Music videos are where most video budgets go to die: a big idea, a rented location, twelve friends as extras, and a shoot that runs out of light. The ones that work are usually simpler than the treatment. One location, one idea, one day, cut to the track.
The Kansas City angle
Kansas City is a good place to make a music video for one plain reason: the locations are cheap and they look expensive. The West Bottoms warehouses, the Crossroads alleys, the Northland farmland twenty minutes from downtown, Union Station, the river, the rooftops. Most of them can be secured with a phone call and a certificate of insurance, and the light in the fall is as good as anywhere.
The artists who make it work treat the video like a short film: a concept that fits the location, a schedule built on sunset, and a crew small enough to move fast.
One location, one performance, one narrative thread
We would build the day around a single location and a single idea. Performance takes first, three full run-throughs of the track with the artist on playback, two cameras, in the best light of the day. Then the narrative or b-roll passes, planned so nothing needs a second location. If the artist wants a second look, it is the same building at night, not a second address.
The edit is the full video for YouTube, a vertical performance cut for the release week, and a set of teasers that match the label's or the artist's rollout.
What to actually make
- The full music video — performance and narrative, one location, one day, cut to the master.
- A vertical performance cut — the same song reframed for TikTok and Reels.
- Release-week teasers — three fifteen-second pieces timed to the drop.
- A behind-the-scenes piece — the shoot day itself, which often outperforms the video on social.
What it costs in Kansas City
For most of the businesses in this post the right starting point is The Short at $2,000: a half-day shoot cut into one 60-to-90-second film plus vertical cut-downs. A music video is a half-day if the concept is disciplined and a full day if it is not; the call is where we decide which. Every package is published on our commercial page, and the video production cost page explains what moves the number up or down. There is no travel fee anywhere in the metro, Overland Park to Lee's Summit to Lawrence.
How the shoot works
It is the same two people on every project, Josh and Brandon. We scope it on a call, write the shot list, show up with lights and a lav mic, and stay out of the way of your customers. A first cut lands in about two weeks with unlimited revisions after that, and you own every frame, including the raw footage on request.
If this is your business, the commercial page has the packages, the examples and the calendar link. If you are not sure which package fits, this is how we work and why the prices are on the site.