Passive Income: How I made $20,000 selling only three 3D Models on Turbosquid 

may I ask how much money you're making out of said hobby? is it enough to be able to quit your job and doing only it?

Explain more and dhare your website to get a look if you dont mind.

@@gamingmonts9737 he still considers it a hobby. Means he can buy pizza once a month.

Yup, I'm still making pocket change for models I created years ago. Always good to make "evergreen" models

@@studysmartinfo6378 It's a flora type.

I thought "evergreen" model meant something that is timeless, that way it has a wide variety of uses over a long period of time. That's my interpretation at least.

@@Pax_the_Casual you're probably correct. I was being facetious ✌️😘

thats almost 1/2 of what i make in a month lol. PS i live in a 3rd world country.

How to made please give us a guide

Some people aren't getting your comment,lol

Yea good point. If you've already made models for your own use anyway, might as well share them on the market and make a bit of extra income

So pretty much you're just making shit up as you go. Basically you just bullshitted and bent the truth.

I really appreciate the vid. Thanks for the inspiration and congrats on your seriously huge success! 20K off your own art is huge!!

How would I know what a trending niche is?

may i ask how?

@@Trumpettalnet literally just by making stuff you learn more

What are your results? 1.2 is like more than 6 years ago. I've been learning blender for a month, and i'm getting better compared to the first render. I wake up early in the morning to model something before going into work, and watch RU-vid tutorials throughout the day

lmao at this rate you shold be as good as blender guru, even then you arent even sure you would get good some day?

@@dant4774 some people take longer to learn, and of course most of the real learning comes from forming daily habits and dedication to consistantly perfect a craft

how is it going?

But 21 is still not a big deal. Heck I would say a 100 over the course of a few years isn;t a bad deal, considering that strong portfolio might get me freelance gigs

Agreed. Though 3D models that are designed for 3D printing are modeled differently that for models designed for broadcast. So it’s unlikely a thief would take your stuff and post it onto Etsy as it just wouldn’t print or the products would receive very low ratings

@@the-sigma-hub they make it manifold and slice it with a slicer, tada.

@@recoverhealth2062 yea, unfortunately

Although throwing any model into a slicer and printing it as is would work, when I worked at a 3D Printing Service Shop we would reject this kind of models or ask for a reconstruction fee as normally this models would be to hard for the slicer to correctly print it. Printing errors were common and normally the client would get a print that did not satisfy them and end up frustrated. Normally people that go for the cheapest are the ones buying the stolen model and choose to deal with the hassle of slicing the model, printing and finishing themselves.

True, which is why I don't sell my design files. Have you considered building a storefront with either Shapeways or i.Materialize? They do the 3D printing, packaging and shipping for you.I'm looking to test this concept with a project I'm currently work on.

true. but there are 'evergreen' models as well that are always in demand such as medical viz - human anatomy, animals, etc. Only thing is that these niches tend to already be saturated with models already

Patron looks to be a sweet way of getting passive income...but isn't really passive as need to keep it updated. Plus need content people want or like to donate to. Great place to be though

@@rampartdesignmodels1614 i guess its treated as passive since its subscriber model. Which is a guaranteed income each month. Some Patreons dont update monthly. Really depends on expectations.

great idea, thanks for sharing

@LJP Bro/ sis, you mentioned " i have seen modellers----". How? And can you explain what idea mentioned in the starting.

@LJP what niche you are referring to.

if you are just starting out, model something you like and just post your models for sale and see, you'd be surprised

Same. This describes my situation exactly. Although, for me it's a matter of timing. I know I'll incorporate smaller, easier, but quality models into my business practice. They won't take as long to produce. But I want to finish my current [4-month long] project first. 😕

@@ratedxklusive7745 It's nice to have a plan for the future right? :) Take your time, I think keeping your head at your current project is most beneficial for everyone

Depends what you're good at. I can model an environment no problem, but making a character might take me a week because I'm terrible at it. Start with the things you like and post 'em. And when you gradually start getting better, check out what's popular these days and model stuff for them. A friend of mine made a couple hundred selling cyberpunk models back when that was the big thing.

Just keep going! May you have a long and fruitful career

@@the-sigma-hub hey thanks man, I appreciate it. I wish you the best as well.

Where can I see your work? :)

It's mostly market research and seeing what is trending. TS and CGtrader have trending keywords that you can check out.

If you can put it in a game. People want it. Specially low polly 'toon' styles.

