Something I started just for fun for my family vacations was making music DVD’s. I bought the software and have spent endless hours learning what to do for unique ones, talking with their customer service for specifics, etc. I’ve made 5 of them now…it’s a lot of work, but since I know what I’m doing, I’ve really streamlined the process. I also have a nice catalog of music.
I made one on a vacation we took with several couples and gave a copy to each of them. I had one couple tell me I should consider selling my services, as they really liked it and said people would pay for it. I know I did once years ago.
So, would you even consider it? I don’t know what I’d even charge. $100 flat fee and $1 per picture, maybe. 50 pictures is about 5 minutes of video. this is probably a dumb idea considering people can buy their own software. But it is a lot of work to make it special and something I enjoy.
Thanks…you’ve given me a little hope. I love pictures and have dozens of photo albums. But there is nothing like watching them on DVD on our widescreen TV set to music. It just puts the whole experience on a different level, and it is so much fun to revisit that way. I was thinking of putting one on my FB page to see if it generates interest among any friends. I’m not a professional by any means, but I think I do a pretty good job.
I just finished one with 370 pictures from our trip to Italy last year. It is 40 minutes long, plus videos we took on it, too. I have all sorts of Italian music on it, from Waltzes to Dean Martin. This may be silly, but I got tears in my eyes revisiting us going down the Amalfi Coast to Pavarotti singing a song from La Boheme. You just don’t get that from looking at a photo album.
The other ones I’ve done have all been vacations. I only use music from that year. That was DH’s idea, and I think it’s a good one for us. My Italy one doesn’t follow that rule though.
Never thought about that…yikes! So, if I bought it on iTunes, I can use it but or I guess I can’t sell it? Well, I found out you’re right. CC is great for that. Bummer. I’m not the artistic type, but I’m good at this. Oh well…
My BIL has made several DVDs with pix set to music for family and we love them.
Is that the service?
Yes, it’s time consuming or he’d make more… Not sure how much you could charge for the service to make it worth your time. .But worth exploring.
Birthdays, anniversaries, weddings and other tributes to loved ones for special occasions or those who have passed are all revenue sources.
You’d have to detail how many pix you need for length and then figure out music. But I’m sure you’d get faster and more expert at it. The more personal the DVD the more it’s worth.
@conmama I understand your dilemma. I love taking pictures, once thought about becoming a photographer, but decided I would like to keep it as a hobby. My H bought me a Nikon D90 SLR a few years ago for our anniversary. I used it to take pictures of the kids playing their sports- lacrosse, field hockey, soccer, etc. At the end of the season, I would take all the pictures and create a DVD with music for each kid. I also included individual pictures so their parents would have something to look at- a lot of them couldn’t make it to some of the games.
It’s a little addictive. When mom died last year, we had over 300 pictures of her form 1933-2015 (my grandfather was also a photography nut). So i created a video montage and put it to music that she liked to listen to. Everyone that came to her memorial just loved looking at the story of her life. I then sent it to my sister and niece so they could have something to remember mom by.
You might look into getting work from your local funeral homes. They have people who put that sort of thing together for wakes/families. The family provides pictures and music suggestions and the funeral home has someone who puts a nice montage together.
Like ChuckleDoodle suggests, but most families probably don’t have a ChuckleDoodle on their team!
@ChuckleDoodle …it is so addictive. My husband takes gorgeous photos and purchased a very nice camera with a terrific lens several years ago. He also did what you did…took sport shots including othe kids. They were great. He would put them all on a CD and hand out. Not to music though.
I had nothing going on yesterday and wanted to finish my DVD before the hustle bustle that is starting. I didn’t mean to, but I spent 12 hours working on it. The time flew by…that’s what got me thinking how great to do this for money.
@sylvan8798 …good idea. But idea, I just though the funeral,home just took everything and put it to some sort of predone package .
I would love to have one of these done with photos of my D from babyhood to graduation in May. And photos of my trips from back in the olden days, when I was a travel writer. I am so done with sorting through disorganized boxes of photos. At one point I bought a ton of ridiculous scrapbooking supplies, but never followed through… this sounds like a perfect solution to me!
Slide shows of photos with music are popular for rehearsal dinners during cocktail hour or at other wedding related functions. For S’s wedding, the bride’s stepfather put it together and my SIL did it for D/SIL’s wedding this past summer. If you could find a way to clear the selected music, I suspect there are lots of brides & grooms who would pay for the service as it takes quite a bit of time to put these together and having someone do it professionally would be worth the money you are talking about.
if they buy the music and just give it to me to use for them, I wonder how that is considered a copyright infringement. Wouldn’t I just be paid for putting it together, not reselling the music?
You would still need a synch license – a license to synch audio music to visual images. Think about it; a movie producer doesn’t get the right to use whatever music they want in their movie by downloading the song from iTunes.
I would pay for this in a heartbeat! Even clunky, mom-made videos are fun, but they sure take a lot of time to make. I have two events this year for which I would love to have really well done videos, with innovative sequencing and thoughtfully chosen & sycnhed music.
The licensing is clearly the issue, but I wonder whether there are any licensing options specificly designed for “small batch” projects.
If you do get such a business going, put me on your prospect list!
Just because you need several music licenses for each song doesn’t mean you couldn’t get them. Synch licenses are negotiated individually, butI have no idea what the licensing folks would say or how much they would charge if you emailed them with a description of your project and asked for a license.
Realistically, if you did this for a few friends without any advertising at all (including on Facebook) it likely wouldn’t be a problem without the licenses, but if you want to know the actual rules it is very complicated.
There must be lawyers who know about this sort of thing - I agree that it has great potential. As far as funeral homes, it probably varies, but the one we worked with seemed to have a contracted service with an expert who made a very custom product. She worked with BIL over several days to get it right, including incorporating an audio taken from an ipad video of S playing the piano.
I’d try it in a heartbeat. If it got “big” then I’d look into music license but until then I wouldn’t blink.
See what the funeral homes offer. Many people would love to have something more personalized than what they offer. It could be an easy tie-in to their services.
My son (a film major) did this when he was in HS when his GF’s uncle died. It’s such hard work! It was such a beautiful tribute, and it even included little home movie snippets of the uncle playing with his nieces. He provided a YouTube link for family members, and I used to watch it all the time, even though I didn’t know the uncle. I hope you can do something with this talent, because it means so much to people.