Making money in this racket

D

DBP

Well-known member
I'm on the same path that many of you have been, I'm sure. Freelancing, but tired of making little money.

I know the answer is "raise your rates", but I wanted to spawn a discussion about how to make more money with video production. Particularly interested in hearing from the older folks here who've been down this road before. I've come to terms with the fact that I have my low/no budget passion projects, and that's ok. That's where my heart is, and it keeps my morale high.

But I need to make more money. Even if it's the most boring work imaginable, I'm curious to hear which genres of video production have been lucrative for people.
 
First of all: don't sell gear. That is, don't say "I shoot with camera X, so my rates are $YY".
Second: don't sell time. Don't say "OK, this will take me two days, which means it will cost $YY".
Third: you won't increase your average pay check working for friends. Target businesses that make money, like real estate.

The more you can think of it as if you're selling a solution, the better off you'll be.

A somewhat stupid example would be if you study a very complex machine for a lifetime. There are lights and switches everywhere. One day you get a call from a machine owner with a serious problem: his machine won't work and the owner's livelihood depends on it. No one can fix it, except you. The solution is flicking the correct three switches in the correct order and it takes you 3 seconds to fix it. But that's not a $5 job, right?

I typically see low earners trying to justify their fee with gear or time quotes, but it's not the right way to go.

That said, it will help you tremendously if you're using proper accounting software—at least in terms of sending proper estimates and invoices. List all the gear you own and go online and check day rates from local rental houses. Any project where the client doesn't provide equipment, you'll rent from yourself and market price (and whatever else you need from a rental house). Your gear is a business cost and you don't do a single job without earning money back from it. It's NOT like you buy what you need to start a business and then that cost is on you. This is also the reason why the price of your camera isn't all that important—you'll earn it back.

Apart from day rates for gear you'll have your own day rates depending on job. You can have a photo day rate or a video day rate. Maybe you just do one of those, or you decide that you have a single day rate for simplicity's sake. That day rate covers your skill and knowledge. That's your "getting out of the bed money".

Try it out: make an estimate with a bit of gear. Then google professional day rates for the service you provide and add it. Where do you end up?

In the end, it's your ability to market yourself and your confidence that will determine your pay. And it's your skill that will determine if you'll get hired again.

And don't do boring jobs. Life is too short for that.
 
I think deliver what a client actually needs.

Hard to explain what I mean by that.. For example an interior shoot may be jazzed up more by buying some croissants for the table than hauling your slider.

So many technical shots are ruined by bad art - don't want to sound sexist but listen to your woman - she might say "bad jumper" or 'the kitchen is dead without some food' more than she might ever say "I love the little push in"

Help clients get shots your missus likes!

I have a chum, successful, who calls himself a photographer - actually he's a food stylist with a camera!
 
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AndreeOnline said:
Second: don't sell time. Don't say "OK, this will take me two days, which means it will cost $YY".
Click to expand...

morgan_moore said:
an interior shoot may be jazzed up more by buying some croissants for the table than hauling your slider.

So many technical shots are ruined by bad art - don't want to sound sexist but listen to your woman - she might say "bad jumper" or the kitchen is dead without some food more than she might ever say "I love the little push in"
Click to expand...

2 spot on pieces of advice that I will add to.

1. Selling your time is a good way to get nickel and dimed and make bad art. You should have a whole sheet of your internal day rates, gear rates, etc. so you can calculate what is fair, but quote your video as a package with markup and sell the product, not a piece mealed time bid. That's a great way for clients to say "2 days? That's expensive. What can we get for .5 or 1 day, and lets not rent XYZ gear from you either." Don't go down this road. It leads to dissatisfaction with the process on your part, constant questioning of how much time it really actually took you or needs, and often results in not having enough production budget to get the shots or planning you know you need.

