Videography pricing models and the risk each one hides

What to take away

What every model rests on

Every model prices the same pools of hours: pre-production, shoot, post and management. Clients see only the shoot day, so the model you choose decides who absorbs the other three.

Management is the client email, the scheduling, the invoicing and the chasing. It is real time and it is billable somewhere, even if it never appears on a line item. Count it before you quote under any model.

Behind the hours sits a cost per working hour. Cost per working hour is not a wage. It is the wage, plus payroll burden, plus the non-productive hours you pay for, plus the share of fixed cost each productive hour carries.

The IRS recordkeeping guidance says you may choose any recordkeeping system suited to your business that clearly shows your income and expenses. Project costing sits on top of that, so if your books cannot tell you what a project cost, no model will save you.

The post hours come from your own records, not from memory. Measure your own post-to-shoot ratio across finished projects before you trust any estimate below.

Four ways to quote, and what each one hides

Four models exist, and each hides a different risk. Read the third column first, because that is the risk you are agreeing to carry.

Most working companies use two of these. A day rate for the work they take from other producers, a fixed project fee for direct clients, and a per-deliverable add-on for versions. Mixing them is not indecision, it is matching the model to who is carrying the risk.

A line-item template works for all four models. How to word the whole document is covered in the quote template.

For a day rate, quote only the shoot-day line plus a post estimate. For per deliverable, split the post line by version. For a retainer, cap the monthly hours and roll unused hours one month.

Day rate: put the ratio in writing

A day rate suits work where someone else owns the outcome and your risk ends at wrap. Working as a shooter for another producer, on their script, with their post team, is a day-rate job.

The risk is the post estimate, because overruns land on you. State your post-to-shoot ratio in writing, so the estimate is a number you can defend rather than a hope.

Some example ratios show how wide the spread is: 1.5 to 2.5 post hours per shoot hour for a single-camera interview package, 4 to 8 for a multi-camera event, and 3 to 6 for a set of social cutdowns, because each version is a new edit. Use your own records for the number that matters.

A direct client with a deliverable list is a project-fee job instead. The risk you are carrying there is post, and a day rate does not cover it.

Fixed fee: the spec and the rounds decide the margin

A fixed fee suits defined deliverables for a direct client. It hides scope creep, which arrives as small friendly requests, so it needs a written deliverable spec and a change process before the shoot.

Two projects can shoot the same day and cost completely different amounts to finish. The variable is not how many cards you filled. It is what has to come out the other end, so a deliverable spec has to name six things before the shoot.

Every one of those six is an argument if you settle it after the shoot and a line item if you settle it before. A vertical reframe of a locked horizontal cut is real editing work. A shot composed for both is a decision made on the day, at the monitor, and it changes what the shoot costs too.

That link between the deliverable list and the shoot plan is why the price cannot be set after the service packages have been shaped. The package decides the deliverables, and the deliverables decide the edit.

A revision round is a priced, counted, defined item, or it leaks margin. A round is not a set of comments. It is a full cycle: receive notes, interpret conflicting notes, cut, re-render, re-upload, chase approval.

The rendering and uploading alone can take longer than the changes. Two rounds of small tweaks cost more than one round of large ones. So write the terms down and hold them.

The terms to write down: two included rounds; a round is one consolidated set of notes, one recut, one re-render, one upload; extra rounds at $150 to $400 each. That is a typical range for small production companies.

Fixed fees fail on revisions more often than on shoot days. The shoot has a hard end. Post does not, unless you give it one.

Per deliverable: price the shared shoot once

Per-deliverable pricing suits social cutdowns and multi-version campaigns. It hides the shared shoot cost, which gets buried in a per-item price, so quote a base fee for the shoot separately and price each version on top.

Each version is a new edit, so split the post line by version. The cutdown ratio in the examples above is the reason: three to six post hours per shoot hour is a wide range, and only your own records narrow it.

Extras then add their own post hours, which is why gear and location choices belong in the price. A second camera changes the edit, not just the shoot. It adds sync, a second angle to review and log, usually a second card to ingest and back up, and it slows the assembly before it improves it.

Price it as a post decision as well as a shoot decision. A second camera typically adds 0.5 to 1.5 post hours per shoot hour for sync, logging and switching. An extra location typically adds 1 to 3 post hours for color matching and continuity.

An extra interview subject typically adds 0.5 to 1 post hour for logging and paper edit. Those are typical ranges; measure your own. Each is a shoot-day line and a post-day consequence.

Retainer: a ceiling, a rollover and a storage term

A retainer suits ongoing content for one client. It hides the quiet months, which subsidize busy ones badly, so it needs a monthly deliverable ceiling and a rollover rule that both sides have agreed in writing.

Ongoing work also piles up footage. Footage is the only material in this trade that you keep paying for after delivery. A shoot day fills media, those files get backed up, the backup gets backed up, and then they sit there.

Three storage decisions belong in the price, whichever model you use.

An owner who has never priced this is running a storage business by accident. Put a retention period in writing, tell the client what it is, and charge for anything longer.

A sample term: 12 months of archived originals included, then $150 to $300 per year per project for continued storage, or a per-terabyte fee. That is a typical range; set yours from your own drive and cloud costs.

Music and rights sit under every model

Music is a rights problem, not a shopping problem, whichever model you quote. Either price the license as a pass-through with a name and a number, or exclude it in writing and say who is buying it.

A piece of music can involve more than one right held by more than one party, and each right has its own licensing path. The U.S. Copyright Office's Music Licensing Study reviews that framework, and the rights guide for client work applies it to shoots.

A monthly subscription may or may not cover a client's commercial use, in the territory they want, for the term they want, on the platform they want. Do not state a licensing rule as fact, in a quote or on a website.

Read the license terms of the library you use. For anything a client's campaign depends on, put a qualified attorney on it. The same applies to talent and property releases, drone operation, venues with their own rules, and clients who want the raw files.

Publishing a price under any model

A starting-from price on a website is an advertising claim. The FTC's advertising guidance for small businesses sets the standard: claims must be truthful, not misleading, and capable of being supported, and material connections behind endorsements have to be disclosed.

Applied here, a published entry price must be available on real work. Attach its conditions rather than send them in a follow-up email. Disclose testimonials from clients who received something in exchange.

The discipline also helps commercially. A price advertised with hidden conditions leads to a difficult first call, costing an hour you did not bill.

Common questions

Can I mix models on one project?

Yes. Many projects use a day rate for the shoot and a per-deliverable fee for versions. Each model's discipline still applies to its own part, so keep the spec, the rounds and the ceiling written down.

Should I publish prices on my site?

There is no universal answer, and anyone who gives you one is selling something. Publishing filters inquiries and costs you the projects that would have been negotiated upward. Not publishing means more calls, more of them unqualified. What matters either way is that whatever you publish is true and available.

A client wants the raw footage. What should the price be?

That is a scope and rights question before a price question. Decide whether you hand over camera originals, whether they are transcoded, who pays for the media or transfer, what license the client gets, and whether your own archive obligation ends there.

Then price the transfer time and the media. Put the answer in the contract template instead of deciding per project.