What should a UK illustrator contract include?

A UK illustrator–client commission contract should name the parties, the deliverables (medium, dimensions, sketch rounds), the licence (use, territory, duration, exclusivity), revisions versus new work, the fee, deposit and kill fee, credit, and what happens if they cancel or pay late. Sign it before first sketches. Commissioning illustration does not transfer copyright.

This page is England and Wales first. Copyright under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 is UK-wide. The money-claim route for an unpaid invoice is the England and Wales procedure in Client won't pay a freelance invoice.

There is no illustrator-only template on Contracts.io yet. Start from a graphic design contract or a freelancer agreement. Repeat work can hang a statement of work under a services agreement. If you are sharing unpublished sketches before the deal is signed, a mutual NDA or the NDA generator sits next to it. Contracts for illustrators is the shorter audience page. What should a UK graphic design contract include? is the design-job sibling.

Nine blocks do the work:

The 40% deposit and 25% kill fee are examples, not a statutory rate. Write the numbers you actually use.

What goes in a freelance or contractor agreement compares templates. How to write a contract is the general checklist. This page is the commission version.

Do not email a Word file and hope v4_final is the one they signed. Both sides should edit and e-sign one shared draft.

Write the commission as a list: medium, dimensions, colour or black-and-white, how many sketches sit before colour, and what “done” looks like. “An illustration” is not a list. “One portrait, A3, full colour, two pencil rounds then two colour rounds, delivered as layered PSD plus print-ready TIFF” is a list. Cap extra poses as new work.

A working scope answers five things:

• What is in. Named pieces, medium (digital, ink, watercolour), dimensions, colour space, file formats. A character turnaround is not a poster. A spot is not a cover.
• What is out. Animation, merch, a second application, a style frame for motion, source brushes — unless they are on the in-list.
• Sketch rounds. How many pencil or rough rounds sit before colour, and what “approved sketch” means. Colour does not start until that approval is in writing.
• What “done” looks like. Final exports the client can print or publish, not an open Procreate file they keep commenting on.
• Working files. Layered files and brushes are not included unless the paper says so. Price them separately. Keep libraries as pre-existing materialspre-existing materialsPre-existing materials are tools, libraries or work the supplier already owned, which are licensed for the job rather than handed over.More in the glossary.

A revision limit is not change control. Revisions polish the agreed illustration. A change adds a second pose, a new product, or a campaign the brief never named. Mixing the two is how a “third round of amends” becomes a new product at no fee. See Client keeps adding extra work and change control.

If the client redlines the limit down to “unlimited,” that is a price issue, not a courtesy. See Your client redlined your contract.

Example

Deliverables are the items in Schedule 1. Two rounds of sketches are included. Colour work does not start until the Client has approved a sketch in writing. Two rounds of consolidated feedback are included on the coloured finals. A round is one written set of comments on the then-current proofs. Further rounds, extra poses, or work outside Schedule 1 are quoted and agreed in writing before work starts. Working files, brushes and libraries are not deliverables unless Schedule 1 says so.

In Plain English: they get the named files. Two pencil rounds, then two colour rounds. Anything extra is priced first. The working file stays with you unless you sold it.

Graphic designers write the same split for logos and brand kits. See What should a UK graphic design contract include?.

Licence unless the client is paying for ownership. You own freelance illustration until you assign it. CDPA 1988 s.11 makes the author the first owner. Commissioning the drawing does not move that. An assignment is not effective unless it is in writing, signed. Paying the invoice does not move title.

An illustration is an artistic work. Section 4 includes a graphic work — a painting, drawing, diagram, map, chart or plan — irrespective of artistic quality. Section 11(1) then says the author is the first owner. The employee exception in s.11(2) applies to employees, not to an illustrator on a contract for services.

GOV.UK on ownership of copyright works is blunt about commissions: the first legal owner is the person who created the work, not the commissioner, unless you otherwise agree it in writing. If the contract is silent, courts may find a limited implied licence for the purpose of the commission. That is not ownership. Silence is how a brand puts a book cover on merch and then argues they thought they had bought it.