2. The most important part of filmmaking is content, not acquisition, yet almost everyone who freelances focuses on acquisition. People make sure they shoot crap with the best lenses on sliders and slow motion RAW but they're still shooting crap. You are better off shooting something good on a GH4 than something boring on an EVA1. If you can do both, more power to you, but one thing I learned over the years: there is strength in your weakness. Don't be the video equivalent of the guy who has more money than talent and buys $5000 worth of golf gear or ski gear and can't hit a ball or tumbles off the ski lift.
 
DBP,

Are you a "production company" hoping to work straight to client from idea to final delivery? Or are you hoping to be a camera operator working for a production company or a producer?

There are so many paths to take, but to succeed in any of them you need to invest in that path.

For example, weddings can be a good source of income. But in order to make some good money, you have to invest in shooting a couple weddings to do it well and learn your style, and perhaps even lose some money upfront by investing in the final product, which ultimately is your marketing material. But this can actually take quite a bit of time, money and effort, but it won't help you at all in terms of getting corporate clients.

Similarly, if you want to be a camera operator for other production companies or television shows, you have to invest time, money and effort in that direction, which won't help you necessarily get straight to client, production company type of jobs.

I know this is generic info, but what I'm saying is that trying to do everything in a competitive way, is too hard. Choose a path, perhaps the path of least resistance, perhaps a path based on your passion or talents, but invest and focus on that area. I know that it may seem like you need to spread out to take as many different types of jobs as possible, because you want more money, but by not focusing on a path, you end up just delaying your progress in any particular path, which costs you more money in the long run.

The advice you'll get will vary greatly depending on what path you hope to take.

I see to many folks hoping to operate as a "Content Agency", doing business and marketing themselves from the camera operator playbook...which is counter-productive. Likewise, I see too many people who hope to be camera operators, thinking they have to drum up business direct to client...which is also counter productive.
 
DBP, you may be in a generalist field where any of the millions of potentially unemployed people can buy a video camera and set up a billboard marketing themselves as videographers to compete with the millions of people shooting video on their smartphones. The best bet to get ahead of the pack is differentiating yourself by finding a niche, marketing and hard work. Do you have some other background, experience, special knowledge you could use for leverage and contacts? Maybe take a step back and get some of that experience.
 
It's hard to answer this question for someone else. I could tell you what I do
to make money......but chances are it will not apply to you. And most of
what I hear other people say, would not work for me. I'm in a small, isolated
location. Niches, specialization and so on is what you need when you live in a city
or populated metro area.....or even an area with roads 😏 Try it where I live and
you'd be lucky to get 2 jobs per year. Here you have to be flexible because the
paying jobs are a bit rare. The biggest 'niche' where I live might be tourism
based promo videos......which would be great May-Sept. But then winter comes,
all the tourists leave, so what do you do to make money? You have to know your
market. You have to help people/organizations by solving their problems hopefully
by using video. One local organization was spending countless 'man hours' walking
people through filling out applications over the phone. I made them a video, showing
how to do it step by step. Their employees could direct callers to the video and go
back to doing what they were supposed to be doing, which saved the organization a
lot of money!
 
alaskacameradude said:
You have to help people/organizations by solving their problems hopefully
by using video. One local organization was spending countless 'man hours' walking
people through filling out applications over the phone. I made them a video, showing
how to do it step by step. Their employees could direct callers to the video and go
back to doing what they were supposed to be doing, which saved the organization a
lot of money!
Click to expand...

Boom, there it is.

Be a problem-solver.
 
I've come to terms with the fact that I have my low/no budget passion projects, and that's ok. That's where my heart is, and it keeps my morale high.
Click to expand...

I actually am not sure exactly what you mean by this. But it reminded me of myself, so I offer my story as yet another angle.

I fell in love with moviemaking when I was 13 and made them all through school. Afterward I started my own video business to justify buying a camera and editing computer, so I could have it to make indie movies in my spare time. But when I started making videos for other people in earnest, it killed it in me (or at least put it in hibernation indefinitely). I wasn't making enough money, I was exhausted, and the last thing I felt like doing in my spare time was an indie movie or anything to do with a camera.

