11–20 of 61 posts
This is super niche is my feeling, not going to be super easy. Musicians are a niche, those that use these visuals is a niche within, those that will like your particular style is a niche within. That said, I'd guess that business managers are a waste of time. Musician's themselves are typically accessible on social these days. Make them custom art for their music and share with them. Probably only a small clip is ne…
Before anything else: just start asking people in your target industry/demographic questions. "Hey, I'm thinking of making a go of this. How do you make money?"
Are you open to creating motion content for any type of situation, so long as it gives you the freedom and compensation you want? Or is your heart set on the contexts you've outlined?
If the former, I'd optimize my efforts on creating a wide surface area from which to learn where the money is for motion visual creators. (Answer: it's probably in advertising)
If the latter, I'd go deep on understanding the business of motion visuals: who pays for them, how much (and how big is the pool?), who decides on them, what the process looks like. Reach out to labels, radio stations, other artists in the same space.
Viewed abstractly, your setup seems to essentially be open-source visuals as a service. If I understand it correctly, your first route involves being a service provider for specific musicians. Sort of like how different groups might tour with a stage director, yes? This route seems like the endpoint is having an agency or studio that contracts with "Big Names." Or maybe you could reach out to one such agency that designs aspects of musician's tours and work with them in some capacity, be their go-to person, etc.
Your question about moving to an annual membership fee instead of monthly fee -- that strikes me a specific tactic. I think some of the other commenters have the right idea: have you considered introducing more tiers? So some of the packs are free, some it's $10 a month, and the super-fancy ones are even more? I don't know your audience at all, but surely some of them will be willing to pay more for exclusivity, rarity, higher quality, or more bespoke creations.
For a very different take, which you may or may not be interested in: What do you think about the productization route? Is there a way you could develop what you're doing into software that could be acquired by the DJ/VJ hardware companies?
Value added might be to bundle it with software to make some of them reactive to the music via FFT. I'm not familiar with the prior art of the field. I've only ever seen Winamp style FFT visualization, or great visuals like you that aren't really synced to the music. I'm not sure how realistic this is.
1. If you are looking to create custom visuals as a service, I'd suggest creating a specific page on your site which outlines what you offer and ideally some testimonials from VJs or clients who have used your service.
2. I wonder if there's a line of business in creating slick motion graphics for business conferences which could compliment the custom visuals work? I had some gigs creating AR visuals for pitches and presentations a while back.
3. On the subject of networking, my experience has been that regularly doing lunch/coffee with other creatives is valuable for generating business- so long as you can clearly state what you do and what kind of client you're looking for in a way people can remember when they come across it. If you do everything and you're looking for any client, people won't necessarily let you know when they find someone relevant to introduce you to.
All the best!
Great work. I checked out your concert visuals 2024 reel. There is definitely work out there for folks that are familiar with techniques such as datamosh and generative visuals. People are familiar with them, since they have seen them used before, but most folks don’t know how to wield them. I’m not a business person, but have been involved in visuals for almost 20 years. I have done paid gigs that were one off thing…
> Biz folk, what am I missing? What am I not considering? Thanks! That, when the light show operators of the 1960s tried to organize to get paid like musicians, Bill Graham Presents crushed them.[1] Live Nation / Ticketmaster is the descendant of Bill Graham Presents. [1] https://www.pooterland.com/rabbit_hole_1969_lightshow_strike...