Ask HN: How to grow a concert visuals business?

91 points by nuclearsugar 1 year ago | 53 comments

I'm tired of working full-time at companies that waste my talent and energy. I want to work for myself.

As a side hustle for the last few years, I've been designing custom concert visuals and releasing them on a monthly schedule. I've released 48 VJ packs so far and created a following within the niche community of VJs. These VJ performers then remix my visuals into their live performances at concerts. My setup is unique in that you can download every VJ pack by becoming a member on Patreon.

I want to take it to the next level and make it into a full-time business but I'm struggling to figure out next steps. It would be helpful to get an outsider's perspective since there are so few people doing this line of work and I feel a bit lost.

As far as I can see, there are two routes to go down:

1) Create custom visuals for touring musicians. Should I find a rep or agency to represent me for landing big projects? Should I start reaching out directly to the business managers of musicians? Should I start a company with a partner?

2) Continue making VJ packs for thousands of VJs internationally. Should I move to an annual membership fee instead of a monthly membership fee on Patreon? Should I move to an online shop format instead of a Patreon membership?

Biz folk, what am I missing? What am I not considering? Thanks!

https://www.jasonfletcher.info/vjloops/ --- https://www.patreon.com/isoscelesVJ

radley 1 year ago |

First, the famous quote: "Why did I quit VJing? I was the first to arrive at the event and the last to leave. I brought and set up all my own gear, worked the entire time, and I got paid less than the coat check girl." - Hyperdelic Dave

There are many ways to get into it, but for the most part it's all about direct connections.

• Network with professional VJs, lasers, sound, and lighting services. You can work freelance to produce content and/or actually play at events. You can probably get paid to make content, but you'll only be able to help out at shows (for free) until you learn the ropes and prove you're reliable. This is the most common path.

• Contact artists directly. You'd probably just have to make free stuff until you develop a good enough reputation to get paid. This is showbiz, so there's a pretty high bar.

• Try to work at a company that does visuals. It's extremely competitive and there are not that many seats available. The first two options are your best way into this later on.

• Do it yourself. Buy a projector, contact your local clubs, raves, event promoters and offer to do visuals. Plan for very long nights. Consider doing guerilla visuals around your town.

• Keep releasing content. Pitch them to VJ loop services like vjloops.com or Resolume. Learn marketing, etc. There's very little money in this, but if you get good, you'll at least make a name for yourself, which can help with the other options.

papertigerau 1 year ago | |

This is great advice! One build on "it's all about direct connections" theme - getting attention when you are starting out is EXPENSIVE. One option you have is start with asking for more time and attention from those people that are already paying you money through Patreon.

Great businesses come to resemble their customers (what they value becomes what your business values), and this only comes from an insanely deep understating of your customers. Talk with your patreons and ask "why" a lot - "why" should be your most used word. This can get a little awkward, so one trick is to set expectations early in the conversation with something like "I'm trying to understand how to make you more successful, so I'm going to ask why a lot because on the other side of that I can help you more."

A fantastic book to read (before you quit your job) is Four Steps to the Epiphany by Steve Blank. Good luck!

chabes 1 year ago |

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 things, but never anything long term.

I’m kind of a DIY/ad-hoc kind of person, so If I were to focus on such things full time, I would reach out directly to artists that I want to work with. Many of them already have folks in their network that handle concert visuals and music videos, but there’s often room for diversity. If you can make something they like, that’s all you need.

As an example, look at artists like Animal Collective/Avey Tare/Panda Bear… David Portner(Avey Tare)’s sister does a lot of their concert visuals and music videos. They also frequently work with visual artist Danny Perez. Still, they find ways to integrate other artists while maintaining their overall style.

The music video for Panda Bear’s Crosswords involved a small team, including a director and a VFX person that were neither Portner or Perez. The video (from 2015, coming up on a decade old next year) uses early generative models like DeepDream, which was out of the realm of most other visual artists at the time.

Hell, if you can find a younger group or artist that hasn’t established those kinds of relationships yet, you could be the in-house visuals person for a good chunk of their career.

DJs also could use visual accompaniment. Plus, sharing pay with a single DJ is often more lucrative than sharing with an entire band.

Another idea is visuals for events/festivals. I work in the legal cannabis industry, and psychedelic visuals are welcome most places.

Anyway, best of luck in your endeavors

metadat 1 year ago | |

That "Concert Visuals Showreel 2024" is bonkers, it seems similar to a demoscene piece but on even more crack and psychadelics. Intensely provocative, and easy to imagine it up on a huge screen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EO__MXVHjy8

sho 1 year ago | | |

OK, I checked it out too and I'm a little less impressed. I don't mean to knock the OP too hard, but I feel like I've been seeing the exact same "glitchy morphs in time to the music" for ever, like literally for decades.