Part of it was because I was making nonfiction instead of fiction. In school I made fun short films. In my business I had to make weddings, corporate videos, etc. Some people like making those sorts of things, and there's nothing wrong with that.

Part of it was sheer volume. In school I thought I was prolific. Over 10 years (junior high, high school, and college) I made 40 little movies. It seemed prolific compared to my classmates, but most of them made zero movies. In my business that quadrupled. I made 100 videos in four years. And as y'all know, that's not even busy enough to make a living.

Part of it was relentless poverty. I literally would have netted more per hour working at McDonald's. After giving it a good try for several years and only accumulating more debt and exhaustion, I reluctantly quit. I spent the next several months looking for a new career. I even took a job in construction to rest my brain. Eventually, through friends, I got jobs in computers and am now a programmer.

So, another tack you can take is simply not to do it as your day job. You can easily have more money and more enthusiasm for your passion projects if you do something else for your day job.

Anyway, this advice may be way off, partly because we all have so little knowledge about you to work from.
 
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Thanks for the replies everyone. Lots of quality stuff from every post so far. Several people have mentioned that I left out a lot of detail on my situation, so I'll add to that right now. I intended for this thread to just spawn a general conversation on the matter, rather than it solely be about me. Something that everyone could benefit from. I'm happy to divulge more, though.

I'm based out of Vancouver, BC. Been working freelance here since 2013. My wife is in school, doing her PhD. That's relevant because she doesn't bring in a ton of money currently, but she will be doing so very soon. Honestly, I think I'll have a much easier time then, because I'll be able to take more chances and be a bit choosy with who I work for. Right now I have to make sure we don't starve or get evicted, so I can't afford to be choosy or pushy with rates.

I started off doing corporate and then got a connection to do weddings. Started off being 50/50 for corporate and weddings, but it slowly morphed into 80% weddings. While there's a lot of work involved, they do pay decently and they are booked in advance, so there's a sense of stability and guaranteed income. I am contracted out by two companies. One pays me pretty well, the other not so much. The lower paying one does offer me quite a bit of work, though. I still do some corporate work as a contractor for a production company here in the city. He pays me well and I like working for him, but the work isn't crazy steady.

I've done about 80 weddings now. I'm not top tier, but I'm pretty solid at this point. I know there's money to be made and I know the exact path required to make it. I can easily envision a life where I make close to 6 figures doing weddings. The problem is..... I hate them. At this point, I have *zero* drive to do them and if I do another one, it'll be too soon.

As others have said, time spent specializing in one genre is time not spent doing it elsewhere. I feel like I've spent too much time doing the safe approach (weddings) at the expense of doing work I enjoy more. The corporate stuff isn't perfect either but I tend to enjoy it way more. I get more satisfaction, and the stress levels are much lower. Problem is, it's too sporadic to make a living while my wife is in school. I've just never been comfortable relying on it.

I have other passion projects. Some volunteer stuff. A new private gym I go to has been a big source of inspiration. In fact, I just watched a short powerlifting doc in the FS7 forum that's inspired me to take a similar route. There won't be much money in it, but it's creatively very satisfying.

So that was the inspiration for my thread. I'm okay with boring work as long as I can make good money from it and take something creatively from it. Even corporate gigs give me practice setting up interviews and lights. I feel like weddings give me nothing creatively at this point. Nothing that I can apply to work I *actually* want to do.

So that's my story.
 
AndreeOnline said:
First of all: don't sell gear. That is, don't say "I shoot with camera X, so my rates are $YY".
Second: don't sell time. Don't say "OK, this will take me two days, which means it will cost $YY".
Third: you won't increase your average pay check working for friends. Target businesses that make money, like real estate.

The more you can think of it as if you're selling a solution, the better off you'll be.

A somewhat stupid example would be if you study a very complex machine for a lifetime. There are lights and switches everywhere. One day you get a call from a machine owner with a serious problem: his machine won't work and the owner's livelihood depends on it. No one can fix it, except you. The solution is flicking the correct three switches in the correct order and it takes you 3 seconds to fix it. But that's not a $5 job, right?

