I've been asked by a TV show producer about purchasing some of my footage for a 15 second intro for a show. This is very new and exiting to me still being a student and all. Where can I find some standard prices to know what I can set my prices against? Is there any good sites to read regarding contracts etc...? He wants to use 6-9 of my shots for the intro.

Thank you so much!

Quite simply... As much as the market will bear!

What's the coverage or market share of the show? (ie. are we talking local access or national broadcast)
Is this an exclusive buy or a license to display? (ie does he want exclusive rights to your content.. in other words 'it's his' from the moment of purchase)
How long/often will this run? (once, once a week, once a day, etc)

There is no standard. Some photographers get $5000 for a click others get $.50 from microstock. The same holds true of speculative footage like timelapse. If your market will support the purchase then it's completely up to you to gauge and set the price.

I would imagine he wants to license them, not purchase them. You probably have to try to figure out what their budget is. If it's a local auto repair TV spot, maybe a couple hundred per clip. If it's a big NBC show, maybe 2 grand per clip. I think $500 - $1,000 per clip is probably a decent starting place. You might ask him to put out a number and take it from there.

This reminds me that I need to get busy putting together the "Business" forum here, for just these types of questions.

He said it would be national, but not CTV or anything that bit. I don't feel comfortable disclosing the exact details here, but I will say that he told me he has chosen me, because he knows I am a not a professional, therefore he might be able to get rates that are better for their budget. (more expensive stock is out of their budget).

I am uploading some low res clips for him to look at and he said that we will have a meeting and negotiate after that. *shrugs*

Thanks again!

Kinda sleezy... National shows 'have the budget' plain and simple. I'm guessing they want what you've got because of it's uniqueness/difficulty and are preying on your youth. If they are using it to 'brand' their show it's actually very valuable and any pro would know that.

Thank you for this. I will be very careful when dealing with this guy.

Not having all the details its hard to give you a realistic price. However as a guide say a National broadcast for a 15 sec title sequence for the lifetime of the show would be a round $1500. Please note that the clip would still be available to be licensed to other clients. Best of luck.

this is all good advice, but keep in mind that you are just starting out, and this does sound like a break. don't price yourself out of the job, either.

i've had people tell me the same thing, that they came to me because they thought they could get a break on the price versus going to Getty or Corbis or more established shooters, and I was happy to oblige, because it was money in my pocket for doing something i love. you have to start somewhere.

Again thanks for all the suggestions and advice. I will keep all this in mind. I have found out that the TV channel the show would be airing on is not exactly national... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joytv

That's what I figured. Even if they do 3 hundred bucks, that's better than no hundred bucks for someone starting out.

There are people selling decent TL clips on Pond5 for 40 bucks, so even if the amount you get is small, at least it's a start.

At the end of the day this is extremely true. The 'joytv' is not so... 'national'

thomas, with getty, they allow you to sell your own clips directly, but ask that you do so discreetly and don't advertise it.

anyway, with getty the price really swings dramatically. if they sell one of your clips RR to a movie studio, the price is about $3k. if they sell it to a little podunk channel or educational video, you get like $30! so pricing is really all dependent on the audience with them.

that's sort of what i was getting at with Smithers' situation.

I think he meant that the content buyers found similar clips or shooters at the big houses and were looking to work with him independently... Not necessarily selling a clip available at Getty 'under the table' (which I agree could be risky).

Nevertheless, all creative fields are feeling the pressure lately so I totally understand the pent up frustration. At my day job we are going after commissions and seeing a sort of 'chicken warfare' of how low can you go. Unfortunately the lowest fees are winning right now for better or worse. The expectation for service continues to rise and the perceived value continues to fall in creative fields.... I'm not sure how the cycle will be reversed.

Interesting! things have changed... It wasn't five years ago that they would make you sign your soul over to them (albeit you'd do well for it!)

to me, it's like any other business. when you start out on wall street, you are fetching coffee for 8 bucks an hour.

i know guys like Pawel Achtel on Reduser who sell their clips for $6,000 PER SECOND! but it takes time to build yourself up to that level, and Pawel offers very unique and hard-to-get clips.

heh. with Pawel, he has some very rare underwater footage of some kind of endangered animals mating or something like that, lol. he's like the only guy on the planet with that footage, so he can charge whatever he wants.

Let's face it... Your both correct. There is an underpaid indy revolution going on and there will always be that once in a lifetime shot or the one that took a year to prepare for... There are also many who spend their entire lives fighting to reach the point where their opinion/work/image is worth gold.

