Storyboard Artist Rates in the UK — 2026 Guide

Updated: May 2026 · Written by Seb Antoniou

TL;DR

How the UK industry sets rates

The UK has no single fixed rate card for storyboard artists. The role sits at the intersection of three trade bodies, none of which publishes a binding tariff: the Advertising Producers Association for commercials, the Association of Illustrators for the illustration craft, and BECTU for the broader film and broadcast workforce. The Association of Photographers covers an adjacent commissioning model — usage rights, kill fees, weather days — that producers borrow when they brief boarders for high-value brand work.

What actually sets the day rate in practice is a mix of: the artist’s reputation, the brand attached to the brief, the turnaround, the deliverable format (B&W vs colour, frames vs animatic), and whether the work carries usage rights or is internal-only. YunoJuno’s 2026 creative freelance report — the largest single dataset of contracted UK freelance rates — pegs the average creative freelance day rate at £397, up 2% year-on-year, with the top 10% of contracts averaging £712 per day. That benchmark gives the most defensible mid-to-senior boundary for storyboard work specifically.

For salaried context, SalaryExpert’s 2026 London data puts the average London storyboard artist gross salary at £58,447, with senior (8+ years) at £64,337 and entry (1–3 years) at £42,097. Convert those to a freelance equivalent (roughly +30–50% for tax, pension, gaps, equipment, software) and the salary data corroborates the day-rate tiers in the TL;DR above.

Rates by experience level

Junior — £200–£350/day. Boarders with 0–3 years of credits, usually graduating from illustration or animation. Typical work: corporate explainers, internal pitch decks, simple 15-second cutdowns, in-house brand content. Frame output is comparable to senior boarders on simple briefs (around 15–20 B&W frames/day) but is normally booked for less demanding work where the brand isn’t paying for pedigree.

Mid — £350–£550/day. Three to seven years in. Has shipped TVCs through regional agencies and is on the books at the smaller production companies. This is the bulk of UK working freelancers. Jamie Rae’s published rate card and similar UK practitioner pages sit in this band. Producers booking a board through an agency rep almost always land here.

Senior commercial — £500–£900/day. Seven to twelve years, an agency rolodex, a portfolio with named global brands, and the speed to lead in a pre-pro room. Most of the work shipped for the larger London agencies — Adam & Eve DDB, BBH, Mother, Wieden+Kennedy, M&C Saatchi — goes through artists in this tier. This is where YunoJuno’s top-10% £712 benchmark sits.

Top-tier global brand — £700–£1,800/day. Ten years plus, with a portfolio that includes the names producers reach for when the brand is the deciding factor — Premier League, Bentley, Coca-Cola, Nike, BBC Sport. Day rates compress upward when the brief is named (locked director, locked agency, locked deck) and stretches further when the boarder is asked to carry the pre-pro meeting in front of the client. Pitch-deck and treatment-led work usually lands at the top of this band because the boards are doing the selling.

Rates by project type

The same artist will quote different numbers for different deliverables. The drivers are frame count, finish level, and what the boards have to do downstream.

TV commercial (TVC) — £350–£1,500/day. The category that anchors most UK storyboarding income. A 30-second spot usually needs 15–25 frames; a 60-second runs 25–40; a 90-second hero film can sit at 50–80. Mid-tier boarders fit comfortably at £400–£600/day for regional TVC; senior commercial sits at £600–£900; top-tier brand work runs to £1,200–£1,800 when the brief is high-stakes and the timeline tight.

Music video — £350–£800/day. Lower budgets than TVC at the indie end, higher frame counts (40–80 panels for a typical music video). Project fees are more common here than day rates because labels and management want a single number. Fiverr’s 2026 cost guide puts a comprehensive music video board at the £2,500–£8,000 ($3,000–$10,000) project mark.

Film / drama — £400–£900/day. Shooting boards for narrative drama are slower and more dialogue-driven; the day’s frame count drops to 10–15 but each frame carries more lens/blocking information. BECTU’s Art Department rate framework is the nearest published reference, though storyboard artists are rarely on the formal art-department card.

Animation pre-vis / keyframes — £350–£700/day. Frame-heavy and slower; expectations are scene-readable poses rather than camera-perfect ad frames. Often booked by the week.

Pitch visual (deck) — £500–£1,500/day. Colour, polished, lower frame count (6–12 frames), shorter turnaround. Day rate looks high but the project is rarely more than 1–3 days. These boards are doing the selling, so finish level is what’s being paid for.

Animatic — base storyboard rate + 25–50%. Animatic delivery adds timing, scene order, and an MP4 export. The board itself is the same; the uplift covers the extra production work. Vox Illustration’s per-frame economics align with this — animatic frames sit 1.5–2× the static rate per panel.

Shooting board (director-side) — £400–£1,200/day. Sketchier, faster, often done in-house at the production company or by the director themselves. When commissioned out, it’s quoted at the same day rate as TVC but with the expectation of more frames per day (25–35) because finish is lower.

Rates by deliverable format

Black & white frames. The default deliverable. A practised boarder turns around 15–25 B&W frames per day. This is the unit of capacity most quotes are built on.