I typically see low earners trying to justify their fee with gear or time quotes, but it's not the right way to go.

That said, it will help you tremendously if you're using proper accounting software—at least in terms of sending proper estimates and invoices. List all the gear you own and go online and check day rates from local rental houses. Any project where the client doesn't provide equipment, you'll rent from yourself and market price (and whatever else you need from a rental house). Your gear is a business cost and you don't do a single job without earning money back from it. It's NOT like you buy what you need to start a business and then that cost is on you. This is also the reason why the price of your camera isn't all that important—you'll earn it back.

Apart from day rates for gear you'll have your own day rates depending on job. You can have a photo day rate or a video day rate. Maybe you just do one of those, or you decide that you have a single day rate for simplicity's sake. That day rate covers your skill and knowledge. That's your "getting out of the bed money".

Try it out: make an estimate with a bit of gear. Then google professional day rates for the service you provide and add it. Where do you end up?

In the end, it's your ability to market yourself and your confidence that will determine your pay. And it's your skill that will determine if you'll get hired again.

And don't do boring jobs. Life is too short for that.
Click to expand...


I don't know if I agree with some of this. If you (OP) are trying to do projects from start to finish, produce them that is (I think "turnkey" is the word?), this advice applies. However, as a freelance crew member (another way to make money in this racket), all of us pretty much do everything advised not to do here, sell time, sell gear, divide things into days, etc. etc. It's just how it works. If I'm a camera guy, my labor is worth x, my gear is worth y. "Can you bring your Divas?" "Sure, that's an extra Z." That includes taking less than stellar exciting gigs. If that's "wrong", then somebody better tell every freelance crew member in Houston they're living their lives incorrectly.
 
Hi guys. Thanks for the great thread and input. If we could, let's talk about this some more.

No doubt communicating with a client, understanding thier needs and coming up with the solution is a great approach.
I see a couple possible scenarios here:

Scenario 1.
Client hires you to shoot only.
Then it seems to me the best way to price this is to determine rates by (1) time and (2) resources (gear/crew) needed.
If they want a one man crew with a one camera, mic, light kit and tripod then it's XXX/hr or XXX/day.
If they want a two man crew with 2 cameras, slider, tripod, teleprompter, light kit, 2 mics then I add more for each extra resource added.
So now instead of say $200/hr or $1400/day it's instead $350/hr or $2300/day.
This gives me a formula to consistantly keep my rates in check and if they want to change something then it's not like I'm pulling numbers out of thin air. They can understand that the more time and resources the more it costs me and thus the more it costs them. I've first sold them on "I'm the guy with the solution that cares about your project success" of course.

Scenario 2.
Client hires you to create turn key project (Brainstorm, write, shoot and post).
In this scenario I use the same type rates to determine the price to keep it all consistant and in check. I may or may not show it all broken down to the client, but behind the scenes I used my rate chart to figure it out. You listen and understand what they really need, sell them on you are the guy with the solution, care about them and come up with some good ideas. After determining the total price, you could present the client with a final number, say $7500.
A little later they want to change something. Again, you don't want to look like you are just coming up with a project price out of thin air. So if they decide they want drone shots afterall, after you already came up with the plan. Sure, no problem. Your drone rate is $300hr so you estimate how much time you need to get the shots and add $XXX to the project price.
Or at the end of the shoot day after the shot lists are done they come up with something else they want you to shoot on the spot for another hour. No problem. That will add $XXX.

If you originally price the project in a big itemized detailed list of gear and time then yes, they could look at it and say, "$1400/day is way too high!" or how about we drop one camera on day two? Or "why is post production $800/day? How many hours will it really take you to post it?"

I'm sorry this isn't well written out. I'm tired but I wanted to continue this thread and get some input.
Years ago, when we gave a total project price without making it clear that it was built based on time and resources then they were more likely to try to add stuff to the project like more time etc and expect the price to stay the same because it wasn't built on time/resources per se.
And if you don't have a formula (at least in your head) of how you came up with the price then it's harder to modify it when they want to change something.

