If a client wanted you to do this - how much would be fair?

M

Mickey Munday

Well-known member
not sure if this is the right section for this, but i was recently approached by a non profit that wants me to create a documentary for their organization.

1) it's in another state
2) i would have to travel there for about 4 months (1 month each quarter) to film and document their group as it progresses. shooting with the HVX, i own a majority of all my equipment
3) they want me to edit and put everything together which i can do

they told me to put together an expense list of how much it would cost them.

my question is - what reasonable ballpark figure would you charge if someone asked you to do this and what things would need to be taken into consideration on my end?

i was talking to a relative about this and they claim my price is too high and that they could get a film company to do it for much cheaper (mind you this relative is not very in the know as to how much film companies actually charge)

thanx in advance
 
You need to put yourself on a salary that covers your hours for physical (and estimated pre and post) production. Per diems when you're on travel. Mileage through reimbursement against actual receipts or at the federal rate and so forth. Any and all pre-approved expenses associated with the project should be reimbursed or paid directly by the client (e.g., airfares, lodging and rentals through their travel agent).

I'd recommend three day weeks on gear or ten day months if you're a one-man shop where the assets won't be in conflict with shorter, higher pay projects. That's up to you, but those would be typical arrangements for such a situation.

If someone, who is a bonafide production interest, will do it for less, let them. If you're young and trying to prove yourself, I just told you what professionals will be bidding - at minimum.

Don't underbid out of desperation and, whatever you do, don't flat-rate the deal. Build in an 8 - 15% contingency and let them know that overruns due to additions are their responsibility.

Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

e
 
Erik Olson said:
You need to put yourself on a salary that covers your hours for physical (and estimated pre and post) production. Per diems when you're on travel. Mileage through reimbursement against actual receipts or at the federal rate and so forth. Any and all pre-approved expenses associated with the project should be reimbursed or paid directly by the client (e.g., airfares, lodging and rentals through their travel agent).

I'd recommend three day weeks on gear or ten day months if you're a one-man shop where the assets won't be in conflict with shorter, higher pay projects. That's up to you, but those would be typical arrangements for such a situation.

If someone, who is a bonafide production interest, will do it for less, let them. If you're young and trying to prove yourself, I just told you what professionals will be bidding - at minimum.

Don't underbid out of desperation and, whatever you do, don't flat-rate the deal. Build in an 8 - 15% contingency and let them know that overruns due to additions are their responsibility.

Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

e
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thanks erik, question - i will be a one man shop on something like this, so what do you mean by ten day months? 10 days each month for the entire year? that doesn't sound too bad.

would the 8-15% contingency be a percentage of the salary? do you think $95k would be reasonable (with an 8% contingency built in)
 
10-day month on your gear rental, based upon four months of ten days each. Forty total rental days. A month being between 28 and 31 days. This is based upon my understanding of your project - four total months of production, spread in full month increments around or during a given 12-month period. Effectively, you embedded fully in March, off until July, back on again in October and so forth.

If you're playing more sporadically than this, I'd not negotiate the 10-day rental rate.

The contingency would be 8 - 15% of total budget - gear, fixed costs, labor, deliverables and on and on.

e
 
Get them to agree that the footage belongs to YOU, until they pay for it. No rights of any kind are transferred from you to them until payment in full. Without stipulating that, lawyers might declare that you are an "employee for hire". in which case they might own everything, even if they default...your time (and compensation for it) and their footage are viewed as 2 completely separate things.
 
He's going to have a contract anyway. If he is an employee of the company, then he is working exclusively for them. If he is a vendor or contractor, he must be paid fair consideration for the work. No deliverable until he is paid - unless he wants to put them on terms.

These constant conversations about who owns the footage in obvious work-for-hire situations is really confusing for people. They are hiring him, for an estimated fee, to produce a project for them. He does not own the footage once he transfers ownership of same to the client. He should have policies in place that discourage slow payment.

Really, it is an interesting conversation on an independent film or DVXUser short, where there is no consideration exchanged. But the purpose of the thread is to establish what that consideration is, not ownership of the finished product.

