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Pricing Information and Service Policies 

Pricing Information

Services and equipment offered by ESS Event & Media Production are available without charge exclusively to support Faculty of Arts & Sciences courses and course-related activities that are restricted to members of one course. All event/performance booking are subject to staff availability.

Additionally, all activity in the Hauser studio (during regular business hours 9 am – 5 pm Monday – Friday except for University holidays) is available free-of-charge to Harvard faculty, departments, and for student activity directed by faculty or departments in direct and primary support of the University mission.

ESS Policy regarding when fees apply

  • FAS Departments: Fees are charged for non-academic functions, academic symposia, conferences, performances that are not course required, and any events that charge attendees. ESS also charges fees for special course meetings that meet after 5pm or during the weekend;
  • Student Groups;
  • Individuals and outside organizations;
  • Extension & Summer School Classes;
  • Other Harvard Schools.

There is a 4-hour minimum labor charge for all weekend events.

ESS Policy regarding cancellation fees

  • Weekday events that are canceled or modified with less than two full business days’ notice will be charged for all scheduled labor;
  • Weekend events that are canceled or modified after 12:00 PM the Monday preceding the event will be charged for all scheduled labor;
  • Canceling events or services without notifying ESS will result in full charges for both the equipment and labor.

How fees are collected

  • Harvard departments should provide a 33-digit billing code when requesting services and will be charged after the work has been completed;
  • Individuals and outside organizations may pay by check payable to “Harvard University”;
  • We are unable to accept credit cards or Crimson Cash.

Service Policies

To ensure safety and production quality, all facilities and equipment are operated exclusively by ESS staff. We are happy to collaborate with and work under the direction of producers and other event or content creators within safety and legal limits as determined by our management and our project leads. If self-service is desired, we are happy to recommend resources available elsewhere at the University.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY RECORDING POLICIES
  • You must obtain consent to record faculty, staff, students, and guests. For sample documents and questions, contact the Office of General Council.
  • All Harvard-affiliated videos that will be posted online for individuals off-campus, must be captioned. There are several services from which to choose for captioning.
  • We are unable to record, stream, or make copies of copyrighted audio, video, or multimedia materials without explicit written permission from the copyright owner. We can excerpt materials in accordance with Harvard Copyright Policies.
STUDIO BOOKINGS, HOLDS AND CANCELLATIONS

A booking is a confirmed studio session. A hold is an unconfirmed studio session. Cancellations are unfortunate, because unused studio time is forever lost! If you are not yet a regular client, please contact us so that we can learn more about your proposed project. We encourage new clients to see us for a studio tour and in-person discussion of your project; we encourage test shoots for talent who are new to the studio experience. 

Studio Bookings
In either of our studios, we generally book a maximum of two sessions per day to allow for resets and run-overs. Morning sessions occur between 9 am and noon. Afternoon sessions occur between 1 and 4 pm. While occasional exceptions may be made, we find that sticking to this plan keeps scheduling coherent during the busiest of times, allows for a maximum of access for all, and (sometimes) gives our crew a lunch break! Almost all of your booking activity will be handled by our Production Coordinator.

Studio Holds
We are happy to hold a few dates to help when scheduling the studio, but ask that this convenience is used judiciously. “Holds” are not booked (confirmed) sessions and must be confirmed at least one week in advance, or otherwise will be considered cancelled. If we receive a request from another client for a date and time you are holding, we will contact you and ask you to book or release the date within 24 hours of notice. Conversely, once you confirm your held time with your talent and others involved in the session, we ask that you do this as soon as possible so that we may release other times you have held.

Cancellations
We understand that things happen, and you may need to cancel due to illness, delayed flights, or other true emergencies (Lack of planning or preparation are not true emergencies!). If you must cancel, please give us as much notice as possible so that in the best case, the time can be released and used by someone else, or otherwise we can redeploy our staff to focus on the many tasks that need to be accomplished each day.

Studio time is a finite resource. We ask that when you book studio time it is with a sense of commitment to using the time with efficiency and purpose. While we enjoy creating a fun, relaxed, and productive studio atmosphere, we take studio preparation seriously. All sessions and shoots require setup time before you arrive to make sure your session or shoot is ready to accomplish everything we’ve discussed during preproduction. We ask that prepare for your shoot and appear on time, ready to conduct the day’s business – and have fun, because we enjoy being in the studio and think you will, too!

Media Retention Policy

While we believe that all Harvard footage is potentially invaluable, the ESS is not funded to retain or archive footage or other media materials for our customers. We encourage our customers to achieve their footage whenever possible.

  • For our peer groups on campus providing professional video/audio services and doing their own post-production, we retain your raw footage for 1 month following delivery. Please check/log your footage soon after delivery so that we can address any discrepancies promptly.
  • Recordings made by ESS-T&L or by an external vendor will be retained for 1 month following delivery of product files.
  • Other client-sourced media such as recordings made by teaching staff with loaner equipment or tape media captures will be retained for 3 months following delivery of product files. Please be sure to check your product files in a timely manner.
  • Studio sessions and event recordings sourced by Media Production for which Media Production is providing post-production services, we retain source and product files for 18 months. Retrieval past 3 months will be delayed by three business days.

In addition, ESS retains for 18 months all product files and deliverables for which we provide post services.