Pricing photos to be used in slide show presentation?
Discussion
6 replies
Posted by Greg Ferens on August 17, 2007 at 11:42 AM
Hi!
A potential client is requesting a price to use images for a slide show presentation for public education purposes. Do I charge per image and if so how much is reasonable?
I'm concerned about copyright issues, however, and wonder if rather than charging for images, if I shouldn't instead charge to produce the presentation and keep the images from being lifted from the CD. If this is best what is a fair fee to produce a 15 min. slide show or a half hour slide show?
Regarding the "fair fee" question, you might consider proposing two approaches to your potential client. One way is to charge by the hour for creating the slide show. In this way, you'll receive compensation for your work, and the client won't be inclined to make change after change after change. The second approach is to suggest a flat fee for creating the slide show, and limit the number of change orders or the time invested int he change orders that the client could create without then having to pay an hourly rate for additional changes.
You might use this tool as a way to help you consider a fair license fee; but, I don't see the exact usage that you seek: http://photographersindex.com/stockprice.htm
I ran a quote in a similar type program - multimedia/external use/six months of usage - on a stock site and got a result of $385. You might look at stock photography sites and see if they have a license fee calculator.
And, good luck in avoiding the piracy issue, because I don't know how you'd do it (but, would love to know!)...
Tim!
Posted by Walter Rowe on August 17, 2007 at 3:52 PM
Be careful when talking prices. We can talk in historical terms and discuss a method and tools for arriving at a price. We can't collaborate on specific prices. That treads on price fixing, and Jim has serious concerns about NPN appearing to advocate that.
Posted by Jim Erhardt on August 17, 2007 at 5:15 PM
What Walter said! For some guidelines on pricing there is useful info here at the bottom of the page;
Posted by Fred Stearns on August 18, 2007 at 12:50 PM
There appears to have been a relaxing of the regulations on what constitutes price fixing,especially where sellers are concerned. There was a posting by the NANPA webmaster, John Lock, on their forum. It is the first posting under the Photography Business division. Apparently there was a court ruling that reasonable discussions about pricing do not necessarily constitute a restraint of trade. Fixing prices is still considered taboo. NANPA has relaxed their restrictions about discussions of pricing. This posting was dated July 10, 2007. There was a link to an article in the New York Times date June 29, 2007, http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/printer_062907L.shtml.
This is still a touchy topic and Jim will call the shots. Actually, it sounds like this ruling would make it legal for us to talk about pricing, but not to set prices. However, it would require that Jim, or a volunteer, police all the NPN forums diligently to prevent any possible law suites.
If you are concerned about copyright issues you have several choices. First register your image with the copyright office to give yourself maximum legal protection. I highly recomend doing this any way before you ever send any image out for commercial consideration. Second if your concern is the image being misused, don't deal with this client. It's not worth the headache. Avoid this type of client.
As for pricing, are you talking about a slide show on cd to be sold retail or a slide show that will be presented? The standard for presentations is to price this type of usage per image based on how many times it will be shown. In other words x$ for one image in a show presented 2-5 times. You can offer a discount for volume sales.
Freds post above is correct. In another forum for Business I am in we discuss pricing and clients regularly, in general terms. It is my understanding you can also discuss actiual dollar amounts and we do, but you can not organize and say, OK, let's all charge this for this.
So with this in mind, and to help you get started in pricing your usage, I will share that PhotQuote, my stock pricing software suggests a range of $206 to $412 with an average of $275 for 1 to 5 photos presented one time. Base your pricing on image unigueness amongst other things. This means, how difficult is it for your client to get a similar image elsewhere. If only you have an image like this it is unique and you can charge more for it.
Look into PhotoQuote or one of the other great resources out there for stock pricing. Scroll down 2 posts in this this forum to, "Price for poster art???" where I posted a bunch of pricing resources. Some are free online sources.
Posted by Greg Ferens on August 19, 2007 at 1:10 PM
Thank you all for sharing what you have learned. The tips and links to stock pricing software is invaluable along with your personal comments! I think we would be doing the photography industry a great injustice if we were misinformed and some were giving their work away for next to nothing. Being able to collaborate as opposed to price fix is necessary for our trade to survive, which is why I value this site so much.
Discussion
6 repliesA potential client is requesting a price to use images for a slide show presentation for public education purposes. Do I charge per image and if so how much is reasonable?
I'm concerned about copyright issues, however, and wonder if rather than charging for images, if I shouldn't instead charge to produce the presentation and keep the images from being lifted from the CD. If this is best what is a fair fee to produce a 15 min. slide show or a half hour slide show?
Anybody familiar with this sort of situation?
Regarding the "fair fee" question, you might consider proposing two approaches to your potential client. One way is to charge by the hour for creating the slide show. In this way, you'll receive compensation for your work, and the client won't be inclined to make change after change after change. The second approach is to suggest a flat fee for creating the slide show, and limit the number of change orders or the time invested int he change orders that the client could create without then having to pay an hourly rate for additional changes.
You might use this tool as a way to help you consider a fair license fee; but, I don't see the exact usage that you seek: http://photographersindex.com/stockprice.htm
I ran a quote in a similar type program - multimedia/external use/six months of usage - on a stock site and got a result of $385. You might look at stock photography sites and see if they have a license fee calculator.
And, good luck in avoiding the piracy issue, because I don't know how you'd do it (but, would love to know!)...
Tim!
http://www.photoportfolios.net/photomarketing.html
This is still a touchy topic and Jim will call the shots. Actually, it sounds like this ruling would make it legal for us to talk about pricing, but not to set prices. However, it would require that Jim, or a volunteer, police all the NPN forums diligently to prevent any possible law suites.
As for pricing, are you talking about a slide show on cd to be sold retail or a slide show that will be presented? The standard for presentations is to price this type of usage per image based on how many times it will be shown. In other words x$ for one image in a show presented 2-5 times. You can offer a discount for volume sales.
Freds post above is correct. In another forum for Business I am in we discuss pricing and clients regularly, in general terms. It is my understanding you can also discuss actiual dollar amounts and we do, but you can not organize and say, OK, let's all charge this for this.
So with this in mind, and to help you get started in pricing your usage, I will share that PhotQuote, my stock pricing software suggests a range of $206 to $412 with an average of $275 for 1 to 5 photos presented one time. Base your pricing on image unigueness amongst other things. This means, how difficult is it for your client to get a similar image elsewhere. If only you have an image like this it is unique and you can charge more for it.
Look into PhotoQuote or one of the other great resources out there for stock pricing. Scroll down 2 posts in this this forum to, "Price for poster art???" where I posted a bunch of pricing resources. Some are free online sources.