CDPA 1988 s.90(3) is the assignment rule. An IP assignmentIP assignmentAn IP assignment is a transfer of ownership in the work, so the client owns it instead of the person who made it.More in the glossary has to be in writing, signed by you or someone signing on your behalf. A licence is permission to use the work. It is not a transfer of ownership. See IP licence vs assignmentIP licence vs assignmentAn IP assignment transfers ownership of copyright or other intellectual property. A licence is permission to use it; the author still owns it. In England and Wales there is no work-made-for-hire first-owner rule for freelancers: Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 s.11. An assignment must be in writing and signed: s.90. Say which you mean, and when it happens.More in the glossary.

| | Non-exclusive licence | Exclusive licence | Assignment | | --- | --- | --- | | What it is | Permission to use. You keep copyright. Others may be licensed too. | Permission to use. You keep copyright, but cannot license those same uses elsewhere for the term. | Transfer of copyright, in writing, signed. | | Formality | Can be express. Silence can imply a limited one. | Express: named uses, territory, term. | CDPA s.90(3): writing, signed by you. | | When it fits | Editorial, a campaign with named uses, a cover for the book. | A character the client must own the use of for a window. | A mascot or identity the client must own. | | What you keep | Copyright, libraries, moral rights unless waived. | Copyright, libraries, moral rights unless waived. | Libraries, working files, moral rights unless waived. | | When it should bite | On full payment. No use until then. | On full payment. | On full payment, not when you send the files. |

Write four licence facts, not a vibe:

• Use. Packaging, web, paid social, print run, merch — named, not “all media”.
• Territory. UK, EEA, worldwide.
• Duration. Two years, in perpetuity, or until the campaign ends.
• Exclusivity. Non-exclusive, exclusive for named uses, or none of the above because you are assigning.

A US “work for hire” heading does not do that work in England and Wales. See work for hire. Write licence or assignment in English words.

Keep three piles:

• Finals — the named deliverables. Licensed or assigned on full payment.
• Working files — layered files. Not included unless priced.
• Libraries — brushes, textures, your earlier work. Licensed for this job, not assigned.

Write the grant in the intellectual property assignment or intellectual property licence clause, and name the uses in usage rights and credit.

Example

Copyright in the illustration remains with the Illustrator. On receipt of full payment the Client is granted the non-exclusive licence in Schedule 1 to use the Deliverables for the uses, territory and term set out there. Until then the Client has no licence to copy, publish, communicate or adapt them. Exclusive use, merchandising and assignment of copyright are not included unless Schedule 1 says so. Pre-existing materials and working files stay with the Illustrator and are licensed only as part of the Deliverables.

In Plain English: they may use the finals as the schedule says, once they have paid. They do not own the drawing. Merch and a buyout are extra. Your brushes stay yours.

If they publish unpaid work, see Client using your work without paying.

Moral rightsmoral rightsMoral rights are the author’s personal rights in a copyright work: to be identified as author, and not to have the work subjected to derogatory treatment. In the UK they sit in the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 ss.77–80. They cannot be assigned. They can be waived in writing, signed by the person giving them up, under s.87.More in the glossary sit beside copyright. You have the right to be identified as author, which must be asserted, and the right not to have the work subjected to derogatory treatment. Those rights cannot be assigned. They can be waived in writing, signed by you. An IP assignment that is silent on moral rights leaves them with you.

CDPA 1988 s.77 is the right to be identified as author of an artistic work, including when it is published commercially or a visual image of it is communicated to the public. Section 77(1) says the right is not infringed unless it has been asserted in accordance with s.78 — on the assignment, or by an instrument in writing signed by you.

Section 80 is the integrity right: not to have the work subjected to derogatory treatment, meaning a distortion or mutilation that is prejudicial to honour or reputation. Recolouring a character into a joke, cropping a cover so the credit disappears, or adding a slogan across a face can raise that right.

They are not assignable. Section 94 says so in one sentence. Section 87 lets you waivewaiverA waiver is a choice not to enforce a right this time, without rewriting the contract. Accepting late work once does not, by itself, kill a time-is-of-the-essence clause if a no-waiver line is present. Waiver is not a variation: Rock Advertising Ltd v MWB [2018] UKSC 24 still requires the agreed method for a change of terms.More in the glossary them by an instrument in writing signed by the person giving up the right. A waiver can be specific or general, conditional or unconditional. The moral rights page is the longer note, and the moral rights clause is the drafting home. Graphic designers and photographers face the same split; see What should a UK graphic design contract include?.

