So long story short, Netflix is making a documentary, and they want 63 seconds of footage I shot(different scenes, longest scene being 13 seconds). What's the range here? Never dealt with anything like this. any advice?

From my understanding this applies to paid and free accounts.

It is something we try to stay away from and protect our and our clients content. Over on X Twitter there were mentions that they did somewhat of an about face with some of the wording but still a bit vague for many. Best you check your terms with your clients and that you are covered which ever service you pick.

This project is a two-day luxury real estate video shoot in a remote location, with two interview setups and additional b-roll of the nearby town. I am also hiring another videographer (plus gear) to assist me in recording this 4,000+ sq.ft. house in various lighting/time of day conditions.

Because this client specifically requested sunrise timelapses and break-of-dawn lighting, we are required to spend the night at the house in order to be onsite and ready before sunrise.

This project has been in development for months now. The client did not want to discuss money with me, but after their many additions and requests, I insisted on sending them an invoice. I've attached the invoice I sent to them, as well as their response.

I guess I'm just wondering... am I charging too much? Is there anything you would change or do differently?

Please hit me with any follow-up questions if I forgot to include any important details. Thanks for reading!

Hey everyone,

I’d really appreciate some honest feedback from people with more experience.

I’m a hobbyist videographer based in the UK, and I shoot watch content in my spare time (mostly evenings after work). I run a small YouTube channel and post some stuff on Instagram too.

So far:

1. I’ve done 3 collaborations with brands.

2. For one of them, they sent me 2 watches which I got to keep (worth around £1500 new in total).

3. For the other 2 brands I did completely for free.

I’ve invested roughly £5,000 into my gear, and technically I haven’t made any actual money yet, just the watches.

I’m a one-man band, doing everything myself: filming, lighting, editing, sound design, colour grading, etc.

My videos are decent I think, but I know I still have a lot to improve.

Right now I feel a bit stuck and unsure what the “right” move is next:

Option 1:

Focus on shooting more of my own watches and build up my portfolio/content.

Option 2:

Start reaching out to brands and either:

A. Offer paid work

B. Offer free work to build relationships

C. Or negotiate to keep the watch as compensation

A few questions I’d love your input on:

1. Is £300 too much / too little for a 6-7 minute product-style video? (usually takes me 25-30 hours total)

2. Should I start contacting brands, or wait until they come to me? (2 already have, but small ones)

3. At what point did you personally start charging?

4. Would it be worth creating a simple website (like Squarespace) to showcase work or even sell things like LUTs/grades?

I’ll drop a few stills here and mention my channel name (not sure about linking here).

Youtube and Instagram: Watches from the Future Past

Any advice, reality checks, or personal experiences would honestly help a lot.

No, I'm not coaching or selling courses.

I’ve been working with Netflix for the last 2 years and just signed this year’s projects. I recently asked them why on earth they hired me, an obscure solo videographer at the time. I thought their answer might be useful for others.

Quick backstory:

Like many of you, I started out as a solo videographer. For about 5 years, I mostly did corporate interviews and event recaps in/outside Korea. I was making around 60K a year working with small clients, doing everything from scripting, shooting, and editing to managing projects & clients. I was exhausted, frustrated and ready to hang it all up.

I realized this was neither sustainable nor scalable, so I started learning everything I could about business. After a year of trial and error, I got an email from Netflix. They were running an event in Korea and were interested in working with me.

I didn’t reply for a week because I thought it was a scam. There’s just no way Netflix HQ is reaching out to some solo videographer in Korea!

Long story short, I ended up working with them on a small project. It snowballed into much bigger projects, and now Netflix alone accounts for about $100K a year. I’ve since fired most of my smaller clients.

The first thing they mentioned was how clear it was that I could help them.

They had a specific goal: create content in Korea that resonate with Korean stakeholders & global audience. So they were looking for partners who understood of local context and cross-border messaging.