Maybe that's just what people want and props to the creator for nailing the genre but I'd be way more interested in something actually unique and generated real time with the music. I feel like visualizers from the 2000s were more impressive - surely with all the progress in CPU/GPU we could be doing some truly epic visualizations these days...

Liquix 1 year ago | | |

it's absolutely nuts live especially at bass-heavy shows. a lot of the smaller guys have really good stuff, but Excision's visuals are the andromeda/farbrausch tier of VJ production imo:

https://inv.tux.pizza/watch?v=j4oF9JDnqgc

wyclif 1 year ago | |

A few years ago I was in the checkout line at Total Wine and to my complete surprise I realised Avey Tare was in line in front of me. I didn't say anything because I was too shy, but I'm a huge Animal Collective and Panda Bear fan.

Animats 1 year ago |

> 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...

NateEag 1 year ago |

Many years ago I did freelance sysadmin work for a group that did stage lighting design for some really big names.

At first I was really puzzled how a guy could be running this thing from Lancaster PA and have all these contacts with huge musicians in LA, NYC, etc.

Eventually I realized that he'd been in the industry for decades and got to know a lot of these people over the years organically, from showing up and doing whatever it took to be involved.

All that to say that I have some reason to think the following advice is reasonable:

Get in touch with musicians directly. Find ones you gel with well, bend over backwards to make their shows amazing, and cultivate relationships for the long haul. You won't get rich, famous, or admired by normals, but you may get to be part of creating some beautiful moments for other humans.

joezydeco 1 year ago | |

running this thing from Lancaster PA...

Rock Lititz isn't some tiny garage shop...

NateEag 1 year ago | | |

It was not, in fact, Rock Lititz.

Little group called PEDG (Performance Environment Design Group), though it looks like they've rebranded to Nimblist:

https://nimblist.com/

nicbou 1 year ago |

When I made websites, I paired up with a graphic designer. Pretty much all of her clients needed websites. Since then, I always paired up with people who get work. They get to offer all-inclusive services, you get work.

Now I work in immigration. Well-established relocation consultants usually get all of their work from large businesses who exclusively work with them when they hire new people.

I'd just advise you to build similar referral streams, and perhaps reward your "salespeople" with a commission.

It's also important to be a constant and genuine participant in related communities. If you bring the community more than you get from it, you can become a sort of well-liked contributor, and the first person they think of when visuals are needed. A sort of household name.

ttymck 1 year ago | |

> then, I always paired up with people who get work

This is shockingly salient advice, and I'm surprised I hadn't heard it before now.

anthonyeden 1 year ago |

I can’t answer your question directly, but I will chime in and mention a parallel space where a number of small creators have built solid businesses - church visuals.

Many churches want motion backgrounds to project behind their lyrics, so companies such as StoryLoop, CMG, Shift Worship, etc. have sprung up to serve this niche.

The general business model is an annual subscription to access all their media. Monthly subscriptions don’t work because people sign up once, download it all, and cancel.

These companies have grown largely by nurturing Facebook groups of likeminded creatives who go on to become subscribers.

BJones12 1 year ago | |

I was going to mention this as well. I don't know the relative market size compared to bar/nightclub music, but it's solid and is expected to continue. Seems like LED screens are becoming ubiquitous in that space. And the product could move beyond just the under-lyric visuals to include lyric-video-like lyrics sequences triggered via MIDI from Ableton.

Carrok 1 year ago | |

I really can't express how different performing visuals at concerts vs a church is.

It's like someone asking "How do I get my river guide company off the ground?" and you reply "Well you could give tours of old folk's homes instead."

They're not even in the same category.

fragmede 1 year ago | | |

Maybe you could try and educate us? Because they are more similar to each other than they are to plate tectonics.

YossarianFrPrez 1 year ago |

Fascinating stuff! Big Caveat: I don't know a lot about the VJ industry. But if you have thousands of people downloading your work, that seems like a decent first step.

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?

pryelluw 1 year ago |

My friend, the best way to grow a business is to work with the people who already trust and support it. Start having conversations with your patreon supporters. Ask them these same questions.

gffrd 1 year ago |

You're asking questions already and looking for input with an open hand, so you're already on the right frame of mind.

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.

bgirard 1 year ago |

I think they look amazing. Letting your customers download all your media for a onetime $10 is unreal. You definitely need to up the pricing somehow. Maybe $10/pack and $100++ for unlimited access.

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.

ainka-ainka 1 year ago |

https://www.teaconnect.org/tea-inspire.html is where industry meets for such things. Hoping that will allow you to make some useful connections. Good luck!

fransjorden 1 year ago |

Do you have any long versions on YouTube? I checked out your showreel and I have noticed that these 1 hour VJ sets get a lot of views, as people like me put them on at parties. It might be a good way to get attention, but I'm also asking out of personal curiosity as I love your style!

royjacobs 1 year ago |

It might be more useful to talk to the people behind the tooling that is used during concerts.

