charge for live band photo's

I have a payment question, but its not in question to how much I am

worth, but rather how I should charge. Basically a rock n roll band

of the punk rock genre is hiring me to take photos at one of their

shows for live photos. Usually when I take pictures of bands they

are friends bands or just bands that I really like. Some of the

photos can be seen on my site at www.AdamKrausePhoto.com. When I

shoot friends bands they usually just cover costs and I am happy

with that. But this band that is hiring me, I am looking to charge

them. I was planning on charging them a flat fee which would include

gas, film, processing etc. But my question is do I guarantee X

amount of photos and then charge them more money for each additional

photo over the said X amount? I was planning on shooting 4 rolls of

24 exposures and letting them chose 8-12 good ones. Does this sound

reasonable or should I be looking at another route? Also these

photos are going to be used for the bands website if that makes any

difference.

 

Thanks for your time.

How much are they making at the gig? It's usually difficult to charge them more than that. My experience with unknown bands is that it's tough to make money, if you love the music, do it for that.

In this case I have never told about namber of photos. Maybe some minimum quantity... Take money for you job, not for the number of photos, take your skill mark (becourse THEY come to you, but not YOU looked for them). Good luck!

Yea I agree with jeff it's not a real big moneymaker! But if you enjoy the shows and the music just do it for fun and as a learning experience... I'm into punk rock, have been for quite a few years.

I have friends in some bands and I know they're just buddies and don't have a lot of money but I have fun doing it for them. I might get into the show for free and get a few free beers out of it. Some word of mouth maybe. They've used my shots for posters and flyers and they'll be on their website soon. If you care about punk rock and want to stick to those ethics just do it for fun and charge just printing costs. Like you did for the other guys.

I wouldn't base your photo biz on it though. Unless shooting for Rolling Stone is your lifelong dream or something. And you're willing to be relentless enough to chase after it. Which could be done.

But there are easier ways to make money in the photography field my friend.

Are you shooting in a studio or on location? You probably incur more expense shooting in a studio depending on what lighting and backdrops you plant to use, so take that into account.

 

I would charge a shooting fee of say $500 for 2 hours and allow them to license a small 6 or 12 image collection. If they want to use more than that, charge them a fee to licensed use. (E.g. $150 per additional image license.) Charge them more if they want fine art prints (as opposed to license only.)

 

Where are they going to use the images? If they want them for a website, you might not be able to charge as much as if they want them for a billboard or a cd cover.

 

Charge based on intended use.

 

1.) 72dpi file for Website. 6-12 digital images + license, flat rate of $500

2.) Everything in above, plus fine art print collection. flat rate of $1000

3.) 200dpi file for billboard, poster or cd cover. 6-12 digital images + license, flat rate of $1500

<i>Are you shooting in a studio or on location?</i><p>

 

Read the question again. It's answered there.<p>

 

<i>I would charge a shooting fee of say $500 for 2 hours and allow them to license a small 6 or 12 image collection. If they want to use more than that, charge them a fee to licensed use. (E.g. $150 per additional image license.) Charge them more if they want fine art prints (as opposed to license only.)

 

</i><p>

 

Do you have any experience with punk bands? It wouldn't appear so from this comment. I have yet to meet a non-major label punk band that can make $200 from a night's performance.<p>

 

<i>72dpi file for Website</i><p>

 

72dpi is meaningless. Website photos should be sized for usage by pixel count, not dpi. DPI has nothing to do with the image when presented on the screen.<p>

 

<i> $500 ... $1000 ... $1500</i><p>

 

See above regarding experience with non-major label punk bands.

The problem you run into here, is that they will never be able to pay you what you are actually worth. You will be eaten alive if you go home and spend "X" number of hours post processing the images, developing prints, etc. What I would do, is charge by the hour, and present them a number of digital files. Call it 200$ for the shoot, and include the 72ppi images. (10 or 20 of the best)

 

If they wanted prints also, they could pay extra for those at a later time.

Jeff, why did you waste an entire thread to refute my comments? What a waste! DPI or PPI (pixels) you get the idea, as opposed to a 200ppi image for printing.

 

I would definately charge more if the band wanted the images for advertising to a larger audience. The bookings that the band should do as a result of the photos should pay for the photo shoot.

 

I am a huge punk rawk fan. MxPx anybody?<div></div>

Mxpx lol, uh no. They're a poppy teenybopper band that sings about girls a lot. Mxpx is to punk... as vanilla ice is to hip hop.

Real punk rock is about positive social change. It is political in nature and meant to sound aggressive and even offensive.

Far from Mxpx. Yea of course you could charge a band like that with the rates you suggested because they are rockstars. They play stadium shows. Andrew if you're dealing with a small local punk band that plays little pubs... I'd just do it for fun or not at all. Don't expect much.

Jeff is exactly right.

 

I shoot for a couple of good, but underappreciated, local bands.

There is no way they could afford to pay me what my work is

worth--heck, they have to use their day jobs to pay for the ability to

play music. (I also shoot some young local boxers, too, none of

whom are yet making any kind of money at their profession--sort

of like me.)

