5 Ways to Make Money as a Freelance Videographer
Someone posted a question on a large filmmaker Facebook group I’m a member of.
“What are the Sources of Making money as a filmmaker?”
The question received a number of answers, but most seemed to be answering a different question. Something like, “How do I become an A-list Hollywood player, pulling in $1m+ a gig?”
So the answers went a lot like “I’ve worked in this business for decades and very few filmmakers make a living at it.”
Perhaps they were answering their own question rather than the poster’s. Because, outside of the quest for global fame and fortune, there’s all kinds of ways to make money from filmmaking.
For 20 years, I was a professional composer. Although we had music on major TV shows and our band had some BBC Radio air, by far the most money we earned was working on corporate videos or writing for “production music” publishers. I still live mostly on the royalties from that work, 12 years after I stopped writing music. But I’m certainly neither rich nor famous.
Like freelance composing, there are many avenues for a freelance videographers to pursue to get revenue for their work. I’m not promising it will be glamorous – but that’s not the question asked.
You might just like the idea of shooting video and getting paid for it. I still remember when, after a few years of trying to secure a record deal as a band, we got our first royalty cheques from our production music tracks. It was a great feeling to finally get some financial reward for all the hard work we had put in to becoming decent music producers. We ended up writing over 180 pieces of music for our publisher.
Apart from that, I have a number of friends and family who make a living shooting corporate videos or adverts. It’s certainly not the easiest job to get into, but not the hardest either, if you are prepared to work hard.
Aside from that, the digital world has opened up new opportunities to create revenue from from freelance videography.
1. Corporate Videos
This line of work has been around for decades. A friend of my parents used to make videos for companies like British Airways. He made a lot of money, back in the 1980s.
I know several people who have made a living this way and also worked for them as a composer. The route in varies greatly but has similarities to the composer’s route.
Essentially, the start can be slow, when you are building your profile, your contacts, your network. You also need to be developing your reel as a corporate video maker.
To get hired by a client they need to see you are trustworthy and know what you are doing. Presentation for clients is absolutely their top priority, so make sure you present yourself and your work as best as you can. Even if the video they are hiring you to make is an internal one (only to be shown to employees of the company) the video is still representing the values of the company – image is everything.
Well, of course. They wouldn’t be hiring a professional videographer if they didn’t want great images. So of course it’s only logical that everything you show them must be of the best quality possible.
As composers, we did a number of low paid jobs just to get ourselves some credits. Once we had names on our CV like “Barclays Bank”, this is very reassuring to potential future clients. And that video went on our reel. Plus those guys we worked for would recommend us to other videographers and we’d start getting calls.
So the route into this job is to just get started, build your reel, try to get some big name clients. At first you might struggle to get well paid jobs, but once you pass that phase, your network can accelerate quickly.
Be reliable
Just by being reliable, you’ll beat 75% of the competition. You might have a shithot reel, but if you’re flaky and unreliable, your network is dead. No one will recommend you and you leave behind you a trail of unsatisfied clients who will never work with you again. Which means you’re always grafting for the next job.
Of course, you will also find yourself working with nightmare clients. But the most important thing is to be reliable. Deliver what you agreed before you started the job.
Being reliable and getting those recommendations means you will end up with so many clients you can start to weed out the difficult ones. Your aim is to build a series of relationships with people you like working for.
How to Land a Corporate Video Gig
2. Weddings
Another line of videography work that has been around for decades. You can start by offering to do “wedding gifts” for friends and family. They are a lot of work, but at least you can escape buying a gift.
Again, efficient and reliable delivery will mean your network grows quickly. To begin with, your work will be hard and the financial reward low (honestly, pretty much all self-employment works this way).
The bigger your network, the more demand for your services, the more you can charge, and the more picky you can be over your clients.
Again, you just have to be reliable and you have to keep going. This job is all about getting recommendations.
3. YouTube, Amazon, etc
I make some money from both these video platforms. Not a fortune. In fact, a gentle trickle. On YouTube, I simply have 2 feature-length films and the channel is set to receive income from ads.
However, I’ve also added some videos of me testing out my gimbal+smartphone, walking through London, Soho and Swiss towns and they get some views and some revenue. And all I did was film walking along a street. If you made one a day, for example, and covered different places, your traffic would build up. You’d start receiving revenue.
