How much to charge for 12 5minutes videos

[Santos Ramos]

Hello,

I was contacted to shoot and edit 12 5minutes videos.
The videos are about gardening.

I will shoot 3 videos per day ( 12 hour day ) for 4 days.

I was thinking this could cost $15000

Each video can take me about 6 to 8 hours of edits ( 15 days of editing plus 3 of reedits )

I usually takes me an hour to edit a 1:30 news pice. But 5 minute videos are really long.

Thanks for the help.

[Mike Watson]

Using your math, that's $833/day. Depending on what kind/how much gear you have and what quality of work you're putting out, you're not out of the ballpark.

To further crunch your numbers, 6-8 hours of editing per video over 12 videos would be 84 hours, or 10.5 days of editing - which to me sounds much more reasonable than 15 days. Also drops your overall cost to $11,250, based on your $833/day rate.

[Ken Diewert]

Charging $1,000 per video sounds reasonable. Especially if you are shooting/editing several - so there will be some economies of scale - like using the same intro and outro. It also depends on how busy you are. Do you want the work or do you need the work. I would imagine that if you are quoting on this then someone else is also quoting on it. Good luck!

[Santos Ramos]

Thanks for the help!

The price I had was = $1250 per video.

All the videos intros and autros are different and I may be traveling to multiple locations.

So, 12K would be a fair price to shoot and edit 12 5 minute videos?

They first offered me $300 per video!

[Don Bloom]

At $300 per video they have no idea what it really takes so the first thing I would ask them is HOW they came to that number.
Then you're going to have to educate them as to why your price of 1250 each is fair and what it includes. In other words you need to explain to them wh yyou are charging what you are charging.

[Tim Polster]

Santos, you have fair prices assuming for good work. It seems this scenario is being played over and over these days:

We have this huge project. Here is my quote. We can only pay this much... Project dies on the vine.

The commodity aspect of video is creeping in and this gap of what we charge and what is expected is widening. So try to stick to your pricing because it is tough when the "client" want to pay Craigslist prices.

[Jeff Pulera]

I think it's hard for strangers on the internet to tell you what the job is worth without us having ALL the details. For all I know, each five minute video can be shot in one continuous take and slap on a few titles and be done. Is this all scripted out? Lots of graphics/animations?

A lot depends on the talent. I've worked with business owners that are just naturals - slap a wireless mic on them, roll tape and they just nail the content with no pauses, stutters, anything, just perfect in one take demonstrating whatever it is that they do. The last one was a hunting dog trainer - the guy was absolutely amazing. A one-take wonder! No way to charge him $10-15k for the several short videos - there was barely any editing at all, unless you count fade to/from black at the ends!

We just know so little. Are you using broadcast equipment - cameras, lighting, sound? Extra crew? Or is it you with a prosumer camera and a lapel mic? What is the basis for figuring 12 hours to shoot 15 minutes of content? You did say 3 vids per day at 12 hours.

We'd all love to get that $15k contract, and they are out there, but one needs to be realistic as well and not price yourself out of a job. You didn't say if these videos are for the web, DVD, or broadcast on the Better Homes and Gardens channel. So many variables that are unknown.

If your client is just someone that has ideas of marketing their DVDs on eBay, I doubt they will spend that kind of money. But we just don't know though. If I had all the info on the project, I might say go for it.

Thanks

Jeff