Detailed editing, your time, and money

[CCash]

I was wondering how some of you deal with editing and fine-tuning as a fee. Recently there have been some threads that suggest spending enormous amounts of time, like lining up every beat of a live drum kit to a click. That could really create a huge bill.

I usually do the really detailed stuff on my own time because I edit better/faster alone, and don't feel right about telling them they Need to pay for all of this "extracurricular" fixing and enhancing. I want every project going out of my humble studio sounding its best, so I can't not do these things.

The kicker is, when I show the bands what I've done, they say, "Oh, great!..anyway..". But if I edit with them, they think it's the most amazing thing they've ever seen!? And they see how much time it takes.

I'd imagine for many of you this falls under the project's budget? So you are compensated? Or do you only do what they ask? Do you edit with the artist(s) present, or just give them a bill for the hours you've spent? And I can't make a long story short...

[brasssail]

ccash
You should charge by the hour for everything you do. Does your mechanic take your car home and tune it up on their time if you just paid for an oil change. The car would run better right. Let them hear a project without the editing and the extra work. Then let them here a project with the extra work and let them decide which way they want to go. I wrestle with this everyday. You want only great work to go out of the studio, BUT you have to survive financially. You won't have to worry about great work if you can't afford to keep the doors open. If a group says they don't want to afford to sound great that is their choice not yours. Be fair about it. It will pay off in the long run and you will get projects that will put it in their budget not yours.

Life is Music
Mark Johnson
Brass Sail Recording www.brasssail.com (http://www.brasssail.com)

[ppine]

For clients that have not done any non-linear editing before, I will usually find time to detail one song out for them in between other work, then I let them hear it, tell them how long it took to do, and give them the choice of paying me for that time, or trash it...So far, no one has had me trash anything. Once they see what the extra time editing does for the track, they are hooked....like us!

I love my job!

[Giovanni]

Hey Ccash,


I have burned various CDs with different mixes to let new clients hear. I'll take a song and burn the recorded but unmixed version, then 2 or 3 other versions after that with each one becoming more involved and expensive. I work with mostly local bands with tight budgets and sometimes very limited past studio time. The CD allows me to demo for them what I can do. Soemtimes all the band needs is a rough cut to send to local booking agents. Sometimes they need something slick to send of to a CD house.

This method works very well for me.

I also agree strngly with Brassail, charge by the hour for all that you do. If you are still building a rep you might make some deals or not bill for time you feel you perhaps goofed on but remember that they are paying for your equipment and skills. The better compensated you are the better things are for you and the better your work becomes. Don't sell yourself short.

Good luck.

---Gio

[editor]

Curt,

Hey I was wondering what happened to you, hadn't seen any posts from you in a while. In brief you should bill per hr. for every hour that the clients are in the studio or every hour that you are working on their project. I had a lot of trouble billing when I started out and clients ran all over me at times. I really got into it with one client some years ago over the bill, when I had left the matter open for discussion. The client told me it would be less awkward and cleaner if I would have just billed every hour spent in the studio vs trying to be a good guy.

I really learned to bill from a guy here in L.A. who owns a really big room and deals with people like Madonna and Aerosmith, to up and comers daily. John is his name, he was visiting my studio years ago when his cell phone rang......trouble with clients at his place. John is a master at being really hip, yet handling people like a total pro. The conversation went like this.

John: Hello.

His assistant: There are some people from huge act XXXX who want to come in right away, they are here now.

John: Mary, we tell the clients, when to come, when to go and how much they will pay. Not the other way around.

His assistant: But their here.....now.

John: Tell them to go away, come back when they are booked and never to do this again, thanx.

His Assistant: The client is on the phone wants to talk with you.

Famous Client: John, I'm sorry man, I was just excited about doing some trax and wanted to get in early.

John: Listen, don't worry about it, please don't do this again, it puts us all in a bad space.

Client: Ok man, sorry, we'll see ya' tomorrow.

John: Ok later, I'm going to have to bill something for the disruption today......(the band had moved 1/2 their stuff in)....


Client: That's fine man, are we cool?

John: We cool.....click.
..................................

By billing the client for every hour used, you earn their respect......

"we tell the clients, when to come, when to go and how much they will pay. Not the other way around". I have gotten a lot of miles out of this sentence.

Regards

e

[Rams Boy]

I agree completely w/Brassail & Editor!

