# How much should I charge to take prom pictures?

It's for a group of five. I wouldn't be traveling more than 5-10 miles.

I was thinking $25? I don't want to charge a whole lot because the girl who asked me is my friend and parents will be there taking pictures too. Does that sound like an appropriate sum? (Btw, I'm an intermediate-level photographer.) ### 12 Answers • "Does that sound like an appropriate sum?" No. Let's do some math. Preping your gear (carging batteries, wipping your memory cards, testing your cameras, testing your flashes ...): 1 hour Traveling to the location: 15 minutes Shooting the event (you didn't say so I'll assume 2 hours): 2 hours Traveling back: 15 minutes Doing redundant backups of the files: 30 minutes Post processing the images: 2 hours Creating the disks (I'm assuming you have no understanding of the value of prints and are just giving away your images): 30 minutes Traveling to meet the client: 15 minutes Meeting the client to go over the final product (and get paid): 1 hour Traveling back from the meeting: 15 minutes So we are looking at a total of 8 hours of work. 25$ / 8 hours = 3.12$an hour. Now, we haven't looked at your costs yet ... travel costs: 22$

(Gas, wear and tear on your vehicle ... you have to budget for that 4X10 miles at 55 cents a mile)

Cost of making the DVDs: around 2$. So out of that 25$ take out 24$leaving you with 1$ for 8 hours of work or 12 cents an hour.

And we haven't looked at business operating costs, the ACTUAL value of those digital files, equipment rental (if you don't have backup gear you are putting yourself at risk of a lawsuit) ...

You are in way over your head there buddy.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, Photography is apparently the new Lemonade stand.

A tool to teach the basic principles of business economics.

• Group Prom Pictures

• Prom Group Pictures

RE:

How much should I charge to take prom pictures?

It's for a group of five. I wouldn't be traveling more than 5-10 miles.

I was thinking $25? I don't want to charge a whole lot because the girl who asked me is my friend and parents will be there taking pictures too. Does that sound like an appropriate sum? (Btw, I'm an... • So, you're willing to charge$5 per person for your work? If you think that's all your work is worth, then go for it.

You say there will be parents there taking photos, are you being commissioned as the proper photographer?

Personally, I would never charge that much for a group of 5. The compensation is not worth all of the work you'll be doing.

• 1

• 5 min

• I would charge $40 MINIMUM that's ONLY$10 a person! Make sure you aren't losing money...I'm sure they can afford \$40 between 4 families

• never let friends or family get in the way of making money...

charge them for your time and trouble... cover travel expenses, editing...

• Whatever you decide, don't be a pretentious @ss about it. There's enough of that on YA already.