Jorge Kreimer
Posts: 1,361
Los Angeles, California, US
How do you deal with it?
I had a trade shoot scheduled for today. Yesterday the model said that she has to charge for nudes. I looked at my original message, and realized I did not mention nudes in it, so fair enough. I made her an offer of $120 for three hours which she accepted.
We start shooting her with a dress for trade. After that we start on the nudes, and after an hour she says she has to go. Fine with me, I didn't like her anyway.
Here's the problem, I give her $40 for that hour, and she insists that it's $100 because that's her rate. We argue over this for a few minutes. I read her the email in which she accepts $120 for three.
Being the guy that I am, I end up giving her the $100. Then she wants all the pictures to which I say absolutely not!
I've never paid so much for a model, clothed or nude, and the worst part is that she sucked! I only got one decent photo out of her.
Anyway, I needed to vent. This is the first time anything like this happens to me.
If she agreed to $40/hour you should only have given her $40. It seems like she also agreed to shoot for three hours. If she decided to leave after one hour she wasn't going along with the terms of the agreement so why would you want to reward her for bad behavior.
My rule is that we do whatever it is we originally agreed on. If a model suddenly wants to change the agreement the shoot is cancelled. No need for drama, there are plenty of other models to choose from.
I recently had a model that was doing a paid shoot tell me the day before the shoot that I would have to pay her an additional $25 for gas. I told her to stay home.
SillyEddy
Posts: 2,246
Coventry, England, United Kingdom
If in doubt, kick them out.
You agreed on something and the model changed it twice - And with no real time for you to manage the situation. You agreed to something, so that's how it should roll.
I had a trade shoot scheduled for today. Yesterday the llama said that she has to charge for nudes. I looked at my original message, and realized I did not mention nudes in it, so fair enough. I made her an offer of $120 for three hours which she accepted.
We start shooting her with a dress for trade. After that we start on the nudes, and after an hour she says she has to go. Fine with me, I didn't like her anyway.
Here's the problem, I give her $40 for that hour, and she insists that it's $100 because that's her rate. We argue over this for a few minutes. I read her the email in which she accepts $120 for three.
Being the guy that I am, I end up giving her the $100. Then she wants all the pictures to which I say absolutely not!
I've never paid so much for a llama, clothed or nude, and the worst part is that she sucked! I only got one decent photo out of her.
Anyway, I needed to vent. This is the first time anything like this happens to me.
I wouldn't have given the $100. I would have paid $40, and printed a copy of the email showing the terms. She doesn't like it, the local police could always forceable remove her from your place. Scammers are scammers. It's sad she may have the ability to do this to someone else in the future.
Michael Fryd
Posts: 2,783
Miami Beach, Florida, US
Frequently people who charge by the hour have minimum increments, and a minimum charge.
If a plumber who charges $60/hour, comes to your house and fixes the problem in 5 minutes, your bill will probably be more than $5 (even though their rate works out to $1/minute)
If a wedding photographer charges $1,000 for 4 hours of coverage, and the wedding only lasts 3, he still wants the full $1,000. Normally he won't accept $750 even though his rate works out to $250/hour.
You agreed to pay her $120. She agreed to work for 3 hours. It is not obvious that the correct answer is to pay her $40 if the shoot only lasts an hour.
The lesson here is that communication is the key. You need to make sure you and the model have the same understanding of the agreement. When writing an agreement, you need to keep in mind how things should work if the unexpected happens (i.e. the shoot lasts longer or shorter than expected). This is not easy, and it's one of the things they teach in law school.
Although it sounds the same, you now know there is a big difference between:
You will be paid $40/hour for a shoot expected to last about 3 hours.
and
You will be paid $120 for a shoot expected to last about 3 hours.
As to paying her and giving her the images. Again, that's something you both should have been clear about before the shoot started.
Michael Fryd wrote: You agreed to pay her $120. She agreed to work for 3 hours. It is not obvious that the correct answer is to pay her $40 if the shoot only lasts an hour.
The main "miss" here is that the model up and left after 1 hour. The photographer (from my understanding) was still working when she wanted out.
While the models did a good job, the event did not deliver as promised and the organizers weren't at all apologetic.
I rarely come to the forums, but see you going on about this group shoot thing and how no one got naked quite a lot. Maybe you were the reason? I'd stop banging on about it if you don't want to come across creepy.
I had a trade shoot scheduled for today. Yesterday the model said that she has to charge for nudes. I looked at my original message, and realized I did not mention nudes in it, so fair enough. I made her an offer of $120 for three hours which she accepted.
We start shooting her with a dress for trade. After that we start on the nudes, and after an hour she says she has to go. Fine with me, I didn't like her anyway.
Here's the problem, I give her $40 for that hour, and she insists that it's $100 because that's her rate. We argue over this for a few minutes. I read her the email in which she accepts $120 for three.
Being the guy that I am, I end up giving her the $100. Then she wants all the pictures to which I say absolutely not!
I've never paid so much for a model, clothed or nude, and the worst part is that she sucked! I only got one decent photo out of her.
Anyway, I needed to vent. This is the first time anything like this happens to me.
Always get all the details in writing. Just have to be a bit more thorough when fleshing out the agreement is all.
