Seeking Battle Tested Videographers For Advice

Videowarrior, I own my own Utah video production company. It is called Savvy Productions. Feel free to ask me any questions. As for a contract. You are in luck. Read this Videomaker article on contracts. Best of luck.

I can’t imagine the hassles I’d get attempting to be that prescriptive. I appreciate the content, but unless the contract was for substantial amounts – and I think I’m talking about ten grand amounts plus, where the money is high enough to warrant extra protection, then it’s a bit over the top for me.

For the sorts of claim values we’d take to our UK country court system, then in general the contract needs to simply detail what both parties will do, and what the remuneration will be – including time for settlement etc. I cannot imagine any of my regular clients signing something like that without wanting to run it past their own solicitor, as it’s complex.

The best advice a friend gave me was to limit your potential loss. What is the worst thing that can happen? Spend your money doing something then not get paid. So what will doing the job really cost? Fuel, food, possibly accommodation? If the job is easy distance, so you don’t need hotels and food, then the real cost of shooting is very little. Memory cards are not like shooting on tape – where you could spend lots of money on things you won’t use again. Time? Did you turn away other work, losing the money on that job to do this one? My time on paper is valuable. However – if I had a diary hole, then my real earning potential for the time taken to do the job was zero. Then I look at the probable maximum invoice value. If the income from the job is going to be higher than the personal limit I set, then I get more detailed in my contracts. To be honest, for many of my clients I do not do a formal, written contract that they sign. Repeat reliable clients I don’t do, unless I am going to have to spend a lot of real cash to do the project, like hiring equipment, venues and other people. I tend to set out things in emails, as questions that need responses, but create a record of things agreed, just in case we do end up in a legal situation. I will put the details in an email like this.

“Hi John, all set for the Tuesday shoot at the Marina. As we discussed I’ve based the £1400+VAT cost on us finishing by 13:00, but if we need to change this to 15:00 it does have an impact on the price, increasing the cost to £1700+VAT. Do you think this is likely, as I need to make sure the venue are OK with the extra two hours”

Phrasing this as a question brings back a response
“Thanks Paul, but I’m sure we can be out by 13:00”. To be honest, I don’t really care, but the response would satisfy the small claims court here in the UK. An offer, and acceptance, with the sums clearly detailed.

Of course I could have wrapped this in a multi-page, legal document that mentions all the things that can go wrong. I think the invoice going into 5 figures would lead me towards something more formal. Most of my work is in theatres – musical theatre, show reels for performers, that kind of stuff, and for many of these, price is paramount as they do not have any money. So lots of people want to edit themselves, so I will do a two hour job, charge say £140 but KEEP the memory card. I put up half of maybe three contrasting songs onto Vimeo with a password so they can see it. Once they pay by bank transfer, they get the memory card, or if they want a download. If, as happens from time to time, they realise their singing was horrible, or they look fat – they won’t pay, and go very quiet. In my area, this means I lost an evening, and maybe 20 miles of fuel. They also get the clips for free, on youtube, free to watch, and a facebook post thanking them, with the link. Did a nice shoot last week at XXXX for Jane Smith (with her facebook link) then post the clip. Works pretty well. Lots of work comes via facebook friends, so this punishment usually works 50% of the time. I get the money and remove the video. I realise this is very much because of the nature of my work and won’t work for normal people. My actual bad debits are pretty low, and the occasional one I can live with. Frankly – for a couple of hours work, I’m OK with it. Especially as doing the shoot often produces requests for others at the same place.

One VERY important thing for me is ownership of the material. Despite rarely being of use in the future, I do not sell the footage, I give them unlimited use of it, but the ownership stays with me. If they can use the material for any purpose and make money from it, I’m cool with that, so they get a licence to use the material in perpetuity, in any territory. “The price I’ve quoted (£XXXXX) also includes the rights for you to use this material any territory, in perpetuity – which means wherever and forever, which covers everything I think – although you will need to think about the rights on the soundtrack, but I’m sure the tracks you used on the night were cleared for performance, so you’d just need to look into this if you do something public with the material on the night – I could probably sort this out for you if you wish, let me know if you need me to do this”
That also goes in one of the emails, which again would show that I tried. This in the UK is not is not so cut and dried, but I’d take my chances on that one – the court would see I did at least try, and offered.

