Hi, I'm an up and coming video editor. I've been editing on NLE systems for the past six years as a hobby, taken university film and digital video courses, and recently graduated with the hope to turn my former hobby into a profession. I've already done a few jobs, but I ran into a snag that I couldn't find an answer for after skimming the FAQ and putting in a few search keywoards.

I looked through this forum to get an idea of what going rates are for video editing projects and I've gotten the general impression that at entry level freelance editors make around $40 an hour ($20 as a base multiplied by two to cover nonbillable hours) with significantly more room for advancement as you establish yourself, you buy your own equipment, and you take on higher profile jobs. Please do correct me if I've misunderstood this.

Now, I know rates vary from market to market and one type of work to another, but I've been looking around in my area and I'm finding people don't seem to be willing to pay more than twenty an hour. I don't mind starting at the bottom rung and working my way up, but between the nonbillable hours that come from organizing these jobs and the general expenses associated with freelance (buying your own insurance, no benefits of any other kind, tax doom, etc.) I just don't see how anyone survives long enough to get higher on the ladder. Granted, I'm sure once you've done enough projects to properly manage your time you get less non-billable and more pay hours in than I am (lots of dead time for me as I build a social network), but none the less I'm finding it kind of difficult to get going in this profession.

So I guess my question is, is the $40 an hour that I've surmised based on various threads here an L.A. standard that is inflated higher than most other markets or am I just shortselling myself and being taken advantage of by people far more experienced in this business than a fresh out of college editor?

Thanks for reading what's probably a fairly commonly asked question and thanks in advance for any answers you've got to give. I'm making good headway in the actual production aspect of this field, but the business aspect is beyond me for the moment.

400 day better gets me a editor that has done more then a few jobs ...
40hr in LA area gets me very good editors with allot of experience ..
40hr in SF area gets me a ok editor with about 50% of the experience of LA editors ... IMO if this SF editor was in LA they would be making 20hr !!
40hr in grass valley area = nobody charges 40 hr there ...
40hr in portland gets me any of their top editors ...if i need a 800 day editor in portland - i fly one up from LA ....

Rates in a given area are indirectly tied to budgets.

If you can't find gigs for better than $20/hr (whether you're considered for it or not), then that speaks of the budgets in your market.

On the other hand, remember that employers/producers are going to be reluctant to even mention rates to you that they feel are not at your level. In other words, there might be higher rates avail in your area, you're just going to have to work up to the highest level in your market to enter into discussions like that.

Don't be discouraged. Just realize that freelancing in the production business takes a few years to get into. There's always more people willing to do the work than there is available work.

I don't mind starting at the bottom rung and working my way up, but between the nonbillable hours that come from organizing these jobs and the general expenses associated with freelance (buying your own insurance, no benefits of any other kind, tax doom, etc.) I just don't see how anyone survives long enough to get higher on the ladder. Granted, I'm sure once you've done enough projects to properly manage your time you get less non-billable and more pay hours in than I am (lots of dead time for me as I build a social network), but none the less I'm finding it kind of difficult to get going in this profession.

This is part of the weed out factor. Pretty much anyone who wants to get into this field is dirt poor/deep in debt for a number of years before they've established themselves. People who want it enough are willing to sacrifice and take the risk and people who are good enough (as well as persistent enough) are able to eventually climb out of their financial gutter.


-A

William, just read through the post and noticed you are in Raleigh. I am an editor in Charlotte and do freelance on occasion. There are several factors in rates: 1] being your experience level which everyone has touched on 2] is the system you are editing on. Editors on different systems demand different money. Most Avid editors will charge more than a Final Cut editor. And 3] is market rates.

In Charlotte, a standard rate for a good Avid editor is $50 an hour.

My suggestion for starting out is to take a full time job somewhere before you go freelance. One problem you will face starting out freelance is, if you start out at $20 an hour, how are you going to raise your rate? The minute you double your rate, you will loose most of your business.

Get your experience and reel and then start out at a good edit rate. Otherwise it will take you 10 years to incrementally raise your day rate as to not alienate your clients.

LOTS of factors here... there is no standard. If you are editing freelance on your own stuff, you get more. $40 seems pretty high depending on the project. I pay $1500 a week for most decent editors with quite a bit of experience. It is more $20 - $25 for younger guys with little experience...


ash =o)

A local ad showed up for an editor here in town, part or full time for $10/hr. Seems to be on or off-site (whichever is prefered by the applicant i guess). I can see $10/hr for someone who has no experiance, is in school for film but perhaps just started. But I emailed the poster and he wanted to see a demo reel. It seems to me that if i had a nice demo real (meaning experiance), I wouldn't be applying to a $10/hr editing job.

Am I crazy here?

Lisa, you're right if you have the experience, you wont be applying for $10/hr jobs. That is very entry level pay. Everyone is right it's based on experience, market, your equipment or theirs and so on. You should use theses factors to determine the best rate for you to make money based on the job.

