a small part of your business plan here, as a lot of a business plan is confidential. It's always best to prepare a separate plan depending on who is going to look at it. One for you to work from, one for potential investors, and one to get the idea of the business to people without really giving details.

[unLevel]

Ya know, Brassfire, I, too, have dreams of running or working for a small company..

I have projects in mind, though no way of achieving them...Possibly, if you or terrestrialsea accomlish your dreams, you would look into them?...

I don't mind sharing them, as it seems all my ideas are already being thought by countless others...

cgstorage:
as most artists know, it's VERY difficult to acquire decent webspace, namely, with hotlinking images being the largest concern...
Also, no one wants their webspace to have ads, banners or otherwise...so, to counteract that, I would have a way that you would have to login on the main page in some way, possibly for cgstorage emails, and have the ads on the front page, much like cgtalk, and cgchallenge sites.....It would offer about 50 megs of space, ftp, and definetly hotlinking...

cgsearch:
I'm in the middle of "the library project" (look in the collab forums here for more info), which is basically creating a library of links, much like cglibrary, but with millions of links, not dozens...I've started posting some of them, about 50 or so, just the tip of the iceburg stuff, and someone said that maybe I could make a search engine for it? I have no idea how to make a search engine, I'm no coder, but I thought that might be a cool idea...

freecg networks:
Much like, you guessed it, cgnetworks, freecg networks would be like the people behind the scenes of a bunch of sites that would offer free things for artists: cgstorage, and cgsearch, for example...

I don't know how in the world to get around to doing all of these, and I've got a few more rattling around in my head, like a book possibly "The Newbie's Guide to the cg world" or something, and I know I"m digressing WAY too much, as usual, and I apologize, but I thought you guys, who seem to think strangely like me (or is it that I think like you?) might have had some of these very same ideas, and I'd sure like to know, and maybe we could form "the brainstorming group" or something, where we address the problems facing cg artists today, and try our hardest to fix such...

Again, I apologize for rambling, digressing, and being blatently boring, and I thank you for your time (I'm guessing about 10 minutes) to read this long and confusing post...

[JIII]

Brass fire:

not only is a business plan confidential.

its also long as hell. does anyone really need to read all 50 pages of it. ;)

one little problem i see is that everyone wants to do this. now its totaly cool we all want our own little studio and all that. but there is only so much room, and so much business.

[gra4mac]

It seems to me that several people have business interests along the same lines. You can only go so far with this in a puplic forum. Perhaps it would be worthwhile to for a CG Business Interest Group and get a Yahoo group going so the discuccions can carry on, and ideas traded. Just a suggestion. Who knows,there may already be a similar group at yahoo, I'll have to have a look.

Cheers, Graham

[JIII]

what about using an IRC channel?

[unLevel]

yeah, JIII, just HOW DO YOU GET YOUR OWN IRC CHANNEL?

Whether or not I'm in a business group, I'd sure like to know, pm me or email me or something, please...

[gra4mac]

Maybe you could explane how an IRC channel works for the rest of us. I gather you can chat. Can you store and share files, and select group members, and have a forum. You can do all this with a Yahoo group. Yahoo is quite slow sometimes, but then so is CGtalk.

Cheers, Graham

[JIII]

you can send files through DCC on IRC and I think you can make rooms private but I am not sure.

http://freenode.net/using_the_network.shtml

check out this site about registering and all that stuff.

[gh0st]

I do have a very small site to show off some of my work... The site is for the modification I was working on: www.unrealwarfarex.com/bob

[unLevel]

Personally, I wouldn't mind hosting us...

I have a personal account at www.f2o.org

75 megs
PHP
1 MySQL database (enough for a forum)
pretty much unlimited transfer..
FTP

But maybe a yahoo group would be interesting, as I have never used one...

Who all is interested in pursueing this? I'm in, to a point, I'd greatly like to hear more into this adventure..

[gra4mac]

I was thinking that a Yahoo, or similar group, wouldn't be for a working project yet, but just to share ideas and findings in a more private setting. I don't expect the group to be very active, but it could be a resource of info for like minded folks.

Cheers, Graham

[unLevel]

yeah, that sounds good graham clark, really good

anyone want to go ahead, or do you want me to set one up?

[gra4mac]

Ok, here it is:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cgbusiness/

Go check it out. I gues the first thing we need is a wish list for things we'd like to see. I will soon post links I like, and a list of books too. For now the group is public and can be visited by anybody, athough you may need to have an active Yahoo membership to axcess groups. At some point I will make the group semi-private so people will have to apply for membership. This is so any private information can be controlled.

Cheers, Graham

[JIII]

gahhh now i have to join yahoo.

[gra4mac]

Originally posted by JIII
gahhh now i have to join yahoo.

I now how you feel. I debated about starting a Yahoo group, but I didn't really see the discusion progressing on the forum. Forums are great for carrying on a therad, but are a problem if you want to find a link someone put in a post a while ago. The group is good for that, since everything has a place, and organization is key to any undertaking.

I have to admit that I broke the first rule of starting a group by not being prepared. I have some work to do to get the group running. In the meantime, you might want to check out the business discusions at AWN: http://forums.awn.com/ or at Animationnation: http://www.animationnation.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi or 3DNY: http://3dny.org/phpBB2/

Cheers, Graham

[Brassfire]

http://www.spotlight-project.com

Seems to be doing some of what we've been discussing.

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