Blender Underground

This thread (hopefully) will be dedicated to asking and answering questions about Turbo Squid, instead of having scattered answers around the forum.
Maybe this thread could be stickied?

When i finish my BMW with detaled enough lights, fairly accurate body and maybe fairly to high detailed interior, what price should i sell it for as like Corban said price could make the work seem like a quicky if too low.

Hi Bogieman,

You beat me to it

Price is always difficult and its something I am struggling with myself. A good starting price for a model would be about $30 and increase from there depending on the amount of detail. Car models on TS start at about $35 and continue upwards from there, give or take. However some models such as weapons start at about $20.

What would help on deciding a price would a be an image, if you could provide one.

Before selling your models here is what TS have to say:

Pricing: http://support.turbosquid.com/entries/171104-pricing-policy

Selling: http://support.turbosquid.com/entries/173349-how-do-i-prepare-my-3d-model-for-sale-on-turbosquid

FAQ's: http://support.turbosquid.com/forums/170941-common-artist-questions

When uploading images to TS don't forget a wire render

Thanks, when its finished ill upload an image, and eventualy the video itll be used in although ill need a few people with spare time to help with the rendering of the video as itll be done in luxrender, image by image and then compiled as a video @ 24 fps in another program

I've been successfully selling models for a while now, and I will agree that pricing is one of the many challenging aspects to the whole process.
What I do is look at the competition. What other frag grenade* models are there? I search, and find that my grenade is one of the nicer ones. Maybe 1 or 2 are similar. If I can afford it, I try to undercut them a little bit for more consumer appeal. What's really cool is when you can undercut trashy models** that are grossly overpriced.

To catch potential customers attention, really try to push your preview renders. They don't necessarily need to be flashy and over the top, but rather need to be easy to read and what I mean by that is that by looking at the thumbnail, I should instantly know what I'm looking at, and that what I'm looking at is a model made with lots of TLC, and attention to detail.

The stores usually recommend selling in as many formats as you can, but recently I've only exported my models to .obj because it's pretty much the only format that doesn't shuffle your vertices around randomly, delete the UVs, or other such lame jokes. Make sure that you don't export modifiers such as subsurfacing. Include a readme in your zip files giving some instructions such as how much subsurfacing to add to what objects. Modifiers like Mirror should be exported.

As for stores, I would recommend going with The 3D studio because they truly have the best customer relationship. Turbosquid gives you 40% royalties on your sales. That's right, they take 60% of the money made by selling YOUR models for themselves. If you sign an exclusivity agreement with them, AND have more than 20,000$ in lifetime sales, they'll give you 60%. But now you can't sell you models anywhere else, not even privately . T3DS on the other hand gives YOU 60% right from ground zero without any sales to your name. If you agree to the terms of the Member Loyalty Program you get 70% royalties! For the record, the MLP states that you will not remove your models from their store in a 5 year period. You don't need to go exclusive so that means you can sell your models anywhere else as much as you please. That's a very fair deal in my book.

Hope that sheds some light on the whole topic


For the record, I'm not an employee of The 3D studio, just wanted to let people know about what I think it a much better deal.
*a real scenario of a model I recently made.
**iJust got bledner and itz this kewl programlook@this nade i made!!!11!!!1!!eleven

Hi Radial,

Wise words my friend, and that's why I always stick with .obj, reliable and predictable. However I do disagree about The 3D Studio. It is a great website and the royalties there are fantastic, however the traffic you get isn't. For example I had a free Demon Head Bust on T3DS and it had no downloads. I had the same model on TS at the same time and it had received well over 2000 downloads. Yes the the percentage rate for TS is very low 40% un-exclusive, however after having my items across two other sites it was the only one where my items got any significant attention. What you lose in one area you gain in another and if you do start selling, and selling well you could easily make up the difference.

Unfortunately I did apply a low lvl of sub-surf to some of my models (earlier ones), however I am trying to rectify this slight oversight. I have saved my models incrementally so I should be able to find one that is un-sub-surfed.

