

Ask HN: Freelance work for a "semi-skilled" designer/coder. - vette982

I'm interested in doing some freelance work for a few extra bucks, but I'm not really sure what my "skill" level is in terms of freelancing. I have 2-3 years experience with PHP (and CakePHP), CSS, Javascript, jQuery, and I'm pretty good with Photoshop. I'm also pretty good with C++ and Java, but I don't think that would be of much use for freelance-sized projects. For the most part, if I'm given some desired web project, I'll be able to put it together with a little Googling if I don't already know exactly what to do.<p>In terms of my level of design skill, it's tough to say... I don't have any live projects at the moment to show off, but I'd definitely say I'm an above average designer.<p>What are some of your recommendations?
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gexla
Look through Odesk and Elance to see what people are putting out there for
jobs. It's a decent place to start. Keep in mind it's like any crazy market,
there is everything from the ridiculously low paying to high end.

You know a lot more than you think you do. Whatever skill level you have,
there are people who are worse who are winning the same sort of projects you
would be bidding on. The absolute worst are those who never even start on the
project (and possibly run with a down payment,) so you can't be worse than
those people if you at least give it an honest effort. ;)

Outside of that. It sounds like this is mostly going to be a side thing for
you. I would try not to deal directly with the "end clients" if possible.
That's the true "business end" of web development and just because you have
skills doesn't mean that you are going to be good at that side of things
without putting in your dues. What I would do is look for other developers to
help out. Look at developers / designers sites and see if they post jobs. Look
at job aggregators. Another awesome source is Twitter, developers post there
all the time looking for help.

Main thing. Have excellent communication. Let your clients know what's going
on, even if it's bad. Bad news is far better than no news at all. They just
need to know how to plan things.

Good luck!

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jayzee
Without a portfolio it would be tough to get a project. If you don't have a
portfolio I would recommend making some stuff up. Take a popular site that you
feel you can do a better job designing and do it. Everybody on Odesk or Elance
has a large portfolio.

luck!

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gexla
This is assuming design work, but it sounds like the OP is stronger in backend
dev. You don't need a portfolio for that, but a list of projects on Github or
something like that would help.

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davidedicillo
email me at davide at 39inc.com

~~~
vette982
sent!

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fleitz
put your email in your profile so people can contact you. also give me an
email: fred dot leitz at gmail.com

