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Overnight hours shooting rates
Just wondering how you all deal with shooting video overnight, say from 9PM to 6AM. Sometimes a client does not want to close their retail business for a shoot, and risk losing sales. But from my perspective shooting overnight is difficult for everyone(crew, talent, client) involved. I would think that since nobody can realistically work the following day on another project, we should charge a two-day rate for everything. Does this seem reasonable? How do you folks handle this? What if it’s a two day shoot, and we have to set=up and break down equipment twice?
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19 Replies
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I agree you need to charge more, what a hassle.
At least a 1.5 day rate.Chris Tompkins
Video Atlanta LLC -
If you want to pitch this idea to your clients, feel free.
However, in all the years I’ve been doing work for large retail clients, overnight shoots have been a constant part of the mix.
No retailer will willingly take the loss of revenue necessary to give over total control of their retail space to a video production operation. Sometimes, you can use a PART of the store during regular business hours, but if you’re doing work that requires blocking aisles, creating customer hazards (flying cameras, lights or jib work) or if you’re working in high traffic areas such as a cash register line – after hours shooting is the standard.
No company I’ve ever worked with finds this anything but “business as usual.”
In fact, long after hours shooting is pretty much the standard retail shooting mode in my experience.
Actors and good talent understand this. Heck, most plays and performance situations are schdeuled evening to late night, so for actors, you typically get a “wider awake” performance booking them at 9PM rather than 9AM!
“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Conner
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I don’t charge extra for after hours gigs. They are almost always less hassle then trying to shoot during business hours for a variety of reasons.
Bankers hours are for bankers.Scott Sheriff
Director
https://www.sstdigitalmedia.comI have a system, it has stuff in it, and stuff hooked to it. I have a camera, it can record stuff. I read the manuals, and know how to use this stuff and lots of other stuff too.
You should be suitably impressed… -
I hear you. I’m not saying we don’t work after hours, I understand the less hassle part. I’m asking about RATES. After all, my crew, the acting talent, and I can not realistically work another gig the next day during normal business hours. Frankly, if I’m a DP, an audio engineer, a make-up artist, a director, a grip, or a PA, why would I woks for a 1 day 10 hour standard rate and lose a chance for another day of work somewhere else, because I need to catch up on sleep?
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[Bill Davis] “Actors and good talent understand this. Heck, most plays and performance situations are schdeuled evening to late night, so for actors, you typically get a “wider awake” performance booking them at 9PM rather than 9AM!
“That’s true for actors who do this on a regular basis. Not once a year. And a typical video crew doesn’t do this normally either. In my experience of doing this for a large corporate retail client as an in-house crew for about 15 years, there was a point where there was a decision to be made on paying the crew extra or absorbing the lost sales in the establishment. It was never “business as usual” in my position. Normally I would take the next day off from work. I’m just not sure how to charge for this.
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If I got work outside Normal Business Hours I need to be compensated for that.
And Ya, If you can’t work the next day, that is like a travel day. Fold some extra in the charge for the late nite work.
Chris Tompkins
Video Atlanta LLC -
Sorry guys, but in this business you don’t get extra compensation for missing your beauty sleep. If the same company schedules you to work the very next day after a night shoot, without a proper turnaround, i.e. 12-hours off in between, that’s another matter. But, night shoots are part and parcel of this business, as Bill Davis first mentioned above.
For the record, this stuff isn’t just made on the fly; there are long-standing industry standards and practices that most professionals in this business typically adhere to. Despite the fact that you may not be in a union, and you may not work in New York, L.A., or Chicago, this business as a whole is based upon the established industry practices laid out long ago in those places.
And, don’t confuse travel days with night shoots… If you’re on location or traveling to or from a location, it is physically impossible to work another job, and thus you are entitled to compensation. But working a night shoot isn’t the same; it may be tiring to work for another company the next day after working all night, but not impossible, and that’s why you get paid the big bucks.
Trust me, if you tried to bill overtime to anyone I know for straight time night shoot, you’d be laughed at and labeled a prima donna.
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles
https://www.drwfilms.comPOST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™
A forum host of Creative COW’s Business & Marketing and Apple Final Cut Pro forums. Formerly host of the Apple Final Cut Basics, Indie Film & Documentary, and Film History & Appreciations forums.
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That brings up another question about hours. What about the 10-hour convention? What about punching out for breaks and lunches?
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Here’s my 2 cents.
You build RELATIONSHIPS with your crews. For me, that means keeping a VERY close eye on anything that overly stresses or annoys them. If they see me as a producer/director who has a history of not abusing them, paying fairly and promptly, and taking THEIR comfort and needs into the mix along with those of the clients and sponsors, then they’ll typically cut me a LOT of slack when it comes to the rare situation where we have to push an extra hour or two in order to get a shot or make something legitimate in the production schedule work.
If you haven’t built those relationships and level of respect, then EXPECT that when you ask people to go “above and beyond” for you, they might do it – but eventually they will STOP doing it – or worse, in my view, the best of them will suddenly start taking OTHER gigs in preference to mine and I’ll have trouble assembling the crews I need when I need them.
In my experience the WORST thing you can do in this business is devalue the human relationships that exist between ALL the people working on your projects.
And if you ever let them get a WHIFF that you’re using their pain to try to make more or save more of even just keep one party to the operations (clients, execs, whatever) happier to the detriment of the others – you’re eventually going to get hosed for it.
My experience, anyway.
“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Conner
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[Richard Herd] “What about the 10-hour convention? “
Actually, as I’ve mentioned here before, the 10-hour convention is no longer the standard in many states. The federal standard of eight straight is starting to be enforced now. However, the 10-hour convention was adhered to for so long that it’s still considered by many as the present standard.
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles
https://www.drwfilms.comPOST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™
A forum host of Creative COW’s Business & Marketing and Apple Final Cut Pro forums. Formerly host of the Apple Final Cut Basics, Indie Film & Documentary, and Film History & Appreciations forums.
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