Again, he should be paid for his work in an ongoing and timely manner. Hard costs should be paid directly by the client. This can't always happen (e.g., car rentals can be reserved, but not always paid except by the person who picks the vehicle up), but it is generally the rule that his client should pay these incidentals as they occur or have a reimbursement system in place whereby he is renumerated in near real-time.

e
 
ya US dollars so you know thats not wirth sh&^, lol.

also i will be expected to edit, do any motion graphics (titling, etc) as well as build a website for them to stream some of the footage clips. they want to use the doc or footage as a source to either get picked up by a network, distribution, further funding from whoever is funding them, etc.
 
I'd say 90k is a good flat rate.
I see it as 4 different productions that would normally be around 30k each. This is a round down deal for one project based on that.
 
I did corporate work for a company where I spent about 2.5 months on it, one month on the road in uncomfortable hotels (still it was a blast, new city every few days) and no amenities really, had to give up my lifestyle for a bit, and then one month of post production at 80 to 90 hours a week. We brought a lot of money in equipment, at least $60,000 worth. Pre-production was the other two weeks. We also did a training video for the company that took up part of that time. We charged in the range of $80,000, but that was to cover quite a few expenses and for several employees. It was definitely less than I'd charge going forward, I just needed the experience. So for this, I mean if I were to do something like that as a company (I am not a shooter) I would definitely have to charge at least that much to make it worth my while. Otherwise you're looking at almost half your year gone for what? If I work that much and am on the road that much I wouldn't think anything less than $90,000 is fair.
 
I guess it depends on what you want to make, I mean for me yeah right now I'd be happy with making $75,000 a year, but I want to be making $250,000 a year at least. So if you're going to do 4 months of on-location work plus whatever editing is required and you have paid a bunch of money for your own equipment, then yeah you should be making quite a hefty sum for that. The whole point of film work is you shouldn't have to work constantly to make a living, because almost nobody can do that. It's too tough to find clients or find work, even for major directors, they spend most of their time not working. So when you are working you should make BANK.
 
Erik Olson said:
Where exactly did the $90k number come from?

e
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i threw it out there in an earlier post to this thread, i was thinking that would probably be enough for travel, hotel as well as pay and contingency issues. I'd be comfortable with $70-$75 to live off.

JonathanLB said:
I guess it depends on what you want to make, I mean for me yeah right now I'd be happy with making $75,000 a year, but I want to be making $250,000 a year at least. So if you're going to do 4 months of on-location work plus whatever editing is required and you have paid a bunch of money for your own equipment, then yeah you should be making quite a hefty sum for that. The whole point of film work is you shouldn't have to work constantly to make a living, because almost nobody can do that. It's too tough to find clients or find work, even for major directors, they spend most of their time not working. So when you are working you should make BANK.
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yea i'm on the same page, and i actually have money savedup to buy additional gear if needed (i'd rather buy it myself so i own it and dont have to turn it back in) not to mention who knows how long this will last..it could be one year, an additional year, etc. it's too early to tell because they're still trying to decide the particulars on what exactly they want....but again i'm open to all opinions.

thanx for the input thus far
 
Erik Olson said:
...
These constant conversations about who owns the footage in obvious work-for-hire situations is really confusing for people. They are hiring him, for an estimated fee, to produce a project for them. He does not own the footage once he transfers ownership of same to the client. He should have policies in place that discourage slow payment.

Really, it is an interesting conversation on an independent film or DVXUser short, where there is no consideration exchanged. But the purpose of the thread is to establish what that consideration is, not ownership of the finished product.

...
e
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But this is NOT an "obvious work-for-hire" unless his contract says it is. The fact he's being paid for the final product does not in-and-of-itself make him an employee. An employment situation exists in situations where a cameraman is shooting as part of his regular job duties for a TV station where he's regularly employed, works under their supervision and control, shoots what he is told to shoot, is paid a wage, has taxes deducted from his pay, etc. Similarly the camera operator or location mixer on a feature shoot is an employee and the images he photgraphs or the tracks he records are works-for-hire since he is a hired technician operating under the creative supervision and control of the producer/director - as such he is not the actual creator of a copyrightable work. But absent a formal employer/employee relationship, an independent producer of a copyrightable work owns the copyright to that work even though he's producing it on the behalf of a client UNLESS his contract explicitly states it is a work-for-hire agreement. Absent the explicit statement the the production is a work-for-hire, his contract might include a provision that he is transferring the rights to the client upon payment but the transfer is not automatic - it too must be explicit and in writing otherwise they don't transfer.

