Luminous Landscape Forum
Equipment & Techniques => Pro Business Discussion => Topic started by: Niels_Patrick on July 02, 2014, 11:01:53 am
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Aloha forum,
since everybody gets use to 36mio pixel look and feel - it´s important to talk about file storage and how professionals like us deal with the immense cost of hardware.
I invested a lot of money in raid systems, servers, etc.
Question:
1. Do you charge your clients for backuping their files?
2. How much? E.g. 10 % of total production volume / per year? Charge by GB?
I am thinking of finishing with the following sentence in my invoices:
Important Notice: Due to the data volume of the project - files will be stored for 0,5 year for free - then automaticlly deleted from our server raid system - without a notification. If you wish to store you project longer then this time period feel free to contact us any time.
What do you think? Thanks for sharing your thoughts ::)
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I doubt you can get away with that. Disc space is cheap, and I suspect my book or magazine publishers wouldn't be impressed if they came back to me and found I no longer possessed copies of work I'd done for them. Even if they were at fault and didn't expect I would retain backups, I'd rather be in a position to help them out.
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yes makes sense if you have 1-2 clients. I was offering this service in the past. no problem.
Now I film 4k video + nikon d800 files + phase iq160.....
Plus clients asking me .... ohhh do you have this photo from 1992 .... it is costing me time to find&send the picture.
Plus harddrives for my raid system.
maybe i raise my daily rate being a photographer and this topic is covered?
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I just don't think it's any different now. Larger files, sure, but disc/tape space is bigger and cheaper, plus you've got cloud services like Amazon s3. Finding stuff, well, a cataloguing system can find stuff quickly even on drives that are stored offline.
Anyway, I can't recall encountering anyone who does charge like you're proposing, and wonder if small print on the invoice would be effective when the client comes back for an old image, but let's see what others say.
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Charge for the file retrieval service & delivery.
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thanks all for the quick feedback. I understand your thoughs.
Looks like I am to hard to my clients.
Fact is I am offering a service - which is not being paid.
Trying to hide this cost in an other position on my invoice and being friendly to my client.
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Charge for space taken on discs exactly as you would do film or tape. I've charged for storage space as it's a legitimate expense.
Some jobs can easily be a terrabyte+, a colleague did 1.3TB in a single day recently. Video particularly 4k is humongous.
Obviously it has to be on two discs and archived as well for disaster proofing and if possible offsite storage as well. So quite likely 3 drives and two computers are needed which all cost money.
Simply explain to client what you are doing and why and how it costs you time and money to do.
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Unless you include it in your day rate storage should definitely be a line item. Just like film in the old days, you either absorb it in your flat rate fee or charge for it separately. The issue is to open a dialog with your client. Make them aware that project storage is non-trivial and present them with realistic solutions. They, then, can decide to provide storage in-house or pay you for the service. - Jim
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The company I formerly worked for stored thousands of tapes and films at Underground Vaults and Storage. That is the storage company in the Hutchinson, Kansas salt mines. It is the Armageddon storage facility. If you've ever worked in the major motion picture or the financial services world, you'd know about it. When they first started using UVS for storage, it was a small cost. Over the years it grew until it became a real burden on the company as an expense not funded by the clients. Every now and then we would meet to discuss how we could begin to recover the cost of storage from our clients. That was an issue that was still unresolved when the company went out of business.
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I've been charging a "file fee" for every file I deliver to a client. This goes way back to 2001 when I first started delivering digital files. My logic then was that it sort of replaced a cost for film and helped defray the huge costs of digital hardware.
I don't deliver massive amounts of files so this has worked well and I've never stopped. It adds a nice total to my gross each year.
I don't charge for storage and I do have a archive retrieval fee listed in my price list I can't remember the last time I used it. If a long term client asks me to find a file I just do it for them. That said I don't get that request more that once or twice a year.
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If you've been storing lots of info free for a client and it's a burden, why not offer them the choice of dumping the info at no charge to them, continuing to store it at a set fee, or provide them ownership (and responsibility) of the files (on DVDs or hard drives) at a higher fee? A few years ago I recouped some good money by offering inactive clients CDs with their images at a set fee.
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Thanks for all the input. Seems like it´s a hot topic. Everyone should think about data storage combined with $$$$$.
@Yelhsa:
i have many use cases, because of shooting classic photo and 4k video now.
Sometimes I sell my pictures "total buy out" - all files went to the client. So you can say they are responsible now.
I also made the expierience it´s easier to call the photographer instead of searching a DVD :)
Now I try to find a good way to explain it to my clients. Transparent and effective.
I found a nice link abou pricing. Unfortunatly in german: http://aws.amazon.com/de/s3/pricing/
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No no no. Cost of doing business. And, the more files you have from a client, the better customer they are - right? If a photog tried to charge me for storing files, I would tell him to go sit on a cucumber.
But, you are not going to give your RAW files to the client so they can store them, they are your property. So, your contract might stipulate that you will use reasonable efforts to maintain digital copies of their photographs, but that you do not guarantee that they will be available in the future.