I do appreciate my clients, and i know I couldn't survive without them. But hey, I give them a great value. I go to the extent of going off the clock if I'm having small tech problems. I never ever ever take phone calls in a session. I will work hard the entire session. I come in at 6am if the client can't do it any other time. But I always, always charge for editing, especially editing.

It's details like that that can make the difference in local & GRAMMY AWARDS!

If they got the $, I got the time. I've never heard a dealer or manufacturer say..." I know you won't use this and that feature, and I know you're on a tight budget, and I know you're not recording multi-platinum albums, so I'm gonna give you this Mac and PT24 MIX+ system for the price of a MOTU 2408."

I believe going the extra mile for the client, Man I'll go 3 or 4 extra, but editing, tuning, etc... is more like the Boston Marathon. It's things like that that can and usually do eat up more time than tracking. We are not wrong in charging for everything. Be fair! BE HONEST! Tell them what you can do and how you can improve things, but let them choose, To Edit, or Not To Edit!

[Jonny Atack]

Enjoyable story, editor, and good advice on all the above posts.

CCash, what I feel is causing the conflict is your understandable desire that all your client's stuff kick major *** when it leaves your studio, because your name is involved.

If you have the time to invest, then ppine's idea makes a lot of sense. I bet he's right, most clients would pay rather than see the work trashed...provided it's a big enough change for them to hear easily.

Personally, I'm not willing to work without knowing in advance if it will be paid, so I "pre-select" clients. That means that I talk about the project with them before starting, and if they have the budget to do it right, I take it on personally. If not, I keep the job in the studio but offer the work to my assistant or to a freelancer so that my name is not involved. Most of the cheap'n fast clients aren't worth the bother anyway, and I've seen my assistant refuse a number of projects as well on the same grounds.


[This message has been edited by Jonny Atack (edited March 05, 2000).]

[Rams Boy]

I agree completely w/Brassail & Editor!

I do appreciate my clients, and i know I couldn't survive without them. But hey, I give them a great value. I go to the extent of going off the clock if I'm having small tech problems. I never ever ever take phone calls in a session. I will work hard the entire session. I come in at 6am if the client can't do it any other time. But I always, always charge for editing, especially editing.

It's details like that that can make the difference in local & GRAMMY AWARDS!

If they got the $, I got the time. I've never heard a dealer or manufacturer say..." I know you won't use this and that feature, and I know you're on a tight budget, and I know you're not recording multi-platinum albums, so I'm gonna give you this Mac and PT24 MIX+ system for the price of a MOTU 2408."

I believe going the extra mile for the client, Man I'll go 3 or 4 extra, but editing, tuning, etc... is more like the Boston Marathon. It's things like that that can and usually do eat up more time than tracking. We are not wrong in charging for everything. Be fair! BE HONEST! Tell them what you can do and how you can improve things, but let them choose, To Edit, or Not To Edit!

[Will Russell]

You should charge for everything you do. Period. Even if you do the client a bunch of these "free favors" they are all forgotten when the balance is due at the end. Besides, have you seen how clients react when they see what you can do? They tend to find the money to do it. This has certainly been my experience. If they don't, then you have to remember that this is a service industry and it is THEIR record, not yours. This has been a hard one to sort out, because I take projects seriously and want them all to sound great! But sometimes you just have to let it go, do "what the clients wants", and try not to think too much about how much better it would have been if they had only listened to you.

------------------
Will Russell
Electric Wilburland Studio
http://www.wilburland.com

[georgia]

I agree... We take 50% on booking. 50% on completion. Unless it's a long project then we take the 50% up front and the rest is billed weekly.
oh, btw.. we also do this for companies and other "big guys". They tend to have excuses and not pay on time. This way, we a least have some of the accounts receivable, while we chase the accounting departments.
geo

[This message has been edited by georgia (edited March 05, 2000).]

[Jonny Atack]

Just on a side note, my policy is that all clients except established major companies are required to pay the full day's session before the session even begins. To make it fair, the cash in advance rate is 25% less than the we'll-invoice-and-get-paid-in-three-months rate we apply to the big firms. I do this because there is nothing more of a waste of time and energy than holding master tapes and chasing after unpaid sessions. With these sorts of clients, I find the whole work environment much improved when the money issue is out of the way at the start of the session. FWIW.

[Rams Boy]

Question on billing major labels.....

On my first occasion to bill a major label (Sony/Columbia) I was presented with a stack of papers to fill out before they would pay. Wow, I live in America and the last time I applied for credit I was the one filling out the forms. Funny how Majors think we want their business more. Frankly, my small time nobody clients are better at paying than the Majors. Well, needless to say I reluctantly filled out the forms so I would be paid.