The long and short of it is that work-for-hire is only automatic when a regular salaried employer/employee relationship exists. Independent contractors are not employees even though they are being paid. Except for regular employees working within the scope of their employment, copyright goes to the creator of copyrightable works.
 
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This is a dreamy-eyed interpretation of copyright law that would rarely (if ever) stand up in a legal dispute. I would love to review any case that backs up your assertion that someone being paid to create something for a third party has explicit legal ownership of same. In commissioning a work for fair consideration, you are legally transferring ownership of same. It is, if not expressly communicated in a written agreement, at least implied in the spirit of the agreement.

Again, why are we talking about this at all? He needs to forge an agreement whereby he is paid what he thinks his time, equipment and materials are worth for a job. If his wants residual interest in the project, then he needs to have this conversation with them and then put it to paper. Otherwise, he has not expressed that this is a concern of his and we shouldn't burden the thread with ridiculous speculation on copyright law by people who don't practice.

That said, one of my partners is Senior Legal Counsel for one of the studios. I'd be glad to ask him his interpretation and comment here.

e
 
Erik Olson said:
Where exactly did the $90k number come from?

e
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I look at it as 4 productions that would be 30k each if done seperatly. Because it will be shot seperatly but as one production, I rounded down as way of incentive.

It's a bargain rate based on what I read.
 
Figure $500 - $650 day rates (less gear, materials, travel, incidentals) for 22 day months and you're at ~$12k per month or roughly $150k a year. If he is in-market, with no chance to go home when he's not working, he might negotiate dark day rate or simply have a per diem tied against each and every room night ($35 - $65 / day, depending on market), regardless of whether it is a working day.

10-day months on gear would likely put him around $2500 - $3500 depending on his package (OP stated HVX-based system). If he can get more (e.g., three to five day weeks), then that changes.

It doesn't mean he should.

From an industry rate standards angle, this one gig, charged at 10-day months, will pay quadruple the rate of depreciation on his inexpensive camera and other kit. He recoups the first cost on the camera, a good lighting package and comprehensive sound package in four months time. Two years less depreciation than many companies would take against such assets. Not bad.

I think $30k per month is high, but not astronomically so. Again, I would not front travel, lodging and other costs except when it is absolutely necessary (e.g., car rentals). My bet is that you'll actually be using your per diem to eat (the HORROR!!!), so you should negotiate what it takes to eat out a lot and to stock your hotel room plus some walking money. $45 goes a long way (toward food, not enteraining and/or too many stiff drinks) in mid-markets, but not in places like NY, SF and Chicago. So, again, get what is reasonable and remember to tie your PD to every day you're there overnight.

1/2 day travel days and so on are standard. No equipment charges for transit days. Production days only.

e
 
Erik -
All we are saying is to protect yourself - get it in writing. If it's not in writing, things get messy. It happened to me, specifically resulting in the question of who owned the rights until payment was made. My contract was weak - the rights were tied up in court for lack of spelling it out clearly up front. You ask why definitions (i.e work for hire) are brought up in this thread. It's simply a 'heads up' from experience. It's an 'oh, by the way, watch out for this.'

Steve House wrote: "his contract might include a provision that he is transferring the rights to the client upon payment but the transfer is not automatic - it too must be explicit and in writing otherwise they don't transfer." Wish someone had hit me over the head with that before my problems.

This thread isn't a blue book paper; it's advice. And I'm sure that we can all name friends who are lawyers (and doctors, and...). But when fellow members have experiences that can help, that's what this forum is for. Yes, 'work for hire' doesn't answer "how much should I get paid?," but it is at least slightly on subject as it deals with 'making sure you get paid.'
 
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