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No no no. Cost of doing business. And, the more files you have from a client, the better customer they are - right? If a photog tried to charge me for storing files, I would tell him to go sit on a cucumber.
So I guess by that logic, one wouldn't charge for say film either? As that is just a cost of doing business too. Now normally you charge clients for the specific costs relating to work you do for them [plus overheads] this could be considered just another specific cost. Alternatively if you simply charge more for say doing the job in the first place then the cost is hidden rather than being open. Is that better or worse?
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Charge for the file retrieval service & delivery.
+1
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So I guess by that logic, one wouldn't charge for say film either? As that is just a cost of doing business too. Now normally you charge clients for the specific costs relating to work you do for them [plus overheads] this could be considered just another specific cost. Alternatively if you simply charge more for say doing the job in the first place then the cost is hidden rather than being open. Is that better or worse?
That's how I would look at it. With all the discussion in other threads about how the photographer owns the raw files/negatives, it would actually be YOUR property that you are archiving, right? And they are items that could bring in more income down the road. It doesn't seem right to tell a client "These files are mine and you can't have them, but I am charging you $X a year to keep them."
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Well you bury the cost of equipment depreciation, licensing costs, insurance costs etc in your price...why wouldn't the storage of the raw files fall under these same costs? Why would you break out this cost and not say $0.25 per actuation cost?
So I guess by that logic, one wouldn't charge for say film either? As that is just a cost of doing business too. Now normally you charge clients for the specific costs relating to work you do for them [plus overheads] this could be considered just another specific cost. Alternatively if you simply charge more for say doing the job in the first place then the cost is hidden rather than being open. Is that better or worse?
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That's how I see it. It's only in your best interest to store the originals in case the client wants more work done with them in the future...which translates into more future income from past work. You'd look kind of stupid if a year from now a client comes to you with money in hand wanting more images and you can't deliver them because you deleted the files.
That's how I would look at it. With all the discussion in other threads about how the photographer owns the raw files/negatives, it would actually be YOUR property that you are archiving, right? And they are items that could bring in more income down the road. It doesn't seem right to tell a client "These files are mine and you can't have them, but I am charging you $X a year to keep them."
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OP, sure charge if you can.
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Warning, you're opening a big can of worms and liability if you are charging for backup. If something ever happens to the files your client would be able to sue for damages. As previously stated it is best to have a disclaimer on your contract stating that you will hold images as a courtesy but they're not guaranteed as a legitimate backup service. A few times a year I have clients ask me for backup copies of images that I do as a courtesy, otherwise you can can state on your contract that you charge a research fee to find old images. My system is very organized and only takes me a few minutes to know what hard drives the images would be on. I keep one set of hard drives in house and another set off location. I also burn a DVD of the final images and keep them in the house
I personally don't keep all my raw files I keep my final tiffs and the raw files that I produced the tiff or Photoshop file to minimize the amount of storage I need.
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I don't shoot video, so I don't have the storage requirements of the OP. I make it known to all my clients that I keep an archive of all the work I do just in case they lose their copy of the files. I then charge a reasonable retrieval and delivery fee if they call me down the road for the files. I consider it a professional service, just like the photography itself.
~ Jeff
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Why on earth would you ever want to delete your images forever?
Unless you own a portrait studio were you are shooting a few dozen people a day every day, I would not see this as being very prudent.
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Why on earth would you ever want to delete your images forever?
Unless you own a portrait studio were you are shooting a few dozen people a day every day, I would not see this as being very prudent.
Even then, it's a bad idea. Your image library is your legacy.
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I shoot 20-50 captures per image just like I did polaroid with my 4x5. I need the images that create the final Image plus a few variants. why do I need the shots with flare or the assistant halfway in the shot. I only need a small number of outtakes like differnt window exposure or ambient fill. I shoot 4-5 gigs a day, in the past 7 years of shooting medium format digital I have never needed to go back and recreate an image from the raw files. I keep my working photoshop file, the raw files I created the photoshop file from, a full tiff and the final image I send the clients. In the film days I shot 4 -8 sheets per shot and only kept 2-3 transparencies, a lot of times I never even ran all the film.
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You don't.
Unless one day that is, that you decided you'd like to write about some of your adventures[/url] - and then you may wish you'd kept a few of those outtakes...
.. as they can be fun to look back-on and see too.
Not to mention that sometimes an image may only become important with the passing of time.
Some photos of a young and unknown Norma Jean, suddenly became quite valuable once the now Marilyn Monroe became a 20th century icon.
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I chose not to charge Clients for storage because I fact those expenses in my creative fee and digital capture fee. External hard drives are more affordable and I would hate for a Client to think that I am try to squeeze every dollar out of them. As a matter of fact, I try to make myself more valuable to them so they think of me as a member of the team not a freelancer.
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If you have images you are storing for clients, a good marketing idea would be to contact them often, assuring them that you have their images and can print them again. I bet lots of clients have forgotten they even had the images available and/or wouldn't know where to get them printed. Many times a contact person will have moved or been promoted and the new person has no idea who you are.
