Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Ask And Ye Shall Receive



Just the other day, a colleague of mine called to ask for some advice. He'd photographed a group portrait, and one of the people in the group portrait needed a headshot, and wanted their headshot isolated out from the others in that group photo, for their own use.

Separate use for separate company, distinct from the company that hired my colleague for the group photo. How did we talk through the pricing?

(Continued after the Jump)

First, my colleague was using a large chip camera - a EOS 1Ds Mark III, so cropping in was no problem. Second, he wasn't obstructed by other people in the picture, and could easily be isolated. So, what to charge?

Well, I first asked him what he'd charge for the portrait for PR purposes, and the number that came up was about $800, all in. Ok, so the argument goes - when you're shooting something, there's a chance that the final photo won't be exactly like you want. With an existing image (i.e. stock), you know exactly what you're getting, guaranteed, so the price for that stock shot should reasonably be concluded to be higher because there is no risk, and you are getting exactly what you want. So, we determined that relative to $800, a figure of $975 is fair, not to mention the fact that the subject doesn't have to be inconvenienced by the timing and efforts involved on their part for the portrait. Further, I was of the opinion that a figure over $1,000, relatively speaking, would be a barrier this client would not get past.

So, did the client agree, when we cited the above information as a justification for our pricing?

Yup. $975 - check is in the mail.

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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yikes, thanks for the reminder to bill it!

P.S. They want additional four years usage. They didn't "buy" the photo of course.

Thanks, human usage calculator very handy to have you around.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for posting this, it's a nice, simple explanation for a recurring real-world situation.

Anonymous said...

John, what constitutes PR use?

We do a lot of business headshots (200+ per year) for attorneys, doctors, etc.

The studio for which I work has never concerned itself with rights, usage or licensing. So, looking forward, I would like a real world model to follow.

It would be nice to shoot 25 headshots per year and charge what your friend charged since our flat rate is no where close to that figure.

So, what is your definition of PR? Thanks!

John Harrington said...

John --

Here's the language I use for that:

"To ensure clarity
regarding the use of the photographs provided, we adhere to the cross-industry standard Picture Licensing Universal
System – PLUS, to avoid any confusion. Use of images provided is for: 1) Publicity Use (PLUS ID#:16430000 0100), 2)
Public Relations Use (PLUS ID#:17840000 0100, 3) Internal Company Use (PLUS PACK: PRCO), 4) Web and Electronic
Editorial (PLUS PACK: PEWE) for a period of one year. Images may be used for Memento/Personai Use (PLUS PACK:
PERS) for an unlimited period of time. To learn more about PLUS, visit http://www.UsePlus.org."

-- John

Unknown said...

John,

I think I would have priced it purely on the usage from PLUS, then used DRR to find the price. If I couldn't find the price there, I would have tried basing it on the company's annual sales (Leslie Burns created a matrix for this). If I couldn't find that, then I would try to determine the circulation and size, then use fotoQuote to find the price. I think I would also charge for the Photoshop work to extract and retouch the individual portrait.

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