Tonal / greyscale. A 25–50% uplift on B&W. The artist is doing about 60% of the frames per day because shading takes time.

Full colour. A 50–100% uplift on B&W. Frame output drops to 6–12 per day for true colour work; pitch-visual quality drops to 4–8 frames per day. Almost always priced as a project fee or per-frame rather than day rate because the relationship between effort and output stops being linear.

Revision rounds. One full round of amends is the UK norm — included in the day rate or project fee. A second or third round is usually quoted as an additional half-day or day, or as a per-frame rework charge.

What affects the price

Turnaround. The single biggest lever after experience tier. Standard turnaround is 3–5 working days for a 30s TVC, 1–2 weeks for a 60s. Anything inside 48 hours triggers a rush fee of +40–50%; anything weekend or out-of-hours runs +50–100%. See the rush-fee guide for the full breakdown.

Complexity. Action sequences with multiple characters, vehicles, VFX, environmental destruction or stunts take 2–3× the time per frame of a dialogue scene. Quotes should distinguish.

Usage rights. UK commercial storyboards are normally a work-for-hire deliverable: the agency or brand owns the boards on payment. If the artist retains any rights (rare) or if the boards will be repurposed outside the original campaign (animatics extracted, in-app use, sizzle reels), expect a usage uplift. The AOP commissioning framework is the most-cited industry reference for how this should be priced.

Rush. See above.

Location. Most boarding is remote in 2026. In-house at the agency or production company adds a London day-rate premium of 10–20%, plus travel.

Reputation premium. A boarder with a public portfolio of named global brands carries a 30–60% premium over the same skill level without that portfolio. Specificity sells.

Day rate vs project fee

Both pricing models are common in 2026. Day rate is simpler when scope is open; project fee is simpler when scope is locked. The full comparison — when each model saves the producer money, and what to put in the contract either way — lives in the day rate vs project fee guide. The short version: book day rate for open-ended briefs with multiple variants or unclear scope; quote project fee for fixed deliverables with a single round of amends.

What to budget for a 30-second TVC storyboard end-to-end

A worked example, mid-tier boarder, standard turnaround, one round of amends:

• 18 B&W frames at 15–20 frames/day = ~1 day base draw
• Add 0.5 day for thumbnails, scene/shot numbering, timing notes
• Add 0.5 day for one round of amends
• Total: 2 days × £450/day = £900 base
• Add 20% for senior tier handling: £1,080
• Add a small VAT-adjacent and rights-handling buffer: typically £1,500–£2,500 final invoice

At the top tier (named global brand, fast turnaround, pre-pro lead) the same brief sits at £2,500–£3,500. At the junior end (regional ad, no rights complexity) it drops to £800–£1,200. The budget-by-deliverable guide breaks the same arithmetic across every common deliverable.

How my rates compare

For context, I sit in the senior commercial-to-top-tier band of the table above, which is where most boarders carrying named global brand campaigns land in 2026. Day rates are quoted per project — the brief, turnaround, frame count and rights position all move the number. Get a project quote: /contact.

What to ask before signing a quote

1. Is the day rate inclusive of one round of amends, or charged extra? UK norm is one round included.
2. How many frames per day does the rate assume? 15–25 B&W is standard. Below 15 is a red flag; above 25 means finish level will be lower.
3. What’s the rush threshold? Standard is 48 hours; anything inside that should be disclosed in the quote.
4. Are weekend rates separate? Some artists fold weekend work into rush; others charge +50–100% on top.
5. Who owns the boards after delivery? UK default is work-for-hire to the commissioning party on payment. Anything else needs to be in writing.
6. Is the artist available for the pre-pro meeting? Top-tier boarders normally are; mid-tier may charge a half-day.
7. What’s the kill fee if the project is cancelled mid-board? AOP-style guidance is 50% if cancelled after work has started, 100% if cancelled inside 48 hours of delivery.

Sources

1. YunoJuno — Storyboard Artist Freelance Rates — UK day-rate benchmark, accessed May 2026
2. YunoJuno — Creative Freelance Rates Report (2026) — 2026 average £397/day, top 10% £712/day
3. SalaryExpert — Storyboard Artist Salary London (2026) — London 2026 salary data
4. Fiverr — Hire a Storyboard Artist: Costs Explained for 2026 — Per-panel and per-project commercial ranges
5. Vox Illustration — Storyboard Cost Per Frame — Per-frame illustration economics (updated to 2026 figures where available)
6. Jamie Rae — How storyboard artists should charge — UK practitioner reference
7. BECTU — Rate Cards — UK union rate-card framework, 2025–2026 cycle
8. Association of Photographers (AOP) — Commissioning fees and usage rights framework
9. Association of Illustrators (AOI) — UK illustration pricing guidance
10. Advertising Producers Association (APA) — UK commercial production trade body

About the author

Seb Antoniou is a London-based storyboard artist with 10+ years across Premier League, Bentley, Coca-Cola, Nike and BBC Sport campaigns. Get in touch: /contact.

Related

• Day rate vs project fee — which one to ask for
• Bentley Flying Spur Hybrid — case study
• Seb’s rates page

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