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Don't mind someone thinking that I'm self employed and own the rights to my work or even thinking that I am trying to squeeze every dollar out of it.
However, I don't charge for storage because I often wouldn't know who to charge for that.
Because I can't quite figure out way anyone would want to pay me to store my own work, but I can see why I'd want to store it and keep it safe for years to come.
Some people work for companies where the work produced is of no use to anyone else and therefore cannot be sold on and on like your great architectural/travel work. So unless they want to use it again, it's just takes up space on one's hard drives.
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Charge them an admin fee for retreiving files from the archive.
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Interesting read - http://www.lincolnbarbour.com/blog/2011/03/10/digital-processing-fees/
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Interesting read - http://www.lincolnbarbour.com/blog/2011/03/10/digital-processing-fees/
FTA:
Don’t charge by the hour. Charge by the unit.
This is elementary.
A faster computer, operated by a highly skilled retouched will work quickly, with more productivity, and need/use less time to achieve the desired result. It is less profitable to charge by the hour.
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I've always advertised that I guarantee lifetime archival storage, one of my biggest selling points (as an art reproduction photographer)
I've built the initial cost of equipment into my main fees (thus giving me the money to upgrade equipment and maintain the storage (at this point ~100TB).
And charge for recovery and delivery when someone asks for old work (charging my post production hourly fee).
If the client happens to be a longtime or good one I have the option of waiving the delivery fee (which I do often and maintain excellent relations) but I don't mind since they have already paid for the equipment overhead in my original invoice.
My thought is that storage is getting cheaper faster than its being taken up by large files - and when you have options such as the Amazon deep storage systems its only getting cheaper and more reliable, so its a no brainer.
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Thanks for all the feedback.
I found an acceptable way to include datastorage / hardware investments .... for the future.
On my invoice it says in one point:
"tecnical handling fee / project management / communication"
Client accept it so far - and I am covering hidden cost like exporting files, FTP Uploads, storage, picture research, telephone calls, briefings ....
I know this is not working for everybody. I just found it not transparent - even to myself if I would covered this cost included into my photographer fee. Technic has to come on top!
BR Niels
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What happens if you have a loss of all data? Can the client then sue you for the cost of the shoot? Do you have insurance to cover the loss of data? These are the questions my attorney asked me when I spoke to him about this very subject years ago.
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I don't know if this works for your clients, but, if you can get a yearly fee out of them, it might work well , and in your favor.
Consider:
"For up to 100GB of digital storage, we charge a yearly backup fee of $X ; you will be billed yearly for this." (for more, you either give them an expanded price list or a custom quote)
So consider that online services such as Microsoft OneDrive or Google charge about $10/month for 1TB or 1000GB of disk space, it works out to $120/year for 1000GB.
Thus, for 100GB of space, your cost is $12 per year.
I would guess you should easily be able to charge between $50 and $100 per year for this service - pointing out that (MS or Google) have super large networks and redundancy of all hardware. MS OneDrive even claims to be HIPPAA (healthcare privacy level of security) compliant, I think.
So now every 12 months, your billing software will kick out a bill for them. Over time, your storage costs may drop; but you can charge the same (everything else is going up but you are not charging them more).
Hypothesis:
50 clients @ $50 each (after 1 year): $2500/year revenue. Your cost to provide (which is integrated into your backup/workflow automatically) is $600. Over time this could grow, as you add more clients, into a nice little dividend each month (since customers will pay you in advance for a year, based on the month they started with you).
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The company I formerly worked for stored thousands of tapes and films at Underground Vaults and Storage. That is the storage company in the Hutchinson, Kansas salt mines. It is the Armageddon storage facility. If you've ever worked in the major motion picture or the financial services world, you'd know about it. When they first started using UVS for storage, it was a small cost. Over the years it grew until it became a real burden on the company as an expense not funded by the clients. Every now and then we would meet to discuss how we could begin to recover the cost of storage from our clients. That was an issue that was still unresolved when the company went out of business.
I've been down into the Hutchinson Kansas Salt mine and it's an experience for sure. This is where they store the original "Gone with the Wind" and "Star Wars" films. Now they don't allow folks into the vaults (film & document storage) but they have a display setup to that you can view to help get an understanding on the vault. This room does include actual costumes worn by actors like the Batman suit worn by George Clooney or the Uniform worn by Matt Damon in Saving Private Ryan etc.
Anyhow, I would say this form of storage would require fees no doubt.
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There is an underground museum for those who really want to go. It is still a working salt mine and visitors and storage items travel the same elevator system used for mining operations.
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There is an underground museum for those who really want to go. It is still a working salt mine and visitors and storage items travel the same elevator system used for mining operations.
Yes sir, They have a small train as well as a electric golf cart w/ passenger cars trailers. These will drive you all over the mine going different directions. It's really cool to check out.
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Archiving is an important part of the overall service and I have been called on countless times to restore a clients lost files. Storage is a cost of doing business and something I bill to my clients, incorporating it in the digital section of my invoice.