I’m absolutely certain legal professionals would laugh at my ‘system’ but it seems to work for me and is nice and friendly – If I gave that multi page document to a singer in a venue they’d run a mile. Worst case is you don’t get paid. I never look at it like I just lost £2000, I really lost £50 in real costs, and the pleasure of the other £1950.

That is a crazy long contract. This may get me in trouble but we don’t use contracts. I would rather go through life believing people are good and will honor their commitments. This is the same business philosophy as Marcus Lemonis. Owner of Camping World and a bunch of other companies. I think the best way to prevent problems is to manage client expectations and make sure what you create is what your client wants.

Utah Video Productions

I forgot to mention. When we have a new client we have never worked with or a job that requires a big expense up front such as actors, rentals or travel we require a % of the job payment up front. This protects you in case they end up not paying the full amount and can cover the expenses as well.

Utah Video Productions

Right on. Best of luck!

Utah Video Production

That’s a good question. I do hire freelancers when things get busy for us and we just can’t handle everything on our own. Since I run a Utah Video Production company in Utah I only have experience with Utah freelance editors and DPs. Camera people charge a half day or a full day rate and most editors charge an hourly rate. The half-day full day rate for camera operators is because if someone wants them for an hour and everyone else wants them for 4 hours then they will lose out on 3 hours of work. The only thing they can sell is their time and when it is booked they can’t bail on you so the half day full day deal protects them. Editors can edit through the night if they need to so they have a lot more flexibility in selling their time. Heads up a typical full day is 10 hours.

When it comes to editing I prefer to be paid at a flat fee instead of hourly. Hourly doesn’t reward editors who are fast and efficient. I know you can argue that you can just raise your hourly rate but you do hit a point where your rates are just too high and when someone compares you and you are charging triple the other person they have a tendency to think you charge too much. A flat rate to me helps make it more of an apple to apple comparison.

The reason I hated flat rates starting out is because I didn’t know how long something would take to do. So hourly protected me when it took much longer then I thought. Now that I’ve been doing this professionally full time for over 15 year I have a really good sense of how long something will take.

Bottom line, the freelancer gets to set their rate and how they get paid. You can either go with it or negotiate.

I recommend you make sure to pay your freelancers as soon as possible or they won’t want to work with you again. Having been around the block I can afford to pay my freelancers the week of work and wait 30 + days to get paid by might client.

Hope this helps. If not let me know.

A couple of things in this thread that I disagree with fairly strongly. For me, not having a well thought-out and articulated contract is suicidal. A contract is a communication tool: “Here’s what you want done, here’s what I will do for you. It will cost you this much, etc., etc.”

Things you may take for granted — e.g., getting access to the venue, getting a lunch break, having a place to park, cancellation if it pours rain on the you are scheduled for an outdoor shoot, who pays for the time taken for drug testing for you and your crew, etc. –may be quite different from what your client takes for granted. You need to come to an understanding and that’s what the contract helps do.

When we started our business more than 20 years ago I drew up a contract and took it to my attorney. The question I put to him: “Can you go into court and defend our company with this contract in hand.” He made quite a few changes and we’ve used the document ever since. It’s only three pages long but it’s designed to cover most contingencies. It can be supplemented if necessary.

As far as how to pay sub contractors: we pay hourly for anyone on a shoot, with a four-hour minimum (half-day.) I don’t know many editors who will work for a flat rate. There’s no such thing as an “easy” edit, no way to guess how long it will take to edit a piece. Clients — especially commercial clients — often want extensive changes as they see what’s possible, and a simple question like “Can we change this” can involve hours of additional work.

You can tell a client “I think this will take about 10 hours — $800 — but it could go over this. I’ll let you know when we approach that mark and you can see where you want to go from there.”

I’ll be happy to share our contract with you if you like. You can reach me through our website.

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