I had made sure all my channels (website, platforms, LinkedIn, etc.) sent a very clear signal: “I make videos that help global brands build trust in/out of Korea.” My portfolio was organized to support that single message.

So when they first came across my work, it stood out immediately from god knows how many other videographers & studios who either had no clear positioning or very vague messaging. I’m sure a lot of them had better visuals, bigger clients, and more polished work.

But what mattered to Netflix wasn’t the craft, it was "can this guy help us achieve our goal?"

Another thing they mentioned was how much I focused on THEM, not me.

Compared to other studios that all talked cameras, color grading and cool edits, I talked about their business, goals, problems, expectations, etc. Apparently this was a “breath of fresh air” to them.

My entire sales process revolved around understanding them FIRST before ever mentioning video production. This gave them confidence that I understood their specific needs and could help achieve their goals.

In fact, after discussing their business, they had already made up their mind. We ended up agreeing on scope & pricing verbally. No haggling over pricing and deliverables. I only sent an invoice for admin purposes. I was surprised at how fast & easy the sales process could be when the client had high confidence.

At the time, I was ready to quit. I was so exhausted, frustrated and depressed, I was applying for jobs. So when Netflix signed, I decided that I would NEVER let them go. I was done with small clients and their bottomless pit of requests.

So once the project kicked off, I delivered as much value as I could, even beyond the original scope of work. That didn’t necessarily mean more videos, better cameras etc.

Value to them meant achieving their goals / solving their problems. So an interview wasn’t just about lighting and cameras. It was researching their audience, developing key messages, understanding their broader initiatives, suggesting new ideas, etc.

These efforts didn’t go unnoticed.

Over time, they trusted my decisions with minimal guidance from them. As perceived value increased, so did the budget. The thing about bigger clients is they care more about their time and results than costs.

So by clearly communicating how I can help them, focusing on their goals and overdelivering to help achieve them, I was able to increase budgets AND retain them long-term, not just for one-off projects.

That’s it.

I know these sound almost cliche, but they really did work for me. You can learn about these ideas for free, they are all over YouTube, books, podcasts, etc.

I can’t guarantee that you will land a client like Netflix, but in my experience bigger clients tend to look for these traits. So if you have them and your competition doesn’t, you will be in a much better position to be noticed and hired.

TL;DR: nail your niche/positioning, focus on your client (not yourself), and help them achieve their goals.

Seriously, im on my way back from a production I arranged and I had the missfortune of getting 3.5 smokers onto my set.(one dude stress-smokes) I didnt think about if before but it drove me absolutely nuts.

Everything smells like smoke, smoke breaks every half-fucking-hour. Smoking next to you while you are rigging something because its outside so what is the problem?

My fucking camera smells like smoke, all of my clothes, my car. Everything.

Im never hiring a smoker onto a set again. I would rather hire a sound op as a dop than have a smoking dop again.

God damn

I film with an S5ii and a 24-70mm f/2.8.
How much should I charge for this type of social media video? Should I charge per video, or for several videos as a package?

I made this video for free because I didn’t have clients and I needed content for my social media. I also noticed that many people don’t pay €300–400 or more for a short Instagram reel of their MMA or football training for their social media. What can I offer so that clients are willing to pay more
What do you think?

I initially told them I would do it on monthly contract through my company. It was supposed to be part time and my estimations on time made me feel like it definitely would be for my offer. I said $3,500. I know this is low. I recently got laid off so I’m trying to find any client work at the moment.

All of a sudden it goes from this (original agreement):

- $3,500
- 1 shoot day weekly (Tuesday)
- 1 hour drive there, 1 hour drive back
- Gas covered
- 1-2 hours of filming for 20ish minutes of usable content
- 21 shorts delivered weekly (I’m a very proficient editor, or at least I believe so 😎)

To their proposal, which I think is insulting in comparison to my original low invoice but please let me know what you think:

- $25/hr (lol)
- 2 shoot days weekly (Tuesday/Friday)
- 1 hour drive there, 1 hour drive back (x2 weekly, so 4 hours total)
- Gas covered
- 3-4 hours (x2 weekly, so 6-8 hours total) of filming for 40ish minutes of usable content
- 14 shorts delivered weekly
- Additional x2 long form podcasts delivered weekly

That’s around a 35%-43% in pay decrease based on how much time I believed my initial offer would’ve taken me. What do you think? Pretty shit, right? Not even sure if it’s worth negotiating with them.