It sort of goes back to: Anything is worth what someone will pay today! 'Art and Imagery' is a particularly strange and wildly varied.

I agree, DO NOT price yourself out of a job. I've work for and with several large companies (Nike, Adidas, Coke, NBA, NFL, NASCAR, etc) in the past 9 years, and one thing holds true for all of them, a dollar is a dollar just as it is for an individual. So where they might have more on hand, they don't and won't spend it on something if it is too high. ONLY when a company gets itself in a jam have I seen purchases of exorbitant prices.

If this is an entrance shot for a reacquiring show then maybe they will need more footage, maybe if you do them right they will come back to you. Most do not make their fortunes with one hit.

Also you should be VERY clear on the licensing part of your deal, IN WRITING.

Good luck!

-j

*scoff* I just got a offer for $20 per clip with 5 clips being used. I was having in my mind a minimum of $400 - $500 or something like that, but $20 that's just ridiculous. Anyone have a suggestion on how to approach this? What should I say to him now?

$20 is insulting - run do not walk away from this person, I would have laughed in their face, and said no thanks. I wouldn't even call the person back. it isn't worth your time.

timt

When I deal with a client who has "budget problems" I sometimes offer what I call the 'custom stock" option.

This means I shoot the specific shot(s) to brief and at the end of the project's initial run, be it a TVC or documentary etc, the stock library rights revert back to me, say after a period of 12 months or what ever is negotiated.
This becomes a "win-win" situation for all parties involved and I hopefully get to resell the material again later.

$20 is a joke ! So if you want to get into the world of sales negotiating reply $200 per clip and see what the response is. DO NOT get sucked into having to justify your price etc. If you get a improved offer counter it by reducing your price and work towards a common win-win situation. Keep in mind your minimum is $100? then be prepared to walk away. Best of Luck.

I'm in a similar situation - got a request for footage from a production company (Starseed Media) and not sure what would be reasonable to ask. Guess it depends on what project it's for and how much they are looking to use which I don't know yet.

Sounds like a good idea - though, I don't have the know-how to write up a contract myself. Do any of you have a "template contract" that should cover this kind of sale or know where I can find one? I guess odds are that they make the contracts though since it looks like a pretty professional company, but just in case... and would be good to have in the future anyway.

Once you know the the details I can run them through one of my library's price calculator to give you an idea.

Ouch. I had a strange feeling this was going to go down this path...

You could approach it as... Okay fine, $10 per clip PER PLAY. If this show airs once a week for a year that's $520 and the usage license must be renewed after 52 plays.

It sounds a bit like there's a glut of time lapse on the market.

Bummer.

Still, no point in giving it away. I prefer to take the moral high ground with this stuff, if only to make myself feel better. I'm not complaining about amateurs undercutting professional, there's no point complaining about that kind of thing. Markets will change due to market forces such as an abundance of supply and some times they change so much that they are possibly no longer viable in the way they may have been (time for a new job in some cases). But I do choose not to make the situation worse by simply not taking low offers or prices if I can avoid them. I have trouble with people wanting my (car) images to use for advertising and it's amazing how often people expect images virtually for free. Digital has made everyone a photographer and has devalued many (but not all) images. Time lapse is very vulnerable to the same devaluation because it was always hard and expensive to create whilst now even HD is very cheap to create. Unique time lapse clips have their own value, but the run of the mill stuff is well, run of the mill!

JJ

JJ,

I run into the "everyone's a photographer" all the time now. Usually I will be neck deep into a 20k project and they decide they will provide the images. Sometimes I argue (keep in mind I am only trying to help them, this is THEIR image, THEIR identity) and sometimes I don't. The kicker though, is they ALWAYS complain about me using bad images when they provide them. They will ask, well why did you use THAT one, or why not THIS one, and How many mega pixels do I need to have to give you a GOOD quality image. All and all in my head I'm thinking, well i've shot for years with 6mpx and less.... ugh there are just sooo many things wrong with people thinking they can do everything. I hire a person to build a house for 2 reasons, I don't have the time and they will do a better job, or at least they SHOULD. People are thinking digital makes them whatever it says on the box. People are forgetting there is skill, experience, talent, and honestly a lot of luck in order to get the shot. And most of us aren't trying to rip them off, we are only trying to give them the best and what they need at a reasonable price. This is a lot of equipment and TIME in these projects.

eh.... Sorry started to rant.

