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storage fee?
I’ve been keeping copies of completed projects and media on hard drive, which I should be charging for, because it takes quite a bit of time and money. The main benefit of offering this service for a fee would be to make it clear to the client that (unless they pay) their media is NOT stored indefinitely, so that they aren’t alarmed by the fact that it can take one or more days just to reload all the media, and recreate all the effects.
I’d be curious as to your reactions to this idea, whether any of you do this already, and if so, what you charge. I was thinking of a charge per gigabyte, per year.
The only drawback is that I wouldn’t want to be on the hook for major liability in the event that the hard drive failed.
As was suggested here on the forum, I could always sell the client a physical drive with the media on it, which gets across to the client the concept that there is a physical substance to this thing, and that they can’t just call up and ask for a free tweak — they have to send the drive back. But they could send the drive to another editing house as well.
Thanks.
Bob C
MacPro 2 x 3GHz dualcore; 10 GB 667MHz
Kona LHe
Sony HDV Z1
Sony HDV M25U
HD-Connect MI
Betacam UVW1800
DVCPro AJ-D650 -
8 Replies
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todays cheap firewire drive prices make it very easy to have a client pay for storage. They buy the drive, it sits waiting for them and that ensures they’ll be coming to you next time they need somthin.
It’s as easy as charging a one hour fee to back it up.
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I give the client the opportunity to purchase a hard drive to keep all the media available or we simply clear all the media off. The only things I save are the Project files, Graphics Files and any After Effects renders. But all other media is cleared off.
In lieu of a storage fee, just have the client purchase the drive. They’re so cheap these days and readily available at any electronics store.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.STOP STARING AND START GRADING WITH APPLE COLOR
The new Color Training DVD now available from the Creative Cow! -
We don’t really charge for storage.
We like to keep everything anyway, and found ourselves spending too much time burning data DVDs to back up everything, and then a lot of time re-loading projects when they come back up.
We buy 1TB eSATA drives that are dirt cheap these days (about $250) and we archive everything to those. When we finish a project, we just drag the whole project including all the source files from the video RAIDs to the storage drives (two copies, two drives). When we fill ’em up, we take them off line and go get a couple more at Costco.
The drive space is so relatively cheap compared to the whole project that we do it that way, sort of “value added” that we don’t charge a client for.
Maybe we should charge for it, but we have fairly flat rates for most of our services and don’t try to nickle and dime it much. It’s just easier. Another film house I know of well itemizes everything to death (invoices for shoots will literally list how much gaffer tape was used), but I like to keep it easy and simple… and I think our clients appreciate it.
T2
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Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
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[Todd Terry] “We don’t really charge for storage.”
That sounds like a good idea, if the amount you charge for production and editing supports it. I suspect that houses that mainly do spots are more liberal about this, whereas if you do longer form, and one project occupies 200+gb, it’s a lot more difficult to give away a hard drive for every project.
I think I’ll sell the drives, charge for the time it takes to fill them, and state on the invoice that my liability in the event of drive failure is limited to replacement of the drive itself. Walter’s idea of keeping copies of all .FCP and .AEP files sounds like great sense. The only question remaining is whether to give the client copies of those files as well.
Thanks to all for the insights.
Bob C
MacPro 2 x 3GHz dualcore; 10 GB 667MHz
Kona LHe
Sony HDV Z1
Sony HDV M25U
HD-Connect MI
Betacam UVW1800
DVCPro AJ-D650 -
we bill by the gigabyte.
Ok, i’m kidding. We seem to buy hard drives monthly, and save everything indefinitely. Inevitably clients call up wanting to re-brand an old project.
Mike
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We charge an archiving fee of $150 and back up each project to a Quantum LTO-3A tape drive. The cartridges are about $50 for a 400 gig cartridge and they’re much more reliable long term than hard drives. Downside is the tape drive costs about $7,500, hence the archiving fee. I can’t remember any time I’ve offered a client the option of an archive that they’ve turned it down, even with the cost.
As far as liability, I make it clear to clients that we recommend they keep a copy of each project master, and that anything we store for them is purely out of convenience to them, and that we’re only liable for replacement cost of the physical media. You can also include a page of terms with estimates or invoices that says as much in writing.
Joe Murray
Edit at Joe’s
Charlotte, NC -
Hey Walter,
I have been a proponent of this for a long time. My question for you is, when you say “all media available” do you mean, OMFI media files from an AVID online, or the QT files from a FCP edit?
We have a folder structure established for our edit suites called “User Projects” Inside is “audio in”, Audio Out, Graphics, Movies, & OMF’s. That folder is archived with our AVID or FCP projects folders. Our animation department has a similar situation, but depending on the size of the project we do not usually keep our renders, as if there are revisions we re-render anyways. In regards to filebased aquisitions, we have been getting clients to purchase drives for those types of projects.Thanks for listening
Earle
Communication, Communication, Communication!!!
http://www.whiteiron.tv/demo -
[Earle Nichol] ”
I have been a proponent of this for a long time. My question for you is, when you say “all media available” do you mean, OMFI media files from an AVID online, or the QT files from a FCP edit?”QT files and anything associated with the edit except the Renders.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.STOP STARING AND START GRADING WITH APPLE COLOR
The new Color Training DVD now available from the Creative Cow!
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