It seems to me that if i had a nice demo real (meaning experiance), I wouldn't be applying to a $10/hr editing job.


Please tell me that you e-mailed the guy back w/that. :)


-A

Simple math, really:
At 40 hours a week, X 50 weeks a year, (gotta have 2 weeks for vacation, don't you?) you've got 2000 working hours in a year.
Therefore:
$20/Hour = $40,000 a year
$25/Hour = $50,000 a year
and, of course...
$50/hour = $100,000 a year.

That's assuming you can work & bill the full 2000 hours, which isn't giving you a lot of time for those hours you will spend finding the customers in the first place.
And, then you add the little extras, like insurance, self-employment taxes, and on and on...it makes the $1500 a week price ($37.50/hr) quite a bargain...

It's typical to assume 20-25 billable hours a week. Not only will you be spending the rest of the time seeking clients, marketing, but all sorts of other little things like learning new hardware/software, trouble shooting your gear when you have problems, etc.

Keep in mind you need to cover ALL your living expenses from food to rent/mortgage to health, utilities, use of car if needed, cost of consumables, equipment maintanence, money to buy new gear, software, upgrade your computer, etc.

This means at $50/hr you're really grossing $50,000. Once you've subtracted all your expenses, depending on cost of living and things related, you may have very little money to invest in your business or spend on that vacation.

Simple math, really:
At 40 hours a week, X 50 weeks a year, (gotta have 2 weeks for vacation, don't you?) you've got 2000 working hours in a year.
Therefore:
$20/Hour = $40,000 a year
$25/Hour = $50,000 a year
and, of course...
$50/hour = $100,000 a year.

That's assuming you can work & bill the full 2000 hours, which isn't giving you a lot of time for those hours you will spend finding the customers in the first place.
And, then you add the little extras, like insurance, self-employment taxes, and on and on...it makes the $1500 a week price ($37.50/hr) quite a bargain...

And don't forget a freelancer has to pay out of pocket a lot of things the employer pays when you're an employee. Things like employer contribution to social insurance, unemployment and workmen's comp, health plan premiiums, retirement plan/401K, etc etc. When figuring hourly equivalents for billing purposes you need to add about 20% to 30% to your comparison employee's base salary to cover the costs of usual bennies and employer-paid contributions that don't show up as dollars on his paystub but you'll now need to pay out of pocket.

Well, in my case - i am a contracter (computers) and already get almost no benefits. So I don't count much on that side. I would need to calculate for utilities that are paid at work, upgrading software, etc that the company handles - general office stuff. Health, 401k, all that fun stuff - stays the same as now. Either way, it would be impossible for me to support myself on 10/hr - especially if it wasn't full time.

What I did on that 10/hr job was tell the guy I don't have a reel but would be willing to cut a 3 minute sample from his video. He seemed to like that idea, but he is kinda slow in responding to emails. Just starting out sure is annoying - catch22 stuff. You need a reel to get a job, need a job to build a reel. Haha.

i do very little to no editing, but when i do edit, my charge is $ 65 per hour.

the main reason i don't get editing projects could be the price...or my bad quality <G>

greetings

Well, in my case - i am a contracter (computers) and already get almost no benefits. So I don't count much on that side. I would need to calculate for utilities that are paid at work, upgrading software, etc that the company handles - general office stuff. Health, 401k, all that fun stuff - stays the same as now. Either way, it would be impossible for me to support myself on 10/hr - especially if it wasn't full time.
...

We're in the same boat - computer application training here! What I meant was, if a regular employee doing X gets paid, let's say, $50 per hour base salary, a contractor doing the exactly the same job needs to bill on the order of $65 an hour just to break even with him, even before taking into account any costs of doing business like computers, supplies, utilities, office expenses, repairs, etc that would be normally born by one's employer but now come out of pocket.

Lisa, et al,

One thing to remember is that a demo reel is supposed to show what you CAN do, not necessarily what you have done. (its' great if it can be both, but not necessary)
If you have no paying work, create something of your own for your reel. A short, a commercial for a ficticous company, product etc.

Yeah, Bill, that's actually what i'm currently working on. I'm working on a few different edits to show different things (music video and a vacation video edit to name two). I think once those are complete I'll have a much easier time getting any freelance gig. However, I still think that any editor that is skilled enough to have a nice demo reel should be getting more then $10/hr.

Yeah, Bill, that's actually what i'm currently working on. I'm working on a few different edits to show different things (music video and a vacation video edit to name two). I think once those are complete I'll have a much easier time getting any freelance gig. However, I still think that any editor that is skilled enough to have a nice demo reel should be getting more then $10/hr.