Write four sentences, not one American “work for hire” heading:

• licence or assignment of the finals, on payment
• assertion of the credit, if you want a byline
• the waiver you are actually giving, limited to the uses they bought
• portfolio use, if you want to show the work

A brand that needs to crop a pack shot is a reason for a limited waiver. It is not a reason to waive integrity for every future parody. Waive as far as the job needs, and no further.

Revisions polish the agreed illustration. New work is a second pose, a new application, or a change to the brief. Cap sketch rounds and colour rounds separately. A round is one packed set of comments, not a drip of Slack notes. Extra rounds, or a new use of the character, are a priced change, not a courtesy.

A working pair:

A revision limit is not change control. Mixing the two is how “can you just put it on a mug” becomes a merchandise licence at no fee. See Client keeps adding extra work.

If they say nothing, write a deemed-acceptance window. Ten working days on the then-current proof is a common commercial pick, not a legal minimum.

Example

Two sketch rounds and two colour rounds are included. A round is one written set of comments on the then-current proofs, sent within 10 working days of delivery of those proofs. If the Client does not comment in that window the proofs are accepted. A request for an additional pose, application or style is new work, quoted and agreed in writing before it starts.

In Plain English: two pencils, two colours. One packed round each time. A new pose is a new fee.

There is no default UK right to keep a deposit or charge a kill fee. Both sides have to agree the sums. A deposit is money before work starts. A kill fee is due if they cancel. For a business client the charge must not be a penalty. For a consumer, a 14-day cancellation right can apply.

A deposit of 30–50% on signature, with work paused until it lands, is the usual freelance shape. Longer jobs split the balance on sketch approval and on delivery. A kill fee sits next to it: work done plus a named share of the remaining fee if they cancel for convenience. See cancellation and kill fee.

Who the client is then splits the page:

• A business client. An agreed cancellation charge that is really a sum on breach must not be a penalty. Cavendish Square Holding v Makdessi [2015] UKSC 67 asks whether a secondary obligation imposes a detriment out of all proportion to a legitimate interest in performance. Tie the figure to time held, costs committed and other work turned down. A flat 100% from the day they sign, with no link to those interests, is the shape that looks like punishment.
• A consumer. Distance and off-premises contracts carry a 14-day cancellation right under the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013. Cancellation terms are also tested for fairness under the Consumer Rights Act 2015. A “non-refundable deposit, no cooling-off” line does not remove a right those Regulations give.

The longer split, with the sliding-scale example, is Client cancelled: can you keep the deposit?. This page is the commission version of the same money lines.

Example

The Client will pay a Deposit of 40% of the Fee on signature. The Illustrator will not start until the Deposit is received. The balance is due on delivery of the finals. If the Client cancels for convenience after work has started, the Client shall pay for work done to date and a cancellation fee of 25% of the remaining Fee. The Deposit is credited to that sum. Intellectual property in work not fully paid for stays with the Illustrator.

In Plain English: 40% lands before you start. If they call it off once you are working, they pay for what is done plus a quarter of what is left. They do not own unpaid work.

Those percentages are examples, not a statutory rate. For a consumer client the same shape still has to be fair, and cannot remove a 14-day right the 2013 Regulations give.

Write a short due date, a right to pause if an invoice is overdue, and that no licence or assignment bites until payment in full. For a UK business client, statutory interest on late commercial payment is 8% above Bank of England base rate, plus a fixed recovery sum. We do not print the current base rate.

