Basically a friend and I asked for an artist to draw a tattoo for us, cause we liked their artwork a lot, but what they had to offer wasn’t what we expected. They drew a “first sketch”, to which we could add/remove details. We thought it was normal for it to be very simplified and that they would make it more detailed and polished for the next sketch, but then they sent over the final sketch before inking, and we really don’t like it. It doesn’t even look close to what we asked for. We haven’t paid for anything yet, but we wanna retract ourselves, and not go any further with this artist. How do we say that without sounding like total arrogant assholes ?
2 comments
Either ..
“Hi. Thankyou for sending over the sketches which we did like as we have always liked your artwork anyway.
Unfortunately, due to recent unexpected financial changes, we can’t move forward with the tattoo so we no longer require your services. I appreciate that this is disappointing to hear but we felt we needed to let you know before any further work was carried out”.
Or ..
“Hi. Thankyou for sending over the sketches which we did like as we have always liked your artwork anyway.
Your work, as expected, was excellent but, sadly, we have to tell you that we’ve made the decision to go in a different direction with the tattoo. I appreciate that this is disappointing to hear but we felt we needed to let you know before any further work was carried out”.
In a situation like this, you don’t have to be explicitly truthful so just let him down gentle with a bit of praise at the same time to soften the blow a bit.
This is why artists usually ask for a deposit.
If you want to be really nice, you can say “I’m sorry but this is not what we had in mind, I’d be willing to offer you (X% of what you were quoted) for your time”
If you don’t want to pay anything and they didn’t ask for a deposit, you can probably simply say “this isn’t what we can in mind, thank you your time we are happy to leave you a good review anyways”.