The rights to the pictures: where the client may show them, for how long and on what media. Paid on top of the shooting day.
What sets the price
Four things. Media — website, social, print, outdoor, television. Territory — one city, a country, a region, worldwide. Term — a season, a year, three years, perpetual. Exclusivity — whether you may work for a competitor during that time.
Every item multiplies the cost. The same shift is worth one number if the frames go to a shop’s feed for six months, and quite another if they go onto billboards nationwide for three years.
The phrases that cost money
“In perpetuity”, “all media”, “worldwide”, “with the right to transfer to third parties”. Each one on its own multiplies the job; together they mean you have sold the image outright. If those words are in the letter, they have to be in the fee as well.
Look separately at any clause about altering the image: a right to modify means your face can end up in material you never agreed to.
When it is fixed
Before the shoot, in the confirmation letter. After publication there is no negotiating position left — the images are out.
Without an agency
Put usage on the invoice as its own line, exactly as an agency would. Clients are used to it, and the absence of that line reads as consent to anything — «Usage Rights, Plainly: Portfolio, Editorial, Commercial».
