high school yearbook compared to
pricing a portrait of a CEO of a
multinational corporation for the cover
of an annual report. It’s the overhead,
materials, and the final presentation
that distinguish them.
There are no standard prices for
commercial images, but there are
standard questions you need to ask
when you receive a layout or
proposal, so you can make an
intelligent estimate of what the job
will cost you, and consequently, how
much to charge your client.
The Variables
Competitive Estimating in
Commercial Photography
hat do I charge for a commercial photograph? Let me ask
you this: What does a car cost?
The first question is every bit
as open-ended as the second.
Commissioning a commercial
photograph is not like ordering from a
Chinese menu—“I’ll have a portrait
from Column A and a product shot
from Column B, and, oh, yes, I almost
forgot, may I see the dessert menu?”
Like most advertising photographers,
I don’t have set prices. How much a
client spends on a photograph depends
on exactly what he or she wants, needs,
and is willing to pay for it. Just as eight
ounces of soft drink costs 20 cents
when it’s packaged in a two-liter
bottle, and $6 when served at a
nightclub, the cost of a commercial
photograph can vary widely. The same
is true of pricing a senior portrait for a
“Thelma and Louise, 40 Years Later” (opposite) was created for a
pharmaceutical ad. The art director collected comparative bids to see
how each photographer envisioned producing the job. The tricky part
was the client’s time frame—three days. Because of the short
production schedule and the season, I shot the job in-studio (right).
It took two models, three assistants, stylist and assistant stylist, and
hair and makeup artists, plus small adjustments to the original layout.
50 • Professional Photographer • February 2001
First question: How will the
photograph will be used and for how
long—you will need to negotiate usage
rights. Will the client use it for a
month? A year? Forever? I never sell a
photograph. I sell usage rights to that
photograph. If a client wants to buy a
photograph outright, own it and do
with it as he pleases, I’m going to
charge a lot more than if he wants to
use it for a fixed time in a defined
market. A lot more.
Will this photograph be used for
editorial illustration, consumer
advertising, trade ads? Will it appear in
a free-standing insert like the coupon
section of the Sunday newspaper? On a
billboard? Posters to be sold retail?
Does the client want to buy usage
rights for one city or region? A nation?
The entire planet?
Now for production values. Will you
need to follow the layout exactly, or
will you have creative flexibility? Will the
February 2001 • Professional Photographer •
51
shoot require building a complicated
set, or merely unrolling a seamless
backdrop? Are there special effects
involved? What about props?
Budgetary restrictions? Is this a
prestige product for which the client
will spend accordingly?
Depending on the photographer and
the advertisement involved, creative
fees can range from $500 to $15,000.
And art buyers are familiar with the
ballpark figures.
What varies most from estimate to
estimate are the production expenses.
A Tale of Two Estimates
Two photographers of equal talent bid
on the same job. One hands in an
estimate that reads:
Fee: ..............................$3,500
Costs: ............................$5,000
TOTAL ESTIMATE:..............$8,500
The second photographer offers a
higher estimate but breaks it out like this:
Fee: ................................$3,000
Casting: ................................$750
Film:*
36 rolls of 120
@ $28.50 ..........................$918
8 packs Polaroid @ $21.35 ...$170.80
Casting film .......................$350
Film total: .......................$1,388
* In a digital shoot, film expenses could
be replaced with the cost of hiring an
assistant to “process” the digital captures
so the photographer can continue to shoot.
Will you be setting up on-location or
in the studio? For example, maybe it’s
easier to just go to an all-American
house than to recreate one in-studio.
Perhaps the client is determined to have
the all-American house shot on location
in Florida, and you’ve got to find one
with no palm trees in the yard. As I like
to say to clients, “It’s your nickel.”
Having ascertained the usage of the
photograph and the lavishness or
simplicity of the production, I can work
on pricing the product. Photographers
gain experience with pricing the same
way people learn about sex: They talk
to their peers, listen to the tall tales,
make a bunch of mistakes on their
own, and gradually they learn. (Some
photographers learn faster and better
than others; almost all exaggerate the
story of their learning.)
