Selling Video Downloads

[Martin Archer-Shee]

Same problem here. Am currently thinking of moving from PD150 to ax 100 but concerned about selling and protecting. Just found this thread and will have to read. I too have seen dvd sales drop for the dance school i do.

Will follow.

Martin

[Chris Harding]

The bottom line here is what do people want! I bet all they really want is a video of the child doing her dance routine so they can show it off to friends and family who didn't attend. It's a well know fact that wedding DVD's ( a far more important, and one-off event) are often watched once and then stuck in the cupboard to gather dust so the bottom line has to be how to get a copy of the recital to parents and still make enough from copy sales to make it a worthwhile venture! We used to shoot recitals free for dance schools and the resulting DVD sales more than adequately covered us for our time but that doesn't seem to be the case any longer as the dance school wouldn't want to lose money on the recital upfront payment (like Roger does and supplies XXX DVD's for a one off payment) I think that the modern parent would indeed be more than happy to download a video of their child's performance but unless it's a massive recital you might simply not cover any expenses from online downloads. We found that most parents are just interested in their child not the others and the only people that wanted the entire concert was the dancing school mainly for evaluation reasons. I would be looking at the option of being able to download each sequence BUT would that result in enough sales to pay you??

As an example we did a live stream wedding ceremony on the beach yesterday and to shoot this 20 minute event we normally charge a mere $250.00 ... so far in the last 12 hours, 182 people have viewed it so if that was the lot, I could have also sold the clip download at $1.50 and covered my costs easily ... Because it's a live broadcast there is also no editing ..just shoot and pack up and the video is created automatically. Trouble is how many people would want to watch a 2 hour recital and pay for it and would it cover your costs?

[Pete Cofrancesco]

I haven't seen a loss in sales but I do see a lot of parents filming their kid in the audience with their smart phone. I always try to offer the highest quality product, at a reasonable price, delivered in a method the client wants in my case its still dvd.

[Roger Gunkel]

I can see that filming a dance recital and selling individual clips of each child could have it's advantages, particularly if you are selling direct to the parents. In my situation though, the performances are nativities and plays up to 60 minutes long, with all the children appearing multiple times, so parents want the whole thing. As I supply a one off delivery directly to the school, I don't have to worry about collecting payments, taking individual orders etc and it has always worked extremely well, particularly as the school also earn from it.

Parents have also liked the fact that the DVD in it's case is comparable to something they would buy in the shops, is a physical object that they get in return for their cash, and is a part of their child's history that they can look back on. They also frequently give them as presents to Grandparents. I can't see a download having anything like the same attraction and giving a download code as a present is just not going to hack it.

Sadly I think that it is an era that is passing with nothing to replace it for small production runs. The alternatives may not be financially viable or are too time consuming to bother with. Chris's live streaming is great for a wedding or similar, where the couple are what it's all about, but when you have 60 kids dashing on and off stage for an hour, it is just not possible to do a live stream or shoot without thouroughly learning the script to know when and where everybody is going to be. It would also require a producer to direct the cameras at the appropriate time. That would be time consuming and not practical. Charging the school a flat fee would also not work in my instance as they are usually primary schools with an already stretched budget and they would not be able to sort out download codes for every parent, collecting viewing payments etc.

Viewing habits and requirements have changed and people are less and less having a need to own a video. I can see having downloads available to purchase, but not at the same sort of cost as a DVD and with a lot more setting up required to make it work, no upfront payments and little chance of making a worthwhile profit. It would be a shame to just let it all go, so I will continue to play around with ideas and costs.

Roger

[Boyd Ostroff]

Originally Posted by Chris Harding

The bottom line here is what do people want! I bet all they really want is a video of the child doing her dance routine so they can show it off to friends and family who didn't attend.

Was discussing this issue with my daughter and son in law a couple days ago. They are just not interested in a DVD, and are in fact a little insulted that one is being offered for $50. I know this is unfair to the video company, but she feels like the dance school tuition is already quite high, not to mention the costumes they have to buy, so it just rubs her the wrong way.

