What should I charge for life-music DVD production? at DVinfo.net

Stefan Immler · June 25th, 2009, 02:43 PM

Hi all --

I have recently been hired by the owner of a music venue to shoot the live performance of a musician. So I spent three nights in a row capturing the performance with 3 camcorders plus sound.

The owner of the venue has already reimbursed me for my expenses (camcorder rentals, tapes, 2x1TB hard drive for storage, $1.5k total) and asked me to tell him how much I am charging for the final product: one 90-min DVD with the live performance of a musician. This included shooting the event on three consecutive nights (5 hours each), mixing and mastering the sound, editing the movie and delivering one master-DVD for duplication.

He also asked me how the three of us -- artist, owner of the venue, me -- want to split up to the profit of the DVDs.

I thought that I charge him $3k for the delivery of the final product (DVD) and ask for 30% of the DVD sales. Am I too cheap or does that sound reasonable? This is my first commercial project and we will make a series of live-DVDs in the future, so I thought I shouldn't charge too much for our first joint project.

Any thoughts/comments are very welcome!

Jeff Emery · June 25th, 2009, 05:12 PM

Charge $7500 for the production work and take 5% of the gross sales.

June 25th, 2009, 02:43 PM	#1
Stefan Immler Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Washington DC Posts: 162	What should I charge for life-music DVD production? Hi all -- I have recently been hired by the owner of a music venue to shoot the live performance of a musician. So I spent three nights in a row capturing the performance with 3 camcorders plus sound. The owner of the venue has already reimbursed me for my expenses (camcorder rentals, tapes, 2x1TB hard drive for storage, $1.5k total) and asked me to tell him how much I am charging for the final product: one 90-min DVD with the live performance of a musician. This included shooting the event on three consecutive nights (5 hours each), mixing and mastering the sound, editing the movie and delivering one master-DVD for duplication. He also asked me how the three of us -- artist, owner of the venue, me -- want to split up to the profit of the DVDs. I thought that I charge him $3k for the delivery of the final product (DVD) and ask for 30% of the DVD sales. Am I too cheap or does that sound reasonable? This is my first commercial project and we will make a series of live-DVDs in the future, so I thought I shouldn't charge too much for our first joint project. Any thoughts/comments are very welcome!

June 25th, 2009, 05:12 PM	#2
Jeff Emery Major Player Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Ohio USA Posts: 222	Charge $7500 for the production work and take 5% of the gross sales.