If you did this every day for 5 years your traffic would be considerable and your revenue too. This revenue would continue, even if you stopped making videos – after 5 years you’ve created enough momentum that the traffic will simply keep coming. This kind of “passive income” is an investment of time into a future income. Like getting music royalties.
On the downside, you are investing your time in one platform and taking a (perhaps small) risk that the platform doesn’t change or close completely. What if the platform changes the rules and your income (that you invested so much time for) is suddenly halved?
Which brings me to Amazon. They allow anyone to publish their videos on their Amazon prime service. It’s harder to set up than YouTube, but not too difficult. However, last year they halved their royalty rate for videos with low viewing numbers.
As content providers, we are somewhat vulnerable to huge companies like Amazon and YouTube (Google). They have the power to cut rates with little consequence.
Having said that, they do offer a real opportunity to get started making videos with the potential to set yourself up with a long term passive income stream.
These days, you can basically start running your own TV show (and upload to YouTube or Amazon) and, if you keep at it, a good show will start to get traffic. Comedy, drama, scifi and other fiction series are harder to make than tutorial shows, travel shows, vlogging, gadget shows, cooking shows, makeup shows etc… the list is as long as there is an interest in some subject or other.
Some subjects obviously have a much higher potential traffic volume than others. These big subjects also have much higher competition, for obvious reasons. So maybe carving out a niche in something with minor traffic but little competition might be worth it. Anyway, it’s always easier to create content on a subject you’re passionate about.
4. B-Roll – otherwise known as “Stock Footage”
You can shoot stock footage and sell it via online platforms. There are a number of well used platforms, Shutterstock being one of the most well known.
They generally work on a royalty only basis. In other words, you only get paid when someone downloads your video from their platform and pays for it.
Platforms will have their own requirements for content. Size, length of footage, image resolution and so forth. Some will be stricter than others.
Thing is, stock footage shots are relatively easy to create, these days, so there’s little to stop you getting under way. The downside is, stock footage shots are relatively easy to create th…. yeah, just like so many things in life, the easier it is to do, the more people there are doing it, therefore the less value that thing has.
So, although I haven’t tried it, my guess is to make reasonable money you have to put a lot of time in and upload a ton of usable footage before you see some reasonable returns.
One advantage is you can capture footage around your other life, using a small portable camera or smartphone. On your way to work, shoot some “London rush hour” footage. On holiday, shoot some skiing shots, mountain footage, or a golden mediterranean beach. Just make sure it’s well exposed and stabilized.
5. Music Videos
Most of us know people in bands, writing songs and trying to get known. A good music video is an essential way of promoting a band’s songs, so there’s a healthy need for music video makers (especially ones who can work on a band’s often meagre budget).
Like previous videographer career paths, this one starts with you as an unknown, offering your services for free. You make a couple of music videos for friends, or friends of friends, and now you have something for your reel and valuable experience.
However, unlike the corporate world, the band/singer/musician world is full of poor artists who will now all make a b-line for the filmmaker who made a great music vid for free, like bees to a honey pot. There is some money to be made in the music industry, of course, but it’s not as straightforward as the corporate world (at least in my experience).
As before, make videos, build your network, get known for being reliable (yes, even in the music biz). However, to get to the top level of any kind of career in the film or music industry requires some kind of mystical element that nobody can quite put their finger on.
Sometimes it’s sheer persistence. Sometimes you meet someone who just bought their first camera and the next thing you know they’re shooting Ed Sheeran’s next video because their hairdresser’s boyfriend is bestfriends with Ed’s aunty… Maybe you have to be a member of the Illuminati, I don’t know. Well, it certainly helps if you live in a highly populated major city with a music scene.
That’s my list of 5. But there’s really all kinds of other ways (aside from being Christopher Nolan). Here’s a list of 35 things you can do to make money as a filmmaker. I like to imagine it was written by someone in response to “I bet you can’t name 5 ways to earn money as a filmmaker..” – “5 ways?! Are you braindead?? I can name 35 ways!” – “35?! Well go ahead, genius!” – “Okay, I will! There’s uh…”
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