Image Designer Archive

I actually have a Master Image Designer on Starsider. I believe I was the first one there to start doing the highly-desiredhairstyles, and I'm quite well-known on Starsider for my Image Designnow.

I never EVER demand a tip. People ask me all the time how much I charge and I tell them "I don't charge up front, but I do accept tips, and you can help everyone out by letting me know who you got the new style from".

In the last two days alone, I have earned almost 80,000 credits. I have gotten two tips for 10,000 credits, and at least one for 6,000 credits. Yesterday I received 17 emails for Image Design requests, and out of those only one person paid me less than 1K, and he apologized for it several times.

I have no problem earning credits. I'm very social, sit down with people, and work out their image with them. A couple of times, people have told me "I trust your judgement", but most know what they want. I've worked on so many people, I can usually guess which style they want within three tries. I didn't just learn the skill, I learned the profession. I learned what is popular, and what isn't. And I created a website with all of the hairstyles listed, to help people decide what they want (it's improving to).

I have no problem earning credits as an Image Designer. No one can expect to just run out, get their skill up, and rake in the credits. If you work for credits, people will pay you credits. If you work for skill, people will pay you with nothing more than XP gains.

I supposed what I'm really disagreeing with, is the comment that "we don't earn enough".

We don't use resources, like medics. All of the credits we earn goes to pay for nothing more than training - if we even use it for that. We can get by on very little, and yet we still earn credits in the thousands, anyway.

I dont know how you guys do it. I hang-out with my PA usually. These guys are pretty happyabout their hair. So I practically beg to modify someones hair. I have a few players that will allow me to modify for a good time getting better xp than I would doing myself. If I find someone that wants a change of hair they wont accept until they find something they like, thus spending alot of time for only one style xp. How do you guys do it?

Maybe I should clarify.

Rilawyn. This isn't really about the money. I make tons of money more then I have things to spend it on. What I am trying to prevent is 3 things.

Number 1, your the only Master Designer on your server I think you said and your famous. Just like Soon is on Lowca. This isn't going to last forever. Pretty soon ther will be tons of them. Tons of Entertainers are going Image Designer becuase hairstyles are the only "New" thing we get. So this means I get the best part of a class by following one tree.Your giving away free styles is going to populateareas withalot of people with the same style. I'm charging and I can see it happening already. People ask repeatedly for the same style. I am a tad bit worriedif I or others give styles away or make them so affordable i'llend up sitting in cantinas begging people to get a cut. That doesn't sound like fun to me. I love styling and I have more work now then I can handle but I can see it drying up in places.

Number 2,Simply put everyone wants to look good. Dancers and certain types of professions take it as a badge of pride though.When you see 4 out of 5 people in a cantina withone of theMaster Styles it takes away the fun of it.This is one of thereasons people get a new style to begin with to differentiate themselves from others. You start pumping out the best styles for free...yournot going to be doing much until they ad new content. Charging is a way ofkeeping somethingsrare and others not. I make plenty of money doing other things.

I forgot whatnumber three is you'll have to forgiveme. Your free to do what you want and you dont need me to tell you what to do. Nor is that my purpose. After all my hard work I would like to walk around with my hairstyle I earned and not see a million other poeple withit. I would like to see dancers and musicians happy because they know they are hot stuff. I'd also like tohave something to do in a couple weeks when there are alot more designers doing hair and it gets harder to find clients. I enjoy being one of a few right now.. its prestige. But I know it wont last. You give things away and with your name out there you going to make it hard for people other designers to really earn. They may not make quality of tips you do. Either way just making some points.

I hoping we can all just look out for each other really, and for our customers as well.

I'm not the only one, but i was the first.

There are a total of four now. Maybe five.

If it wasn't for the fact that I get my weapons, armour, droids and housing free through my PA, I wouldn't even have credits to travel. Even ID'd who don't hunt will want to invest in some good looking outfits, which agian I'm getting free of charge. While I love designing and dancing (which I've been neglecting far too much lately) I also enjoy going out with my friends to hunt. And when you try to hit Kimogillas with a stick on Lok, well you need to insure. Often.