I'm working on that myself for VO now, I don't have much in the way of commercials or radio imaging work, mostly corporate/industrial/educational, but would like to get some, so I jotted down some ideas on the drive back from florida last week. (17 hours in the car means a lot of radio!)

you're correct. a skilled editor is worth a heck of a lot more.

I'm working on that myself for VO now, I don't have much in the way of commercials or radio imaging work, mostly corporate/industrial/educational, but would like to get some, so I jotted down some ideas on the drive back from florida last week. (17 hours in the car means a lot of radio!)

you're correct. a skilled editor is worth a heck of a lot more.



10 bucks an hour shouldn't even be spoken of out load...lol. Really if you look at it in a national economic view point we're all in this together. Guys who take 10 dollar an hour jobs plain and simple shouldn't be in this business. I don't mean to sound like a snob really, but there has to be a consideration for our market. It effects us all. I've recently been noticing companies like expertvillage.com, and some other companies focused on real estate offering an extremely low amount for quite a bit of work. You find the subject to shoot, probably go shoot a half day, edit, author, and mail, all for how much 100 to 300 dollars?????? That is crazy!! The fact that people are biting this kind of stuff has a suttle threat to our industry. If a person is wanting to venture into the video production realm that's great, but start by getting hired by a company that charges what it's worth and pays you the hourly rate they decide, or start your own gig and be considerate to the current rates in your market.

10 bucks an hour shouldn't even be spoken of out load...lol. Really if you look at it in a national economic view point we're all in this together. Guys who take 10 dollar an hour jobs plain and simple shouldn't be in this business. I don't mean to sound like a snob really, but there has to be a consideration for our market. It effects us all. I've recently been noticing companies like expertvillage.com, and some other companies focused on real estate offering an extremely low amount for quite a bit of work. You find the subject to shoot, probably go shoot a half day, edit, author, and mail, all for how much 100 to 300 dollars?????? That is crazy!! The fact that people are biting this kind of stuff has a suttle threat to our industry. If a person is wanting to venture into the video production realm that's great, but start by getting hired by a company that charges what it's worth and pays you the hourly rate they decide, or start your own gig and be considerate to the current rates in your market.

Your right, problem is technology and affordability.
Gear is so cheap, performance computers, software....it's all so cheap! cheap! cheap!

10 bucks an hour shouldn't even be spoken of out load...lol. Really if you look at it in a national economic view point we're all in this together. Guys who take 10 dollar an hour jobs plain and simple shouldn't be in this business. I don't mean to sound like a snob really, but there has to be a consideration for our market. It effects us all. I've recently been noticing companies like expertvillage.com, and some other companies focused on real estate offering an extremely low amount for quite a bit of work. You find the subject to shoot, probably go shoot a half day, edit, author, and mail, all for how much 100 to 300 dollars?????? That is crazy!! The fact that people are biting this kind of stuff has a suttle threat to our industry. If a person is wanting to venture into the video production realm that's great, but start by getting hired by a company that charges what it's worth and pays you the hourly rate they decide, or start your own gig and be considerate to the current rates in your market.

I disagree a bit. I don't think it's that black or white. $10 from a large company in a large market looking for a large amount of work is obviously an extreme low-ball. But $10 at the local TV station in an Indiana cornfield is not.

Unless you've made your living overcharging clients for basic work because you were the only game in town then I don't think the flood of cheap equipment and sudden rise of competition at the low end is a threat. Top flight editors still get paid top flight money. There is just a new, lower end market that didn't exist 10 years ago. I mean, McDonald's pays people $6/hr to make food, but I don't think that undercuts chefs trying to get gigs at Ruth's Chris Steak House.

It used to be hard to get in the door and the tools were prohibitively expensive. It's still hard to get in the door but now the tools are so inexpensive that "everybody" has them. That hasn't killed the publishing, music, or photography industries and I don't think it will kill post either.

Yeah, if you open up your own business and purposely undercut everyone by 10% that's a bit shady. But, you'll probably end up w/all the low-balling, PITA clients (aka grinders (http://www.creativecow.net/articles/lindeboom_ron/clients_or_grinders/index.html)) that the other guys would rather not have anyway. Karma's a bitch. ;)


-A

I don't market myself as an editor in the least, but wouldn't it make sense to charge for each finished minute, as opposed to per hour? For example... $7 (or whatever) for each minute of the final cut.

Or would this get you into too much trouble when the footage doesn't want to go together well?

No, 'cause what if you were doing a 1 minute commercial, or something, but it took you 30 hours of working with After Effects to complete it?

Ok! Thought as much.

I can't get over peoples' willingness in my locale to pay $18/hr for a house painter, whose tools consist of an assortment of brushes, a couple of ladders, buckets and drop cloths, but look at me like I'm crazy for wanting to charge $20-30/hr. The technology may be cheap relative to what it was a few years back, but I'm not convinced it's all that cheap compared to the tools other craftspeople, technicians, service providers use.

Hourly rate or flat fee?