Transcripts
1. INTRO: Hi, my name is Stacy dentin and my whole life I've been
called a jack of all trades. Which at first and for quite
a long time I thought it was a bad thing because we mostly hear only the first
bit of the same. And that is not
exactly a compliment. You can't do anything, but you can sort of do
a bit of everything. Well, it's not a gold medal
and that's all I knew. But if you listen to the full
saying, it is a complement, the two handfuls saying
is a jack of all trades, master of none bath. Oftentimes better
than a master of one. That got me thinking, I'll go, go, go, go cocoa, Coca-Cola. If I can only do a
bit of everything, I'm going to do a bit
of everything well, so over the last 20 odd
years, I expanded, studied, and tried out how to do makeup, props, Dakpo, painting,
mosaic, clay work, weaving candle making, big design, costume,
acting, singing, dancing, choreography, directing everything and
anything creative? That much and all
over the place. Yes. But then I thought, Where
can I use most of these together and really read the benefits of using the
skills I had learned. That is when I started putting
together kids parties, theme parties, and shows. And that is what
brings us here today. We are starting off by
putting together and organizing a theme
show for an event. Everything you need to know from concept to creation
to conclusion. This lesson is
about the concept. They will be two more
lessons coming your way in the near future about
creation and conclusion, where we will be
building costumes and do many more exciting tasks before we get to do
the creative and fun, but we need to cover
the logistics first. The concept. You can't eat the dessert before the main
meal. Now can you? In this class, we will
be covering topics such as the client budget, negotiation, deposit,
preparing for your quotation, outsourcing, and
compiling the quotation. We are going to have a lot of fun doing a bit
of everything and hopefully do a bit better with the knowledge
you learn here today.
2. THE CLIENT: The client speaking
to the client for the first time is something
I find very exciting. You get to be creative, think on the spot and
brainstorm ideas. Most often your
first meeting with the client will be
over the phone. Yeah, awesome tips I've
learned throughout the years. Be polite. You need them as
much as they need. You. Show interest and
enthusiasm that are super excited to this event and this is important to them. They are also spending
a lot of money to make this idea become a reality. This might be your 10th
event of the year, but this is most likely
the only one they'll do. So treated with
first-time enthusiasm. Be positive but realistic. The golden rule is always the
client is right or wrong. You are the professional
in the field and they have approached you to
do a job and take control. So do it. Be confident. If they could handle
it themselves, they wouldn't have asked you for your services in
the first place. Remain enthusiastic. But now what can and cannot be done within the time
available and be realistic about
what they can and cannot achieve
within the budget. Never promised anything. You can't deliver. Rather under promise
and over-deliver. For your first communication, have your calendar and pen and paper or whatever
technological thing, image GKE you use, ready to jot down the
important details. I old school it with
a pen and paper. When the conversation starts, it is very important to
find out the following. When are the dates? Are you available? Deliver the product. Also taking
Conservation your time available to make preparations. Make sure to repeat the
dates back to the client. If you are available and able
to deliver the products. Continue on. What is the theme? What
is the expectation? What does the client
want you to do? Make sure you
understand everything. Ask as many questions as
you need to ask to find out exactly what they
expect from you. I always draw a
picture in my mind and on the page to make sure I see what they need visually
and I make notes as I go. This is also the time to think
on your feet, be creative, throw in an ideal or
two to excite them and confirm that the idea
is on the right track. So if everything
went well so far, at this moment, everyone is
supercharged than excited. But we haven't yet chatted about the dreaded but very
important question. Budget.
3. BUDGET: What is your budget? Very often people have no
idea what things cost. They often have big expectation
and very little budget, in which case you
need to let them down without putting them down. The keyword here is negotiation. Let them know what you can deliver within a
realistic budget. Part of negotiation
is giving them alternative options to the
ideas they originally wanted. They might come to the party with a bit more money or not. But the important
thing here is to come to an understanding
of what can be done within the budget
and not lose the client. The budget must also
include your fee, which is to me personally and
non negotiable set amount. After coming to a decision
of what needs to be done, make sure to again, repeat the information
back to the client. Always make sure that you
are on the same page on what is agreed upon from
this moment forward. You then let the
client know that you will send them
a final quote, including Britain agreed
to specifications. Once you have finalized
the costs involved, once they've agreed on the amount and pay the
non-refundable deposit, you will start working
on the project. Deposit. Don't waver on the deposit. It is a decision that could potentially cost
you a pretty petty. I have had many clients
changed their minds about themes or types of entertainment
at the very last minute. And if that happens
after you've already bought the materials
to begin with, you are screwed,
make them commit.
