Made a mess...

Steve Laramie

Steve Laramie

Veteran
Shot a wedding reception last year and everything went well edited it made it look great mailed it to the client. I got my first 50% before shooting but didnt get my other 50% because "The DVD skips" I test all of my DVDs on 3 players. I know the DVD doesnt skip. I told them I would be happy to send them out another one when they said that they want to add in some stuff to and will pay me extra. So after waiting 4-5 months I finally tell them I want to get this project over with and ask them to pay me the other 50% they owe me. They ask if I can burn them another DVD and mail it to them because the other one "skips". I say sure... I go back into my FCP and I have a ton of media offline stuff from when I had a drive crash on me. This job was 12 months ago... What should I do.
 
The dvd 'skipping' is obviously their problem and not yours! and they shouldn't expect you to still have the files/project a year after anyway really...its not as if its a feature.
Get ya cash since you did deliver a working DVD.
 
Well I guess the problem is I get repeat business from them. Its only been this one job that was a mess. I don't think they purposely stiffed me or are lying about the DVD. But at this point all I want is my $250 and I am not sure how to do that without giving them another DVD... which seems to be a problem.
 
Did you have an agreement about how many DVDs you initially handed over..? maybe they were just after some extra ones for family on the sly.... :-/ i guess all you can do is tell them the situation with the footage and to be fair, you have delivered what was agreed...? and if the dvd skips, then they need a new player....
 
well id just go back to them and say they have had more than the agreed number of DVDs that they WERE working when they left you... and that you want the balance paid. You are not acting out of line so there is no real reason why they shouldn't return to you for work if they have any decency about them.... you have adhered to the agreement
 
finchy said:
The dvd 'skipping' is obviously their problem and not yours! and they shouldn't expect you to still have the files/project a year after anyway really...its not as if its a feature.
Get ya cash since you did deliver a working DVD.
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Wrong ... as a customer I would expect him to routinely retain duplicate backups of the original source files for the same amount of time a photographer would retain negatives -usually as long as he's in business. Or at least for the same amount of time other sorts of business records need to be retained, which for most sorts of records is a minimum of seven years. Duplicates because of the possibility that one backup drive could go bad but the likelyhood of two failing at once is remote. With the advent of terrabyte drives for $200 there's no excuse not to.

The skipping is not "obviously their problem." It might be, perhaps their player is worn or misaligned. But it could just as easily be our OP's burner that is out of spec.

I'd ask the client to return the skipping DVD for examination, rip it off onto the computer, and burn a fresh copy with a different burner. If that one also skips on their machine, then he can legitimately say there's nothing he can do about it and the problem is on their end.
 
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You really should backup all of these things. I keep a copy of the deliverables for every client I've worked with, and will keep all of them at least a decade after the event. That might be a bit extreme and different for how little work I do, but a year really isn't much and I would expect files to still be available. I understand hard drive failure is a different situation, but it's still a client expectation that the media guy can handle protecting the data.

But if the DVD isn't working burning another might not help. They should be asked to bring it in so each party can see if it's actually the disk or not. If it is, they deserve a partial refund. Even if it works fine they should get a little bit shaved off just because there are apparently issues with this project. If they're repeat customers again it will be worth it later.
 
Dont get me wrong. I absolutely back my stuff up. Its just that some stuff got jostled around when I had a drive die and replaced another drive. I am sure its somewhere but its going to be a super head ache retrieving the missing files.
 
I keep project files that are at all recent, for the time being everything, on my RAID for safety, but then everything is separately backed up to other external drives, so duplicate backups (plus one with built-in redundancy) -- keeps one drive failure from being a massive headache.

I don't guarantee in any contract that your footage will always be available, though. When I deliver, that's the end of my responsibility to you contractually. The reason I keep backups is just good business sense -- I'd rather be able to help you if possible later, like adding to a project or redoing part of it, etc., then not have those files. And also it's a nice service to offer.
 
Yeah, these things happen. I lost a lot of extremely important files because my drive died just before a new backup was made while I was transferring everything. There were a few minutes that I didn't have enough copies; and of course that's when it happens.
 
You should really back up everything onto a suitable backup media. Hard drives are not good backup media. My dad is a professional photographer, he's been in business for 35 years. He has every negative of every thing he's ever done and then when he switched to digital he has backed up every picture onto CD. If you had a picture taken by him 10 years ago and you need new prints he can do that. Of course you could always charge extra for archival of source material to cover the cost of a more suitable media like LTO Tape.
 
My Dad is a professional photographer to and his office is layered with boxes of negatives and CDs. But ZeroContent... I am not shooting film and CDs are not sufficent or economic for backup. Especially when shooting in 1080pHD I am not about to spend $50 on the amount of DVDs it would take to back that project up. The only logical way for me to back it up is harddrives for HD video.
 
Backing up data onto harddrives is definitely the way to go for 1080p contents. Just make sure you have multiple copies of those backups.

1 backup = 0 chance
2 backups = 1 chance
3 backups = 2 chances

As for this mess, what Steve has suggested is a good way to make sure both your client's and your ends are clear.
 
lairhair said:
Well I guess the problem is I get repeat business from them.
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I guess that depends on how many more weddings they have!

I find that DVDs have a better chance of working in cheap DVD players if you burn them slowly. I burn single layer DVDs at 4x and dual layers at 2x.
 
If you still have the drive,and its not burned up , it can be repaired. The data is still on the disk in the drive. It can be put into another housing , or the failed parts replaced .
When its HAS TO BE DONE
 
1-800-GEEKSQUAD (1-800-433-5778) so we can save the day – and your hard drive. (A quick search online I got these guys, there in every town across the USA)
 
To fret over a year old gig for half-payment is to not have any gigs lined up. To not have any gigs lined up means networking is in order. Spend the time you'd spend recovering that old stuff on networking.
 
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