She agreed that a $10 download of just her daughter's numbers would be a no-brainer, however she would expect to be able to share it on social media and e-mail or text it to friends and family for that price. That's what she does with her iPhone video of the dress rehearsal, so she is not going to accept any less for a professional video.

[Roger Gunkel]

Originally Posted by Boyd Ostroff

Was discussing this issue with my daughter and son in law a couple days ago. They are just not interested in a DVD, and are in fact a little insulted that one is being offered for $50. I know this is unfair to the video company, but she feels like the dance school tuition is already quite high, not to mention the costumes they have to buy, so it just rubs her the wrong way.

She agreed that a $10 download of just her daughter's numbers would be a no-brainer, however she would expect to be able to share it on social media and e-mail or text it to friends and family for that price. That's what she does with her iPhone video of the dress rehearsal, so she is not going to accept any less for a professional video.

You have just raised an interesting point here Boyd. WIth the sort of productions that I film for schools, one of the things that the schools are particularly keen on is that they have control over the sales, and make it quite clear that they do not want video including other children uploaded to the open internet. Of course where it is a dance recital with just one child, that is up to the discretion of the parents, but with a large production it is a different scenario.

Roger

[Martin Archer-Shee]

Pet, Roger, Boyd

Your last few remarks pretty well says it all.People want it simple, fast, and easy (and cheap).
I feel somewhat sad for Boyd's kids, and mine, all having their own kids and downloading mobile phone videos and photos. Unfortunately there is a very good chance that the hard drives will fail or the cloud storage go defunct. Then where are the memories.
I still have an 8mm film projector, a hi 8 player and my PD150 to play mini DV's on. I also have a DVD player. Yes a pile of gear over time but I can and do show my kids and the grandkids pictures/films of their parents. I also have slides and negatives. With everything on hard discs and cloud, where will the memories be n years from now.

I video and photograph for my daughter's dance ( mainly ballet ) school that she has been at for 23 years. Yes the market is contracting but still there. The DVD's give a permanent record of recitals and also her performance groups ( (Nutcracker etc). She also uses these as training information.

Enough parents still want hard copies (photos & DVD's) to make it worthwhile. However it is the kids who play them over and over, and not just their sections. I have had requests for replacements because they get worn out.

In my case orders are per individual as they may wish. Some do and some do not.... tip later. Have received orders several years later.

And yes copying is a problem, mostly with the photos. My display of photos on SmugMug are taken off for social media even though they are of lower quality and have two lines of text on them. Oh well.

Costume wise my daughter does not sell but rather rent and the parents love that. Also as far as security, a waiver is signed about photos and videos and any parent can opt out of have individual shots go online. Never a problem and only one Opt out in all those years.

So, are we any farther ahead? No, but the scene is clearer. What does the customer want and do they think about the future?

In my case I will continue to offer photos and dvd's while looking for other routes( downloads etc). Luckily I do not have to make a living at this.

Martin

[Boyd Ostroff]

Originally Posted by Martin Archer-Shee

I feel somewhat sad for Boyd's kids, and mine, all having their own kids and downloading mobile phone videos and photos. Unfortunately there is a very good chance that the hard drives will fail or the cloud storage go defunct. Then where are the memories

I take your point, but that has not been my experience. I spent a lot of time building a website of my design work last year and there are lots of images going back to 1981. I started using CAD around 1990 and by the end of 1993 I completely stopped drafting on paper.

Quite a lot of my old paper drawings are just gone, I have a vague memory of some stuff getting water-damaged at a storage place 10 years ago. But I still have all my digital files. I also have a lot of digital files like budgets, schedules, correspondence and notes going back before 1980 when I was using an Apple ][ computer.

Most of the watercolor paintings that I did for my Master of Fine Arts thesis in 1992 are gone, again the victim of water damage in my attic. Started doing photorealistic 3d modelling for my designs in 1996 and by 1998 I had put away my watercolors and brushes for good. I still have all the computer files from those years. In 1999 I switched over to digital photography, and again I still have every picture.

