To my photographer friends: I apologize for this very long post. Below is a post from Rob Provencher (wizardoflight/blog-2/). He normally has a link to his posts, but not this time - this article is not on his blog. After being in the photography business for a number of years, I can definitely relate to what he says below. While on informal photo outings with friends, Im sometimes asked why I didnt make a photo of a particular scene. Part of the answer is below, and that is unfortunate. (I have another reason, but maybe Ill share that in a future post.) I just dont need any photos of the scene in front of me, or I dont want to use up disk space on my photo workstation for some photos. And, being in business & processing thousands of photos from paying jobs, I often dont have time to do anything with these non-work photos. E.g., Judy & I were on a photo outing at the Ft. Worth Stockyards years ago, and I still havent touched the photos that I made there (sigh...). I also agree with Robs comment regarding getting feedback on Facebook. I see a lot of photos posted by pro photographers on Facebook, and the feedback I often see is nice, but useless; it may make you feel good, but these comments often do not help you in improving your photography skills for your photography business. There are some really good pro photography forums for this. (But Facebook is still an important marketing tool.) BTW: I enjoy viewing photos of sunsets & flowers from my friends. And I enjoy making them. Finally, a link to Robs blog is above; check it out - it has some good stuff on it. ------------------------------------ Rob Provenchers post: Sigh... How many times do people send me sunset photos. And expect me to revel in the visual beauty that theyve so easily created. Or shots of flowers. All taken by merely pointing their camera and clicking. Someone naively suggested to me that I could take pictures of surfers (Im in Costa Rica right now, at a place where surfing is huge) as I explained how were still able to manage our studio, create blog posts, book sessions and answer queries, all possible thanks to the interweb and Skype.... Ahhh...who doesnt love technology. I replied...naw, theres no money in it. Unless I photograph them just for fun and passion, or to hone my skills for when I need them honed for real money making paid gigs. Oh.. Is all they replied, stymied. Conversation over. Most folks dont get it. Why? Most arent in business. I be a bidness dude. Photography is my business. And theyre aint no money in sunsets, flowers and surfers. As a matter of fact, anything that has inherent visual beauty wont have a load of economic muscle....wedding photos aside. Back when I was in college all of, hmmm, barely one feeble semester, we had one photography submission based project due every Friday. Each with a theme. And we had two rules, break either, instant fail. No sunsets, no flowers. That was it. If I had to adjust that for modern times, I would say: No sunsets, no flowers, no surfers and pretty young girls. Pretty young girls are the new sunsets and flowers. Fairly easy to shoot, and every newbie with a Canon Rebel from Best Buy starts shooting them right away, and even in bad light gets fairly decent results. (so they think) Ask their facebook friends. And their moms. Problem is, getting feedback, even if in the real world where real, paying clients fork over hard earned moolah, getting feedback from facebook and your mom amounts to nothing less than small hill of beans. It means nothing. Youre not a photographer. Youre a dude, or dudette with shiny new toy photographing things that are EASY to photograph. Thats why we couldnt submit sunsets and flowers. And why I always warn newbs: never take business advice from your mom. She loves you too much. I could add never take business advice from your facebook friends either. Wanna impress me? Show me how you created a business model based on your photographic skills. Not the sickly $97.00 session and a thousands files on DVD promotion. But a real, legit business model where over the span of five years you work your butt off, and start making some serious pesos shooting families, babies, children, business portraits, pets,...even some commercial and editorials stuff. Not advanced stuff here folks. Just business. Yours in photography and success, Robert Provencher
Posted on: Fri, 31 Jan 2014 18:44:33 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015