What Questions Should I Ask Before Hiring a Filmmaker?
Video costs more than photography, takes longer, and has more places to go wrong. These are the questions worth asking before you sign anything.
Who is this film for, and where will it live?
A good filmmaker asks you this first. A two minute film for your website is a different job from four vertical cuts for Instagram, and different again from a 20 minute documentary for a screening. Sort out aspect ratios, lengths and subtitles at the start. Most social video plays with the sound off, so captions aren't optional.
What's in the quote?
Filming days, edit days, kit, travel, music, graphics. For reference, I charge £500 a day for production including equipment, with travel added beyond 25 miles of Doncaster. Some people quote a low shoot rate and make it back on the edit. Ask for the whole picture.
Who's doing the edit?
Some filmmakers shoot and pass the footage to someone else. That can work fine. You just want to know who you're dealing with when you ask for changes.
How many rounds of changes are included?
Two is common. Get it written down. Unlimited revisions sounds generous and usually means nobody knows when the job is finished.
How do you record sound?
Bad sound ruins a film faster than bad pictures. Ask how they mic up interviews and whether they record separately to a field recorder. If the answer is the microphone on top of the camera, keep looking.
Where does the music come from?
A commercial track on your promo will get it muted or taken down. The music needs to be licensed for how you're using it.
Who owns the footage, and do I get the rushes?
Some clients want the raw footage for future use. Some filmmakers charge for it. Some delete everything after a year. Agree it now.
How do you handle consent?
Everyone who appears on camera should sign a release. For anything involving schools or under 18s, there should be a proper process with parents or guardians. [Optional: reference the Thorne primary school workshop if you want a real example here.]
Have you made anything like this before?
Ask to watch a whole film, start to finish. A showreel is ninety seconds of drone shots and slow motion set to music. It tells you they own a drone. It doesn't tell you whether they can hold an audience for five minutes.
What's the timeline?
Work back from the date you need it. If the film needs sign-off from three departments, build that in. Sign-off always takes longer than the edit.
