-
Budgeting a 10 hour lecture series of six DVDs
Hi folks,
I was asked this week for a quote on a long (in duration) project and was wondering what would be a reasonable amount of time required for this. The talk would be recorded on a single camera and edited into six 1.5 hour messages with no cutaways.
The material would be authored to six Standard DVD disks with 5 section chapters for each. It seems fairly straightforward. If we were to add an additional camera on the shoot I might add another 2 days of editing.
Here is the time I’m thinking it may take:
2.5 days shooting in XDCam HD (prep and production)
5 days of editing (probably 3 days of loading and rendering alone)
4 days to author and burn the six disks & QC.Do these assumptions seem reasonable? I welcome your thoughts.
Cheers,
Jim
-
27 Replies
-
With zero input from the client and assuming some assistant level help along the way- sure. I’d maybe pad the post time more if you see it going otherwise.
Noah
Unlock the secrets of 24p, HD and Final Cut Studio with Call Box Training. Featuring the Canon 5D Mark II and 7D.
-
How is your project working out? Did you win the work?
-
Hi Lawrence,
No I haven’t sent the bid in yet. I was waiting to get a little feedback from peers like yourself. I’ve been in business for many years but have never bid on this kind of thing before. I just wanted to make sure I’m not making any wrong assumptions on how long this would take to do. I can’t afford to underestimate on this one.
Cheers,
Jim
-
Jim-
First of all, no cutaways for “six 1.5 hour shows“??? Has this concept been drawn up by a client with no TV or video experience whatsoever or someone who’s ego is so large that they assume just looking at them for NINE HOURS would be tolerable for any audience not already secured by handcuffs and leg-irons? I’ve been approached before on something like this and it was by an “educator” who quickly lost interest when an actual price was attached to carrying out his idea. Perhaps this is a similar situation.
Assuming this is a one camera show, you would have to shoot it multiple times from different angles to give you decent edit points. This would also require a fair amount of consistency from take to take to keep from backing you into a corner with several un-makeable edits. Unless you’re working with a real pro, achieving consistency and continuity requires another crew member whose primary job is watching the little details and making sure that the same things are said take to take. Two and a half days may be enough for all of this if you are very lucky and very efficient. But I wouldn’t commit to that schedule until you saw how long the first one or two took.
If you are still editing in Media 100 and were able to use a second camera, the multi-clip functionality could speed things up considerably, but you are likely to still need a few pick-up shots apart from the A & B camera just to make things look decent.
The edit time seems reasonable, again if you are very efficient and if the material is well organized and delivered cleanly. If any of these three are not optimal you’re going to need more edit time.
The DVD authoring seems OK, assuming you’re doing fairly straightforward stuff.
Any way you can play this safe and have your prospective client fund a “pilot” so both of you can get a true feel for what this will look like and how long it will realistically take?
My two cents: if you feel at risk of under-bidding this, don’t. It’s better to not have this job and be available for something with easier/better specs.
-
Yeah I mean- is this a play? Can the client do 1.5 hours at a single take with no mistakes? If not, you’ll need a second camera at least to cover over that. Or would you cut to his powerpoint then?
Noah
Unlock the secrets of 24p, HD and Final Cut Studio with Call Box Training. Featuring the Canon 5D Mark II and 7D.
-
You’ve allowed 2.5 days for shooting. Is the guy going to talk to the camera for 5 hours on each day?
Also, is there a need to shoot in HD? It’s going down to SD and if it’s just a talking head then I’m not sure if you’ll see a difference in quality shooting in SD.
Finally, if it was me, I’d find a way to just capture straight to a computer or even DVD, as well as having tape. That will cut down on capture time.
[nick griffin] “Has this concept been drawn up by a client with no TV or video experience whatsoever or someone who’s ego is so large that they assume just looking at them for NINE HOURS would be tolerable for any audience not already secured by handcuffs and leg-irons?”
What he said…Talking for 10 hours? That could be delivered on audio tape. This is the kind of thing I talk people out of all the time (hey, I’m government…). Lord of the Rings didn’t go that long.
-
I think your time frame is reasonable. However since you haven’t bid a project like this before, I assume you haven’t done a project like this before. In which case adding 30% for poor estimation is always a good bet.
Cutaways aren’t necessary for a lecture DVD. You’re not making TV shows. If these are seminar recordings where the guy is speaking on stage maybe drawing or showing visuals of what he is saying the DVD viewer will get the same experience as an audience member.
Cory
—
Cory Petkovsek
Corporate Video -
[Cory Petkovsek] “the DVD viewer will get the same experience as an audience member.”
Respectfully, Cory, I disagree. An in-person lecturer has the benefit of eye contact and, as such more of a connection to the recipient. A lecturer via video does not. As corporate producers even though we are not making “entertainment,” we should be making content which retains viewers, keeps them awake and succeeds at relaying information. A single camera view for 90 continuous minutes — especially in this age of shortening attention spans — is far less likely to accomplish these objectives. (IMHO.)
-
My (limited) experience is that live presentations are quite padded, either intentionally (because someone has X amount of time to fill) or unintentionally (with ummms, ahhhs or badly prepared material). A live audience will tolerate this because they can look around, zone in and out etc. Sometimes people are there because they have to be. At many presentations, it’s what happens after that’s important – meeting and greeting, schmoozing and lunching. Someone watching a padded presentation on DVD will simply switch it off. It has to be focussed and on message; every word must be chosen for the information it will convey. This does vary with the motivation of the person watching the material.
One way we keep people watching is to have a nice location, cutaways, pics, videos, dot points. The ultimate (for us) is to hire an actor to present the thing because gawdnose, most doctors have trouble stringing a sentence together that anyone else not in the club can understand.
-
Hi folks,
Thank you for all your valuable advice and insight! Today, I submitted three budgets with detailed assumptions. I will likely discuss the options with my client today and report back to our group the results. Rather than lose a job these days I sometimes offer an option a, b or c budgets. Nonetheless, my clients are fully briefed on what to expect for their money; I don’t want to shoot myself in the foot by low balling or giving them a package price just to get the job. I gave up on that 20 years ago.
Cheers,
Jim
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up