For the day rate and the hours after
The shoot is a day. The edit is hours. Both go on the bill.
Log the shoot as a day, the cull and retouch as hours, the travel and prints as expenses. One PDF. One file. No seat, no month.
One payment. No rent. File is yours.
Photographers — straight talk
The parts that usually go sideways.
The shoot was easy to remember. The edit vanished.
Tag the job. Shoot day as a day-rate line, edit as hours on the same client. Friday you still know what Tuesday's cull cost.
Travel, parking, prints: off the invoice again
Snap the receipt, mark billable, link the job. It waits on that client's next PDF as its own line.
Every tracker is a subscription
One payment. The copy does not check in again after you activate. History is a file in Documents, not a login.
Assistants and second shooters on a seat plan
They buy their own license if they need the app. You do not rent them a chair from us for a Saturday.
What you’ll actually use
Just the bits you bill for.
Day rate and hourly on one invoice
Log hours underneath. Print a line as 1 day at the shoot rate and another as 6 hours of edit. Mixed jobs read like you wrote them.
Expenses ride the job
Travel, parking, prints, second-shooter fees you fronted. Receipt photo, billable flag, on the PDF.
Per-client currency
Local jobs in your money, the overseas brief in theirs. Set once on the client.
Import if you are leaving Toggl or Harvest
CSV, dry-run, then the old login can die.
And the rest of owntime
Timers, timesheets, invoices with tax, expenses with snaps, estimates, per-client currency, CSV you can hand to anyone — the full list.
Set it up like this
Your world, in your trade’s words.
First run: pick Photographers
Jobs for projects, Step for tasks, shoot and selects suggested as you type, and Quotes for estimates. owntime seeds Shoot, Cull, Retouch, Admin and tints the app brick red.
Client = who books you
Brand, couple, agency. Currency and address for the letterhead.
Project = the job
Spring campaign, the wedding, the headshot day. Hours budget if you quoted a cap on edits.
Tasks = shoot, cull, retouch, admin
Same four on every job so you can see what actually ate the week.
Tags = the day or the round
Shoot, selects, retouch-r2. The invoice line can follow the tag.
A week in owntime
How the work actually flows.
Shoot day
Timer on for the day, or log one day at the day rate after. Travel receipt the same afternoon.
Edit days
Hours against the same project. Notes if the client changed the brief.
Delivery
Check the budget bar if you quoted a cap. Talk before you eat the rest unpaid.
Invoice
Unbilled time plus waiting expenses. Day line and hour lines together. PDF. Mark paid.
What the client sees
A bill that looks like you wrote it.
| Description | Qty | Rate | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| Campaign shoot — 1 day | 1 day | $1,200 | $1,200 |
| Selects and retouch | 8h | $75 | $600 |
| Expense: Travel and parking | — | — | $64 |
| Total | $64 | ||
Plain lines, your letterhead, your numbers. PDF, made locally. No server in the middle.
Straight talk
What it will not do.
Every tool has edges. Here are ours, plainly, so you find out now and not in month three.
- ×No gallery, no client proofing, no delivery of files. The work lives in Lightroom or whatever you use. Time and money live here.
- ×No phone app. If the whole job is shot and billed from a phone in the field, this is the wrong tool.
- ×No Xero or QuickBooks sync. PDF and a payment link you already have.
Asked a lot
Questions photographers people ask.
Can I bill a shoot as a day and edits as hours?
Yes. Time is stored in hours. On the invoice, present one line as a day at the day rate and another as hours at an hourly rate.
What about an assistant I paid that day?
Billable expense with a receipt, on that job, on the next invoice.
I already use Toggl for this.
Export CSV, Import, check the dry-run. Then see if the PDF is enough to stop paying Toggl.
Does a second shooter need a license?
Only if they run owntime. Your file does not seat them. Their hours can be an expense line if you fronted the fee.
Test it on a real week.
14 days, full app. If it doesn’t survive your busy week, don’t pay. Simple.
Other worlds: