Appropriate Freelance Rates

[sockdaddy]

I have the opportunity to bid for a Freelance gig, and have been asked to give them my daily rates in the bid.

The opportunity is a 2.5 day film festival, and I would be responsible for general documentary photography, plus specifically photographing one of the invited guests during his panels, discussions, appearances, etc. They want good general coverage, with a few specific key events each day. All shots to be delivered digitally, on CD at completion of festival.

Now, I'm pretty much a shoe-in, and the invoice is going to go to a 3rd party company, not the event organizer. However, the organizer has asked me to tell him what my general rates are.

I have only ever shot for a local community paper before, and have been paid $/photo published. Is there a guildeline that someone can help me with for this daily gig type of thing? What is a good range for rates, is there a resource I can look into, etc.? This is for Denver, CO.

Thanks.

 

[Chaser]

i personally cannot help you, but if you do a search over at www.fredmiranda.com there are quite a few threads over there on this. It could be helpful.

 

[Jason_K]

Try here:

http://www.editorialphoto.com/resources/estimator/


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[sockdaddy]

cool estimator, but i'm not sure how the images are going to be used.

they may be used on the web, or in industry publications, or in press materials about the subject.

isn't there a guideline for a day of shooting, independant of usage?

 

[Jason_K]

It really depends on your level of experience and what they're asking you to do, what the expenses look like, whether or not you'll give up the copyrights, if you do post processing, etc.

If you look at the National Press Photographers Association's Find a Photographer listings you'll see that day rates vary wildly.

http://nppa.org/member_services/find_a_photographer/listings.cfm

One thing you might try is checking out the day rates of other photographers in your area.

 

[sockdaddy]

wow, the rates listed in my area on NPPA are all over the place - i wish one of the details on the profile for each photographer listed was range or amount of experience...

 

[phototone]

As a general rule of thumb, $700 to $1000 per day. + all materials and expenses.