Unless you're getting paid for ingest the footage and export to tape which will be over 2 hours of work since you'll have to render to dv for a p2t, I'd shoot DV, hand the tape over and be done with it.

If you want to keep a copy of the tape, that needs to be in your contract.

cheno

I know that for my daughter's wedding, seeing I had to actually be in the wedding, I paid a person to video it, then give me the raw DV tapes to edit myself.

When they were done shooting, they gave me the tapes, I gave them the cash, then that was it. HD, however, was not involved.

Worked for me. It did take a bit for me to find someone willing to do this.

Two of my nieces ( I think) are getting marriage next year and their father planning to record and edit or just edit.......... so it will be interesting to see how this works out. I think shooting and being in the wedding would be a serious challenged for even tech-o- geeks.

Please post your experience from your shooting and suppling the tapes/disks, maybe it would help my brother-in-law work out a manageable solution for contracting out his daughters' weddings. ;-) But then are times when "no" solution works. ;-)

I know that for my daughter's wedding, seeing I had to actually be in the wedding, I paid a person to video it, then give me the raw DV tapes to edit myself.

I had that done myself too. Cost me $250+tapes for someone to record & hand over tapes. They got themselves a copy of the tapes so they can use in their portfolio.

I did a few projects like that a few years ago, but really editing is where I make most of my money. Otherwise, you do all this prep work for taping, then you hand over the tapes after spending all that time just to charge for a couple hours of work. If you just tape for a couple hours, how much can you actually charge for a project? But when you bring it home, load it, edit, synch to music, etc., and burn, that's where you earn your pay. The taping itself is quite an artform obviously, but the editing... that's the part I love!!

For me it depends on the scale of the event.
For example; if my client is an international pop-star, then I'm going to tape the highest quality, highest resolution footage I can, and I'll make a DV dub for him. If it's a wedding with 500 guests, three bands, and a flaming stuntman, then I'll tape that in HDV too. But if it's not something I see myself using for a sizzle reel in the future, then I'll shoot DV and hand it over as was mentioned before.

now that I've got an HDV camera, the only reason i don't do HDV is if someone can't use it (no HDV camera to capture with). If someone wants it in HDV & isn't anything special, why not record in it? Any specific reason? Takes the same # of tapes after all & same equipment.

I would develop your own workflow with associated costs for you to make a reasonable profit. Clearly spell out the clients deliverables.

Anything extra not included in your standard deliverables, determine an hourly rate, plus materials, plus overhead.

Maybe it's because I come from an old-time photographic background, but I can't imagine handing off originals except in extraordinary circumstances. So it doesn't surprise me that it would take some work finding someone willing to act as cameraman without any kind of control over the final product.

Among the concerns would be guarding my reputation -- how many referrals could one expect from a video one had no creative control over? If I *were* to give over the tapes directly, unless the person I sold them to was a perfectionist, master editor, I'd want to include a stipulation in the contract that my name would not be in any way associated with the work unless I had seen and approved the credited DVD or other final product.

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that the goalposts keep moving, though. Just be sure to get the money first and place all liability for damage after the fact with the buyer.

The one time I did hand over tapes that I can recall, I was also not personally operating the camera, but merely lending the equipment for an event whose organizers had not had the forethought to arrange to tape themselves.

First of all thanks for your reponses, I think I will simply shoot directly in dv. In fact to customer is creating a film for an asociation, and he has taped all their activities during one year. Now for one activity, he isn't avalaible and wants us to shoot that activity. He has no equipment at all to read hdv and also everything he taped is dv. The camcorder he used to tape the other activities was a Canon XL2.

"Maybe it's because I come from an old-time photographic background, but I can't imagine handing off originals except in extraordinary circumstances. So it doesn't surprise me that it would take some work finding someone willing to act as cameraman without any kind of control over the final product. "

Three words - Work for Hire

If you're being paid to shoot the footage and that's all they want you to do, theoretically, they own what you shoot and the tapes, unless specified otherwise in a contract. I know photo work has differed in the past where the photographer owns the negative but in video, unless specified that you're retaining master copies of the footage, the client owns it all and is legally entitled to the master tapes.

1/2 day rate for 2 hours or less if I'm shooting. Prep & time is worth money. If it means I can walk away and hand over the tapes, I'm fine with that. Did so this week but made a backup for the client so they had a backup of the one they had to send overseas in the case there was an issue. If I'm not editing, I tend to be a bit more critical in my work since I'm not the one doctoring in post.

cheno

Now for one activity, he isn't avalaible and wants us to shoot that activity. He has no equipment at all to read hdv and also everything he taped is dv.

IMO, that answers your query right there. You're a WFH, and that's it. Shoot it, hand off the masters. Collect your money, pass GO.

" Two of my nieces ( I think) are getting marriage next year and their father planning to record and edit or just edit.......... so it will be interesting to see how this works out. I think shooting and being in the wedding would be a serious challenged for even tech-o- geeks.

Please post your experience from your shooting and suppling tapes.'

At our son's wedding the bride's father was too busy to use his video camera,!!

. Suggest the father shoots the video of the bride getting ready. This can be edited into the other tapes and stills.

We had 2 other similar cameras available and made sure they were all set to the same specs and settings. We supplied all the tapes for the day.

I then collated all the tapes and stills into a finished video using Vegas.
That's the fun bit, and was able to relax and enjoy the day.

Hope all goes well

C