Graphic Artist Guild Handbook

Book Review: Graphic Artist Guild Handbook to Pricing & Ethical Guidelines. The guild handbooks are very useful guides to have at your fingertips to know how much to buy and sell graphic designs for. This book is an awesome buyer’s guide so you won’t ever be underpaid or overcharged!

Also, the Graphic Artist Guild Handbook goes over everything you could ever need to run a successful freelancing graphic art related business. Ethical guidelines, forms, and how to keep you and your business legally sound.

When purchasing the Graphic Artist Guild Handbook, be sure to use the most recent version so the values are current. For this book review I only go over chapter by chapter of the one I have (and highly recommend). But, there is a new release that I have listed at the very bottom of the post.

Since the cover of the book tells you absolutely nothing about what is all in it, here is a preview of the subject of each chapter:

Starting out with:

1- Professional Relationships

Illustrator professional relationships, ethical standards, sources of design talent.

2-Legal Rights & Issues

Here is the direct link to The Graphic Artists Guild, copyright, work for hire, resale royalties, trademarks, international and Canadian copyright, etc.

3-Professional issues

This goes over things like tax, deductibility, kill fees, contests, employment issues, etc.

4-Technology Issues

workplace changes, pricing considerations, legal & ethical issues, health issues, The Labor Market, etc.

5-Essential Business Practices

Negotiating, deciding what to charge, marketing & self promotion, getting paid, maximizing income, growing professionally, etc.

6-Standard Contracts & Business Tools

Importance of contracts, the 7 types of contracts, when to call a lawyer, when things go wrong, etc.

7-Salaries and Trade Customs

Employment outlook, salary ranges, hiring practices, etc.

8-Graphic Design prices and trade customs

General trade practices, corporate graphic design, advertising & promotion design, collateral design, package design, publication design, book jacket, book shepherding, photo retouching, greeting card design, etc.

9-Web/Interactive Design Prices & Trade Customs

Advertising illustration, artwork used in motion pictures/TV/video, Corporate Illustration, book-package-fashion-medical-natural science-3D-architectural illustration, etc.

10-Cartooning Prices & Trade Customs

Covers magazine cartooning, editorial cartooning, newspaper syndication, comics, book-length formats, licensing & merchandising, etc.

12-Animation Prices & Trade Customs

Animation today, computer animation, careers in animation, job markets & salaries, freelance animation, motion graphic design, etc.

13-Surface Design Prices & trade customs

Trend & color forecasting, the design process, computer-aided design, surface pattern, surface & textile design, pricing for freelance design, etc.

14-The Graphic Artists Guild

Long range goals, history of, taking action, member benefits & services, etc.

15-Resources and References

Recommended books, useful publications, industry directories, buyer databases & list services, organizations, conferences, useful web sites & blogs.

Appendix: CONTRACTS AND FORMS

Copyright, cease and desist letter, artist-agent agreement, artwork inventory, all-purpose purchase order, nondisclosure agreement for submitting ideas, work change order form, licensing agreement…long & short….graphic designer’s estimate & confirmation form, release forms, agent agreement, estimate & confirmation forms, holding form, and designer’s invoice.