You are right that T3DS doesn't get quite the traffic TS does, but I'm am I correct in my assumption that you are stating this based on free downloads? I used to have a free model or two available for download, but have since removed them as I realized they weren't very good quality. If I remember correctly, TS did get more downloads. But I have a theory about all this. No proof, just hypothesillizing . I believe that T3DS get's a more serious, professional audience on the consumer end of things whereas TS get everyone. (How many kids-just-starting-blender have you seen download freebies from TS? Quite a few here.) I have not made quite as many sales on T3DS as on TS, but total royalties have more on T3DS. For me, and I'm sure you would all agree, income is more important than sales.

Another reason to avoid TS is a boycott sort of strategy. It's my hopes that T3DS will get more popular, as TS sinks into more humble grounds.

Here's an interesting read. Yes, it was written by T3DS so take with a bit of salt, but it does shed light on some interesting things.
http://www.the3dstudio.com/blog_detail.aspx?id=873
Oh, and 'the scammers' they're referring to is actually TurboSquid but I think they can't mention them directly because of legal reasons.

Hi Radial,

It was a free item that I uploaded, however like all my models I put a lot of time in to it as it was representative of the quality of my work. I may remove my free items though as I think they have ran there course. So far I haven't made any real sales so its hard to say which site is better however, TS dose appear to get more traffic and I have had more interest in my work from TS. If TS is a site for everyone, then it may be a better choice for selling as it has access to a wider audience.

I admit that I would rather have stuck with T3DS, however I found the site to be devoid of life. When I had models with them they pretty much went unnoticed.

At the moment I am still struggling to make that first sale, and with the range of items I have created I am at loss as to what I should create next. I often feel like I am stumbling along aimlessly and regardless of the site I chose I think the result would still be the same as it is now, 0 Sales!

I think you're objects fit into a rather small niche market. They are fantastic however and I don't know why they aren't selling. Maybe try making a more...main stream model for your next shot. T3DS recently added a new search report to they're reports page. You can see what the most searched for object was in the last 24 hours, or even the last week. You should be able to find something nice to make there.
Just be sure to set the filter to 3D models, because I think it's on stock images by default.

Good luck!

Hi Radial,

Yep they are niche However I don't want to compromise my style of work just to make sales, Id rather my items be bought because of their design. That said maybe items such as a Demon Skull with spikes riveted in place is a bit macabre Maybe I should make some normal looking sharp implements

That sounds like a nice feature on the T3DS, however I went exclusive with TS. A decision I didn't take lightly, however with my experience of T3DS it seemed like a good choice, and it makes life easier, only one site to manage.

This is a great thread guys. Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experiences. I'm sure a lot of Undergrounders would have a bunch of models archived on their hard drive which could earn them a few pennies.

Corban: one possible reason for lack of interest in you demon bust is it's not particularly useful as such (a complete demon would be). Now, a well modeled sword (which yours is, very nice) is very useful to animators (and even still-modelers).

That said, what about getting a 3D print of your bust (make sure you hollow it) and try selling that (maybe at your local gaming shop)?

That would be pretty cool man. If it was life size I wonder how much it would cost?

Well, the only place about which I know anything is shapeways. They charge by "printed" volume, and thus have provided a pricing script.

Note, I have absolutely nothing to do with shapeways, I'm not even a customer.

Hi guys

@Taniwha, I agree about the demon busts and that was one of the reasons why they were added as free items. More than anything the demon busts were intended as promotional items. Because these items weren't particularly useful I decided to build more complete items such as a full demon skull, weapons and hopefully a vehicle soon. However the Axes I have uploaded have received little interest and I don't have much hope for the sword. If my Gunship dosen't sell I'm giving up on 3D and applying for a job at my local supermarket instead.

3D Printing dose sound great and it is something I have wanted to try, and in the future may give it a go