Payment terms should name:

• when invoices go out — on signature, on sketch approval, on delivery
• how many days to pay — net 14 or net 30Net 30Net 30 means the client has 30 days from the invoice date to pay.More in the glossary beats an open-ended “when procurement next runs”
• a pause right if an undisputed invoice is overdue
• that copyright, or any licence to use the work, passes only on full payment

For a qualifying business-to-business debt, the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 sets statutory interest. GOV.UK on late commercial payments states the rate as 8% plus the Bank of England base rate. Once that interest runs, a fixed recovery sum is also due: £40 under £1,000, £70 from £1,000 to under £10,000, and £100 at £10,000 or more, plus any reasonable recovery costs not met by that sum. See late payment interest. The 1998 Act does not apply to a consumer client.

A contract rate, if you name one, is the rate you point to instead of the statutory rate. A late feelate feeA late fee is an extra charge, or interest, added when an invoice is not paid by the due date.More in the glossary is that contract rate. Do not invent a figure that has no link to the statute or to the paper.

Example

Each undisputed invoice is due within 14 days of its date. The Illustrator may pause work while any undisputed invoice is more than 7 days overdue. Copyright and any licence to use the Deliverables pass to the Client only on payment in full. Until then the Client has no right to copy, publish, communicate or adapt the Deliverables.

In Plain English: they have two weeks to pay. After a week late, work stops. They do not own it, and they may not use it, until they have paid.

The chase sequence — written demand, letter before action, money claim — is Client won't pay a freelance invoice. Net 30, net 14, on receipt is the due-date page.

Only if the contract says so. An assignment of the finals does not, by itself, give you a right to put the work on your site. Write a licence back: named channels, whether you may name the client, and whether confidential work stays off the portfolio until they launch.

A working portfolio clause answers four things:

• Where. Your website, social, printed showreel, award entries.
• What. The finals, not unpublished options or the rejected route.
• When. After launch, or after a named embargo.
• Credit. Whether you name the client, and whether they name you. That sits next to the moral rights assertion.

See publicity and portfolio use. If the job is confidential — an unlaunched character, a product still in stealth — write that the licence starts on their public launch, or on written consent. Silence is how a case study goes live the week before their announcement.

Example

The Illustrator may reproduce the final Deliverables in the Illustrator’s portfolio and on the Illustrator’s website and social channels, and may name the Client as the commissioner, after the Client has first used the Deliverables in public, or earlier with the Client’s written consent. This licence does not extend to unpublished options, working files or confidential informationconfidentialityConfidentiality is a promise to keep shared information private and to use it only for the agreed purpose.More in the glossary.

In Plain English: once they have used it in public, you may show the finals and name them. You may not show the routes they killed, or leak the launch.

If they refuse any portfolio use, that is a price issue. Some brand work stays off the site. Get that in the paper before you start, not in a later brand-guidelines PDF.

Name the credit line and where it appears. Assert the right to be identified if you want a byline. UK copyright does not, by itself, stop a client feeding the files into a training set. If you do not want that, write a restriction. That is a contractual promise, not a CDPA rule we cite.

Credit is two things that sit next to each other:

• The contractual credit. “Illustration by [Name]” on the pack, the campaign page, the colophon, or wherever credits customarily appear, where technically feasible. See usage rights and credit.
• The moral-rights assertion. The right to be identified as author is not infringed unless it has been asserted (CDPA 1988 ss.77–78). A byline in a proposal is weaker than an assertion in the signed contract. See moral rights.

A working AI-training line is commercial practice. It is not a statute we have checked. If the deal is silent, the licence you granted is the licence you granted — named uses, not “everything a model might later do”. If you want a ban, write one: no copying the Deliverables into a dataset for training a machine-learning model, and no sublicensing for that purpose, without written consent. Do not dress that up as a CDPA holding.

Example

The Client shall credit the Illustrator as “Illustration by [Name]” on the uses in Schedule 1, where technically feasible. The Illustrator asserts the right to be identified as author of the artistic work. The Client shall not copy the Deliverables into a dataset for the purpose of training a machine-learning model, or permit another person to do so, without the Illustrator’s written consent.

In Plain English: they name you on the work they bought. You have asserted the byline. They do not feed the files into a model unless you said yes in writing.

This guide is England and Wales first. Write England and Wales as the governing lawgoverning lawGoverning law is the legal system the parties choose to interpret their contract and decide disputes about it.More in the glossary and the courts if that is where you work and invoice. Copyright under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 is UK-wide. A US “work for hirework for hireWork for hire is a phrase, common on US-style papers, meaning the client is treated as the author and owner of the work from the start.More in the glossary” heading does not transfer copyright here. Do not paste a foreign template and hope.

