One of the most daunting tasks an aspiring RPG publisher faces is to provide a product or service that is vastly different or highly superior to the free products available on the web. Gamers are passionate and often produce high quality work out of pure enjoyment, not sales prospects.

Art can help a product stand out

But (professional grade) art costs money. And here’s the situation a lot of us are in:

“I have this great product or product idea. I have not published it or made money from it yet. I want the best possible artwork to make my product stand out. It’s going to cost me a lot of money that I don’t have.”

Sounds problematic, right? Johnn Four recently quoted something he read in a RPG forum: if you want to make a small fortune with roleplaying games, start with a large one. Pretty funny. But thankfully, it’s not quite true. The only way you can turn a large fortune into a small one is by spending money without earning money.

Ok, so let’s go back to the art problem.

You’ve got to spend money you don’t have (yet)

This is exactly how you shrink your fortune. So be careful. Stop dreaming about the best possible art and start thinking about the best possible art you can afford.

Are you publishing your first book? What makes you think you can afford a bunch of interior art? Focus on the cover art and the quality of your written content and just accept that the perfect book or product isn’t in your price range. It’s a sacrifice that will help make your first product a financial success.

Now let’s go back to the fact that gamers do great work and give it away for free, just because they are passionate about their hobby. Some of these gamers producing great work are artists. It is fair to assume that the best artists are recruited by the bigger RPG publishing companies, however there’s always an up-and-comer somewhere. And they are trying to break into an industry where free is almost a standard – just as you are. You may not have much money at this point in your endeavours, but that young artist doesn’t have high (or any) expectations.

So ask around.

You will find a great artist

That’s how I found an artist for my latest project. I asked around. I asked my friends, my coworkers, people I used to work with. Eventually, Dan, from Obsidian Portal, suggested someone who is looking to break into the RPG industry. He is an accomplished artist and needs to pay the bills with his art commissions, but he understands that the initial payouts in the RPG industry will be lower than they would be for a random corporate gig. It’s fun work. It’s worth it.

The bottom line is that there are great aspiring RPG artists out there and that they are willing to work at a price that will not see your fortune shrink from large to small.