And psychology plays into this too.
Lets say you have a job priced at $2550. Then the client tries to get you to lower the price because their budget shrunk etc... So you agree and drop with price to $2000 with no modification of anything. "Well if you can drop it to $2000 out of thin air, why can't you go ahead and drop it to $1500?"

Kind of like you run an auto repair shop and determine with the client what they need done and how much. Then they need to lower the price. So you don't just drop the price, you figure ways you can scale it back. "Maybe you don't need those 100,000 mile Goodyear GT tires afterall." So you change it to a cheaper brand to get the price down. And you lower the warranty length on the transmission to drop the price a bit.

Now let's go back and try this another way:

You have the job priced at $2550. It's broken down that you will shoot with 2 cameras/crew for 3 hours.
Pre-production 2 hrs - $50
Production 2 cam/crew 3 hrs - $900
Post production - (2 days but you don't tell them 2 days, you tell them a week's deadline) $1600
But now they need to lower the price. So you talk it over and decide what they can do without and still accomplish the needed result.
You determine 2 cameras isn't critical afterall, so that drops the price $300. Then you are able to drop the post another $200.
So now you are at $2050 and are within their budget and you did it by lowering your time and resources needed instead of just eating the discount.

Thoughts?
 
I can really only advise you on scenario one based on how professional freelancers (by which I mean people in the "real" production industry, who work on higher end corporate projects, commercials, movies, etc. etc.). We really don't work hourly. We go by day or half day rates, generally based on a 5 hour (half day) or 10 hour (full day) rate, with overtime being incurred after ten hours. After 5 hours it becomes a full day, even if it's only one extra hour-- 6 hours (up to you if you wanna be "nice" about it and give them a break). Some folks don't even do the half day (I don't as a teleprompter operator, one of the things I do. I leave the house, it's a day rate.); that would be a personal decision. If you are so busy that there's a high chance a client wanting a full day from you could call on a day you've already booked, maybe don't do half days so you don't screw yourself out of a full day rate. Half days are typically billed at 2/3, and some even do 75% of the day rate. You are statistically unlikely to pick up the other half of any given day (say a shoot is scheduled, and I say SCHEDULED--these things often go off the rails--from 8-11 am. What are the chances something is a going to come along that starts at a time that would allow you to safely finish your other shoot, pack up and drive to the next job's location? Not good), which I believe is the main reason for this. The half day/full day thing ONLY applies to your labor, gear is always billed at a full day rate (e.g. your camera package is worth $350 or whatever for an hour long shoot or a 12 hour shoot). If you have to rent gear you don't own, many folks add a markup of some percentage or a dollar amount to offset the cost of gas to pick up/return the gear, the time to do so, time to check it out and make sure it's working, and to give you a little extra in case you damage something and have to pay to have it replaced/repaired. Some folks also mark up the cost of additional crew (your grip charges you $350, you bill client $400 or whatever). I still don't quite understand that one, but again, your call.

The rest of what you have there sounds good. One thing I might advise, and I admit I rarely do this myself, though I should, is to create a contract/agreement for each of these gigs, even if it seems simple/ridiculous, so everyone's on the exact same page and to prevent "scope creep", where "just one more piece of gear" is added, or "can you stay 30 more minutes but still bill us like you didn't" stuff doesn't happen. You can always refer to the agreement and say "not to be a dickbag, but you know you signed off on x gear and work for y money, anything else is extra." These situations are awkward as hell (at least for me) when they pop up in real life, in the moment, and it can be hard to stand firm. Always up to you if you want be a "nice guy" and let little things go. That's another thing you sort of have to feel out as you go and get more experienced. Some people are hardasses about everything, some will make small compromises to keep folks happy/keep getting work. Up to you which to be and how much.
 
Josh Bass said:
I don't know if I agree with some of this.
Click to expand...