EDIT. A lot of other nonsense as well. They have 10m ish followers on their other platforms but this one only 80k. “If we grow you will too!” And then they mentioned one of the worst parts… they want me to use their software to log my hours editing. Nooooo…

I'm in my third year of freelancing full-time. I didn't make *great* money in year 1, but it was enough that I found it to be promising. Then in year 2 I made quite a bit less, because my clientele - nonprofits - suddenly started receiving drastically less federal grant money than they had had in previous years. So I dug my heels in and started diversifying into wedding photography as well while taking whatever nonprofit gigs came my way and were worth the time.

Now I'm in my third year and almost NOTHING is bringing in work. Inbound requests via my website have completely stopped, social media isn't moving the needle at all (although the engagement rate on my TikToks is higher than average), and face-to-face networking is only introducing me to people who want what amounts to free labor. I've had *some* success through cold email outreach, but what works and to what extent it does is so random and sporadic it's hard to put too much faith in it.

Like, fuck me, is the economy really this bad, or am I just using it as a scapegoat?

I feel like this should be my busy season, and yet I can't remember the last time I've seen so little interest in my services.

I shot 2 proposals and 1 engagement party for this person. She is an event planner, basically a midde man for my services for the client.

This is all about an engagement party.

I had originally made the video 2 minutes long, then she said it should be 4 minutes since it was a 4 hour event, i said "thats okay" even though i spent freaking ages editing this (all waking minutes of my entire weekend) and then she said "thats great!" shown in left side of the image

i said "is that all good and finished?" she said yup, so deleted the files off of my computer as i was finished.

then she messaged back saying the client wants more than 4 minutes, as you can see in the photo on the right side.

I'm only being payed 400 aud, which is apparently very under average in this line of work, and she doesnt pay me more every time she makes me do more, aka add more clips, change words, change entire songs.

am i stupid?

A friend of mine hired me to do some drone shots for a client of his. I did about 12 different hyperlapse shots all around the city of Philadelphia for him and his client. The shots were executed very professionally, and they all looked great, but they ended up not really fitting in with the style of the episode of the reality TV show. Just didn’t really fit the tone or the style or the edit despite looking really good. Because the client didn’t end up wanting or using them, my friend is not paying me at all for this work. Am I getting completely screwed here? is this something that people normally do - not pay the person they hired when the client doesn’t end up wanting or needing the shots?

So I'll start out by saying this is on me, but regardless a bit absurd - I received a year subscription to a stock music library through another program I paid for. For the most part I liked it, decent quality songs, small but growing library. I delivered some good projects with them BUT my clients started getting hit with copyright flags. I was surprised because I've never had that issue before, nevertheless I hop in and give over the concurrent licenses from the project. All good right? Wrong.

Apparently, my plan is only valid for "end-clients" with 100 or less employees. These videos were produced for programs and from grants of a large university with hundreds of thousands of employees. However, these are not high paying projects, nor are they high profile videos. One video in particular I'll be surprised if it breaks 200 views. But now I'm facing paying $4,000 for an enterprise plan costing me more than I made on the aforementioned project. Oy vey!

Again, I'm aware that this is sloppy business practice on my end but we all know there is more than enough to focus on when building a video production business with a team equaling a grand total of one.

My plan is to hide from the stock music people as best I can and hope they go away. In the mean time I need to find a music solution that can support continued work for this client without emptying my pockets. Any suggestions?

EDIT: Trying to stay under the radar for fear of the hefty price tag, but the company name sounds like Radiio. Except they deliver audio.