Governing law and jurisdiction is two lines:

• Governing law. Which legal system reads the paper. England and Wales is the default this guide writes to.
• JurisdictionjurisdictionJurisdiction is which courts will hear a dispute if the parties cannot agree.More in the glossary. Which courts hear a dispute. Exclusive English courts is the usual freelance line when both sides are here.

If the client is abroad, you can still choose England and Wales. That does not, by itself, make an overseas invoice easy to collect. The unpaid-invoice route on this site is the England and Wales procedure in Client won't pay a freelance invoice.

Copyright first-ownership and assignment rules cited on this page are CDPA 1988, which applies across the UK. Scotland has its own courts. We do not rewrite this guide as Scots law. See How contracts work in England and Wales.

Example

This agreement is governed by the law of England and Wales. The courts of England and Wales have exclusive jurisdiction to settle any dispute arising out of or in connection with it.

In Plain English: English law reads the paper. English courts hear the fight. Change that only if you mean to.

The Association of Illustrators publishes an Illustrator Template Contract for members. It is a common industry starting point: a job-details and licence page plus standard terms. We do not reprint that member text. A static PDF or Word file still becomes v4_final in email. Agree the same terms on one shared draft, then e-signe-signatureAn e-signature is any electronic way of showing agreement to a document, such as a typed name, a drawn signature or a click.More in the glossary.

AOI’s member contract is widely used as the shape of a UK illustration job: who the parties are, what the job is, and a licence schedulescheduleA schedule is an annex to the contract that holds the detail: fees, dates, deliverables, service levels. It is part of the agreement if the main body says so. An order-of-precedence line should say what happens if the schedule and the clauses collide. Swap a schedule only by the variation method the contract names.More in the glossary sitting in front of the boilerplateboilerplateBoilerplate is the standard back-of-the-contract clauses: entire agreement, variation, severability, notices, counterparts, assignment, third-party rights, and governing law. The name means “set wording”. It does not mean “unimportant”. Rock Advertising Ltd v MWB [2018] UKSC 24 and Cavendish Square v Makdessi [2015] UKSC 67 are both cases about clauses people used to skip.More in the glossary. Many illustrators start there, and many clients recognise the layout. That is industry practice, not a statute. We do not copy AOI wording, and we do not quote AOI prices.

The gap is the file, not the topics. A downloaded template still travels as an attachment. Each redlineredlineA redline is a proposed edit on a draft contract — words added, struck out or rewritten — not a signed change.More in the glossary is a new version. Someone signs v3 while the other side is editing v4. On Contracts.io both sides draft, negotiate and e-sign one shared commission contract, so the licence, the kill fee and the credit are the version you both signed.

Use the topics AOI members already expect. Put them on one shared draft so the signed paper is the paper you edited.

On Contracts.io both sides draft, negotiate and e-sign one shared commission contract, so the scope, the licence and the kill fee are the version you both signed. Describe the job in a sentence. Lex, our AI host, drafts. You share one link. Nobody emails v4_final.docx back and forth.

The client opens that link. They can Accept, Counter or Decline on the same version, then both of you e-sign it. The other side never pays and does not need an account.

Start from a graphic design contract or a freelancer agreement. Repeat work can hang a statement of work under a services agreement. You can also start from the AI contract generator or the contract generator. If you are sharing unpublished sketches before the deal is signed, the NDA generator sits next to it.

That does not chase an invoice for you. It does mean the revision limitrevision limitA revision limit says how many rounds of changes are included in the fee before extra work is quoted.More in the glossary, the licence or IP assignment, the deposit and the kill fee are the words you both signed, not a line lost in email.

Free £0, then paid plans from £15 a month — see /pricing.

Try it on contracts.io: describe the commission in one sentence, share one link, and e-sign before first sketches.

Contracts for illustrators is the wider set of terms that sit around this paper. Contracts for graphic designers is the design sibling. Should I start work before the contract is signed? is the day-one rule.