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Pricing by project or per minute
I’ve decided to start my own small business and need advice on how much to charge/pricing.
The main focus will be hospitals and private practices. I’ll be putting together “informational” videos on procedures patients are about to undergo.
Other events will include weddings and some recreational events.
I’m not a professional editor, nor am I a professional videographer. However, I’ve spent the last 6 years using FCP and the HVX200, while working on commercial or indie film sets, so my experience isn’t limited either.
How do you choose what to charge? $500 a minute? $2000 per project? What?
I know weddings will have a separate price tag ranging from $200-$30,000. I have a friend who is a photographer who does the $30,000 weddings–wouldn’t that be nice to have a piece of that… But how do you choose…?
Thank you.
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20 Replies
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The only thing I price by the minute is compression/transcoding/encoding.
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You should be a professional videographer and editor first. You’ll hone skills, know what it takes to make these projects, and know what they are worth. Our telling you to charge 5 grand a video is not going to help you.
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I understand your reply, however, what one may constitute as “professional” knowledge may be to someone else “beginner” and vise-verse. An example, I and three others edited a blockbuster feature as well as a few casino commercials. I don’t think that constitutes me as a “professional” but I can hold my own when editing. Maybe I’m just cutting myself short or maybe I’m right.
I’d still like help with my query, though. I’d like to know how other people are charging so I have an idea of what I need to look at. I understand that it depends upon my quality of work and I will take that into consideration when deciding my own rates.
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So I probably will need to stick to project rates and daily rates?
These videos will likely be between 5-15 minutes–give or take depending upon the procedure–with visuals as well as graphics for illustrating and possibly small staged procedures.
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One thing experience would tell you is that a 5 minute video could take you a day or it could take you weeks. If you don’t want to charge a client hourly than you should be very good at estimated the time it takes to do a job. A minute of multilayered graphics is not the same as a minute of talking head interview.
If you plan remaining in business rather than going bankrupt you have to meet all your business and life expenses every month. My estimate is you should be able to cover all those expenses on 20-25 hours of paid work a week. You’ll likely going to have to spend a lot of unpaid hours marketing, maintaining gear, doing paperwork, improving your skills. As you get better you may raise your rates to cover additional business growth and profit. If you develop repeat clients you may spend less time marketing but you’ll always have a fair amount of unpaid work.
Since you have done editing you should have an idea of how fast you work. You’ll need to learn how to estimate how much time it’ll take to do a job. In some cases you may charge hourly. In some cases you’ll be constrained by a budget and you’ll have to stick to a number of hours for a given job. Alway include revisions in your estimate or they can be endless.
Based on your own self awareness you can charge hourly, day, project estimate, budget constrained but you should always have a set or at least a close approximate number of hours to do a job.
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I’ve decided I’d like to be in the Polynesian Restaurant business. What should I charge for a Puu-Puu Platter?
That is kind of how you framed the question.
Can you tell me the name of this blockbuster you worked on, so I can see your work?
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[Nathan Abbott] “The main focus will be hospitals and private practices. I’ll be putting together “informational” videos on procedures patients are about to undergo.
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Have you done these before? They are quite different to anything else (note: I work for a state Health Department, in a public hospital. I make these sorts of videos. I have been in the health game for 20 years, as a videographer for the last 3.)Informational videos can be easy pieces (video a mocked-up procedure while off-camera person reads out what on-camera person should be doing, edit with consultation, dub voice in afterwards, put in circles and arrows) to quite complex (animations, voice-over artists). Being a poor government employee, we usually do the former. The other types include narrative which should mean actors and a script written by a pro, or working in theatre which is quite time consuming and you have to know in advance what to capture and have a good relationship with the surgeon, or grab everything and have a lot of stuff to edit.
This is a great game to get into, but it’s a fairly wide-ranging area.
From what I have heard – and remember I get paid just for turning up everyday and all my equipment (and coffee) is supplied – the hardest part to learn about running a business is the business things: quotes, invoices, tax, insurance.
To give you something to be going on with, if someone has their act together, I can shoot, edit (with their input) and deliver a 15 minute video of a mocked up procedure (as above) in around 2 days.
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Again, experience will give this answer, as well as the other knowledge you’ll require to succeed.
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[Nathan Abbott] “I don’t think that constitutes me as a “professional” but I can hold my own when editing. Maybe I’m just cutting myself short or maybe I’m right.”
Well then, if you consider yourself as “holding your own” then you should be able to figure out this answer for yourself.
The formula is quite simple for pricing a project.
PreProduction + Production + Post Production = Estimate.
Based on your skill set and those you plan to work with, you come up with the price based on that. How many days of PreProduction + How many days of Production / size of crew / talent required / + how many days of Post Production / music rights / animation / voice talent / dvd / bluray / master / web compression = total estimate.
None of us can answer your question except I will say I RARELY offer a project price and only to clients I have worked with in the past. The only two things I price by the minute are video compression and animation. Actually animation we price by the second.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Editor, Colorist, Director, Writer, Consultant, Author, Chef.
HD Post and Production
Biscardi Creative Media“Foul Water, Fiery Serpent” featuring Sigourney Weaver coming soon.
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And to add to what I already wrote in my previous response, I do have a three part series here on the Cow (working on Part 4 finally!) for starting and running your own business. Might be some useful information in there for you.
https://blogs.creativecow.net/blog/273/your-own-business-part-1-are-you-ready
https://blogs.creativecow.net/blog/277/your-own-business-part-2-setting-up-shop
https://blogs.creativecow.net/blog/300/your-own-business-part-3-running-building-your-business
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Editor, Colorist, Director, Writer, Consultant, Author, Chef.
HD Post and Production
Biscardi Creative Media“Foul Water, Fiery Serpent” featuring Sigourney Weaver coming soon.
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