Recording Your Production to Digital Media

Increasingly, our customers are asking us whether we could supply the video of a drama or other performance as a digital file, on U.S.B. key or by download rather than on disc.

Advantages of Digital Media

From our point of view it is very straightforward to produce a digital file for distribution. A U.S.B. key is not really necessary since we can make the file available for download and customers can simply copy the file to a device of their choosing.

Digital files offer much better image quality than D.V.D., do not have the limited shelf-life of disc media, will play on modern devices including many TV sets and are easily sharable with relatives at home and abroad.

Disadvantages of Digital Media

The problem is that once the file is released there is nothing to prevent copying and you will wish to recoup the cost of our recording fee. We are already producing digital files for wedding video customers but they pay for the service up front.

Hollywood have tackled the problem by making it virtually impossible for outsiders to produce 4K (UHD) discs and the move is in any case away from physical discs and towards streaming.

The Subscription Model

We recommend that you ask your participants to pay a small subscription which will give them access to the completed file. For example, if we were to charge £250 to video record and edit a school play featuring 50 students you could cover your costs by asking each participant to pay a subscription of £5. The cost of this subscription will typically be considerably less than that of purchasing the physical media complete with library cases and printed inserts.

Clearly, you would need most or all participants to subscribe and an individual might reasonably refuse to pay if s/he did not want access to the download. Our suggestion would be that you canvass your participants with a view to determining whether or not they would be prepared to subscribe in this way and then do a cost-benefit analysis.