I work in architecture, we work in a lot of different sectors, but especially modern healthcare models (like labs, lab equipment, hospital equipment, dentist stuff, etc) seem really hard to come by - good models anyway. Those things seem like a good thing to make rather than couches etc, furniture is usually so custom that we model it ourselves, but healthcare equipment is largely the same everywhere. just my 2cents as someone who purchases models a lot. - good city streetscape models are also something we purchase a lot.

@@tayayoung6031 what constitutes a good model? im wondering if for your use case if a model has to be dimensionally true or if its ok to be ball park measurements.

@@ellemnist things I look for are: topology (clean edges and quads, chamfers, etc), pbr materials, compatibility (vray and corona are pretty much industry standard) I use vray but can convert the materials easily if they are corona but maybe some other studios don’t have time/experience for that so the more compatibility you have the better. And yeah for some models being exact matters. At least within the inch, surely depends on the type. Being accurate will only increase the value of your model. You don’t want a client leave a bad review because it’s not correct. I personally rarely measure a model I buy but if it’s clearly off and doesn’t look right that’s a problem that costs me extra time to fix

Yep. But if you do, you can't be exclusive with TS. This lowers your royalty rate down to 40%

you are welcome, good luck

@@the-sigma-hub Thank you.

I will reveal it next video

Poly count doesn't really matter in UE, does it?

@@_savvy_9902 you can create whatever you desire. But there are developers that like the style and optimization of low poly assets.

@@_savvy_9902 Why don't you load up some architectural models and see how much fps you get. Poly count always matters, unless it's a full pipeline voxel engine - but you have no polygons in those.

haha I just did the exact same thing with the maths... something does not add up there....if he sold 126 models at $39 he only made just shy of $5k...

maybe he lowered the price or its the 40% he got. or a combination of the two

yes, I did lower the price over time, and sometimes raised it depending on the season

I do it in substance painter.

@@justindavis2711 what company is substance painter through?

@@Mr.McWatson Adobe

glad it helped!

Yes for turbosquid you are required to provide your tax information before you are paid.

An artist like michael jackson was inspired by better entertainers and performers than him like james brown, sammy davis junior, fred astaire and many other artists from music and cinema before his generation. Art is not creation but invention. The only real and unique creator that you can't compete with is God.

yes, be sure to include textures

😄

I never have, but turntables help

@@the-sigma-hub You mean the auto rotation of the turbosquid site? So you usually upload 3d models only?

@@EmiliaKaida You still ahve to render the 3D turntable from your 3D program, but yes, once you do that the customer can see the model in 360 rotation. I have seen some models link to RU-vid videos showing the model animated, very useful if its a character for example

@@the-sigma-hub Thanks

absolutely, these would mainly be used for archviz or game engine purposes, just be careful with including branding.

some of my priciest models never sold until I lowered the price. if they can find a similar model but cheaper then customers will buy that. if you make something that very few people can make, then you can set your price higher

yes, TS and CGtrader both have trending keyword searches

its really about the quality of the model but if you have an exchange format like FBX that should make your products more appealing to more people

@@the-sigma-hub thank you!

the price was $89 for a number of years

@@the-sigma-hub so the model hasn't been bought since you reduced the price to $39... Of course that sucks... And is weird... But yeah...

I have some models on there, but yea, the site doesn't get too much traffic in my experience

I second this question ^

As a games industry vet, its means making models that are efficient for game engines. This would be making them efficient as possible with as few textures as needed, fully unwrapped and textured with high to low poly baked normal maps, metal / rough maps etc creating game texture sizes e.g. 1024 / 2048 / 4096 at game texel densities and exporting them in file types for modern game engines like Unity and Unreal Engine. You should also make lods (Level of detail) for your model files. These would then be classed as "game ready" and could easily be adding to any game and be as cheap as possible to draw on screen. where as normal 3d models for say video production or rendered images probably wouldn't have baked maps and would be modelled mostly in geometry (usually higher poly as no an issue for rendering with high detail) with a some basic textures on it with no lods. Plenty of videos on you tube on how to create correct game assets.

@Paul Worster thank you so much! I would love to know more about making LODs as I'm currently working as a startup's only 3D Generalist.... so basically their whole art department. So all my faults I need to iron out. Also learning how to put multiple object's textures onto a single file helps out a ton. Either way thanks for the clarification, since you're a industry vet I just wanted further knowledge since I don't get to talk to many people in the industry.