The reason we need to get some sort of pricing scheme figured out is *because* we don't use resources. There's nothing in game that influences the quality or quantity of our designs, aside from our mind pool.

Also i have a winrar zip file of all the female human hair styles, I've submitted it to allhakazam.com, but it'll probably take awhile to get posted. If anyone wants this file post your e-mail address and I'll send it out to you. It was a pain in the butt to get the multiple views and then crop them down, so I don't know if i'll be doing any more!

-Soon Mot

Master Image Designer

Tygress/Rilawyn is on my planet/server, as well as at leastthree other master image designers (all on Naboo). I hang out in the Theed cantina, where three other novice image designers hang out every day (one was just about to reach Master this wknd). We practice on each other and train each other. And despite all of this "competition", when I have my Novice Image Designer title up, I get plenty of requests. If someone asks for something I can't do, Irefer them to one of the other ID's. Maybe I don't feel any competition because I'm also dancing and tailoring and I get lots of requests for clothes. R

Really I feel that until they add some serious unique content to Image Designers (unique = not in character creation), Image Design is going to be a hobby for many of us, and not something that will inspire us to scratch each other's eyeballs out over All of the other ID"s in Naboo, Starsider I've talked to are just taking tips. Some say they may set up a pricing scheme eventually, but for now, we're just going with the flow

Kwee

I'm sure if it hadn't been for Misery taking the initive and organizing us, Lowca would be the same way. Right now as far as I know, only myself and Abrin are Masters, with Misery being close behind. I've allready told clients that if they're based on Tattooine to look up Misery so they can save some cash on traveling expences, and just last night i was bugged and couldn't bring up the image design menu for a client, so I sent a tell to Abrin to take care of him again. We have no problem co-operating on Lowca, we just have a standardized price list so people know what they're going to be paying no matter where they go.

And you're right until we start to get some serious new content, ID will just be a niche profession.

-Soon Mot

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EmpireEntrepeneur wrote:
If I find someone that wants a change of hair they wont accept until they find something they like, thus spending alot of time for only one style xp. How do you guys do it?

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Empire;

Find another entertainer to practice on and work on each other at the same time. The initial four levels under the entertainer tree will fly by. You don't even have to change anything. Just use hair color/eye color (depending on your abilities) and commit the current color. As long as the other player accepts, you get the experience.

Heck, I did ID1/2 by working on myself while I was out sampling. I did ID 3 in an hour with a partner and I've gotten halfway through ID4 just working with other entertainers during down time and, again, working on myself. Once I finally finish Dance 4, I figure I'll be Master Entertainer an hour later. Maybe less.

The advanced skill tree is where the big XP costs are, but the principle still applies. Find someone to work with and practice, practice,practice.

The Image Designer Masters of Wanderhome have agreed to follow the following price guide as a focus of thier prices and services for competativeness:To answer a question asked on another Image Designer Thread, industry standard rates were decided upon amongst the galaxy's designers and given a price guide.

The prices most image designers charge with in 20% under or over the following prices:


Basic Image Designs:
ID I: 100 credits
ID II: 200 credits
ID III: 300 credits
ID IV: 400 credits


Elite Designs:
Novice Image Designs: 1000 credits

Hair and Markings:
Intermediate: 2000 credits
Advanced: 3000 credits
Expert: 4000 credits
Master: 5000 credits

Face snd Body:
Intermediate: 2000 credits
Advanced: 3500 credits
Expert: 5000 credits
Master: 6500 credits

Master Image Designs:
Skin Color: 10,000 credits
Torso: 9,000 credits
Age 8,000 credits
Other: 7,000 credits

Complete Face/hair/body overhaul: 100,000 credits
Complete Face/Hair overhaul: 50,000 credits
Complete Body overhaul: 75,000 credits

Common practice in Bestine is to tip 2/3 of the design and teh balance upon satisfaction for security. Choosing a lesser design will refind the differeance. No satisfaction gets a full downpayment refund.

Hope this helps you all.

Lady China, House of Style
Master Image Designer, Wanderhome
Entertainer Agent
Crimelord of Bestine