 

Go, enjoy the show, get some good stuff for your portfolio, see if

they'll at least cover your expenses, and hope they hit it big one

day--your good offices, I would hope, won't be forgotten then.

<i>www.AdamKrausePhoto.com</i><p>

 

Nice stuff, Adam, especially the ones with people in them. I'd lose the flowers and stuff, it's messing with your image.<p>

 

Between Bernard and Matthew, you can get the picture (haha). Unless you're dealing with name-brand bands, there isn't much to go around.<p>

 

<center><img src="http://www.spirer.com/tubring/images/tub16.jpg"><br><I>Tub Ring at The PoundSF, Copyright 2004 Jeff Spirer</i></center></center>

Ha! Great shot, as always, Jeff.

 

Here's one of my recent ones.<div></div>

And another....this is fun. Not too profitable, but fun.<div></div>

As an ex-musician, I can attest that they're pretty much broke all the time. Even most of the successful ones. I was in a band for six years and we never had the band's picture taken. (We did the world a favor, I think!) Of course fans shot pictures at the gigs, but there's no way we could or would have justified paying much of anything to have our picture taken - and we weren't even punks. Good luck!

I'm a mostly-retired bass player and have played in a lot of different types of bands. None of them made any real money, except one probably paid for my equipment. Most of the time, after we paid our expenses we were lucky to have enough money to grab something to eat after the gig. You don't do this to get rich.

 

Realizing this, I'd have a hard time asking for much more than your actual costs. Figure out what it will cost you to do it and maybe throw a few bucks in there for your time (if the total still seems reasonable). There's no point of asking for $500 here. Do it because you enjoy it and want to build a portfolio.

Donate the time and skill, but don't lose money on it. In other words, have them cover production costs and just enjoy the experience.

They're getting images they need and you're getting a chance to add to your portfolio. If they like your stuff, it could lead to more work in the music area, which you may or may not want, depending on the level of the bands.

 

Back in the 60's (any of you remember the 60's?) a fraternity brother of mine got into shooting concerts and went on to do many major groups (Dylan, Janis Joplin, The Band, Stones, etc.) and album covers (remember albums?) and built a career as a rock photographer. He started by attending the concerts, shooting on spec, and selling to the mags. As he got known within the business, he'd be called to cover a particular concert. Later, as he made a name for himself, he'd be contacted by group managers to shoot covers or sessions. In the beginning, though, he started out paying his own way just for the chance to be there.

I remember the 60's, the rock festivals and all the chicks! Getting in free, toking a doobie, selling a few pix to magazines, picking up an album cover assignment now and again. Oh, yeah! Great memories! Then I remind myself that I should probably be printing up some of those negatives I still have of Janis Joplin, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Jefferson Airplane, including some back stage stuff and after concert parties. And I also keep reminding myself that all those cute chicks in mini skirts and hip hugger bell bottoms (both in style again!)are now 60 year old grandmothers...LOL

Yea Al that's scary, funny how time flies eh? But you should definitely print some of those negs... although it would be a little painful to look back on possibly, it would be neat to see again. Post a few here if you ever do, that'd be really cool. As a youngin I have only been to SF to look around and listened to some of the tunes but never took part in seeing any of those bands personally.

Mathew, no it's not painful. I've led an interesting life and had plenty of good times with the bad (or vice versa). You'll find me mostly over on the Leica Forum here on photo.net but Marc got me into stopping by here from time to time. Lately I've been going through all those boxes of neatly filed B&W contact sheets and negatives with the thought of putting an exhibition together, possibly a book. In addition to the rock stars there are a lot of senators and presidents and governors (but the parties were more boring...LOL). I guess it's become a lot more difficult to maintain an archive today what with digital storage requiring constant copying and changing to the newest current storsge media. At least Ti-X negs last awhile!

Yea a book or an exhibition would be great. You gotta do something with them! Let us know what you decide on!

So did you ever get the opportunity to actually meet some of them then?

Yeah, I've met some of them. Years ago my then wife worked in an office with another young woman who'd recently moved down here to Miami fom New York where she'd worked in the music industry. She got us all passes to a Jefferson Airplane concert and we went backstage after. The Airplane asked about where they could go for some good pizza but didn't really want to go to a restaurant where they'd be mobbed by fans. We ended up all sitting around our living room with take-out from Marcella's, a popular Italian eatery near my house.

 

A few years ago the Grateful Dead were in town for a Ft. Lauderdale gig. I got a call about 2 AM from my friend John telling me that one of the Dead's roadies (Sammy, who had lived here years ago) had just called. All the Dead's stuff was in a truck and already on the road to the next city but they wanted a couple of guitars to play around with. John grabbed his 12 string, picked up me and my 6 string, and off to a beach front mansion in Ft. Lauderdale. I had enough sense to grab some 20+ year old contact sheets and a magnifier, pix I'd shot of them when we were all much younger. They jammed well past sunrise and they ordered a mess of prints too! Enough stories for now. It's been an interesting life! Don't want to kill the book sales...LOL

Ask them how much they want to pay you. It may be higher than what you wanted to charge them. If it is less ask enough money to cover the expenses.