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Storyboard artist vs freelance designer

The differences between storyboard artists and freelance designers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 1-2 years to become a storyboard artist, becoming a freelance designer takes usually requires 6-12 months. Additionally, a storyboard artist has an average salary of $90,053, which is higher than the $57,260 average annual salary of a freelance designer.

The top three skills for a storyboard artist include animation, adobe photoshop and fine arts. The most important skills for a freelance designer are sketch, CSS, and HTML.

Storyboard artist vs freelance designer overview

Storyboard ArtistFreelance Designer
Yearly salary$90,053$57,260
Hourly rate$43.29$27.53
Growth rate5%3%
Number of jobs3,75745,914
Job satisfaction5-
Most common degreeBachelor's Degree, 80%Bachelor's Degree, 73%
Average age4038
Years of experience212

What does a storyboard artist do?

A storyboard artist specializes in creating and designing storyboards to visualize scripts for film, TV, advertising, and animation production. They utilize their talents in sketching and storytelling to help the production process run smoothly and accurately. A storyboard artist's responsibilities revolve around coordinating with the production team, collaborating with directors and writers, conceptualizing imagery, and conducting revisions and edits as needed. Furthermore, as a storyboard artist, it is essential to adhere to the production's deadlines and goals.

What does a freelance designer do?

Freelance designers are creative, independent contractors who create visual and graphic designs for their clients. They develop text and illustrated versions of brands, messages, and communications with strong visible influence with their clients. Typical activities include networking, seeking projects, and negotiating prices to their customers. They manage client proposals, develop concepts, present solutions, and ensure the timely completion of projects. Freelance visual and graphic designers are creative, self-motivated as well as result and deadline oriented.

Storyboard artist vs freelance designer salary

Storyboard artists and freelance designers have different pay scales, as shown below.

Storyboard ArtistFreelance Designer
Average salary$90,053$57,260
Salary rangeBetween $56,000 And $144,000Between $39,000 And $83,000
Highest paying CityGreenwich, CT-
Highest paying stateNevada-
Best paying companyThe Walt Disney Company-
Best paying industryFinance-

Differences between storyboard artist and freelance designer education

There are a few differences between a storyboard artist and a freelance designer in terms of educational background:

Storyboard ArtistFreelance Designer
Most common degreeBachelor's Degree, 80%Bachelor's Degree, 73%
Most common majorAnimationGraphic Design
Most common collegeUniversity of PennsylvaniaUniversity of Pennsylvania

Storyboard artist vs freelance designer demographics

Here are the differences between storyboard artists' and freelance designers' demographics:

Storyboard ArtistFreelance Designer
Average age4038
Gender ratioMale, 69.9% Female, 30.1%Male, 48.0% Female, 52.0%
Race ratioBlack or African American, 4.4% Unknown, 5.9% Hispanic or Latino, 14.4% Asian, 7.7% White, 66.8% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.8%Black or African American, 3.4% Unknown, 5.0% Hispanic or Latino, 10.6% Asian, 10.4% White, 70.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.4%
LGBT Percentage11%13%

Differences between storyboard artist and freelance designer duties and responsibilities

Storyboard artist example responsibilities.

  • Lead a team of artists to create the art and animation for motion comics aspects of the show.
  • Introduce electronic publishing in order to bring print production in-house.
  • Proofread and approve completed pages and convert to PDF files for uploading to the printing company FTP site.
  • Page layout for scientific journals using QuarkXPress.
  • Print InDesign ad to PDF for proofing to client.
  • Accumulate knowledge for the deadline filing system and typesetting computers.
  • Show more

Freelance designer example responsibilities.

  • Lead the transition from paste-up, typesetting, pasting up page layout to digital ad/page building and web printing.
  • Hand-Code HTML, CSS, JS and PHP for custom design solutions and form processing, validation, and animations.
  • Provide identity and stationery design, web design, HTML / CSS development and WordPress integration (content management system).
  • Image manipulation in platforms such as Photoshop and illustrator as per assign.
  • Develop high-qualityshop drawings for all casework to be build by in-house woodshop.
  • Design websites, landing pages, banner ads, pop-ups, and HTML emails.
  • Show more

Storyboard artist vs freelance designer skills

Common storyboard artist skills
  • Animation, 45%
  • Adobe Photoshop, 7%
  • Fine Arts, 7%
  • Feature Film, 5%
  • Storyboard Pro, 4%
  • Sketch, 3%
Common freelance designer skills
  • Sketch, 11%
  • CSS, 7%
  • HTML, 6%
  • Adobe Photoshop, 6%
  • Adobe Illustrator, 6%
  • Photography, 5%

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