[Bill Davis]

Since it’s just for scratch tracks, you might consider this recipe…

Take ANY basic mic. A headworn unit would be fine, or even a simple Shure SM58 or EV-635.

Buy yourself a Centrance MicPort Pro. It’s around $150 and is essentially a mic preamp, headphone amp, and USB converter (with phantom power if you ever want to use a better condenser mic) – all in the form of a simple barrel connector.

Plug it into the XLR socket of your mic. And run the included USB cable to your Mac. Plug your cans directly into the MicPort Pro which gives you zero latency monitoring – and you’re in business.

Point your FCP audio input to the USB bus and record directly using the Voiceover Tool.

Simple, portable, effective, and even cheap.

[Bill Davis]

Having done quite a bit of this kind of work, I think you’re gonna have problems.

In an ideal world, each speaker takes their place. Starts speaking. Concludes on time. And that’s that.

In the REAL world, each speaker takes their place. You hit RECORD. They realize they don’t have their notes. The leave the podium to grab them. They start speaking a minute and 35 seconds after you started your RECORD leaving a LONG space of dead content to deal with. At 2 minutes into their presentation, one of the attendees stands up unexpectedly and asks a long-winded question that isn’t miced and therefore isn’t recorded. The presenter DOES NOT repeat the question, but goes directly into a long answer. Then gets back on track. They end 4 minutes PAST their alotted time with the the deadly phrase “any questions?” whereupon there’s ANOTHER 5 minutes of audience/presenter discussion content making the 7 minute presentation more like 15 minutes.

THAT’s what you start out with before you go to burn to your DVD.

The ONLY way I’ve ever found to do convention DVD work is to record each raw speakers presentation from BEFORE the start to AFTER the last question directly to the Hard Drive of a LAPTOP with editing software in place. Trim the footage. Edit any major messes (like the unheard audience question at 2:00) Slap a pre-built title on it. Fade to black at the end. The Author, Encode and Burn a DVD master from that timeline edit.

Anything more “automatic” simply doesn’t give you the control to fix that stuff that will UNDOUBTEDLY happen in the real world of live presentations.

YMMV.

Good luck.

[Bill Davis]

Lots of good material here, but I’m gonna disagree with the idea of trying to mic the audience. It’s a nightmare and hardly ever gets more than barely adequate sound unless you set up a stand mic and make the audience shuffle up to ask their questions directly to it.

Which is silly in and of itself, cuz the audience isn’t typically relevant, only their QUESTIONS.

So go ahead and set up an audience mic, but not for the soundtrack, for your reference.

Then in post, instead of hearing the audience questions, just SUPER the question as text (concise, clearly worded text) as a lower third over the beginning of the properly recorded answer.

The viewing audience will “get it” immediately and you don’t have to worry about audience audio at all.

[Bill Davis]

Nothing wrong with these “traditional” ways of billing.

Once upon a time I did them all as well.

Today I don’t. I have 3 forms in Filemaker. A Production Estimate. A Quote. and an Invoice.

The Production estimate calculates my costs & margins. It’s a semi-traditional above-the-line/below-the-line format. Above are all administrative expenses that are fixed no matter how many assets or how much time anything takes.
Below the line are incremental charges – how many cameras, how much crew, how many hours estimated for editing, etc, etc.

But it’s the very first line in my “Above-the-line” costs that makes my life easier these days.

That’s my Production Fee. It typically hovers between 20-50% of the entire job cost. (a larger percentage on smaller budgets) I tell clients – right up front – that that’s the fee they’re paying me to make their video. It covers my experience, judgment and knowledge. If it’s a $60k video, that production fee might be $20k of it.

Most of my clients are long time accounts, so few of them ask to see the production estimates any more – so I seldom send out Estimates, but if they ask for one, I’m happy to provide it. They give me a projected budget – if I agree, that’s what I bill.

The cost number this form generates gets put on a QUOTE that I usually send out. The Quote figure becomes the invoice with no need for line item listings. Again, if someone wants the numbers, the Production Estimate is in the system waiting to email out.

The funny thing is that in the past 15 years, I’ve NEVER had a client argue that Above the Line PRODUCTION FEE. Not Once. If the budget it tight, they’ll work on the below the line stuff – but they seem to think that hacking at the Production fee is equivalent to saying that I’m not worth that money – so as I said, I’ve never had a single client mention it as a negotiating point.

This approach reflects that the difference between a typical video and an excellent one isn’t the time, materials, or even the crew you use, it’s the knowledge and understanding YOU bring to the process.

I think that’s something the client should pay for. And the client’s I’ve built up over the years appear to agree.

FWIW.

[Bill Davis]

If you want some insight as to WHY there are compatibility issues with certain programs like CS2 – I’d recommend you invest some time in reading the excellent breakdown of how things have changed in Leopard that ars technica posted earlier today.

It’s a long read, but very digestible as to some of the technical changes in 10.5 and WHY some programs written like CS2 will have some issues for a while.

Highly recommended.

https://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/mac-os-x-10-5.ars

might be busy for a while, I suspect the hard core tech and hacker communities are devouring this like a, well, like Leopards.

[Bill Davis]

You’re not seeing “rates” here because any “rate” is meaningless out of context.

This forum is about Corporate Video, not digital filmmaking, church video or special interest videos. Those are all perfectly reasonable things to do – but to compare rates between them is irrelevant.

For example, as a corporate shooter, I carry a $2million dollar liability policy. (Plus errors and omissions and a bunch of other business insurance policies) Without them – and the ability to call my agent and get a coverage rider instantly – I can’t shoot for many companies because they can’t (nor SHOULD THEY) even let me near their machinery/equipment.

