Shepard Fairey Part 2: What We Can Learn About Freelancing

This one is going to be incredibly short because, really, it's cut and dry.

One argument I've heard in defense of Fairey is that even if the Associated Press one, the original photographer wouldn't be compensated. The problem with that argument, though, is that it's still the property of the Associated Press.

Mannie Garcia is the freelance photographer who took the photo under a work-for-hire provision. That means the work created by the freelancer was bought by the Associated Press and they own it, not the original creator. While Mannie thinks it's "pretty cool", which I won't lie, it is, there's still the fact that the Associated Press has a point.

So in this I think is a lesson to any and all freelancer's out there: Realize that when you do work for a client, sometimes your waving your rights as a creator by doing it as a "Work-for-Hire". Doing something as a "work-for-hire" is always risky since you never know what sort of life the piece of art will take on later on.

Clients Are The People You Need That Kill Your Dreams

Source: Pearls Before Swine/Univeal Press

In the world of freelancing, you're always left with a tough problem: While you may dream big, you always need to keep your client in mind in terms of what they can afford. I don't have any stories about it from myself, and really, the title is just a joke (I love 99% of my clients; the 1% left... well, that's life).

But I have a friend who was struggling with a commission he got to design some labels for a local company. The company was printing the labels themselves... on a label-maker printer. The problem? Because it was their printer and their inks, he had to design something fun and interesting that used as little ink as possible. He was having a hard time until I sent him links to packaging blogs where designers had the same problem. I still haven't seen the results, though, but he did say it helped.