I recently got back several hundred DV, DVCAM and HDV tapes of performances that I filmed during the period 2001-2011. They had been moved around through various boxes in a crowded storeroom and the company clearly no longer cared about them, I have no doubt they would have been tossed out within a few years. Currently in the process of capturing these all on a 5tb drive with an identical one for backup. As I start to fill up the drives, I'll add another layer of backup, like giving a drive to a friend to keep.

My attic is full of paper stuff and negatives…. after I'm gone, someone will probably just throw it all away. It's very sad, but I have been in that situation twice myself, and even though you want to preserve things you reach a point where you just have to get it done and move on.

But I think the chances are a lot better for someone keeping a couple high capacity disk drives. And online storage is another level of backup. If you put your images in a website, Google will eventually archive everything and that is likely to survive a lot longer than you also. In the case of some photos that I no longer had, I was able to recover them through archive.org, which has copies of a website I used to operate in the 1990's.

And don't feel sad for my kids, I'm so proud of them. The world is changing, they are adapting and we are constantly learning from each other.

[Roger Gunkel]

Hi Boyd,

Like you, I have digital files of my work and my family going back many years, but then you and I are specialists and understand the storage mediums. Most ordinary members of the public don't understand different ways to store and don't have the equipment either. These days, it is so easy to take photos and video on your phone and share it with friends and family, recalling it whenever you want, but how many of those fun pictures of kids growing up etc are going to be forgotten about and lost when phones are changed or lost etc?

As Martin said I wouldn't want to trust my memories to remote cloud storage, with absolutely no control over future storage requirements, charges or longevity of the companies concerned. Having a DVD or hard copy put away under my control is what I want, but there is really nothing solid to replace the DVD that is so accessible. Many other storage solutions may be very transient and seem to be geared to remote instant access providing you have access to a decent internet connection and funds to pay for it. Who knows how that may change in the future or for that matter, who may have or get access to your supposedly stored private information.

Roger

[Boyd Ostroff]

Hey, I hear you - and agree that many people place too much blind trust in "the cloud" and don't devote enough thought to backup… until it's too late. But again, I just have to look at personal experience. About 8 years ago my daughter wanted to take all our old photo albums back to her home in New York. They arrived late at night and parked on the street. In the morning, the rear window was broken and everything was gone. The irony is that the reason they broke in was because she left an old DVD player I gave her out in plain view. It was maybe worth $25.

It's fortunate that a lot of the pictures were copied and sent to my mother back in the 1980s. I still have boxes of all her old photos, and have been gradually scanning those.

[Chris Harding]

Hi Roger

I don't really see your point about needing a script if you are recording and doing a live broadcast at the same time? If you are sending video to a CDN as well as recording it surely it's a simple enough matter to switch multiple cameras during your nativity play in real time ... The option does have the advantage of being able to pack up after the show and say "I'm done" and not have to slave over your computer editing.

However all you guys have a good point about the cloud versus a physical hard copy ...yes, people do like to have something material in their hands when they part with their money as opposed to just a web link that could quite easily vanish into thin air overnight. DVD still gives you a physical item and is probably the cheapest media option out there. I wonder if anything will come out that allows one to have physical media that's not DVD? SD cards and USB's are still pricey when compared to disks!! I think when selling video you still need to offer a selection of physical media and/or cloud

[Roger Gunkel]

Originally Posted by Chris Harding

Hi Roger

I don't really see your point about needing a script if you are recording and doing a live broadcast at the same time? If you are sending video to a CDN as well as recording it surely it's a simple enough matter to switch multiple cameras during your nativity play in real time ... The option does have the advantage of being able to pack up after the show and say "I'm done" and not have to slave over your computer editing.