That and a hundred other small things I must consider in the context of MY business profile and/or liability will be different than it is for a person shooting a “church” or a “wedding” or “digital film”

I will say that if you charge someone $500 for a video. No matter WHO you are, if you look at that number on a pure business basis and extract your tax obligation, the depreciation/replacement cost on your gear, consumables, and other standard business costs, you’ll be lucky to take home 50% of that.

And if it takes you 20 hours to produce that work – (meeting, planning, scripting, shooting, editing, mastering, burning DVDs, etc) you’re making SUBSTANTIALLY less than a typical plumber, or electrician. (And THEIR tools don’t become obsolete every six months-1 year!)

I can point a handycam at a talking head in available light and generate 15 minutes of video and $500 might be OVER charging the client.

And I can fly to 3 cities, use a full crew in each, employ dolly track, jibs, and a Jet Ranger with a Tyler mount, spend three weeks in post plus have a team of 3 artists work for weeks on the graphics, and $100,000 might be a BARGAIN to generate MY 15 minutes of video.

That’s why it’s so hard to quote a “magic” number.

[Bill Davis]

OK, here’s how I do it.

I have an ancient Filemaker Pro worksheet that I’ve been using for developing quotes for about 15 years now. It roughly follows the ancient “above the line, below the line” movie budgeting format I learned back in the dark ages. When someone I don’t typically work with asks me to quote on a project, I spend 15 minutes or so filling in all the little boxes with numbers. The form generates a number.

HOWEVER, this number has only a small part to do with with what I actually charge them.

For example, the very first line is a “production fee” which is what I feel they should pay ME for making their video. That line goes up or down based on what kind of client I think they will be and the general scope of the project. It might be 0 for a pro bono project, or tens of thousands of dollars.

All the little boxes just get me thinking about the scope of the project.

Below the line, in the post production section – there are calculations for how many cameras, camera ops, hours of editing, etc. I think it will take. The edit rate I use is about three times what you can get from some other “lowball” cutters in my market – but the point is I’m not trying to charge them this hourly rate at all. I’m just getting a general idea of the value of the time.

At the end of the estimating process, I just look at the bottom line number, know that it totally comfortably protects me if the project “goes long” and I quote a number somewhere in the ballpark of the total – telling them “this is what you’ll pay me to make your video, and it’s a – not to exceed – number unless we agree the scope of work has changed.

If you want to look at the form, I have it in a download bin on my dot.mac account from a year or so ago when I talked about it on a podcast apperance. Feel free to grab a copy if you think it will help you figure out something similar for yourself.

For what it’s worth.

the url is https://homepage.mac.com/davisbill/clientdropbox/FileSharing9.html

[Bill Davis]

Now that everyone else has weighed in, I guess I’m gonnna come along and fly in the face of a lot of the fine advice given so far.

FIrst, I think the other posters have given fine advice for someone who wants to do traditional work in a traditional fashion.

Personally, I think concentrating on working “traditionally” in an era where all the traditions are breaking down is suspect.

So here’s a different approach.

NEVER charge by the hour for anything. Ever.

The metrics generated by hourly thinking are patently false.

This deck, or this camera, or this many hours in the “A” suite is ancient history.

Why? Because if you execute a GREAT cut in 1 hour of editing, that’s worth MORE than executing a mediocre cut in 10 hours. And the reality is that the client’ won’t CARE how long you take to do things. They will care, however if the end result is GREAT rather than GOOD.

So screw hourly billing. If you can do GREAT work fast, Hurray! You should get MORE than the beginners who have to struggle 5 hours to set decent looking titles.

Here’s my definition of time based (hourly, daily, whatever) charges – “If i’m good and fast, my work will end up generating LESS money than will the work of someone who is crappy and slow” Think about that. It’s patently stupid.

Personally I only quote a single number for the whole project. And I make sure that number MUST have enough RAW PROFIT to make the time spent a minor consideration.

Yes, you will be pretty expensive. But if you’re really good, you SHOULD be expensive. Undercharging is a HUGE problem in the production world today, because there are so many equipment rich but expreience poor people in the business.

My advice, separate yourself from them AS FAST AS POSSIBLE – provided you’ve got the skills to do so.

And you can only get there by concentrating on your SKILLS AND REPUTATION – not on your hourly rates or gear.

Really, NEVER charge for time. You should relentlessly, obsessively, build and charge for your EXPERTISE. Period. Be paid to be smarter, more creative, more business-savvy, more talented or more WHATEVER. And I work your ass off to try and be precisely THAT on every project.

I want to find the flaws in their script, and fix them. I want to be the one to realize when a jib is a better solution than track and dolly. Or when the teleprompter result is too stiff, so I need to shut it down and just sit down and have a conversation with the executive.

I want to learn about my client’s business so relentlessly that they STOP COMIING to my shoots at all. Because they know I’ll fix what needs being fixed and do what they’d do in the same situation so they can keep runinng their business while I make their videos.

THAT, is the only kind of job security I think still exists today.

Skills trump gear. Particularly today when anyone with a credit card can get all the gear they need.

If you want to use booked days or hours as a metric for efficiency, fine. I guess. But wouldn’t it be better if you could get to a place where a SINGLE job generated enough to the bottom line that you didn’t have to even DO another project for nice long time?

There are folks out there doing just that.

And they didn’t get to that place by doing things like the TV stations of yesterday. (Lets’ see, that 1 hour of “online” plus 2 hours of “offline” plus 1.25 hours of ADO – so your bill is…)

Good luck.