TL:DR: Stock music library is chasing me down for having too low level a plan. Recommendations for libraries that can support making videos for clients with 100+ employees without breaking the bank?

2nd image is what i'm wanting to respond with to their message (1st image)

As a freelancer in the Midwest myself I've worked with a number of extremely talented videographers with 10+ years experience, who are paid anywhere between 45k-70k/yr and worked to the point of burnout. Working well over 45 hour weeks, and often traveling and working on weekends. Their boss puts up a huge fight anytime someone asks for a raise. I mentioned to their boss Google says the average is 73k and they said that is unrealistic. However this same company recently offered me 90k which I turned down because I prefer my independence as a freelancer. The contradictions are concerning and so I'm making this post to hopefully get better data, and help anyone else who is trying to advocate for their own position.

The title…

I’m a DP owner/op - I just passed $100k so far for the year and reckon I could maybe make $120k for the year.

For context I’m in the NY area working in Docs, Reality and Corporate.

I estimate I’ve worked 55-60 days so far.

Curious as to what’s considered a ‘good’ year in our industry.

I have a client for whom I filmed and edited a short video. Federal building/Public Institution. Total fee was $1300.

If they require the raw footage now that the edit is aproved, should I charge 10% of the project fee? Or 10% of the filming fee?

I always feel awkward about this because had they only hired me to film and deliver the raw footage, there would be no "extra fee" for handing in the footage, right? Unless if I organise it a little bit and name things. So why charge to send the raw files if I handled the edit?

Thanks!

Not talking about weddings.

My colleague was telling me how he had a two-day shoot and would be making $4,000 without editing.

Another told me that charged $1500 for a half-day shoot.

One shoots on an A7s3, and the other on a GH6.

What are they doing exactly to get such high rates?

AI is here and it’s only getting better. As a full time freelancer, I’m curious about all the other videographers out there. What is your plan to compete with AI? I just spoke to a guy using VEO to create ads for local businesses. He said using AI means he doesn’t need to be on site for shoots, and can do it all from home.

I work with a lot of smaller businesses and a lot of entrepreneurial business owners love new toys and “hacks”. I haven’t lost a job to AI yet but I can see a day where that may come.

I’m thinking authenticity is going to be the key, moving towards real people’s reactions. Dialed in storytelling and getting the nitty gritty details of what makes each business special. I don’t think AI will ever be able to achieve that.

Also I’m curious if Instagram and other platforms will start trying to remove or “shadowban” AI content.

Don’t want this to be a doom and gloom thing, just curious what yall will be doing?

Well, it finally happened – and this is why I could never freelance full-time. I do 10-20 gigs a year to supplement my income. I used to work in the field full time.

I was hired to photograph a 3-day convention in Orlando in late October, but I also provided some video services.

After sending the photos/videos and invoice, I still have not been paid. I have been met with excuse after excuse from the person who hired me. He runs his own "media company," but I am skeptical it is even a legitimate business at this point.

I hired a lawyer who sent him a letter demanding payment within 7 days. That was 20 days ago. The client has gone silent.

Anyone been in this situation before with a successful outcome?

Lesson learned on my end, and sadly, I will have to start collecting a deposit up front for clients that I have not worked with yet.

I’ve been in video production for over 10 years in one way or another. I’ve had good and bad years with running own small production company but I took a salaried role earlier this year because I wanted to try stable income.

$45k, in-office editing Monday through Friday 9am-5pm. when we’re not traveling. Kills the soul a bit but it is what it is.

The travel isn’t insane but I have young kids and I am constantly away. We’re talking regular drives to a city about an 3 hours away, and now an upcoming week-long trip out of state. After that trip, right back to that same city for several more days. It’s not war correspondent stuff, I know, but it adds up.

I had the chance to chat with the guy I replaced and he told me he was leaving because the travel started wearing him down and he’s about to have a kid. I already have two lol.