However all you guys have a good point about the cloud versus a physical hard copy ...yes, people do like to have something material in their hands when they part with their money as opposed to just a web link that could quite easily vanish into thin air overnight. DVD still gives you a physical item and is probably the cheapest media option out there. I wonder if anything will come out that allows one to have physical media that's not DVD? SD cards and USB's are still pricey when compared to disks!! I think when selling video you still need to offer a selection of physical media and/or cloud

Hi Chris,

With some types of events, live camera switching works well as you say and I have filmed a number where we have done exactly that using our 4 channel video mixer. That has been really useful for music shows, dances, choirs etc where the action is fairly steady and predictable. The problem with the school shows that we film is that they contain dialogue throughout, so if the speakers are in different areas of the stage or speaking really quietly, we can end up missing a line that someone's parent is waiting to see. As we use a lot of close up shots of the kids, we would need a script to know who was speaking when, or someone to direct the shots. The alternative is to keep the angles wide so that the whole stage is covered, but that just makes the whole show boring and bland, with nobody clearly seeing who is saying what. Two of the shows we filmed just before Christmas were just short of an hour each and each had lots of narrators in different places, who had various sections each and stood up for a few seconds to say their piece. I can just imagine the parents reaction if we failed to show their little darlings doing their bit. These shows usually have 50-100 children involved and following the action is essential.

There is nothing we would like more than doing a live mix, adding titles and just running off copies, but the sort of shows we film just don't make that possible unfortunately.

Roger

[Boyd Ostroff]

Originally Posted by Chris Harding

However all you guys have a good point about the cloud versus a physical hard copy ...yes, people do like to have something material in their hands when they part with their money

See, that's what I think is changing today. My son in law just told me that Apple Music "changed his life" and he no longer feels the need to have CD's or even downloaded music. Same thing with Netflix. And when they want to watch a movie at home, they rent it on their Apple TV.

I agree that today many people want to still "own" their media - I am one of them in fact. But 10 years from now, I don't know that will be the case anymore. And then we will see if "the cloud" is really everything people hope it will be.

[Chris Harding]

Hi Roger

Our audio with a live mix never comes from any cameras ..we have a dedicated 12 channel mixer which feeds audio into the vision mixer's audio mixer and cameras simply supply visual content so regardless of where people are our audio is still consistent. With shows that are higher tech we get an audio feed for the mixing desk at the theatre but I'm assuming this is a school play and none of the kids are actually "wired for sound"?? We did a simple 75th birthday in December and what I did is close miced the one man band speaker and that was my sole audio feed. I'm therefore assuming that this is a simple stage and all the kids just talk loudly and you rely on using an on-camera mic that's nearest the child who is talking for audio .. or am I wrong??

Hi Boyd

I love doing cloud based stuff! We do live broadcast weddings now and it streams to the CDN so families overseas can watch it live and our provider also creates an online copy of the stream at the same time. It's really neat to film, pack up and go home!! No editing, no media to create and no post work at all except we download a USB copy for the bride the next day.

[Roger Gunkel]

Hi Chris,

We film from the back of the hall from a platform to get us above the audience and the audio is recorded into a seperate recorder from a pair of Boundary Mics on the stage or the wall at the back to get a reasonable overall coverage of sound. at the editing stage the audio and video streams are synched and closeups from the appropriate one of 4 cameras cameras, cut to the main track. However reading my previous post I think I was not clear that it was the video of the speakers that is easy to miss, not the audio which is usually fine. Sorry for the confusion.

Hi Boyd,

I totally agree with you that many people just do not need to own a dvd or CD any moreand I am one of them with music from Spotify when I want just about anything and film streaming if I fancy a movie. So what is the point of buying a DVD if I can download films at a much lower cost. Also a film or a song is fairly transient, so I probably won't want to listen or watch again for some time if at all.

Therein lies the problem though, I could fairly easily make a school play available for streaming, but it woukd have to be at a considerably lower price than I would get for a dvd as I don't think parents would be prepared to pay the same amount for a streaming view. Given the limited numbers of parents for each show, the reduced return would not make the whole thing economically sustainable. As far as I can see, the value of a hard copy of a school production comes in the future as a memory for the families of their child in younger days. I do deliver weddings on USB so I will do some research and see if there is a market for a nicely presented schools USB at a price that reflects the increased cost over DVD delivery.

Coming back to Chris's live streaming, I think it would be great for school productions if it didn't mean reducing the quality that we achieve at the moment and was financially viable. Without financial support from the schools, which is unlikely, I can't see it happening.

Roger