Freelancing tip: Make Better Art

I was pondering art and life as usual and this topic came to mind that I felt was worth writing about. As a freelancer, especially just starting out, don't limit the quality of your work based on what you're being paid. Entry level rates are terrible, we're all trying to fix that, but in the meantime you have to play the game if you want to have a career in the arts.

To escape the sticky swamp of entry level jobs, you need to produce better work and market that work, which will never happen if you're always taking shortcuts to get your work done faster because, "They're only paying me X, it's not worth spending more than X hours on."
To grow your career, you need to create artwork that's worth more than what you're being paid, for three reasons:

1. If you do that for long enough, your existing clients will pay you more because they want to keep you.

2. If your existing clients can't pay you more, your increased work quality will attract (with the help of your proactive marketing) better quality clients who *will* pay you more.

3. Painting bad art for bad rates is demoralizing as hell. Creating work you know is below what you're capable of is a great way to kill your passion in a matter of months. If you can't increase your quality because of living expenses, look for ways to reduce those expenses or find other work while you develop your best possible portfolio.

Obviously we all need to make enough money to live, and sometimes rush jobs are inevitable because the rent is due and there's nothing wrong with that. But be wary that you don't get stuck in a rut because your clients pay bad and you haven't made anything you're proud of in two years.

That happened to me, it probably happens to all of us at some point, and the best way out is to make better art. Study more, do more ideation, spend more time on it, use more reference, take fewer shortcuts. Whatever it takes, make the time to create the best art you possibly can.