Paying her $40 should have been the maximum payment, but she broke the contract not you, so there may be case to argue that she was not entitled to any payment at all.
Michael Fryd wrote: Frequently people who charge by the hour have minimum increments, and a minimum charge.
You agreed to pay her $120. She agreed to work for 3 hours. It is not obvious that the correct answer is to pay her $40 if the shoot only lasts an hour
Exactly, she broke the contract. Under basic contract law, if one party breaks the contract, the whole thing is null and void.
Legally, he owed her nothing.
$40 would have been a nice gesture.
$100 was a sucker.
When I do a shoot, I give the model everything she was promised (and usually a little bit more -- I've found models are fond of chocolate truffles). I fully expect the model to provide what she promised.
Michael Fryd
Posts: 2,783
Miami Beach, Florida, US
Black Dog Studios RI wrote:
Exactly, she broke the contract. Under basic contract law, if one party breaks the contract, the whole thing is null and void.
Legally, he owed her nothing.
$40 would have been a nice gesture.
$100 was a sucker.
...
None of us were there, and we don't know all the details.
The short summary we have seen could easily be interpreted in a number of ways.
Perhaps this was not the model breaking the contract, but a contract modification agreed to by both parties. Not a violation of contract law at all.
Imagine a wedding photographer offering to work up to 4 hours. After 2 hours he feels he has all the images the bride will want. He tells the bride he wants to leave, the bride says OK. Should the bride only pay the photographer half?
I am not saying the model in the OP was definitely in the right. I am saying we don't have enough information to know. What we do know was that there was a lack of communication between the model and the photographer. With better communication neither party would have been taken by surprise.
In addition to more demanding terms not being worth it to me, I feel wanting to change the terms at the last minute after everyone has made commitments and agreed to terms is almost as bad as a bait and switch and I'm not going to reward that behavior, even if it means there's no way I can find someone else.
I can understand where the OP is coming from on this one. Although the model was the one who was walking out after an hour of shooting, it was probably better to just pay $100 and be done with it.
I admit, it's not true to the contract and not fair in the least; however, it's presumptive to think that the contract spelled out a specific hourly rate since we just don't know from what was posted.
That sucks... but had you seen the model's portfolio ahead of time? If she was such a bad model it would be pretty clear in her port.... I would never agree to pay a model for a gig unless I was sure she was capable of delivering the images I wanted.
While that doesn't excuse the model... there were definitely some bad decisions on your part. If the model isn't warmed up after at 30 minutes max of shooting you should have stopped the shoot. No sense in wasting time and in this case your money.
Ryan Kerns wrote: That sucks... but had you seen the model's portfolio ahead of time? If she was such a bad model it would be pretty clear in her port....
In fairness a port CAN be a good primer but judging from it is not infallible. Some people simply don't mesh together no matter what either party does to make it work.
This is where I'd have shown her the images on the memory stick, deleted them and told to her take her bait and switch ass elsewhere MINUS any cash. She didn't do the job as promised.
Jorge Kreimer
Posts: 1,361
Los Angeles, California, US
Ryan Kerns wrote: That sucks... but had you seen the model's portfolio ahead of time? If she was such a bad model it would be pretty clear in her port.... I would never agree to pay a model for a gig unless I was sure she was capable of delivering the images I wanted.
While that doesn't excuse the model... there were definitely some bad decisions on your part. If the model isn't warmed up after at 30 minutes max of shooting you should have stopped the shoot. No sense in wasting time and in this case your money.
Sometimes it's hard to judge. I've done some pretty nice work with beginners in my time.
Also remember that originally this was trade. I just agreed to the $120 for three when I realized I didn't mention nudes in my message. Otherwise the shoot would have never happened.
Right... but after an hour of shooting her clothed and there were no usable shots... why even attempt to shoot the nudes at that point? You should have just thanked her for the time and just say it wasn't working out... you both go your own ways.
what a bummer..
Obviously she was more interested in getting the money than earning it. Sorry to hear about that. Why don't you put her on your don't recommend list.
I've run into issues over the years that made me say.."NEXT TIME....." I chalk them up to learning experiences and try not to repeat my mistakes...
I've revised my contracts numerous times..and often ofter having a negative experience like this and realizing I needed to cover it in my upfront agreements..
This has never been an issue with my regular clients. But it's a good thing to use with new folks, so everyone's on the same page.
Ryan Kerns wrote: Right... but after an hour of shooting her clothed and there were no usable shots... why even attempt to shoot the nudes at that point? You should have just thanked her for the time and just say it wasn't working out... you both go your own ways.
Hmm... then wouldn't you get the model (hypothetically speaking) posting on MM with a; 'I arranged a shoot with this guy for a 1 hr trade shoot and 3 hrs paid nude and after the hour of the trade shoot he told me to leave!' rant!?
RKD Photographic
Posts: 2,989
Iserlohn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
I wouldn't have given her anything - if the agreement is for a three-hour shoot and she only works one hour (and not even at the level agreed) then the agreement has been reneged upon and no payment is owed...
PC-Will Stills wrote: She wasn't a model she was a scammer.
I would of kicked her out of my studio as soon as she started changing the agreement.. Plus if you pay talent for their time never, ever do I give them any images for free!!
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