At this point Sony/Columbia is at least 9 months late in paying what I consider a small bill. They don't dispute owing any of it. They just don't seem to consider my humble studio a priority in any sense. So as far as allowing a major to billed, it will never happen again.

I would love to know if any one else has experienced this with a Major, and if so how you handled it?

Thanks, Rams Boy

[Jonny Atack]

Rams, our experience (in Paris, don't know how relevant that will be for you) is that we usually get paid by the majors within about 60 days. If not, a phone call to the accounting dept. usually solves things. For just one or two days, we don't ask for upfront payment from the majors if they fax us an official work order when reserving the dates.

[editor]

Rams,

The majors like to keep all the cash they can, in the bank as long as they can, to collect as much interest as possible.

I have called, then went and sat at the billing dept. on the Warner Bros. lot to get paid 12 month over due bills.......I figured a day running after 20 grand was a day well spent. Besides it annoyed the whizz outta' me.....it ain't like they needed it.

http://www.digidesign.com/ubb/images/icons/wink.gif


e

[Jules]

Late payment is a BIG issue. I get nickle & dimed the whole time. Even people, who's jobs it isn't, try to f**ck me for money and royalties. I'm sick of it.
Makes you want to go "postal" sometimes. The late payment policy has closed down many a studio.
More leverage & power's what we crave, same old ****. Nothing changes.
Jules

[CCash]

Thanks for the great advice folks (and great anectdotes e.). J.Attk.- right, I'm trying to build/protect my reputation, and build a solid reel.

It seems obvious, but I was surprised by the consensus on "Charging for everything and not being budget rate = respect". Guess I need to be a little more firm; draw lines.

What I'm still unsure of is whether or not the client is always present during editing with you guys. Like I said, for detailed stuff, I work better on my own (because I don't explain everything), but handing them a bill for hours they didn't see seems like it could cause trust issues. Especially if they're unaware that this stuff takes some time.

And how do you deal with no-shows? I'm sure some of you big dogs simply bill them for it, and some of you req. at least partial payment up front. But if you're going by the hour, and local superstars "The Rad Boys" scheduled Sat, all day for 10hrs, and are too hung over to make it? Do ya send them the bill? And what if they cut out after 4 hours?

[This message has been edited by CCash (edited March 07, 2000).]

[Will Russell]

I think that honest, direct communication with your client is the key here. You've usually got plenty of time to develop a relationship of trust before you need to do editing. I charge for services whether the client is present or not. The key is telling your client that you will be doing the editing alone, why the editing is necessary, and that is will cost them. If they don't want you to do the editing, then you have a decision to make. Edit on your own time or let it go? I've done both. What you want to avoid at all costs is presenting the client with a "surprise bill". Instant trust killer. Know your clients budget and respect it. It's all about communication.

As far as no show, my client get one chance. **** happens and it isn't fair to penalize someone for what they cannot control. Too hungover? Pretty lame. They get one mistake. Booking 10 hour and only using 4? Get used to it. It's impossible to guess how much time everything will take. hell, I've booked a full day for vocals and sent the client home after 2 hours because their voice was in poor shape that day. ya never know.

------------------
Will Russell
Electric Wilburland Studio
http://www.wilburland.com

[Steve MacMillan]

About avoiding late payments...

Have your client sign a form letter before you do any work that says your rate is xxx if paid in 30 days from invoice, xxx plus 20% if paid in between 30-60, and xxx plus 40% if paid over 60 days, etc. If you are billing a major record company, always call and ask for a Purchase Order. You might need one only 1 in 5 times, but it will help to talk to the money man. Be sure to fax them the payment agreement as well. If you get any grief then maybe you could be doing something else.

sm

[Rams Boy]

Regarding no shows, or late clients, my policy is:

€ 50% deposit at scheduling, 50% at session time

€ 48 hours notice to cancel and get deposit back

€ 24 hours notice to reschedule without losing deposit

€ No refunds on deposit for no shows

€ No refunds or credit for being late

€ Session time and deposit is lost for clients arriving 1 hour late without notice. ( I can't afford to book an entire day and lose that time to a "no show" for only the deposit. Therefore, after the 1 hour late mark, I simply cancel their session, and call in a client on the wait list.

This works well, and most all my clients respect this policy. Business is business, Time is $, and the studio, although being fun, is real work! I love my job!