Anyway, yeah Shmithers don't degrade your work selling as street corner goods. If you are on Getty Images just tell him he can get it from there, or whatever. Or bug off. Whatever you need to tell him, he seems to have taken up too much of your time as is.

-j

Well if 400 - 500 is what you wanted, tell the guy it's gonna be $400, take it or leave it. And be willing to leave it.

The key to negotiation is being 100% willing to walk away from a deal without looking back.

NEVER let them write the contract or the license. The license is about the extent of their right to use the material (terms of use, passes, markets and audiences, versions of the original program or movie, duration of license, media, forbiding resale of material, use in promoting the program or movie, limitations, etc.), the contract is more about how much they will pay, their obligation of respectig the license and terms of use and how you will provide the material. Generally, the license is good only when paid for according to contract terms. If you let them write it down for you, they will have all the rights for pennies... Same thing when renting your equipment. I rented one of my film time-lapse cameras to a major production company a while ago. At first, they refused to sign my contract and sent me their own. According to this contract, they did not have any responsibility in case of an accident or robbery, and I was the one supposed to provide security 24/7 on the set! So, better have your own contracts and licenses than use those of your clients. Mine are very simple, just a few sensible terms and clauses, but they are enough to protect my work and my rights.

I gave him my offer, and he said he would consider it.

He gave me a link to http://timejoy.net/ and told me to look at this guys pricing. From what I can tell, all his footage is of webcam quality, but I may be wrong. Have any of you heard of this guy?

and it's $86 per clip at iStock... What's the point?

If he wanted content from 'timejoy' he would have purchased them... He want's your content. That's the point.

Your not wrong !

BTW I know of this guy and he doesn't have HD clips.

Well, it's kinda interesting. He wants to stock HD footage and sell it for $25 per clip, keeping 40%. That makes the major stock houses look pretty greedy in comparison. We could use some people like that to start up and manage TimeScapes Stock Footage! If charging $75 per clip and keeping 20% he would still be making more per purchase than with his current pricing, and he would see some business...

The cheapest I have ever sold anything for is $200 for a single clip, and that was only for a local very limited market.
TV studios will regularly pay around $3000 / minute for regular HD video, so I think any specialized TL footage that takes longer to get / set up etc should be charged for appropriately.

I totally agree. If it comes up again, you could politely mention that if he had found what he was looking for at that price, you guys wouldn't be talking.

I genuinely love the way just about everyone in this forum is sticking up for you. It doesn't hurt to remember that this TV guy isn't a bad guy either. He's just trying to get the best deal he can get (or as far as we know).

A good deal is one where both parties are happy with what they're getting. It took me a long time to learn that I won't be happy with what I get unless I push for it, especially when dealing with people who are 'in the business'. It's not being mean, or rude, or greedy. Just a healthy does of rational self interest They can always walk away if they don't like what they are getting, too.

Good Luck!
AlexB

Long story short:

He says he'll think my offer over, and a day later decines the offer. It seemed like that was the end. A week(ish) later he contacts me and says he has managed to "scrounge up some cash" and is willing to buy some of my shots at my price. (I knew your advice was a good idea).

Everything seems good, accept with the licenses. He emailed me this:




What do you all think of this??

Thanks again!

It stinks! You have to write down a license relating to rights of use. This is a release... In fact, they take ownership of the material and reserve the right to resell it! (see clause 4). It is unacceptable. Especially the fact that they get the rights for all markets, for all purposes and forever! Generally, a license applies to a single use (for a program, for example, including promotion of the program) and specifies the markets (local, national or international, and fees vary according to the market) and for a limited or unlimited amount of time (fees vary according to this too). Don't sign this! You are selling your soul!

Yeah clause 4 scares the #*%^* of me. It let's them re-sell your stuff however they want and give you nothing. You should be the arbiter in licensing your work (with the exception of stock footage houses who license it for you and pay you a royalty).

DELRIOUS

This producer is so shady. They are trying to take over ownership of your work period. They want to put it on their stock shelf to use indiscriminately on any production AND if they sell their company they'll sell your work as an 'asset' of the company.

I hope your getting what you want out of the footage because after you sign this... It's gone.

I have struck this sort of thing a few times.
I would just re-write the agreement and send it back to them how your want it. Most people have no problem with this.
Specifically lay out that it is only to be used within the context of the show they are producing, and only that complete show may be re-sold etc.