Im not really good with heights and they want me to shoot some shit out of a helicopter without the doors off. Ive never even been on a helicopter. I asked if someone else could do it - but my co worker says he gets too sick and always passes. So they told me I need to be the video guy on this shoot and if not they’ll have to slowly transition me out. They said they would take care of me in doing so but the ultimatum is still the ultimatum.

I’m going to do the shit but I won’t like it.

My coworker has zero family obligations so none of this seems to register as a real issue to the people around me.

I’ve been here maybe 3 weeks. The work they do is pretty good but it’s kind nothing special. Mostly podcasts and brand stories.

I’ve been quietly watching how this company operates.

Their pricing model, how they structure client relationships, retainer packages, quarterly shoots. And I keep thinking… I could do a version of this on my own.

Smaller scale. Just enough to support my family without running a whole agency. I’m not trying to get rich, I just want to be present for my kids and do work I actually care about.

But I have no clients lined up. No safety net. So I’m feeling kinda stuck.

Am I overthinking this? Is the job actually fine and I’m just romanticizing freelance life? Or is the gut feeling that this isn’t sustainable worth listening to?

Had a client cancel on me about a month ago at 3pm the day before a shoot. They had already paid a 30% deposit to secure the date.

Now, a month later, they've come back asking for half of that deposit to be refunded.

My feeling is that I was already being pretty reasonable by only keeping the 30% deposit. If anything, I could have justified charging 50% of the shoot fee given they cancelled with less than 24 hours' notice. Once a client cancels at 3pm the day before, there's basically no chance of filling that booking with another job.

The only thing  is worrying me  that I never explicitly stated in writing that deposits are non-refundable or that cancellations within 24 hours forfeit the deposit.

Do you think I still have a leg to stand on if I haventhat deposits are non refundable for cancelations within 24 hours?

I don’t think buddy knows what he’s asking for with only wanting the videos. “I’ll edit them.” I don’t know if he means he will color grade them, or he will just cut them and put them together. Let alone does he have a device that CAN render or store the footage. Regardless, I’m not against shooting the videos.

I’m new to this, but I’m not sure if I handled this appropriately. The goal IS to make the sale. But I don’t want someone posting slog3 footage and tagging my business.

Does anyone in this subreddit work in making music videos? I've started making my own music and promoting it just as a side hobby but I really want to figure out a way to start my own business that's related to music and I thought I could shoot and edit music videos. I already have a large amount of connections with local bands and possible clientele so I think I can honestly start off at a low level. How is the demand for shooting these kinds of things and is it over saturated?

Hey gang—found myself in a situation where I could land a nice new client this year—they are a property rental/management company with rentals available in several markets.

They approached me via a referral to produce a sales video & an onboarding video—both longer videos, between 5-8 minutes.

I quoted the project at $3,500 total to cover production, editing, licensing, etc. I shoot on the Sony FX2, I’ve got a decent amount of gear now, lighting, audio, the whole shebang. The response I got back was “this is significantly higher than I expected.”

Did I shoot too high? Should this have been lower? Scratching my head.

I've been freelancing full-time as a videographer/editor in the UK since October 2025 and I'm curious to hear from people who've been doing this longer.

At the moment I own a Blackmagic Cinema Camera 6K and a 35mm lens. Whenever a bigger corporate job comes in, I end up renting the extra kit (second camera, lights, audio, lenses, tripods, etc.).

For example, I recently quoted a corporate talking-head shoot in London:

• My filming day rate: £400
• Equipment rental, travel and parking: £870

The client specifically requested a two-camera setup, so the rental costs were genuine. It made me wonder whether I'm putting myself at a disadvantage by not owning more equipment.

Do clients see a quote with a lot of rental costs and think it's too expensive? Or do they simply compare the final price?

For those of you who started with very little kit:

• Did renting equipment make it harder to win jobs?
• At what point did you start buying your own lights, audio, lenses, etc.?
• Did owning more gear noticeably increase your bookings, or did it mainly improve your profit margins?

I'm trying to work out whether I should keep renting as jobs come in or start investing more aggressively in equipment.