4. PREPARATIONS FOR THE QUOTATION: Preparation for the quotation. Now that you know exactly
what the client wants, it's time to make some calls, do some sums, and
make some deals. For our purposes today, I'm going to work with a
hypothetical quote and work with the show requirements of
a show I put together for an event not too long ago. What the client wants circa
scene but darker than normal, a mixture of carnival
and servers. The colors purple, red,
gold, black, white. Five performers, three singers and dancers and do dances
that can also sing. The characters are the bearded
lady, the ring master, the Joker, the Acrobat, and the singing sensation. We need costumes for
all five characters. Props, five umbrellas for the opening number with hypnotic
spirals painted on them. Sound and lighting higher. Tracks of all the numbers in the show plus musical direction. Choreography for
some of the numbers. You start with the things
you cannot do yourself. These are the things you
would need to outsource. Performers, costumes, the box. You cannot make yourself
sound and lighting. And backtracks. There are two ways to
approach the money situation. You can work out a
reasonable amount for each separate requirement on the list and offer the amount available to the people
you are outsourcing. Or you could ask for
a quote from them and negotiate a price
that suits you both. Personally. I like
to offer an amount. Having done this a lot, I know what a fair
financial officer will be acceptable to all the
different departments, so I can offer an amount
right off the bat. However, before
doing this yourself, you'd need to do some
homework, contact, and ask for a quote from at least three different places that deliver the same service. You take the average between the three prices as a starting
point for your offer. It's important to
offer a fair amount and pay people what
they are worth. Even if you know,
you can potentially put some extra coin
in your pocket. No-no. You don't want to
have a reputation of putting money in your pocket by taking money out
of someone else's.
5. OUTSOURCING: Outsourcing. Let's start with the
list performance. Before you can offer
the artist anything you need to figure out
who you want to cost. This is done through a
series of additions. Sometimes the
production is precast, which basically means you've got without having
auditions first, I have a future lesson
coming up where I will cover auditions from
both the performer and the creative
teams perspective. But for now, we will
assume that we have precursor show and they are
ready to sign the contract. When you are dealing
with the performers, it is important to make sure
that our 100% on board and aware of what they are saying
yes to this involves date, time, and place of
the performance, amount of resources and the time States and plays
they will be held. Remember to calculate
time in for a meet and greet and
also a costume fitting. Depending on the amount
of people involved, this can take a few
hours of the day. Is it safe time to give what is expected from the performers
regarding the performance? For instance, in this case, that needs to be there
earlier for a sound check. Basque for 30 minutes
before the show. Stuff of this nature, discuss what they
feel would be for the above requirements and
when they will get paid, a contract will be
written up between the production
company, the artists, agreeing to all of the above backtracks
and musical direction. For this specific show, there's no live better
and and the client has asked for backing tracks. When dealing with
the backtracks, you need to approach
someone that can extract tracks them into the shape you need
the songs to be in. Sometimes you need a
song to be shorter than the original or loop
two courses together, whatever is needed to
make the show flow. They might also have to transpose the track
into the key that is suited for the
artists covering the songs for the show
and sometimes attract, needs to be filled with more
harmonies and made fooled by adding instrumental
sounds, uncertain parts. If music is your vibe and you want to do this by yourself, you can download a lot of free tracks from
different sites and there are a load of easy to learn
editing apps you can utilize. If this is a passion of yours
by all means, go for it. This isn't it, right? What does Jack so I'm
outsourcing the spot. If you can find someone
that can do the tracks and help with musical
direction, that is a plus. We will assume for
today that it is an all in one spatial backtracks. And the musical director,
what I give you, the musical director, a list of the original songs and which version we will be
covering in the show. This is very important
as one song can have about ten different
covers and you don't want them to Source Sans regular
version of I will always love you when you wanted to use the one from your beloved
Whitney Houston. A breakdown of every
song in terms of length, this means you need to decide
the structure of the song. Chorus, verse, chorus, chorus
or whatever you decide on. I call it the cut version of the original list of incidental music or sound
effects you might use. You also need to ask the
musical director to put the cut version of the original tracks and
all the backtracks in running order of the show
onto a USB or have it mailed to you
Fourier's law purposes and for the artists
to learn the songs. Again, everything must
always be in writing, email, email, email,
sound and lighting. Sorry, wanna be techies. This is the department. I have very limited
knowledge of. All I can say is, as you are expecting
the client to trust you to do your job well, you need to trust the
