guides
Guides
If you're bidding a job and want a real number back, this is what I need. Send what you have. A partial brief still gets you a ballpark, and we fill the gaps on a call.
Download the quote checklist (PDF) and fill it in, or use the list below. Either way, send it with your boards.
The short version
Boards or references
Deliverables: how many stills, how many spots, lengths and cutdowns
Usage: media, territory, term
Shoot window and delivery date
Product: how many SKUs, and whether there's liquid
Post-production: what's needed, and who handles it
Who's producing
Boards or references
Boards are best. If the job is still at the reference stage, send the references and tell me which parts matter: the light, the move, the color, the speed of the liquid. I'd rather hear "we love the pour in this one, ignore the rest" than guess.
If the creative isn't finished yet, send what you have. I can help with concept, boards and the treatment, and that can be part of the quote.
If there's CG or AI in the boards, flag it. A lot of what gets boarded as CG I can shoot for real, in camera, and that changes the schedule and the budget in both directions.
Deliverables
For stills: the number of final images and the aspect ratios.
For motion: the number of spots, the lengths (:15, :30, :06 cutdowns), and the formats (16:9, 9:16, 1:1). If stills and motion come out of the same production, say so. Shooting both in one production is most of what I do.
Usage
Media (print, digital, paid social, organic social, broadcast, OOH, in-store), territory, term, and any category exclusivity. One year in North America and worldwide in perpetuity are very different numbers, so I need this up front. If the client hasn't decided, give me the two options they're choosing between and I'll price both.
Timing
The shoot window and the date you need finals.
A shoot day is 10 hours. After load-in, meals and load-out, that's about 7 hours of actual shooting. Divide that by the shot list and you'll see quickly whether it's one day or two. On anything with liquid or motion control, I build in a pre-light day so the shoot days go to shooting.
Post-production
Tell me what the job needs after the shoot: retouching, color, edit, VFX or cleanup, sound and music. Then tell me whether my team handles it or it goes to your post house, how many rounds of revisions to plan for, and what formats you need delivered.
Product
How many SKUs, how many hero samples, and when they can ship to the studio. Liquid work eats product. Plan on multiples of anything that gets poured, opened or broken.
Who's producing
Tell me if there's an agency producer, a production company, or if you want me to bring the whole production: crew, studio, camera, motion control. I work all three ways, and the estimate covers only what you need from me.
What you get back
A preliminary estimate with the assumptions written out, so you can see what moves the number. Then a call to sharpen it. Send it all to hello@timothy-hogan.com.
Why budgets vary so much
The same brief can be priced a lot of different ways. Plenty of jobs I shoot myself, in my own studio in Ojai, with my own motion control robots. That keeps the number down. At the other end, a full production with crew, a stage, a techno crane and a big motion package can run low to mid six figures a day. Most jobs land somewhere between, and the brief decides where.
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