Richard Lewisohn wrote: >.....One of my problems is that in the days of film a 6x7 transparency tended to look rather good with nothing done to it. A 1Ds file straight out of the camera is in most cases no match and can be greatly improved............
Hi Richard I don't want to get into arguments with all and sundry about charging. I think when these issues go public, it is easy to lose the plot. Sometime ago I posted on the AOP Forum a basis of coming to some decision as to what to charge for fees. Within that issue came post production and in particular the need to make sufficient profit to pay for the investment, which probably has to be changed every three to five years. It is of course, your decision how many exposures you make of a particular subject. Like many of us, you possibly might bracket exposures, then take an extra one for insurance and then take another one because you have just noticed something else not quite right and another one for insurance and so on and so forth! However many you take, back at base there is a time element in sorting out the exposure you are going to finally work on. I bet you would pour over your 6 x 7cm trannies for ages before you finally decided which one to use. The fact that that was an infinitely more pleasurable task than hopping between images in a RAW file browser only added to the time you spent doing it. Equally, the only investment you needed at that stage was a lupe and a light box, which meant you felt you could afford and enjoy the time to waste, doing it! In other words both should have an element of time costed into the job even at that stage. When you finally come to working on the final images you must be strict with yourself and note the time down and charge for it. And yes, I do charge �75.00 - �90.00 per hour for doing so. I work directly for my corporate clients and do not go through ad or design agencies. The design agencies would love to have that work themselves and so find it difficult to let photographers have full rein on this issue. My corporate clients more easily understand the need for this element of charging. They know as well as I do that it can be difficult to estimate how many images they will get. I recently came back from an assignment, with approximately 1200 digital capture exposures. I made the choice to cull this down to 200 images which the client received. All the post production came to 40 hours of work at �85.00 per hour. On top of that, I charged the client for the cost of making 4 x A5 'aim' prints of each image on A4 paper. All this was on top of my day rate, travelling, hotels and so on. Last week, another job resulted in the post production of 85 images taking 35 hours at a similar rate. So what I am getting at here is, that although the time scales are different, with experience you eventually get a feel for what the post production costs would be. You should be able to give a client a ball park figure with any qualifications you choose to throw in. For normal overseas shoots I find that post production work generally works out at about 4 images per hour after sorting. Sometimes three images, sometimes five. In that time, I find I can correct colour, density and contrast and leave some time to correct or manipulate other aspects of the image to improve the subject matter. It becomes a balance of time against how far do you go in working on each image. Time writing to CD should be part of the hours of post production and charged for. If you end up writing 20 CD's that takes up quite some time. As you say, the cost of the CD is mere pence so can be discarded. In the days of your 6 x 7cm trannie - how much time did you put into after work. None! Except for putting it in a black mount and sleeve and handing to the client! So, to sum up: 1) It is still, and will remain our responsibility to educate our clients in what our creative and technical expertise is worth and the investment we must make to achieve the results they desire. 2) Maybe, you should seek out a few more corporate clients, rather than design agencies. There are still thousands of clients out there, who do not know how to contact a photographer - particularly a good one. Join Ecademy! 3) You really do need to work out what your investment costs are, plus all your other costs, in determining what you must charge for your time. Not really knowing, or just making a stab at it, could mean you are losing money every time you do a job! Frightening! 4) I wouldn't say it is easy, but when you know the figures, it does help to focus the mind on what you really should be worth. 5) Please contact off list phone or email - if you want to chat things through. Kindest regards Norman Norman Childs Mobile: +44(0)7831 519217 Tel: +44(0)1256 767611 Fax: +44(0)1256 767612 Website: http://www.greenshoots.co.uk =============================================================== GO TO http://www.prodig.org for ~ GUIDELINES ~ un/SUBSCRIBING ~ ITEMS for SALE
