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06/21/2011 01:20:44 PM · #1 |
I was recently approached to shoot a book cover for a local artist. The book will be a collection of photos of her, a sort of memoir, but I will only be doing the cover.
This is my first time dealing with any sort of photography business and I need a lot of help.
What would one look at to charge for this and how about usage rights, license fees, etc.
Also, she's a local artist, so she's working with a low budget. What's a competitive rate?
Did I leave anything out that I should consider? Other legal matters? |
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06/21/2011 02:19:52 PM · #2 |
You should find out how many copies will be printed, as that is a major factor in determining licensing fees.
Make sure you word your contract as a license and not a sale; specify the specific usage allowed, number of copies, and the fee.
You can charge whatever you feel fair -- you can use this stock photo price calcuator to get an idea of how much it would cost to license a photo for a book cover from a stock agency. If this is a person you know and trust, you could make a deal for a small(er) up-front charge, plus additional fees/royalties based on the number of books sold or printed. |
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06/22/2011 07:55:38 AM · #3 |
The way things used to be (when commercial work was pretty much the purview of professional photographers), this type of work had two pricing components: the shoot and the usage. With so many available photographers today and so many people needing/wanting photos, that model is pretty much going away, with the buyer expecting one simple, affordable price. Even so, you owe it to yourself to take these things into consideration in developing your price.
I use both the calculator Paul recommended, as well as another stock photo calculator to get a base idea for the image usage. I price the shoot based on my hourly rate (you can use this freelance rate calculator to help develop yours). Even though I am still going to be giving the client "a number", that number has to be two things: justifiable to me from a business perspective and reasonable to them from a budget perspective.
Here is some food for thought
(read the link, pun intended...)
The key to your situation is to not let the job take on a life of its own. For example, if she swears on her life that she can only afford to spend $150, then tell her that will do for a 15 minute shoot with 3 delivered (processed for print) images, cash upfront, with poses and location decided in advance, with her showing up ready-to-shoot, and with no setup required on your part (no lights, no props, nada). And make it clear that anything beyond 15 minutes will result in extra charges to be paid before you deliver anything. Yeah, this sounds hard-ass, but consider the alternative: you go out shooting for an hour or so and wind up with 500 images to go through. Before you know it, you've got 10 hours in this baby and she's still giving you the run-around on making changes to your edits. A difficult situation becomes worse and you realize you'd rather be working at McDonalds...
Find out what her budget is and what she expects. Make sure you understand exactly what is involved in meeting her expectations. If the money is reasonable for the effort required, you're golden. Otherwise, you will have to get her to either come up with more money or cut back on what she expects.
Good luck! |
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