For instance, Notch grew out of the demo scene and could be interesting maybe? See https://www.notch.one/

SeriousGamesKit 1 year ago |

Congratulations on your success so far! My thoughts as someone who has worked in real-time graphics but not the VJ niche;

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!

lazyeye 1 year ago |

Also try indiehackers site for lots of discussion around business building/marketing etc

https://www.indiehackers.com/

fallinditch 1 year ago |

You could consider investing in a big screen and provide a more comprehensive service by renting it out for concerts and events. You could also reach out to companies that already do this.

hluska 1 year ago | |

I did something similar during the rave days and the memories are making my blood pressure spike. It was the most annoying and time consuming way that I have ever lost a lot of money. I could have quite literally paid you $10,000 to waterboard me and it would have been cheaper, more efficient and about as pleasant.

fallinditch 1 year ago | | |

For sure, whatever business endeavor you undertake, it's important to plan and execute effectively. I mention this aspect of the Pro AV services industry because someone I know started this way and quickly built a significant business supplying and managing video displays for events like Glastonbury, major acts like U2. This is a significant and growing market:

"The global event pro-av services market size was valued at $28.6 billion in 2021, and is projected to reach $56.9 billion by 2031, growing at a CAGR of 7.1% from 2022 to 2031."

https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/event-pro-av-services-m...

Adding the creative VDJ sugar on to could be a good niche.

boppo1 1 year ago | | |

C'mon man, you gotta do story time now. Can't dangle one in front of us like that.

radley 1 year ago | | |

Yeah, you really gotta love it to do it. Otherwise, it's like buying, hauling, setting up, and running your own sound and lighting system, then DJing from start to finish, and nobody noticing.

foxylad 1 year ago |

Find a new niche? I could imagine large companies incorporating these into presentations at conferences to liven things up.

andoando 1 year ago |

This is cool. I am just getting started in this space but its also my dream. Best of luck to you

poopsmithe 1 year ago |

If you're having trouble making it as the concert visuals guy, perhaps you could try being the Bitcoin concert visuals guy. Others have made a point that using Bitcoin in their marketing can drive 10% more sales.

ddtaylor 1 year ago | |

It can also drive people away.

crngefest 1 year ago | |

I see bitcoin or blockchain mentioned and instantly think this is a grift or some kind of scam

brudgers 1 year ago |

[Generic/random advice from the internet]

To me, the big idea is right. The approach vector is wrong. Talk to musicians directly. They are the one's calling the shots. Talking to their gatekeepers means dealing with someone whose jam is gatekeeping. Gatekeepers are risk adverse because they want to keep their position as a gatekeeper.

No primary is going to reject your product because you bypassed their gatekeepers. They might redirect you to one of their people if they are interested instead of hanging with you. Or they might reject you outright.

The next step is hard work and lots of rejection. The reality is that most people in any business have existing relationships for goods and services...e.g. people who use VJ services in their business already have working relationships with people providing VJ services.

Going further, touring musicians tend to have a team they tour with..."there's a VJ in the tour van" so to speak. That person has experience with the problems of touring.

My advice is to become more personal. More custom. What actual problems can you solve for for specific VJ's and how much will they pay? Basically, consulting/freelancing/contract work for people with money to spend on bespoke products.

Doing either or both of those things will raise your experience when making new commodity products if you go that route. And three revenue streams is better than one. Be flexible, try lots of things and see what there is a market for. Good luck.

saaaaaam 1 year ago | |

Problem with talking to musicians directly is that they might quite like or even quite love the idea, but they often prefer to hand off decisions about stuff that they are not super passionate about to the people who look after the money. Many musicians actively avoid wanting to have to deal with the commercial and logistical side of the shows and stuff around their music and delegate that side of stuff to managers and labels, so that it doesn’t distract them from their core mission which is creating.

So to get those musicians on board you need to make them passionately care, creative to creative.

So as you rightly point of the best way is to approach the creatives who design shows for lots of musicians and get them to care to be able to sell it in to the musicians and their teams.

brudgers 1 year ago | | |

There are always problems when you are solving problems.

conductr 1 year ago |

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 needed, something to get their attention and hopefully reach out to you for custom work. This is where you can charge bigger prices.

The patreon approach is a great start but unless you really can build a huge following it's going to be hard to make it add up to to a greater sum. Prove me wrong though!!

baxtr 1 year ago | |

Which approach would you recommend instead to someone starting out?

conductr 1 year ago | | |

I don't see them as competing strategies, do all of it.

Patreon probably will give more dopamine hits as you get to feel like you're building a community as seeing it grow. The musician approach I assume is a hard grind. Months will pass with hours invesred and no conversions, so probably has a higher give-up rate. I'd do both. I'd also set some traction/revenue goals as I can see this turning into more of a hobby (earnings/time is very low)