people you are outsourcing. Do the theirs. You can do for your
technical team. Make sure they get
time to explore the venue before the
day of the show so they know which equipment
would be needed to best serve the
space and the ship. Communicate as much information
about the show as you can and give them a detailed list of everything
you need. For sound. It would be things
like which kind of microphones you will
be using and are many. And if you need
microphone stands, because we are working
with backtracks, it would be important
to find out if they need the tracks
emailed or on a USB. For lighting, you might
want to make sure they had whatever
you need to create, whatever special effect
they might be like dry ice, fog or UV lights. Things I might not have as
part of a standard show. We should repeat all the
information given to them in an email
so that there is no confusion after they
have an idea of what is needed on the day and all
is confirmed in an email. Is there time to put a quote together and seeing
it through to you? Unless of course you've
offered them a set amount, in which case they
will need to send you a list of what it is they are bringing and confirm the amount is correct
and accepted. Once I find a company, I trust that does the job well is on-time and as
the right attitude, I work with them all the time. Costumes. The first and very important
thing here is to organize a measurement session between the artist and the costume
person that we're making, the outfits and accessories. I will cover every element about the costume section in more
detail over the next lesson, where we will actually be
making some of the outfits. The fun part is coming, but for today's purposes, I'll break it down for you. So you have an idea
of what to do. Measurements with the artists, followed by designing
the costumes that will be needed for each
character in the show. This will include all
the costume changes and accessories needed for each character from the beginning to the
end of the show. Whatever I can't. So we'll be given over
to the seamstress with detailed explanation and visual aids or
inspiration boards. If you are not extremely
specific on what you want, it is so much fun to do. I can't wait to show you
everything you agree on will again be sent in an e-mail to have everyone
on the same page. Okay. You have covered all
the outsourcing. This brings us back to you.
6. COMPILING A QUOTATION: Compiling a quotation. If we go back to
the original list after chatting to the client, we still have props and
some caution parts to make as I'm not
outsourcing this, working out, the quotation
for each object works out to the price on all the
materials to make the object. Petrol to drive to and
from shops to buy what you need and the time to make it. This is an added extra
and would have to be voted for on top of
my existing fee. Remember, you are being
paid to organize or direct, or in this case, organize
our rate and choreograph. But it does not include
the making of anything. Which brings us to the final
part of today's lesson, how to compile a quotation. You have four parts
to fill in here. The client's details,
your details, the quotes details, and the service you will be delivering
and the amounts they love. I've made my own template
with the help of a friend, but a standard template
can be found online. In the one section. It's all about them, the client, it is very important to ask the client
what details they need. On the quote, Every company
has different requirements. Your standard quote
will have the job, the date, company name, company address,
company Vietnam, company registration number, contact person, and
contact details. In the other section, it's all about you logo. If you have one, I
use my signature as I am not accompany
but an individual, contact person, contact
details, e-mail address. If you have
registered, accompany, you would need to
put all the details of the company onto the quote, but it's not needed for today. The code section has the date, job name, and normally a date until which the
quote will last for. But that is really just
for orders made and again, not needed on this
particular quotation. The biggest section
is all about the job. Lists, the items you will
deliver, or in this case, the requirements
you will fulfill and a short description of each with the amount of each
item in the last column. Again, if you are
placing an order, you would need to specify
how many units needed, but it's not needed
for my personal grid. Make sure your total is very clearly defined and
correctly calculated. We are almost done. One final email to the
client and lock it all in. Since we've been asked to do
the other department quotes, you will attach the
quotes in the same email, type out a final budget
breakdown to your client in the conversation space
on the e-mail confirming that all is within the
agreed upon amount. When you are done,
you can send it off. Make sure the client's email
address is correct and ask for confirmation
on delivery. Now we're finally ready to
enter the second phase. The creator.
7. OUTRO: In the coming lessons, we will have a great
deal more fun. The admin is done,
and it is all about designing and making
your ideas come to life. Join me as I show
you how to design and make costumes,
create some props, dig deeper into the
audition process and see what rehearsals
really look like. It was fun spending
time with you. Please reach out and say hello. I would like to assist
you with a quote form. Should you want me to guide you? Please be so kind
to rate, review, and subscribe as it helps us to create more content
for you in the future.
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