What a Concert and Festival Broadcast Costs, and Why

Our crews are small and practised, which keeps the daily rate sensible, but people are still the largest part of most budgets. A camera operator, a director, a vision mixer, a sound engineer and a technical lead are the usual shape of a modest show. Larger stages add a second lighting hand, a runner for cable and a dedicated person on replay or graphics.

Days matter as much as heads. A rig day before the event, a rehearsal or line check, the show itself and the derig afterwards are all paid time, even when the broadcast is only two hours long. Clients are sometimes surprised that the performance is the shortest part of the booking.

Travel and accommodation sit on top when the venue is a long way from Inverness. Highland and island venues can mean an overnight stay for the whole crew, and I would rather you saw that line early than found it on the invoice.

The equipment is the second big block. Cameras, the vision mixer, monitoring, intercom between the crew, and the routing that ties them together all need to arrive, be powered and be tested. For a simple venue with a house network and clean power, the kit list is short. For a field or a car park, we bring distribution, protected cable runs and sometimes a small control position under cover.

Power is a quiet driver. A generator, its fuel and a safe way to run cable across walkways are easy to forget until the site visit, when they become a line in the plan. Weather protection for the cameras and for the people operating them is not a luxury in a Scottish festival season.

Connectivity decides whether the show goes out live. If the feed has to leave the site, we need a dependable uplink, and a backup if the first one fails. A second route costs more, and for a live audience it is usually money well spent.

Stage lighting is designed for the audience, and cameras see it differently. Strong coloured washes, deep shadows and moving beams can leave faces unreadable on screen. Sometimes the existing rig works well with a few adjustments from us. Sometimes the cameras need a little extra light on performers, which means more fixtures and more hours of focusing.

Sound is the same story. Taking a feed from the house desk is the cheapest route and often fine for a speaker. For music, a separate broadcast mix, with its own engineer and a split from the stage, sounds better on air and costs more because it is a second job running beside the live show.

I always ask who controls the lighting and the sound on the night. When the venue team is helpful and well briefed, we save time. When several contractors each work to a different plan, rehearsal grows, and so does the bill.

Planning time is real work and it belongs in the price. A site visit, a run sheet, camera plots, a schedule for the load-in and a plan for what happens if a camera fails all happen before anyone touches a cable. Skipping that stage rarely saves money, because the problems simply move to the day of the show.

Rehearsal is where the director learns the set list and the cameras learn where the performers actually stand. A soundcheck-only rehearsal gives a quick look. A full run with the performers gives a much better show, and it needs the crew for longer.

The items people leave out are usually modest ones: parking and access for the vehicle, permission to rig, insurance or permits the venue requires, and a place for the crew to eat. They are small on their own and noticeable together, so I list them in the quotation.