Where to Hire Pro Spine Animators and 5 Tips for clients

I Hired Spine Animators for 6 Years

Now I am a Spine animator myself

I know very well from inside to outside how to find the best suitable Spine animator that can offer you their services at competitive price range.

Below are the channels that I used to hire pro Spine animators and find clients

I will dive into more details so you can decide which one is best for you. Will start from least to most popular.

Reddit

Although this community had some activity a few years back, it's quieter now. You can still post here; you might catch the attention of those actively seeking work.

Upwork

When you post a job on Upwork, you'll typically receive 10-20 proposals in a couple of days. While it's less common to find highly experienced animators among these proposals, you'll have a variety of options. Be mindful that the quality and English communication skills might vary

Fiverr

Fiverr tends to be more effective due to its thorough monitoring of ratings and recent activity of animators. Animators who consistently provide high-quality work and are responsive are more visible on the platform. It's important to review both their work and the ratings of their gigs. The number of ratings can indicate their reliability and frequency of successful deliveries. However, it's still relatively rare to find top-tier professional animators surfacing here

Official Forum

You won't find too many animators posting on the forum but a lot of them are keeping an eye on Networking category so make sure your post is tagged as Networking. A little downside is animators may continue writing you even after a year not checking the date of the publishing. Also this is where you sometimes can hear back from professional animators.

Discord

This Discord Server attracts almost all professional animators in the area. So you have very good chance they can see your post. You will get a lot of responses very quickly, however dont rush hiring here, be patient and check all their works. It may take few days until your post attracts a few professional animator. Make sure to tag your post @Looking for Animators, This will send notification to animators who has marked themselves as open for work.

Direct Search

Your golden ticket to hire best Spine Animators lies here. Sometimes you will have to convince, adjust your timeline or even go beyond your budget so you can hire them :) To my knowledge most of the professional freelancers get jobs through direct messaging so they are most likely to not miss your proposal and get back to you quickly.

Linkedin

Pros Easy to spot best of the best

Cons Lack of quick access to portfolio

Artstation / Behance

Pros Ability to see their work right away

Cons You may not get a response for few a week

Instagram

Pros You can see how engaged they are with the community

Cons The portfolio is not well organized and accessible

5 tips before you hire pro spine animator

1. Related Portfolio: For the portfolio, ask them to share only their best works that closely align with what you need for your project. Most of the time Animators will send you links that feature 30+ works hoping you will check all of them.

2. Clear Briefing: It's on you to clear questions such as what Spine version they should use or what limitation do they have when using Spine. Having a clear briefing will guide even junior animator to deliver good quality work. Here is an example of a briefing I am sending to animators to get time and budget estimations

3. Estimation: Ask them to estimate the project with a fixed price. Only a select few Spine animators have had the opportunity to work on a diverse range of projects, which has made them to objectively understand their hourly rate estimations. So fix the price and maybe give bonus if you see they are trying hard to deliver several revisions. It's not always their fault, sometimes communication is the key problem

4. Payment: It's important to determine the payment method upfront, as some animators may not be familiar with preparing invoices or might lack access to international payment systems. Also there are fees to consider, which are very noticable with smaller project

5. Source Files: Prepare PSD files, sometimes clearing up photoshop files takes 50% of the work. Make sure layers are cut and named properly, unnecessary masks and blending modes are flattened. More on this topic in this Preparing Photoshop Files for Export to Spine guide

6. Reference is Crucial: Within the briefing it is important to provide any references that can be helpful. References can be anything visual that can tell the animator what are you looking for. For example you can send this gif and ask I want squash and stretch to be exaggerated at this level. Alternatively, consider recording yourself performing the task, especially if it's something specific you want to demonstrate

Angry Birds Slap with squash and stretch

Summary

Pay attention to portfolio relevance, clear briefings, accurate estimations, payment logistics, well-prepared source files, and providing detailed references. These steps will guide you to hire a pro Spine animator who can effectively realize your vision

What is the best channel to hire Spine animators to you?

• Reddit
• Upwork
• Fiverr
• Official Forum

See All Options

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