​@@xenoturegaming198 Sure NP, Lod's or lodding are used to to cut down on the tri counts in games, if we had everything with no lods in games the drawing of these models would affect performance especially in the past and on older Gaming consoles whos hardware was the limiting factor. lods in essence are simple, you reduce the tri / texture count over distances from the camera and replace it with a cheaper model at a certain distance or based on its screen size. There is no sense having a full model miles away from a camera and it displaying fully and rasterized in ten pixels on screen. it might as well be a coloured box / plane and one texture. Good modelling loding practices in a nut shell would be : 1) Reducing tris where that would not affect a models silhouette. 2) Removing polys that wont be seen. 3) Reducing bevel edge counts , edge loops (where possible not to affect point 1) 4) Dropping height / depth of models 5) Trying to keep the models textures that has high contrast for as long as needed not to see sudden visible changes. eg textures that are dark and light if they were removed would be very obvious to the player if they suddenly disappears on screen., You also Lod materials, which is probably more important. that way the game has less texture draw calls to display on screen at once so a model with 4 textures goes down with each lod. not doing this and you pretty much have a game that can't be shipped. There is also modelling for lods in mind so you try and reduce any normal map changes by using clever UV arrangements when unwrapping your model Lods also are not free, they do have a cost as its another model. so sometimes lods created can cost more than the model they are replacing especially low poly models where it would be a waste to even use them. Nanite, has changed conventional loding, rather than loding the model its lods it in a per cluster basis meaning the you can now have really dense meshes and anything going below a per pixel is culled away on screen. its not perfect with overdraw issues, resolution and it cant be used on everything, but its really impressive and efficient, its the future and no doubt it will keep being refined by Epic until it is.

I started posting these models back in 2016 and steadily added a handful each year for several years

@@the-sigma-hub Thanks for the prompt answer! Appreciate the insight.

yep. if you know how to code, you'll be unstoppable

do you mean coding for 3d modelling or just coding in general?

@@paulpark552 I mean't coding in general.. but if your going to work in games or film for 3D. .. . coding for 3D will probably also give you the best pay and job security for that industry. It won't pay as well as coding for finance or other industries though.

MATT!!!!!!!!!!!

@@anahuaccontreras3232 Haha hey man, you know me from somewhere?!

Oh shit it's the shotgun guy

@@adekin1090 Hah! Didn’t know people actually recognized me 😃

Your videos are amazing Matt

blender is 100% free

Whoops

yes, and it's optimized for game engines which means that the polygon count is relatively low, but this will be less and less of an issue with time as processors become more powerful

Ok

Retract this statement as I've confirmed this is in USD/CAD, however, he fails to give you all the REAL context on these models. There are high poly models that required well over 200 hours to get to a level of 3D art to just learn how to create them. And on top of this, his 3 top selling items have been on the site since roughly 2015, which 18k over 7 years is 2k a year. Which lets say took him 40ish hours to produce each one from design, to model, to texture, to the effort of upload and image capture, divided by 3 for the 3 models that's roughly $15 an hour. Sure it's passive, but it's nowhere NEAR as sweet sounding as he puts it in this video. Lets says you spent 20-60 hours per model, you upload 20 models, only 3 of them sell "well", you have well over 700 hours of unpaid work just sitting there.... Please dont be fooled by this, yes uploading to multiple sites and doing many models is good but it's so hit or miss and usually in the industry right now, a legitimate full time 3D artist at an INDIE studio makes around 27-42/hr cad/usd. So you are much better off maybe doing models like this once you have learned 3D, work for a company, and do this on the side. Which is likely what this man has done here. Every single model he sells on turbo squid are around the level of a 3D artist with at least a year if not 3 of asset/industry experience. Lets not mention that the "low poly" art he recommends to learn and put on the site is SO saturated and will make you absolutely ZERO money, you're looking at maybe $5 an hour if you're lucky for lowpoly assets like that. Only Lowpoly that sells well are MASSIVE asset packs made by people who have 5-9 years of industry experience and sell the packs of assets for $140 - $360 a pack and are well known and pre integrated to a game engine like Unity or Unreal... I am not saying to not learn 3D and not sell your models, but this video just feels way to much like false advertising

everything in TS is in USD

@@SolarTaraI needed something like this. Seemed way too good to be true.

he lowered and raised the price over time depending on the seasons and demands.