How we work together.

Who you’re working with

Base Camp Studios LLP is a limited liability partnership registered in England and Wales, number OC434702. Our registered office is The Robbins Building, Albert Street, Rugby, Warwickshire, CV21 2SD.

Charlie Smith leads every project and is your main contact throughout. Where a project needs it, we use subcontractors, such as developers, filmmakers or photographers, from a network we know well. We’re always upfront about it: anyone we bring in is named in the proposal before work starts, and we stay responsible for their work.

The proposal

Every project starts with a written proposal: what we’ll make, what it costs, when it’s due and what we’ll need from you. Work starts once you’ve accepted it in writing and the deposit has been paid.

If anything needs to change along the way, we’ll tell you upfront what it means for the fee and the timing before we carry on. Nothing is added to an invoice without your say-so.

Acceptance doesn’t have to be formal. A reply by email or message, a go-ahead or a thumbs-up on a call, or asking us to carry on with the work all count as accepting a proposal, a change or a stage. We’ll confirm it in writing so there’s a clear record.

These terms and your proposal form the agreement between us. If the two ever disagree, the proposal wins.

Fees and payment

• Fees are quoted in pounds sterling and are fixed for the agreed scope. Work charged by time is billed at the day or hourly rate in the proposal.
• Projects are usually paid as a deposit of 40–50% on acceptance, with the balance at the stages set out in the proposal.
• Invoices are due within 14 days, by bank transfer. Each one shows what has been paid so far and what is left to pay.
• If you’re paying from outside the UK, please cover any transfer charges so the full amount arrives.
• Fees are quoted excluding VAT. We’re not currently VAT registered. If that changes, we’ll tell you before VAT appears on any invoice, and it will be added at the standard rate from that date.
• If a payment plan would help, ask. We’ve agreed them before.

If an invoice is more than 14 days past its due date, we may pause work until it’s settled. For business clients, we’re also entitled to statutory interest and recovery costs under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998.

Feedback and revisions

The proposal sets out how many rounds of revisions are included, usually two, within the direction you’ve approved. A round is one consolidated set of feedback from your side, so please gather your team’s comments before sending them.

Revisions and scope changes aren’t the same thing. Revisions refine the work we’ve agreed: adjusting copy, colour, layout or an edit within the brief. Scope changes add to it or alter it: new pages, extra deliverables, new formats or a different direction. Revisions are included. Scope changes are quoted separately, and we’ll tell you upfront when a request crosses that line.

Please name one person to give feedback and sign off each stage. It keeps decisions clear and the work moving.

Once a stage is signed off, we build on it. Reopening it later, or changing the agreed direction, is new work, and we’ll quote it before we start.

Timings and pauses

The dates in the proposal assume feedback, content and access arrive when agreed. If they’re late, the schedule moves with them, and we’ll re-plan with you rather than rush the work.

If you need to pause, tell us. If a project is paused for more than 30 days, we’ll invoice the work done so far and agree a new start date when you’re ready.

Third-party costs

Some work needs things we buy in: fonts, stock imagery, music, software licences, kit hire, locations, crew and travel. We’ll agree these with you before spending anything. As standard, anything we buy on your behalf is charged at cost plus a 20% markup. We may reduce or waive the markup at our discretion.

Recharges and pass-through costs, meaning anything we pay a supplier on your behalf, such as hosting renewals, licences and subscriptions, are always invoiced 30 days before the supplier’s payment is due, and are payable within our usual 14 days.

If you want to cancel or change a recharge, tell us within those 30 days. If we don’t hear from you in that time, the cost goes ahead and the invoice still needs to be paid.

Where we can, licences are bought in your name, so they stay with you.

Launch and hosting

For websites, launch starts a 14-day period in which we fix defects, meaning anything that doesn’t work as agreed, at no extra cost. After that, changes and support are quoted separately or covered by a retainer.

If we manage your Webflow hosting, we pay Webflow on your behalf and recharge it yearly. Like any recharge, it’s invoiced 30 days before renewal and payable within 14 days, and if we haven’t heard from you by then, the renewal goes ahead. It covers the hosting plan and looking after the account. It isn’t a fee for design or development.

You can take the hosting over at any time, and we’ll transfer the site to your own Webflow account.

Who owns the work

Once the final invoice is paid, you own the finished work we’ve made for you: the identity, the website, the film, the photographs and the final files. Until then, it’s licensed to you for review and approval only.

Some things stay with us: concepts and routes you didn’t choose, raw footage and working files unless the proposal includes them, and the tools, templates and code we use across projects. Where any of these form part of your finished work, you have a permanent licence to use them as part of it.

Fonts, stock, music and other third-party material stay under their own licences. We’ll tell you what they are and what they allow.

We’d like to show the work in our portfolio, journal and pitches once it’s public. If it needs to stay confidential, tell us and it will.

Retainers

Retainers run month to month at the level we agree: Studio Support, Creative Partner or Embedded Studio. What each month includes is written into the retainer proposal, and it’s invoiced at the start of each month.

Either side can end a retainer with 30 days’ written notice, after any minimum term set out in the proposal.

Ending a project

If you need to stop a project, let us know in writing. The deposit isn’t refundable. Work done beyond what the deposit covers is charged at the rates in the proposal, along with any third-party costs already committed. You’ll receive everything you’ve paid for.

We can end a project too, with written notice, if invoices go unpaid or the work changes beyond what was agreed. The same applies: work to date is invoiced, and you keep what you’ve paid for.

Confidentiality and data

Anything you share with us stays confidential and is used only for your project. The specialists we bring in are held to the same standard. If you’d like us to sign your NDA, send it over.

We handle personal data in line with UK data protection law, and only for the work we’re doing for you.

We sometimes use AI voice recording to capture notes, thoughts and ideas from calls, meetings and shoots. It gives both of us an accurate record of what was discussed and agreed, which protects you as much as it protects us. We’ll always tell you when we’re recording, recordings are kept securely and used only for your project, and if you’d rather we didn’t record, just say.

Responsibility

We’ll do the work with reasonable skill and care, to the standard you’d expect of an experienced studio.

You’re responsible for making sure the material you give us, such as copy, images, logos and data, is yours to use and accurate, and for final checks of anything legal, technical or regulatory in your sector before it goes out.

Our total liability for any project is limited to the fees paid for it. Neither of us is liable for indirect losses, such as lost profits or lost data. Nothing here limits any liability that the law doesn’t allow to be limited.

The legal bit

These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales, and its courts have jurisdiction. If a disagreement comes up, we’ll talk it through first. Most things are settled with a phone call.

We may update these terms from time to time. The version that applies to your project is the one in place when you accepted the proposal.