Video Creation & Editing FAQs

Three retainer tiers: Starter is $1,250/mo (effective rate $50–$75/hr, 15–20 hrs/mo), Growth is $2,500/mo (effective rate $80–$110/hr, 25–30 hrs/mo), and Enterprise Scale is $5,000/mo (effective rate $100–$120/hr, 45–50 hrs/mo). Annual billing saves 2 months.

It's a flat monthly retainer with a published effective hourly rate and an hour pool per tier — not per-project quoting or bundled hours you can't see.

Editing, color, audio cleanup, captions, licensed commercial music, and 2 revision rounds per deliverable are included at every tier. Custom motion graphics and kinetic typography are included starting at Growth. The retainer is built around editing and post — on-site filming is a separate line item.

On-site shoot days are a separate line item on top of the editing retainer. Commercial music licensing is included and documented with every delivered edit, not billed separately. Hours beyond your monthly pool bill at $75–$125/hr depending on tier, and we flag an approaching overage in writing before the work is done.

The retainer price itself is fixed and published per tier — Starter, Growth, or Enterprise Scale — so you know the monthly cost before committing. A Creative Audit up front will tell you which tier actually fits your footage volume.

The retainer is centered on Central Illinois and the broader Midwest, covering clients from local SMBs through regional mid-market brands.

On-site shoot days run across Peoria, the Quad Cities, and Dubuque as a separate line item outside the core editing retainer.

Starter carries a 48-hour SLA on standard cuts. Growth is 24–36 hours and Enterprise Scale is priority same-day to 24 hours. Complex motion graphics, custom animation, or a multi-module onboarding suite go on a build calendar you approve before work starts — so nothing is ever “in progress” without a date attached.

Since the retainer is built around editing and post rather than filming, shoot days are scheduled separately as a line item — ask on your Creative Audit call for current availability.*

Most retainers kick off within 1–2 weeks of signing. Exact start date depends on current workload — we will give you a real date on the strategy call, not a placeholder.*

Book a Creative Audit — bring one folder of footage and we'll show you the campaign inside it.

Yes — the Creative Audit is exactly that: a working session on your actual footage, not a generic pitch.

Yes — most clients already own the raw material (phone clips, recorded Zoom trainings, an unused webinar, a screen-captured demo). What's usually missing is a repeatable post-production process, which is what the retainer provides.

Yes — long-form repurposing is one of the four production lanes: mining podcasts, webinars, and panel recordings for vertical shorts, captioned clips, and audiograms out of an asset you already paid to produce.

We do, and it is included. Every delivered edit is scored with music cleared for commercial and paid-media use, and the license documentation ships with your final files. We will not hand you a video with a track that can get an ad account restricted or a channel claimed — even if you ask for a song we cannot clear.

The retainer is built around editing and post — that is where the volume and the margin are for you. We do run on-site shoot days across Peoria, the Quad Cities, and Dubuque as a separate line item, and we will coach your team on capturing usable footage with the phone already in their pocket so shoot days stay optional.

The core retainer is built around editing and post-production of footage you already have, using a two-minute brief form (goal, audience, platform) rather than full scripting and storyboarding from scratch.

Burned-in captions are included at every tier. Custom motion graphics and kinetic typography are included starting at the Growth tier, with a dedicated senior motion designer at Enterprise Scale.

Licensed commercial music is included on every deliverable, with usage-rights documentation shipped with the delivered file.

Yes — color grading and audio cleanup are included at every tier, along with captions designed to survive muted autoplay on a laptop speaker.

Yes — multi-platform aspect ratio delivery (9:16, 1:1, 16:9) ships together starting at the Growth tier, so your media buyer, LMS, and website all get the version they need the same day.

Local SMBs and single-location operators (Starter), regional B2B and mid-market brands running paid media (Growth), and large healthcare, manufacturing, and logistics accounts (Enterprise Scale).

Four lanes: employee and customer onboarding series, performance ad testing (hook variations for paid social), B2B product walkthroughs and demos, and long-form repurposing into shorts and clips.

You upload raw footage and fill out a two-minute brief covering the goal, audience, and platform — no transcoding or naming conventions required on your end.

The core retainer starts from footage you already have. If a shoot is needed, that's scheduled as a separate line item, and we'll coach your team on capturing usable footage with the phone already in their pocket so shoot days stay optional.

You get a review link with timestamped commenting instead of an email thread of vague notes.

After you approve via the timestamped review link, files land in every aspect ratio you need with license documentation attached, and we track what performs to feed into the next month's batch.

We set up a shared drive folder on day one. Upload straight from camera, phone, Zoom, Loom, or your existing cloud storage. We accept ProRes, H.264, H.265, MP4, MOV, and screen recordings, and we handle proxies and transcoding on our side. If your files are on SD cards, mail them — we return the cards.

For on-site shoot days (a separate line item), we coach your team on capturing usable footage with the phone already in their pocket, so a full production crew isn't required for most footage.

Drop everything into your shared folder — camera files, Zoom recordings, phone clips, screen captures — and fill out the two-minute brief form. No transcoding or naming conventions needed.

Yes, across the four production lanes: onboarding and training series, performance ad creative, B2B product walkthroughs and demos, and long-form repurposing into shorts and clips.

Yes — multi-platform aspect ratio delivery (9:16, 1:1, 16:9) ships together starting at the Growth tier.

Burned-in captions are standard at every tier, and custom motion graphics and kinetic typography are included starting at Growth.

Starter and Growth include two revision rounds per deliverable, which covers the overwhelming majority of projects when the brief is filled out. Enterprise Scale is unlimited inside your monthly hour pool. Anything past the included rounds draws from retainer hours at your published rate — never a surprise line item.

No, but results are tracked — across active retainer accounts, tested ad creative has averaged a 3.2x return on ad spend over trailing 12 months, and onboarding modules have hit an 84% completion rate versus 41% for the PDF/slide decks they replaced. Your results depend on your footage, audience, and platform.

Every deliverable is edited retention-first with captions and sound mixed for muted autoplay, then shipped in every aspect ratio your platforms need — not a single master resized after the fact.

Yes — delivered files ship in every aspect ratio you need with licensing documentation attached, cleared for your ongoing use.

That's confirmed per client rather than assumed — ask on your Creative Audit call.

Up to 50% of your monthly hours roll into the next month and stay live for 30 days. That is designed for real business rhythms — a quiet February funds a heavy March product launch. Overages bill at $75–$125/hr by tier, always flagged for approval before we spend them.

Since on-site shoots are scheduled as a separate line item from the core editing retainer, rescheduling is handled directly with your account team rather than affecting your monthly editing hours.

Book your Creative Audit — bring one folder of footage and we'll show you the campaign inside it and which tier fits.

Final files ship in whichever aspect ratios your platforms need — vertical 9:16, square 1:1, and horizontal 16:9 — delivered together, not promised and resized later.

Yes. Cleared commercial music and documented usage rights ship with every delivered edit — we won't hand you a video with a track that can get an ad account restricted or a channel claimed, even if you ask for a specific song we can't clear.