Hi Josh. Yes, all my advice is based on the premise that the OP wants to raise his rates, not just find paying gigs. He already makes some money, but would like it to be more.

My central idea is that you can not be the employee. I don't feel the need to label a single person as a "production company", but I guess one can look at it that way. And yes, whatever the client budgets as 'project cost' for that specific video or item—you need to pocket all of that*.

If a client is ready to spend $10k, for a promotional item or image film, I don't think you'll be able to get a large piece of that if you're only "holding and pointing the camera" or rent out isolated line items.

I don't think that people who prefer to work that way is living their lives wrong. It's totally up to each of us to decide for ourselves, but I also don't think it's the answer to the original question, as I didn't understand the question to be "how do I get any work?"


*= I do believe being a "collaborator" is a fine thing. If it's Nike looking to assemble a small team for their next shoe commercial. For ground level stuff—make sure you get all of it.
 
Fair enough. But one can still make more than “little money” even as a crew member; it’s the same principle. Find better clients who will support a higher rate. HOW? Dunno.
 
Josh Bass said:
Fair enough. But one can still make more than “little money” even as a crew member; it’s the same principle. Find better clients who will support a higher rate. HOW? Dunno.
Click to expand...

Yes. I didn't mean to imply it's a lesser form of work. This is all probably very market dependant too. But I do think that if you can be the guy talking to the person paying for the job, suggesting a few solutions, maybe even steering the whole project a bit with some good suggestions, that you'll come out with a bit more money.

In the end is probably the old "truth" about the quality of your connections or ability to network and build a reputation. And the word proactive comes to mind.
 
AndreeOnline said:
First of all: don't sell gear. That is, don't say "I shoot with camera X, so my rates are $YY".
Second: don't sell time. Don't say "OK, this will take me two days, which means it will cost $YY".
Third: you won't increase your average pay check working for friends. Target businesses that make money, like real estate.

The more you can think of it as if you're selling a solution, the better off you'll be.

A somewhat stupid example would be if you study a very complex machine for a lifetime. There are lights and switches everywhere. One day you get a call from a machine owner with a serious problem: his machine won't work and the owner's livelihood depends on it. No one can fix it, except you. The solution is flicking the correct three switches in the correct order and it takes you 3 seconds to fix it. But that's not a $5 job, right?

I typically see low earners trying to justify their fee with gear or time quotes, but it's not the right way to go.

That said, it will help you tremendously if you're using proper accounting software—at least in terms of sending proper estimates and invoices. List all the gear you own and go online and check day rates from local rental houses. Any project where the client doesn't provide equipment, you'll rent from yourself and market price (and whatever else you need from a rental house). Your gear is a business cost and you don't do a single job without earning money back from it. It's NOT like you buy what you need to start a business and then that cost is on you. This is also the reason why the price of your camera isn't all that important—you'll earn it back.

Apart from day rates for gear you'll have your own day rates depending on job. You can have a photo day rate or a video day rate. Maybe you just do one of those, or you decide that you have a single day rate for simplicity's sake. That day rate covers your skill and knowledge. That's your "getting out of the bed money".

Try it out: make an estimate with a bit of gear. Then google professional day rates for the service you provide and add it. Where do you end up?

In the end, it's your ability to market yourself and your confidence that will determine your pay. And it's your skill that will determine if you'll get hired again.

And don't do boring jobs. Life is too short for that.
Click to expand...

A lot of what Andree said, I agree with. The majority of it, IMO, equates to "be valued based" not "price based". Some, as you've already seen, don't like the value based model or agree with it, and that's ok. However, I think if you give it a try, you might be pleasantly surprised that using a value based model does better for you.

Also, I don't agree with your (OP) sentiment of not being able to ask/charge more for your work/services. Usually, you are your own worst enemy and this is especially true when it comes to "worth" and "pricing". If you offer yourself as a cheap solution, you'll only get people/clients who think that way. Don't cut yourself down!
 
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