There are two parts to any estimate:
the creative fee and the production
expenses. Photographers base creative
fees as much on their experience in
pricing photographic jobs as on their
experience behind the camera.
One photographer may see an ad
image as a location shot, while another
sees it as a studio shot. In these days of
tighter and tighter budgets, the estimate
and its cousin, the bid, become more
and more important.
Those Are Bidding Words
Now, a bid is always an estimate,
but an estimate isn’t necessarily a bid.
Whenever you provide prices for a
client, you are making an estimate. If
other photographers are also doing
estimates for the job, then your estimate
becomes a bid.
An estimate shows the art director,
art buyer, or client not only how much
the job is going to cost, but also how
the photographer plans to shoot the
project. Are you planning a luxury cruise
when the client wants a canoe ride?
Conversely, are you setting up for a
home video when the client wants a
Cecil B. De Mille production? You don’t
want to scare away buyers by pricing
below their expectations. Buyers are
well aware of the costs involved in
52 • Professional Photographer • February 2001
Crew:
2 assistants @ $175 ea. ........$350
Stylist @ $500/day (one day
prep, one day on set) ........$1,000
Crew total: ..........................$1,350
Props:
wing chair, loveseat,
table, misc. .......................$600
Wardrobe:
For two adults, one child .......$500
Messengers ...........................$200
Set expendables......................$175
Studio misc............................$160
Models:
2 adults ...........................$600
1 child ..............................$150
1 backup child ....................$150
Total models ..................$900.00
TOTAL ESTIMATE:..............$9,023.80
Now, if you were the art buyer, which
photographer would you feel more comfortable with? The $8,500 bidder who submitted
two lines, or the $9,023.80 photographer who
told you where every nickel would be going?
Believe me, most clients want the breakdown. (Of course, they might ask both photographers to come down on their estimates!)
If you look at these examples carefully,
the more expensive photographer is
actually cheaper. The fee is less, but more
money is going into the production of the
photo. Clients like that. Ask the client for
another $1,000 for the production—let’s
say for a great prop—and chances are it’ll
be OK’d in an instant. But if you ask to
boost your fee an additional $300, the
reaction will be, “Not so fast.”
shooting high-end and low-end jobs.
There are several kinds of bidding.
In competitive bidding, the buyer is
comparing prices. It’s likely that she
already has someone in mind for the
job, but she wants to see how that
shooter’s estimate compares with a few
others’. If you are not the chosen
photographer, your purpose here is to
“round out” the bid.
It’s a tricky position to be in—you
never know for sure if that’s what
you’re doing. Preparing a bid takes
time and research, and if you’re merely
rounding out, you’re doing it for
nothing. My agent and I are very good
at smelling out such bid requests, and
she asks prospects straight-out if that’s
the purpose. Usually the buyer is
straightforward.
Even if I’m there just to round out
the bidding, I still do an intelligent
estimate (at least a ballpark
guesstimate)—you never know;
something could happen with the
“pick” photographer, and suddenly
you’ve got the job.
In absolute bidding, such as certain
government jobs, the bids are sealed.
The lowest bidder, even by just one
nickel, gets the job. Every such job
involves at least a three-way bid; there
are no estimates. In these cases, it
helps to find out (for example) that a
hotel room in the client’s region
actually goes for $99 a night, not
the $125 you would have used in
your bid.
There are also hard bids, in which
your estimate or bid becomes The
Budget. Then you’ve got to produce the
job at or below that price. And there
are bottom line bids or estimates, in
which you bid a fixed amount to do the
More info? Circle 53
54 • Professional Photographer • February 2001
job. If you produce the job for less than
this amount, you keep the difference; if
you go over, you eat it.
As the saying goes, “Some days you
eat the bear, and some days the bear
eats you.” Do the research, and let’s go
bear hunting.
■
Jack Reznicki, Cr.Photog., is an awardwinning photographer, educator, and
writer in New York. His newest book
is Studio and Commercial Photography:
A Kodak Pro Workshop (Silver Pixel
Press). He and Gary Gladstone are
the founders of Photo News Network, a
news site and host of popular forum
(www.photonews.com).