Setting Budgets for Creative and Managing Expectation vs Outcome
I regularly have clients that want a specific style of photography in my portfolio. As often as I try to work with a budget of a client, there comes a point where I can’t meet that level of quality without having certain resources, which cost money.
If I decide to take the job anyway, they’ll end up unsatisfied and unhappy with the results. The end result will not look like what they expected, because they couldn’t afford to budget for things that I needed.
For example, the client may think they can forgo having lighting assistants, a stylist, a hair and makeup artist, lights, and post-production work. They may think that they can have me show up on the day, take a bunch of photos, and give them a drive of raw images that they can edit themselves.
What they don’t realize is that they have a really high shot list and can only afford one day of shooting so I’m rushing to get all the shots I need which means that not every shot is as good as it could be.
The models may have shiny faces or hair that’s out of place because I didn’t have a hair and makeup artist on set. Their outfits may not coordinate well with the colors of the scene or the brand colors because I didn’t have a stylist to pick out wardrobe. They didn’t have a budget for lighting and assistants so there will be a lot of shots they don’t like because the lighting isn’t what they want.
They’ll struggle with going through 1,500+ images and culling down shots to the select images they want to keep because they don’t have their own workflow and they couldn’t afford to have me go through everything and pick the best shots.
The photo selection process will be even more challenging because they aren’t used to working with raw images and don’t have a workflow for processing 1,500+ photographs. They’re sorting through raw images that haven’t been edited and don’t know that many of the dark and underexposed shots they don’t like (remember, I didn’t have lights) can be fixed in post with some minimal changes.
Somehow they end up figuring it all out and they have their selects. Oh wait, now they have to EDIT THEM. After editing they need to be retouched but they need an obscene amount of editing and retouching because again, I didn’t have proper lighting or a hair and makeup artist.
They’ll probably end up spending as much on retouching as they did on the shoot, itself. Now they’ve spent twice as much money and have images they don’t like because everything was so rushed (and low budget).
Guess what? The next time they need photos and have a budget they will go with someone else because they don’t think I’m a very good photographer.
As creatives, it’s on us to educate clients on value, or say no and pass. They can pay cheap or pay twice.
